like a never ending song

You should’ve told him to give this a name back then — whatever this thing was between you — because at least then you’d have a name for the feeling searing in your chest just now, as you’re forced to watch Robby flirt with Noelle on the other side of the workstation.

You’re examining the chart glowing from the iPad in your hands, trying hard to ignore the ache in your lower back and the fact that you haven’t eaten since six that morning, when the sound of Robby’s sudden laughter graces your ears — finding you despite the buzzing chatter of the crowded E.R. 

You glance up automatically and find him leaning against the counter, with the sleeves of his undershirt pushed up to his elbows and his stethoscope looped lazily around his neck, towering several inches over Noelle.

“You’re getting less grumpy in your old age, Robinavitch,” the older woman quips beneath a quiet smile and the faint flush coating her caramel-colored cheeks. She arches a manicured brow in his direction, dark eyes glimmering beneath long lashes. “Something been improving your mood lately? Or some-one?”

Your palms go clammy around the tablet in your hand. You never wanted anyone to find out that you were dating your attending, but god, your heart stops beating just to hear your name fall from his lips.

Robby laughs instead, a sharp exhale from his nose. 

“You always think you know everything,” he says with a shake of his head, though you can still hear the smile in his voice when he tells her, “I’m not sure your new boyfriend up in ortho would like you asking about my love life, Hastings…”

“Oh, I stopped seeing him ages ago,” Noelle scoffs. “He kept calling himself an alpha male unironically, and I— couldn’t take it anymore.”

Robby physically recoils. “Jeez… And here I thought your taste in men improved after me.”

Their laughter entwines and lingers in the air for several lingering moments. It’s more familiar than flirtatious, but your stomach twists with a sick feeling anyway. Because Noelle was, to put it simply, everything you weren’t. She was effortlessly gorgeous and carried all that confidence in her matching pant suits and pulled-back curls. She was much closer to Robby’s age, too, and their lengthy history is one you know you couldn’t compete with if you tried.

You feel a little like a child as you watch them talk in hushed voices. You flare with all the embarrassment of one, too, when Robby’s eyes lock suddenly with yours.

You turn away a beat too late, just in time to catch the look that flashes suddenly across his weathered features — as if he’d somehow been caught. You pretend not to notice, or otherwise care, when he dismisses himself from Noelle and closes the distance between you. He towers over you the same way he had with her, smelling like a mixture of his cologne and your bed sheets.

“Hey…” he says, all casual, stuffing his hands into his scrub pockets and nodding to the tablet in your hands. “You get that CBC back on Central Eight?”

“Yep,” you deadpan, still without looking at him. 

He flinches slightly when you shove the chart suddenly at his chest with a less-than-gentle hand. His brows lower in confusion when you turn on your heel and walk away a second later, with considerably more ire than you had that morning. (‘Cause you’d been complaining about some mild insomnia for a while now, so Robby fucked you to sleep the night before. He figured you’d be in a better mood today accordingly. But alas.)

“So I take it you’re not helping with this endoscopy?” he calls after you, pulling his glasses from his shirt pocket for a better view of the screen in his hand.

“Nope,” you call back, already halfway down the hall — not as his resident, but as a woman halfway scorned.

Whitaker’s eyes dart back and forth like he’s watching a tennis match — between you, Robby, and the bloodied head wound he’s watching you stitch up with practiced hands. There’s a heavy tension he can feel simmering in the air, snatching all the remaining oxygen out of the room. Even from where he stands behind you, peering over Trinity’s shoulder, he feels hardly shielded from the building stress.

“Call ortho for a consult for me, will ya?” Robby asks you, or rather politely commands, without looking away from the chart in his hands.

You, similarly, don’t glance up from your sutures as you tell him, “You have a pair of free hands, don’t you, Dr. Robby?”

The man’s eyes dart to you in an instant, peering at you over the top of the glasses sitting low on his broad nose. His dark brown gaze glimmers with a mixture of amusement and shock as a faint smile flickers beneath his beard.

“Excuse me?”

“I’ll do it!” Whitaker blurts, half-strangled by the tension, as he rushes for the red phone across the room. It’s quite telling, the younger boy finds, that he’d rather suffer a call with Park the Shark than watch this lover’s quarrel unfold.

Robby squints as he takes a slow step towards you. His eyes flit from your deadpan face, to your gloved hands, to the balding head of the unconscious patient you stitch up. 

“Have you eaten today?” he wonders aloud.

“Are you gonna ask if I need a nap next to?” you scoff. “I’m not a child.”

“Well, you’re kinda acting like one,” Robby says within a breathless chuckle. “So do you wanna maybe dial the attitude back a notch?”

“Sorry, Dr. Robby,” you say flatly, tying off the final stitch with sharp, methodical movements. “I’ll remember to stroke your ego next time—  Maybe then you won’t accuse me of being a bitch.”

“I wasn’t—”

A laugh sputters suddenly from Santos’ mouth before she can help it. She hides it behind her fist when Robby glares at her and pretends to cough instead.

The tension between the two of you doesn’t snap until around the tenth hour of the shift, when you’re hiding from the chaos of the E.D. with the excuse of fetching more supplies from the walk-in closet. Robby enters like a dark cloud, mixing with your own storm, and threatening to create a most fatal concoction when he corners you against the shelf. (You hadn’t stopped moving for about four straight hours, to be fair — this was his only real chance of getting you alone.)

“What the hell is your problem today?” the older man says in lieu of a greeting.

You huff and roll your eyes, shoving at a pack of saline flushes a little harder than necessary when they threaten to fall from the shelf and on top of you. Robby watches with narrowed eyes and a pair of weathered hands splayed on his hip. 

“Did I do something to you? ‘Cause you’ve been acting crazy all day—”

You slam the cabinet door shut with a resounding clang, so hard it refuses to latch,before spinning on your heels to face the man behind you. The glare you give him almost makes him flinch before he swallows down the instinct to.

“Crazy?” you echo through a tense jaw. “You flirt with Noelle all day, right in front of me, and now you’re calling me crazy?”

Robby blinks owlishly back at you for several long moments. 

You almost think you see a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth beneath his mustache, before a chuckle sputters suddenly from his lips. You flinch at the intensity of his laughter, and at the distant mania glimmering in his dark eyes.

“Oh, my god—”

“Don’t laugh!” you exclaim, face burning under the weight of your embarrassment.

“—That’s what this is about?”

“Yes! It is. Because I thought I was enough for you.”

His weathered features soften with a heavy sigh, though traces of his amusement still remain — equal parts fond and exhausted. 

“Oh, c’mon… You know this wasn’t supposed to be anything serious,” Robby croons gently, taking slow steps towards you. “That was the agreement, right? Casual. So we could avoid all… This.”

You peer up at the man from beneath your lashes when he plants himself in front of you. You try not to melt when you catch a whiff of his dizzying cologne. “This?” you echo.

“Yeah… You know, all the… jealousy and the— arguments,” he huffs with a lazy shrug and crosses his pale arms over his chest. “I’ve been through this before, kid. Trust me. This is… This is what’s best.”

Your chest sears with a mixture of red-hot anger and ice-cold jealousy. Your jaw tightens at how detached he sounds, how rational, as if he were discussing policies instead of real actual feelings. (If he was even capable of those). You want him to feel this, too — this awful, wretched jealousy clawing at your ribs from the inside out. 

You fold your arms tightly across your chest, forcing your voice into a deadpan as hurt simmers somewhere beneath the words. “So I can see whoever I want?” you ask him.

Robby’s expression flickers slightly, almost imperceptibly. His adam’s apple bobs in his throat as he swallows, but his dark gaze never once wavers from yours. 

“Of course, you can,” he tells you, though his taut voice threatens to betray him. “We’re casual. That was the deal.”

“Okay,” you nod once and turn away from him again, giving him very little to play off of as he tries and fails to call your bluff. 

Robby’s forced to stare at the back of you while you pull a large pack of lap pads from the shelf. His brows knit in confusion when you spin back around to face him, mostly back to normal again, with a ghost of a polite smile dancing the edges of your mouth.

“Run these to Trauma 1 for me, will ya? Dr. Al-Hashimi needs ‘em for a trauma patient coming in.”

You press the package to Robby’s chest before he can answer and walk past him for the exit before he can blink.

Three days after the fact, you’re sitting in a crowded bar a block away from the PTMC, drowning your post-shift sorrows in half-priced beers. 

In those three days, you haven’t seen Robby once outside of work. There were no more stolen kisses in empty elevators, no more lingering touches in stairwells, no more “come over” texts sent in the dead of night. And Robby thought it was strange, because the two of you weren’t even fighting anymore — not technically, anyway — and yet you were more distant now than ever.

“Question,” the man murmured casually from the other side of the desk while you finished up your charting at the monitor. “Is it me you’re avoiding or just my apartment?”

“What?” you scoffed, still typing. “I’ve just been— busy, Robby.”

“Hm…” he sighed, less than convinced.

You didn’t spare him a second glance — not then and not when you took Santos’ offer of happy hour and Friday night karaoke. The girl herself returns now to the cracked pleather booth in the corner of the dingy bar, where you sit with Mel and Whitaker, after butchering another Alanis Morrissette song. 

Her chest heaves with panted breaths under her black tank top, pale skin sticky with a thin layer of alcohol-induced sweat.

“Okay, what’s with the long faces over here?” Trinity jokes as she steals a room-temperature fry off your plate, talking through the mouthful. “I know you and Robby are fighting or whatever, but I just gave the performance of a lifetime up there.”

You slurp nosily at the remnants of your fruity drink and nearly choke on it at the accusation. “What?” you cough with the thin straw still in your mouth. “We aren’t— fighting. What are you talking about?”

“Oh, please,” Trinity scoffs and reaches for her beer. “You’re both been acting like a couple of… divorced parents at soccer practice.”

“Okay, I don’t even know what that means—”

“Playing nice in front of everyone as not to evoke suspicion, which inevitably turns the obvious tension between you from angry to sexually charged,” Mel rambles matter-of-factly. Her blonde hair sways around her jaw as she nods, left slightly crimped from her undone braid.

Your eyes flit to Whitaker then, who nods much more solemnly in agreement.

Your face burns red-hot in response. “Well— we’re not even, like, together or anything, so…”

“Mhm…” Santos hums with a knowing look that makes you shift uncomfortably in the booth. She takes another quick swig from the amber bottle in her hand before her gaze zeroes in on an unfortunate Whitaker. “C’mon, Huckleberry. You’re up.”

His light eyes widen, glassy with exhaustion and alcohol alike. “I’m… Up?”

“Yeah. You’re doing karaoke with me. Let’s go,” Trinity says as she slides once more off the weathered vinyl. She frowns when she rises and finds the boy still sitting in place. “Let’s go, I said! We gotta get back in line before the spots fill up—”

Whitaker scrambles to follow the girl towards the stage despite his better judgment. You use that as an excuse to get another drink, tugging the skirt of your dress further down your thighs as you go. You weave through the crowd of strangers and coworkers alike until you reach the sticky wooden counter. 

You lean your elbows against it and flash the bartender a kinda smile. “Can I get another aperol spritz, please?”

“Put that on my tab,” a familiar voice says from beside you.

Your head whips to find Jack sitting there, one chair down and nursing a sweaty amber bottle of cheap beer in his pale hand. He looks more relaxed now than you think you’ve ever seen him — camo pants baggy around his legs, black t-shirt untucked from the belt, warm around the edges from the alcohol.

You feel very suddenly overdressed in your form-fitting velveteen number and cross your arms over your chest to hide beneath the loose cardigan you wear over top of it. “Oh, you don’t have to do that—”

“I insist,” the older man smiles. “You deserve it after that canthotomy you did today. You were a real trooper.”

The bartender slides a cocktail glass across the wooden surface over to you. The orange liquid threatens to slosh over the thin rim. You give him a polite grin in return. “Thank you,” you tell the man, then grow considerably shier when you turn back to the attending sitting a stool down from you. “Thanks, Dr. Abbot.”

“Jack,” the older man corrects before bringing the lip of his bottle back up to his mouth.

“Jack,” you echo softly.

The man shifts on the hard stool, keeping his prosthetic limb stretched slightly ahead of him beneath the bar. A not quite silence settles between you then, filled by the buzzing bar all around you. Your eyes cut to the stage on the far side of the room, where Santos belts the lyrics to “You Oughta Know” and Whitaker stumbles over himself to get the foreign words out. 

“I think Shen is looking for a karaoke partner,” you quip, nodding your head towards the doctor standing by the stage and flipping through the binder of song choices there.

The dim overhead lighting turns Jack’s silver curls a softer golden shade when he turns his head to follow your gaze. He grimaces instantly at the thought. “Yeah, absolutely not.”

“Why?” you laugh softly, with the thin straw dancing against your mouth. “You scared?”

“Yes,” the man answers without a second thought. “And I’ve been shot at before— Today, even— And somehow karaoke still feels more terrifying.”

Your eyes squint in his direction, glittering with something foreign. “That’s a little dramatic, don’t ya think?”

“Eh. Maybe a little.”

You scoff and slide into the bar stool beside him. “You don’t strike me as someone who embarrasses easily, Dr. Abbot.”

“That’s because you only know me at work,” he quips halfway into his beer, before licking the amber sheen from his mouth. “Where I am equal parts competent and mysterious.”

“Mysterious?” you repeat skeptically.

“Mm,” Jack nods with narrowed eyes and a faint smile twitching the corner of his lip. “Very tortured, you know? Very brooding.”

“Ah, yes…” you sigh with alcohol glittering on your lips like gloss. “The very brooding, tortured doctor who makes dinosaur noises to win over scared children in pedes.”

Jack pauses mid-sip, pale eyes narrowing. “Well, this is new…” he hums.

Your stomach flips at the way he’s looking at you. Heat crawls instantly up your neck. You feel very suddenly suffocated by the heavy cardigan on your shoulders. “…What is?”

“I don’t know,” he answers with a lazy shrug, though his heavy eyes dart once down your form and up again. You don’t realize, until then, that this is his first time seeing you in anything other than your dark black scrubs. “You… Flirting with me.”

You exhale a breathy laugh, if only to dispel the anxiety clawing at your chest. “Flirting? Is that what this is?” 

“Hey— You’re the one who called me mysterious.”

“Actually, I was clarifying if you thought you were mysterious.”

“Still counts.”

“Does it?” you squint.

Jack smirks behind the lip of the beer bottle against his mouth. His adam’s apple bobs with a short sip before he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “You know… For a while there, I thought you hated me… Considering you never talked to me unless you had to.”

“You work nights, Jack— I don’t talk to you because I see you for, maybe, twenty minutes out of my day,” you scoff, and don’t realize you’ve called him by his first name until his eyes glimmer with amusement. You turn away with a shake of your head as your face burns, bringing the straw back up to your mouth. “Though, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t consider it…”

“Oh, really?” Jack hums with raised brows. “What’s the verdict now, then, huh?”

You let your gaze drag over him deliberately as you ponder the question, biting at the straw between your teeth. You scan over his toned biceps, his lean stomach caged beneath his form-fitting tee, and his spread thighs that make your head spin, before meeting his eyes once more. 

“Now,” you hum sweetly, “I think I’m starting to understand the appeal…”

Jack stares at you for a long moment before he lets out a low, disbelieving laugh. The lamplight shines in his greying curls as he shakes his head. “Yeah? And how does Robby feel about that?”

Your eyes harden in an instant.

Jack raises a free hand in surrender. “Hey, I’m just sayin’— He looks like he wants to put his fist through a wall any time another attending talks to you for more than thirty seconds.”

Your chest tightens unexpectedly. You swallow hard to fight the strangling feeling — of Robby, and of his laughter in the supply closet — as you shrug a lazy shoulder in response. You don’t bother to lift your cardigan when it slips softly down your arm.

“It’s casual,” you tell him.

Jack studies you for a long moment. The corner of his mouth curls into a slow half-smile, and you feel your heart stuttering behind your ribcage. 

“Casual, huh?” he hums and brings his bottle back up to his mouth. “Interesting…”

Morning arrives slowly through the veiled curtains of the quiet bedroom, where pale golden light cuts softly over hardwood floors and rumpled sheets. You rouse gradually, cocooned beneath strangely heavy blankets that smell differently from your own back home — like unfamiliar detergent, cedarwood, and musky cologne. 

For a blissful wink of a moment, you don’t remember where you are. Not until you stretch your tired limbs and brush a scruffy leg with your foot, anyway.

Your breath catches. Your heavy eyes snap open. Your body prickles with heat as flashes from the night before return to you at once — of the walk home from the bar, of Jack’s laugh against your throat, of his stubble scraping your skin, of the teasing murmur in his velvety voice as he told you to cum for him.

Your thighs clench together at the memory, while a lingering ache pulses pleasantly low in the pit of your stomach.

You lift your head from the pillow and inhale sharply through your nose as your eyes scan the foreign bedroom, which you had been too busy to do the night before. 

There’s an expensive-looking record player in one corner, sat beside a crate of well-loved vinyls. There’s a bookshelf lining the far wall — cluttered with medical textbooks, old paperbacks, and framed photos from his military days. His camo bag, etched with his name, slouches by the entrance, and over the foot of the bed, you can see his prosthetic limb lying beside your shoes.

Other than that, it’s strikingly empty, with very little decoration on the wall or bedside tables. It makes sense, you figure, for a man who is working far more than he isn’t.

Your head turns in the opposite direction to find Jack sleeping soundly just beside you. The gentle rays of morning light brush over the canvas of his bare back, turning his freckles there a deeper shade of golden brown. He’s got one arm shoved beneath the pillow he folds into his cheek and the other lying loose across the mattress — from where your waist must’ve been before you slithered out from underneath it.

Your chest pinches at the sight of him. With pride, maybe, at having conquered him. And with a pang of white-hot guilt that twists when your mind inevitably drifts to Robby.

You slide out of bed, careful not to let the mattress give too much beneath your weight. You grimace when the fabric of your t-shirt twists uncomfortably around your form, only to find that you’re wearing Jack’s shirt, which had seemingly been given to you at some point last night. It falls over your thighs when you stand, bare feet padding as you gather your discarded clothes.

You bend down to drag your underwear back up your thighs and wince when your head throbs from last night’s cheap cocktails. With your dress and knit cardigan balled in your arm, you toe your shoes back on. Your breath hitches when the mattress shifts with a soft creak.

Jack squints when he raises his wild head. His mouth twitches when he finds you at the foot of the mattress. “Y’know…” he rasps, voice rough with sleep. “I’m at least grateful you’re not robbing me before sneaking out. That’s very courteous of you.”

“I’m not sneaking,” you scoff. “I just… didn’t want to wake you.”

The man inhales sharply as he twists onto his back, charcoal sheets tangling around his waist. You force yourself to look away from his lean stomach and the red claw marks you left on his scruffy chest when he stretches his toned arms above his head. 

“That’s sweet,” he says with a wince. “But unfortunately, I wake up if somebody breathes wrong in the next room.”

You exhale a soft laugh. 

Jack’s eyes soften around the edges at the sound of it. “You workin’  today?”

“Yep, in about…” Your eyes flit to the alarm clock on his nightstand. “Half an hour.”

“Brutal,” he scoffs.

“You’re fault.”

“Don’t say that like you didn’t have a good time,” he teases with narrowed eyes, then softens slightly when you turn away. You fumble with the stubborn back of your shoe, and his chest twists at your silence. “Do you… Do you regret it?”

“No,” you answer instantly.

“Good,” he hums, relaxing visibly once more into the sheets. “Me neither.”

Your stomach blooms with warmth. You shift awkwardly on your feet before him, even still. “So, uh… What— What now?”

“Well, feel free to use my shower, if you want—”

“I’m serious, Jack,” you insist gently, then add, more sheepishly. “But I will be using your shower, actually, thank you…”

Jack inhales deeply, considering. “Well,” he starts carefully, “I like you. Obviously.”

Your pulse rushes like a teenage girl.

“But,” he continues, as relief and disappointment tangle in your chest all at once. “I also know that neither of us is in the right spot for a relationship right now…”

“So… Casual?” you offer lightly, mouth lifted in a tired smile.

“Casual,” Jack agrees with a firm nod and glassy eyes.

You wear the night before all over, despite your desperate attempts to hide it.

Robby notices it the moment he sees you — how relaxed you are, how happy you seem to be. Whatever had been plaguing you before is now long gone, and that alone should be enough to comfort him. But still, he can’t shake the feeling that someone had gotten rid of all the aching for you — fucked it out of you the way only he could.

“You’re in a good mood today,” he observes while signing off on the chart you’d given him.

“Am I?” you hum.

“Yeah,” he nods, clicking his pen with his thumb. He glances at you over the top of his glasses before averting his gaze once more. “What’d you get up to last night, huh?”

“Nothing,” you shrug. “Other than watching Santos butcher Alanis Morrissette’s discography at karaoke… Maybe I just slept well.”

“You usually only do that at my place.”

Your brows furrow when he passes the clipboard back to you. “I’m sorry— Are you accusing me of something, Dr. Robby?”

His mouth opens to respond — to tell you that he can smell the foreign body wash on your skin, far muskier than the delicate sweet-vanilla he’s used to. But the automatic doors across the station swish open and shut before he can. 

Jack enters with his camo pack slung over his shoulder and brings a cool evening breeze in with him. Robby can’t help but notice how your eyes find each other’s almost instantly, clicking like magnets and lingering together like there’s a secret that only the two of you know about. His stomach swirls with jealousy.

“Look alive, degenerates,” Jack announces in lieu of a greeting, then quiets slightly when he reaches your side. “What’d I miss?”

“I was just briefing Robby on last night at karaoke,” you answer with a polite smile. “And how I will never be able to listen to Alanis Morissette after Santos’ crimes last night—”

“Fuuuck you,” Trinity drags out from the desk beside you, still sluggish from the long day and the hangover that won’t seem to leave her.

“Don’t drag me into this,” Jack quips. “I took an oath as a physician to do no harm.”

You exhale a quiet laugh. The man’s eyes soften around the edges, as though pleased at having earned the sound, before walking off towards the locker room. He leaves a trail of musky cedarwood as he goes, and Robby’s heart drops when he finally places the scent — the one he’s been smelling on you all day. 

The realization hit him like a truck.

His expression darkens instantly when he turns back to you.

“Supply closet,” he mutters lowly as he walks past you. “Now.”

Your stomach drops at his tone. He takes all the remaining breath from your lungs with him as he goes. Your chest stings accordingly — with a surge of pride at his jealousy, and with a pang of distant regret at his hurt. You follow behind him down the long hallway to the supply closet like a scolded child. He barely waits for the door to click shut behind him before rounding on you.

“You slept with him?” he shouts, eyes wide and wild.

You cross your arms tight over your chest, with your head tilted inquisitively to your shoulder. “Aren’t you the one who said I could see whoever I want?”

“Yeah, I meant random assholes at the bar,” he snaps. “Not my best fucking friend!”

An incredulous laugh sputters from your lips. “Oh, so now we have rules? What happened to just being casual, huh? If you can flirt with your coworkers, why can’t I?”

Robby’s dark eyes narrow as he takes a slow step towards you. You catch a faint upward flicker of his mouth as he asks, “So that’s why you did it, huh? You just wanted to piss me off?”

Your anger spikes instantly. You feel it prickling red-hot beneath your scrubs. Because he’s an arrogant asshole, maybe, or maybe because a distant part of you knows that he’s right.

“No, actually,” you tell him anyway. “Because not everything’s about you, Robby. I did it because Jack wanted me. Because he didn’t treat me like I was just another one of his dirty secrets—”

“Yeah, alright,” Robby scoffs a breathy laugh and turns away, running a pale hand through his chopped brown hair.

“Because being with him made me feel good—”

“I said alright!” 

“Aw, what’s wrong, Robby?” you coo, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Does it bother you that somebody else wanted me?”

Robby exhales another one of his stupid laughs.

Your chest swells with a burning feeling that makes you feel like crying. “Why is it so hard to admit that you care about me?”

“I care about you! Of course, I fucking care about you!” he exclaims, red in the face. “Because I’ve spent months trying not to screw this up.”

“Oh, please,” you roll your eyes. “Says the man who practically shoved me into someone else’s bed.”

“Oh, don’t do that,” Robby squints.

“Do what?”

“Act like this is what I wanted—”

The words die in his throat when the silver knob to the closet door clicks suddenly behind him. The hinges open with a quiet squeak a second later. Your heads whip in sync to find Santos in the threshold, rubbing at her tired eyes as she steps into the room. She doesn’t realize the two of you are in there until the door shuts behind her again. 

Her wide eyes dart back and forth between the two of you for a moment. “…Why does it feel like I just walked into a hostage situation?” she quips in a monotone.

“Now you know how I felt last night,” you joke back weakly.

She flips you off and walks further inside. Neither of you says a word as she retrieves a case of saline flushes and four-by-fours from the shelves. The plastic crinkles loudly in the silence. 

“Please. Feel free to continue,” Santos deadpans as she leaves. “I definitely won’t be listening with my ear pressed against the door.”

The entrance shuts behind her with a dull click that sounds much louder in the quiet. You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding as Robby pinches his nose between his thumb and forefinger. When he lifts his head against, his eyes zero in on you. 

“We’ll finish this when we get home,” he tells you, firmly.

“Can’t tonight,” you shrug, lying through your teeth. “I have plans.”

“Yeah, not anymore, you don’t.”

Your stomach does a back flip at his words, at his very sudden act of dominance that makes you feel like melting into a puddle at his feet. And judging by the newfound glint in Robby’s dark eyes, he notices it, too.

You couldn’t hide from him if you tried.

Your polite smile widens a little at the nickname. “You paged?”

“We’ve got a three-year-old girl. Suspected meningitis,” Robby briefs in a monotone, each word coated in a thick layer of fatigue. “High fever, lethargy, neck stiffness— labs are ugly, too.”

Your features soften instantly. “Oh, poor baby…”

Your eyes dart to the window. You catch only a sliver of the family through the edge of the curtain — young parents, likely in their early twenties, faking teary smiles for their sick baby, who sits in a too-big bed in a too-big hospital gown patterned with so many cartoon puppies.

“Parents are freaking out, obviously,” Jack adds gently, never once taking his eyes off of you. “We thought you could walk them through the admission process before we take her upstairs.” 

“Of course,” you nod, with a voice as gentle as you look.

Jack passes the clipboard over to you and allows his calloused fingers to brush your softer ones for a beat longer than probably necessary. Though if you notice it, you make no mention of it as you flip through the thin pages and follow behind Robby into the dim room. 

The chaos outside muffles when the door clicks shut behind you. 

A young mother — Nia, the form tells you — sits in a chair beside the bed with a wadded tissue clutched in her trembling hands. Her husband, Malcolm, sits on the edge of the hospital bed, wearing the long day all over, as his daughter curls lazily into his side. Ruby Turner is clammy with fever; her round eyes are heavy with it, too. And beneath her chubby arm, is a stuffed animal wearing a lab coat and a stethoscope around its long neck.

“Hi, there…” you greet in a gentle lilt, crouching beside the bed until you’re eye level with the toddler, who eyes your warm smile with a weary suspicion. “I have to say, that is a very serious giraffe you’ve got there, Miss Ruby.”

The girl blinks back at you with sleep-weary eyes; the same dark brown as her mother’s. “Pickles,” is all she can make out through her hoarse throat. The words came out like dry gravel, which rattles harshly in her chest when she coughs hard a second later.

Her dad pats her gently on the back with a wide hand and flashes you a tired smile. “She named him Pickles,” he clarifies.

“Pickles?” you gasp. “I had a dog named Pickles when I was growing up— He looked a little like that one there.”

You motion to the shaggy white dog on her hospital gown. The girl tilts her curly head down and begins pointing at each puppy herself, aptly naming each of them Pickles. It’s the first time the child has been moderately alert, or otherwise has been willing to engage, since she arrived some hours ago. Watching you work feels a little like watching a magic trick.

“Sorry. Hi. I should probably introduce myself,” you laugh warmly and rise to full height again, shaking both of the parents’ hands. “I’m one of the pediatric caseworkers upstairs— My job is basically helping families know what’s happening next. You know, all the boring insurance details, and making sure you guys aren’t going through things alone.”

The mother nods, wiping her nose with the crumbled tissue in her fist. “So what happens now?” she asks, voice teary and trembling.

You nod with a polite smile. “Yeah, so the pediatric unit is gonna start preparing a room for her upstairs, so our doctors can give her the full evaluation she needs— They’ll probably monitor her over the next few nights, too, just to make sure everything’s okay. And you’ll be able to go with her once transport comes, of course, we’ll just need to get everything squared away with insurance while she’s getting tested.”

“So she’s gonna be okay?” the father presses, half-strangled.

You never lie to families. Not ever. It was, as you saw it, the golden rule in any hospital. Jack noticed that about you, too — because he couldn’t help but notice everything about you. But he saw how hopeful you were without ever being dishonest, without ever making promises you knew you could not keep.

“She’s exactly where she needs to be,” you answer carefully. “And she has the best doctors I know taking care of her now. You guys made a great decision by bringing her when you did.”

The mother beside you sniffles. Her exhale leaves her mouth in a quiet sob, which she buries behind her hands before her daughter can see her crying. It’s not quite sad — certainly not as much as it had been earlier that day — but rather it’s a cry of distant relief; the first time all day she hasn’t felt like the worst mother on the planet.

Robby exhales quietly through his mouth behind you — scruffy cheeks puffing, obviously eager to leave. Jack, however, just keeps on staring at you, as you turn back toward the little girl with your voice now lowered in a feigned sort of seriousness.

“Now, Miss Ruby, I’m gonna need your professional opinion on this, okay?”

The girl blinks slowly back at you.

“…Do you think Mr. Pickles needs his own hospital bracelet, too?”

Jack sees the young girl laugh for the first time all day when you’re helping her wrap a plastic arm band around the giraffe’s stuffed leg. It’s basically your superpower, the way you make all the terrifying things feel halfway manageable. By the time you’re stepping back out into the hallway, with Jack and Robby at your side, the family is a little bit steadier than they were before you arrived.

Jack eyes you up and down for a moment, before leaning in to nudge your shoulder with his broader one. Your soft sweater grazes his bare arm, and he gets a faint whiff of your pretty perfume before he leans away again.

“When did you get so good at that, huh?”

Your head whips to the side. You blink like an owl up at him “…At talking?”

“Sure, yeah,” he laughs. “At talking people off the ledge.”

“Oh.” You bounce a shoulder in a lazy shrug, then reach to pull the neck of your sweater back up again when it slips off your collarbone. “I don’t know, I just… try not to sound like a hospital brochure, I guess.”

“Hear that, brother?” Jack quips, reaching behind you to clap Robby on the shoulder. “Try not to sound like a hospital brochure next time, yeah?”

The older man says nothing. He just lifts his hand and scratches at his temple with his middle finger, discreetly flipping him off.

You laugh under your breath and head back towards the elevator, pretty skirt swishing around your ankles. “Try not to traumatize anyone while I’m gone, alright?”

“Can’t make promises like that down here, Sunshine,” Robby calls back. “You know that.”

“Yeah, I’m starting to think we should just keep you down here permanently,” Jack says with a lazy shrug. His freckled biceps flex slightly when he crosses them over his broad chest, swaying back and forth on his feet. “You know, just— bring you into every room before the doctors go in. We’ll call you the Emotional Support Coordinator.”

“Oh, would you?” you scoff a faint laugh and hit the button for the upper floor. 

The doors part with a soft ding a second later. You step in through the threshold and turn to face him once more, giving him a much better view of the smile on your face.

“I mean, it’d certainly make me feel better,” he jokes.

“Well, you’re not the patient, Dr. Abbot,” you retort with a devilish grin. “I’m pretty sure you’ve got a few more years before your geriatric assessment, right?”

“A few,” he echoes sarcastically, light eyes squinted. “My opinion still counts, though.”

You shake your head at him despite the soft grin still dancing on the edges of your mouth. “You’re funny, Dr. Abbot,” is all you say, as you press the panel on the inside of the lift. The doors whir when they slide shut; your grin remains visible between them until hatch closes just ahead of you.

Jack drops his head with a chest-deflating huff when you’re gone.

Robby tries and fails to choke back his laughter. 

“You are officially 0 for 6, brother,” the man jokes. He claps Jack on the shoulder, hard, as his dark eyes squint under the weight of his smiling. “It’s honestly getting a little painful now.”

Jack turns to flash him a deadpanned look. “Shouldn’t you be clocking out now?” he wonders in a monotone.

“Not anymore,” Robby scoffs. “It’s just starting to get fun.”

The pediatric floor was quieter in the mornings, you found, after switching to the day shift some weeks back. It was never truly silent, exactly, but it was still a little bit softer, as the panic from the overnight patients faded into a calmer sort of quiet. 

Cartoon reruns play quietly behind closed doors, while lively children’s music can be heard from further in the main area, down the hall to your right. A softer set of lullabies, meanwhile, plays more distantly from the nursery behind the double doors to your left. And, somewhere within the soft sanctuary of it all, a wailing baby is fighting a losing battle against taking their liquid medicine.

It’s all confetti to you, really, from where you sit behind the reception desk with three different charts open on the monitors ahead of you. 

There’s a highlighter in your hand, a pen behind your ear, a paper cup of cooling coffee between your teeth, and approximately fourteen unfinished tasks glaring at you from the computer screen. 

You have not yet properly woken up — the same way the sun has not quite yet risen over the horizon. Your hair has been haphazardly dealt with, for one. Your cherry-colored sweater is bunched awkwardly at your waist, for another, while the white button-up you wear beneath it sticks out over top of your plaid-patterned bottoms. You vaguely noticed that your socks were mismatched when you slid into your scarlet flats, but were much too tired to bring yourself to care.

You don’t even flinch when the phone rings beside you. You reach for it with your free hand without looking, missing twice before finally plucking the plastic from the hook.

“PTMC—” You falter when you realize you still have the paper cup between your teeth. You scramble to set it back on the desk with the hand not holding the phone. You clear your throat and try again. “PTMC Pediatrics— How can I help you?”

“Morning, Sunshine.” 

Jack’s low voice crackles from the other line. You can practically picture him downstairs in the E.D. just now — leaning against the workstation with a computer glowing before him; with his messy silver curls, and his tired blue-green eyes, and that stupidly handsome half-smile he gets every time he talks to you.

You’re smiling at the thought alone before you even realize it. 

“Dr. Abbot?” you answer. “Do you need something? What didn’t you just page me—”

“Weren’t you the one who said I can call just to say hi before you switched to the dark side?”

(The day shift, he means.)

You scoff quietly and lean back in your swivel chair. “Well, I guess, that is preferable to getting paged about sick babies, so… I’ll take it.”

“Wow…” Jack croons drily. “You always say the sweetest things to me, you know that?”

“Well, what can I say? I’m very charming before seven A.M.”

“I think you’re very charming all the time, Sunshine.”

You falter for a brief moment, unable to tell if he’s flirting with you or if he’s just being nice and you’re the weirdo for thinking otherwise. So you shake the thought from your head and change the subject entirely.

“You sound tired, old man— Isn’t it almost bedtime for you?”

“Almost…” His sigh crackles through the faint static of the landline. “But unfortunately, there’s this case manager upstairs who won’t stop distracting me…”

You exhale a frustrated huff, utterly oblivious as you begin to gossip with him under your breath. “Is Hastings bothering you, too? Because she’s been hounding me about clearing beds up here since I came in an hour ago.”

There’s a long beat of silence on the other line, filled by the sound of distant chatter from the E.D.

“…I’m talking about you, Sunshine,” Jack clarifies.

“Oh…” you trail off, face burning hot. Your brain scrambles further when the light starts flashing on your desk, another call waiting. “That’s, uh— Sorry. There’s— There’s just someone on the other line.”

“Oh.”

You tuck the phone between your shoulder and cheek, fingers whizzing across the keyboard as you type with practiced (only now slightly anxious) hands. “So if you wanna have a conversation, you’re gonna have to trek all the way up to pedes, unfortunately.”

“Damn…”

“Yep…” you hum absentmindedly. “It’s a real difficult journey. Very treacherous elevator ride.”

“Well, you’re making a pret-ty compelling argument here, Sunshine.”

“Goodbye, Jack,” you lilt with a big dumb grin on your face, that you hope isn’t as audible in your voice.

“See you soon, Sunshine.”

You think nothing of his words when you decline his call and take another. You hardly expect to see him now, not when he’s still wrapping up the long night and briefing the day shift that’s trickling slowly in downstairs. He’s about half an hour shy of going home and collapsing face-first into his mattress — and you’re hardly special enough to lose sleep over.

Jack, however, respectfully disagrees. 

And so does Dana, who saunters into the workstation to start her morning, only to find the man hanging up the desk phone with a lazy grin hinting at the edges of his mouth. 

“What’s that look for, huh?” she croons in place of a greeting, shrugging off the jean jacket she arrived in and spreading it on the back of her chair before her.

Jack looks up from where he’s shoving the phone back into its cradle. “What look?” he scoffs. “I don’t have a look.”

“Oh, you most certainly have a look,” she argues.

“I have a face, Dana.”

“Uh-huh,” the older woman deadpans, half-distracted, as she logs into the monitor ahead of her, with her glasses sitting low on her nose. “And right now, that face looks like you’re the main character at the climax of a Nora Ephron movie.”

“…What’s a Nora Ephron?” Jack wonders with furrowed brows.

The corner of Dana’s mouth lifts in a crooked half-smile as she peers at him over the top of her clear frames. “Go ask Little Miss Sunshine about it. She’ll tell ya.”

Jack’s light eyes narrow in a smug sort of look as he strolls slowly past her. “Thanks for giving me an excuse to go up there, Evans,” he quips. 

“Oh, please,” she scoffs. “You were already on your way.”

There’s a newfound skip in his step, along with a faint limp in his prosthetic from the long shift, as he makes the elevator ride up to the pediatric floor — where he’s greeted instantly by soothing lullabies, children’s laughter, and reruns of old cartoons.

He’s swaddled instantly by the dim lighting and the soft warmth — both of which are rare to find in the cold, sterile chaos of the unrelenting E.D. just a few floors down. It’s like entering a whole new world when he steps out of the elevator.

Jack hears your voice, distant at first, but growing louder the further he treks down the hall. “No, I understand the policy, sir. You don’t have to explain it to me again—”

You exhale an annoyed sigh when the man on the other line prattles on, anyway, talking in a slow monotone as if you hadn’t understood him the first time. Despite your irritation, you perk instantly when Jack enters your vision, still in his black scrubs from the night shift, with a new exhaustion etched across his scruffy face.

He greets you with a tight-lipped smile anyway.

Your chest swells with a funny feeling accordingly.

“Sorry,” you mouth apologetically. “Just— one second.”

Jack waves a hand in your direction. “You’re fine,” he mumbles and turns away, idling awkwardly some feet away with his hands in his pockets, pretending not to hover. He marvels at the paintings on the walls, vivid scribbles from children of all ages, as he shifts on his weight — trying to relieve the distant pressure in his artificial limb.

You return to your phone call some feet behind him: “Yes, I get that. But this is a six-year-old going through extensive leukemia treatment— Delaying authorization for inpatient care would—”

You grumble an annoyed breath and drop your head into your hand when the man on the other line speaks over you once more. Jack glances over his shoulder at you, features softening instantly.

“—No, why should his parents waste their time fighting insurance, which should already be in place, by the way, when they could be spending it with their son? How is that fair?” you continue, obviously angry, but still so soft in your way. There’s a few seconds of silence as the person on the other line responds. You nod wordlessly to yourself at whatever they’re saying. “Yes, I will absolutely call back when your supervisor comes in— and every day until this is handled. Alright? Great. Bye…”

You set the telephone back on the hook with a huff.

“…Asshole,” you grumble around your breath, then get all sheepish again when your eyes find Jack’s. You cower under his softened stare. “Sorry… This insurance company’s trying to deny extended coverage for one of our oncology kids— because apparently compassion is illegal now, so…”

Jack musters a weak smile as he closes the distance between you. “I’m sure it’ll all work out.”

“Hopefully…” you sigh, a little embarrassed now, as you shrink further in your swivel chair. “So, uh... H-How was your shift?”

“Better now,” the older man croons, folding his arms along the countertop ahead of you, and leaning in until you can smell the cologne lingering on his skin — a mixture of leather and sandalwood.

“You’re such a suck-up, Dr. Abbot,” you say with squinted eyes.

His face twists into a look of faux-offense. “Well, that’s not a very nice thing to say to someone trying to invite you out for lunch, now is it?”

You brighten instantly. “Wait, really? That sounds so fun! Are Shen and Ellis coming, too— I haven’t seen them in ages!”

Jack’s smile falters slightly at the edges. “Well… Well, no, ‘cause I.. I thought, you know, it’d be just us. You know, you and me. Like a date.”

You blink owlishly back at him. “Oh…”

“Unless— Unless you don’t want to—” Jack stammers, quickly losing his ground.

“Of course I want to!” you blurt, a little louder and a far quicker than you mean to. “I just… I didn’t— I didn’t realize that you, you know, that you… liked me.”

His brows lower in confusion because, to him, it couldn’t have been more obvious that he was into you. He’d spent months tripping over himself to get your attention, including the time he ran into a crash cart ‘cause he was too busy staring at you to notice that it was in his way.

A chuckle sputters suddenly from his mouth accordingly. “I’ve been flirting with you for weeks! I mean, I’ve been calling up here just to talk to you since you changed shifts!”

“I thought you just liked bothering me!” you giggle in return, face burning hot.

“Yeah, well,” Jack tilts his silver head. “I do like bothering you, actually.”

“I like when you bother me, too…” you murmur sheepishly, struggling to meet the man’s unwavering stare as you swivel anxiously back and forth in your chair. You catch yourself smiling wider than you realize when you tell him, “And lunch sounds great, by the way.”

“Great…” Jack exhales a breath he didn’t know that he was holding, that he feels like he’s been holding in for weeks now. “‘Cause Robby’s kinda been threatening to ask you out for me if I didn’t do it myself, so… Happy to save myself the embarrassment.”

Your eyes widen with a girlish sort of horror. “Wait— Robby knew?”

“Sunshine,” Jack grins. “I’m pretty sure the entire hospital knew.”

“How about you don’t tell anyone, and you do the driving?” you propositioned, flashing the man a faux-innocent look from over the top of the rim as you brought the cup to your mouth. The fresh brew singed the tip of your tongue a bit, just enough to jerk your exhausted mind awake.

“Fine…” Jack caved with a slow huff; his first good breath all day. His following words came out slightly muffled as he leaned forward to press a fleeting kiss to your temple before walking on by you. “How much we got left on our sentence, huh? An hour? Two?”

“Sixty-four minutes, but… Who’s counting?”

“Well, that’s plenty of time for something fun to happen.” Jack turned in the doorway to flash you a knowing grin that you met with a tired scowl.

“Don’t jinx it,” you called to his retreating figure.

You’ve given enough of yourself for one night, you think; and after a rather urgent thoracotomy that nearly killed both the patient and you (though mostly in the metaphorical sense), you feel like you’re owed the small break. Now that the day shift is trickling slowly in, you’ve decided to stay hidden until somebody absolutely needs you.

You sink deeper and deeper into the plastic chair, willing yourself into invisibility, until a baby’s cry shatters the sacred quiet. 

The high-pitched whine cuts through everything — your heavy exhaustion, your simmering headache, and the steady hum of the emergency department you’ve learned to tune out over the years. You drag yourself from your seat with a distant groan in the pit of your throat, ‘cause you know you won’t be able to relax until you know someone else has got it handled. 

You trudge to the door and take a peek down the hallway, if only to say that you did, and find the long corridor bustling with an energy much livelier than you are. When the crowd parts, you spot Dana walking your way with something tiny swaddled in her arms — much too small to be as loud as it is now.

Her eyes light up at the sight of you.

“Dr. Abbot— Just the person I was looking for!” the older woman croons in her usual gritty monotone, with a knowing smile sitting crooked on her mouth. “We got a baby Jane Doe, ditched in the bathroom.”

Your features crumple under the weight of your exhaustion. Your head tips back to groan a long and theatrical, “No…” though your sneakers scuff the floor as you trudge her way despite yourself. “I only have one hour left on my shift— Please don’t make me do anything else.”

“Well, I also got a central line placement in Central 13,” Dana deadpans. “You know, if you’d rather not waste time takin’ care of this perfectly nice baby.”

The swaddled thing fusses when it’s shifted in her hold. Your eyes flit from its scrunched face, round and wet with tears, to the wise look in Dana’s eyes. She grins at your obvious hesitation.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

You sigh and step forward, like a martyr to the gallows. You trade the clipboard in your hand for the baby in Dana’s. She sets the thing gingerly in your hold — a warm and delicate weight between your arms, fitting just perfectly against your chest.

You had done a rotation in pediatrics before you settled on emergency medicine some years back. You know what it means to take care of a baby in the most technical sense, though none of it ever seemed to come totally naturally to you. 

You move like a robot accordingly, all tense and methodical. The whining baby settles into your hold with a gentle coo anyway, like a switch suddenly flipped.

“Well, look at that,” Dana hums with an arched brow of amusement. “You’re a natural.”

“You’re evil,” you deadpan.

“So they say,” the woman quips drily, patting you on the shoulder with a warm hand. “C’mon. Show my shadow how to do a proper pedes check-up— Dr. Abbot’s not as mean as she looks, Miss Emma, I promise.”

You flash the young, fresh-faced nurse a polite smile that doesn’t quite meet your eyes before leading her towards the pediatric unit across the way. She’s made of bright smiles, braided chestnut curls, and sunshine incarnate as she scurries just behind you. She’s got a sparkling look in her dark eyes that you’re pretty sure you lost somewhere around your first week of residency.

You pass the workstation with a sort of tunnel vision zeroed in on the vibrantly painted pedes room. You nearly miss Jack standing there, leaning over the desk with his arms folded and his biceps straining against his scrub sleeves.

The silver-haired man briefs a newly arrived Robby on the morning cases and pauses at the sight of you — his whole entire life, cradling a much smaller one in her arms, with an exhausted frown on your face that you don’t bother trying to hide.

Robby traces the man’s suddenly distracted gaze over his shoulder. His brown eyes follow your form, lighting up at the sight of you the same way Jack’s do. 

“Well…” the older man croons. “Would you look at that—”

“Don’t,” you cut in sharply, and don’t bother slowing your stride as you pass them.

Jack’s quiet laughter follows you across the room. His eyes do, too, as he drinks up every ounce of you and the tiny thing swaddled in your arms. He finds himself getting drunk on a craving he didn’t know he had until that very moment.

Robby’s dark eyes squint. “Why do I have a feeling that you’re mentally siphoning through a bunch of baby names right now?”

“I always liked the name Milo for a boy. And Iris for a girl— but the missus is pretty allergic to pollen, so I’m not sure she’d go for that,” Jack answers without missing a beat, as though the thought had haunted his head at least once before. He only turns to face Robby again once you’re out of view. “What do you think?”

Robby just scoffs out a laugh.  “I think you’re screwed, brother.”

Baby Jane Doe is mostly stable, all things considered. 

Physically, she’s perfect. She had obviously spent the bulk of her little life being properly cared for. And, if you had to guess, she spent most of the time being held — if her immediate protest at being left in the warmer had anything to say about it. Her breathy whines fill the otherwise silent room as you perform a routine evaluation with practiced hands. You pay little attention to her annoyed cries and slip into teaching mode despite your palpable fatigue.

Emma hovers just behind you, with empathy glittering in her dark doe eyes. “Gosh,” she sighs. “How sad…”

“Eh,” you hum with a lazy shrug. Your gloved fingers lift the hem of her tiny white t-shirt to check for any bruising on her soft, pale skin, or for any other markers that might indicate signs of infection. You ramble on, half-distracted, “If you think about it, this baby got pretty lucky— If it really was abandoned, I mean. Better to be left here than with a family that can’t love it properly, right?”

Emma’s eyes widen at your cynicism. She can’t shake the feeling that you’re speaking from experience as she swallows hard and nods once in response. “Right…” 

The door swings open across the room. The noise of the E.D. swells for a brief moment, before muffling when it clicks shut again a second later. Robby steps in first, with Jack following close behind. The former stands on the opposite side of the warmer and keeps his suddenly softened gaze on the cooing baby before him.

Jack migrates to your side the same way he always does — never as close as he’d like to be while on the clock, but never more than a few inches away from you when he can be. 

“What are we thinkin’ here, Doc?” he asks.

“Normal pulse. Normal BP,” you rattle off with an air of indifference. “She’s well-hydrated, too. No visible sign of infection, either — though I guess we can’t rule out a benign virus just yet.”

“Do you think she qualifies for Safe Haven?” Emma wonders from Robby’s side.

You shake your head, lips softly jutted. “No. Either this baby is gigantic, or it’s well past the twenty-eight-day mark for Safe Haven. Worse-case scenario at this point is obviously abandonment. She’ll likely be put in foster care after a full evaluation.”

The young girl’s face falls slightly.

You soften despite yourself.

“But,” you add, if only to make her feel a bit better. “Past experience tells me that her parents might’ve just needed a break. Maybe they— I don’t know— stepped out for a cigarette or something. God knows, I’d need one if I had to take care of an alarm clock twenty-four-seven.”

Robby scoffs a weak laugh and shakes his head. “I’ll get Lupe to make an announcement in Chairs. See if anyone’s looking for her— If you’ll excuse me,” he nods with a polite smile down at the squirming baby below before sauntering out of the room.

The baby jerks when the noise of the crowded E.R fills the room again, startled by Dana’s yelling, who seems to be telling off a rowdy patient down the way. Her wet eyes squeeze shut as her gummy mouth opens to bellow a tiny wail. You reach out to comfort the baby, if only to hear less of the thing, with a methodical palm placed against its frail chest. 

It whines for a moment before softening with a contented sigh.

“Look at that… You’re good with her,” Jack mumbles, taking a step closer to peer over your shoulder — until you can smell the coffee on his breath and the musky cologne lingering on his skin. A small smile lifts the corner of his mouth as he watches you with glittering eyes. “Told ya you should’ve gone into pedes.”

You flash him an emotionless scowl. “Don’t patronize me,” you scold.

“Have you guys ever thought about having kids?” Emma wonders with a kind smile, having assumed your marital status from your matching last names and golden wedding bands. She cowers instinctively when your eyes turn to her in sync, fearful she might’ve said the wrong thing. “Or is that super rude to ask? I’m sorry—”

“No, it’s not rude at all,” Jack assures her, reaching to wrap his hands around either end of the stethoscope around his neck. It makes his freckled biceps strain against the black sleeves of his scrubs as his silver head swivels slowly to look at you. Something mischievous swims in his blue-green eyes as he lilts, “We’re just… going with the flow. Right, Dr. Abbot?”

You meet his tightlipped grin with a deadpanned look. The two of you agreed long ago that, while neither of you is totally opposed to having children, you’d also be perfectly happy living a completely childfree life. 

But instead of getting into all of that with less than an hour left on your grueling shift — in front of the newest addition to the nursing team, no less — you just nod with an artificial smile.

“Right. Yeah,” you say, already inching back towards the door. The baby starts to cry again a second later, in a series of revving whines that lead to a sharp shriek. You flash an apologetic grimace over your shoulder from your place in the doorway. “You guys have fun with… all that.”

You spend the next half hour finishing up your already-completed charting. You reword, backspace, and click occasionally at your mouse — pretending to work to keep from being bothered, though it isn’t quite as foolproof as you would’ve liked. Whitaker rushes your way with one of his interns in tow, sporting a worried sort of glint in his wide puppy dog eyes that he only gets when something’s going wrong.

“Hey… Dr. Abbot. Are you— Are you busy at the moment?”

“Nope,” you answer in a monotone, without looking up from the bright-white computer screen ahead of you. “And I’d very much like to keep it that way.”

“Well, uh…” Whitaker falters, shifting awkwardly on the other side of the desk. “We— We kinda need you. In pedes.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Baby Jane Doe hasn’t stopped crying since you left,” the woman behind him says, standing several inches shorter than the boy and sporting a heavy pair of glasses and a glittering silver septum in her nose.

Your eyes dart toward the stranger — Joy Kwon, MS3, the badge on her chest reads.

“That was, like, twenty minutes ago,” you say with an incredulous twist to your features.

“Exactly,” she deadpans.

You huff and lead the duo the short distance back to the pediatric unit. The crying hits you before you’ve even crossed the threshold — a sharp, unrelenting wail that adds to the headache you’ve been nursing all day. 

You find a lanky, blonde-haired man who eerily resembles Whitaker in the vibrantly painted room, though his badge reads James Ogilvie, MS4. The young med student flashes you a wide-eyed look of horror, holding the writhing baby in a visibly awkward hold.

“Please help me,” he pleads.

You don’t bother trying to hide your apathy as you trudge across the room to close the distance between you. You slip the tiny baby back into your hold, where it settles almost instantly, heavying against your chest with another breathy whine. You rock it gingerly in your arms the way you were taught to. Its wet eyes flutter slowly shut as fat tear drops trail down its reddened cheeks.

Whitaker gestures with a dazed smile. “See? Knew it. Total natural.”

You flash the boy a deadpanned look over your shoulder. “Because I’m a woman? That means I’m automatically a natural-born caretaker?”

His light eyes widen with an immediate panic. Joy tries and fails to hide her amused smile as she purses her lips to the side of her mouth. Whitaker, meanwhile, stumbles over himself to get the words out.

“W-What? No! No, not at all! I just—”

“She’s just messing with you, kid.” 

Jack’s voice drifts in as he steps through the door, saving the boy from his own stuttered-out apology. He’s perhaps the only one in Pittsburgh who can decipher your usual monotone from your humorous one, which he was only able to master after years of loving you. 

“Oh…” Whitaker says, deflating with a relieved sigh, though his pink cheeks are slow to lose their newfound color.

“Go check on Mr. Alvarez for me, will ya?” you tell him, jutting your chin back towards the door. “You know, since I have to take care of… this thing.”

Whitaker leaves and takes his interns with him, who trail after him in line like ducklings. They pass by Jack in the doorway, who peers at you over their heads with a pair of wide eyes. 

 “This thing?” he scoffs.

You bounce a shoulder in a lazy shrug. “I’m not getting attached to it.”

“It?!”

You huff and adjust the baby in your arms, with one hand resting on its diapered bottom and your other rubbing gently over its tiny back. You sway gently back and forth, far too sweetly for the following words out of your mouth.

“The entire reason I got into emergency medicine was so I could help people without having to deal with all the— baggage that comes with him.”

“Well, babies don’t have baggage, honey,” Jack laughs as he strolls slowly towards you. “They’re brand new— that’s literally their whole thing.”

“Yeah. That’s because the parents give it to ‘em through… years of psychological torment.”

Jack studies you for a long moment with a pair of squinted eyes. “I think you might be projecting a little bit here…”

“I know I am,” you scoff. “Which is why I’d be a horrible mother. ‘Cause I’d just be a mirror of my mom, and our kid would just be a mirror of me, and it’ll just be a whole cycle of… emotionless, unaffectionate women...”

You trail off with a heavy sigh, lifting your gaze from the calming baby to the man towering over you. You find him wearing a much softer gaze than you expect him to. He tilts his silver head to his shoulder, eyes narrowing and lips curling slowly.

“Our kid?”

Your eyes flick away and back again. “…What?”

“You said our kid,” Jack clarifies with a wider grin.

You roll your eyes at him despite the way your cheeks blaze beneath his unwavering stare. “Well, we are married, you know? Who the hell else would I be having kids with— Robby?”

“God, I hope not— Poor kid,” Jack quips drily before leaning in to press a soft, fleeting kiss to your temple. His silver scruff brushes our delicate skin when he pulls away, far sooner than you would’ve liked. “And, just for the record, I think you’d be an amazing mom.”

Something warm flickers in your chest at his words, like embers stoked suddenly to flame. You recoil physically from the foreign feeling, with a grimace twisting your features.

“Eugh…” 

“What?”

You shake your head in response, parting from him to set the now-slumbering baby into the warmer at your side. You lay it gingerly onto the blankets before stepping away with your hands splayed out, as if it had burnt you in some way.

“It got too real for a second there,” you mutter with a look of disgust on your face. “I started feeling all… warm and… and fuzzy— I didn’t like it…”

Jack laughs. 

“Yeah, that’s what they call happiness, Dr. Abbot,” he jokes in a gritty deadpan. “And I’m glad you’re finally getting to experience it after three whole years of marriage.”

Jack can’t get the sight of it out of his head. You, in the rocking chair in the corner, with the pedes room dimmed to a dull lamplight, cradling a sleeping baby to your chest and looking half-asleep yourself. 

“Thought you weren’t getting attached?” he whispered into the serene silence from his place in the doorway.

“’M not,” you mumbled back, head lolled to your shoulder, eyes half-closed. “‘M just using this as an excuse to shut my eyes for a second.”

Something about it all catches him off guard. Not the baby, exactly — he’s seen a thousand babies before — held them, handed them off, charted them like any other patient in a sea of a hundred different patients. They were always temporary things to him, always someone else’s. 

But then he sees you — his future, his eternity — with someone else’s baby tucked to your chest as if it had always been there. You had one hand instinctively supporting the weight of her head while your other smoothed up and down her back. And your voice, often edged with sarcasm dry enough to sand wood, had softened into something warm and low and honeyed. And the seemingly orphaned baby, who could cry loud enough to rattle glass, goes instantly still in your arms like it finds sanctuary in you alone. 

It does nothing more than pique his curiosity at first — the idea of having kids with you, of how great a mom you would be — which isn’t a completely rare thought, but one that is typically fleeting. But then the thought lingers. Festers. Settles somewhere in the pit of his chest until he can’t breathe without thinking about it. 

By the time you’ve settled in the empty cabin, six hours away from the PTMC, the desire has rooted itself somewhere far deeper than he’d like to admit.

Jack, freshly showered, reclines on the clean sheets of the familiar bed, smelling of detergent and time gone by. The bedroom settles slowly into a lamplit darkness in time with the late night. Fireworks crackle faintly in the distance, in mere echoes rolling across the midnight-colored lake outside. The quiet feels borderline suffocating compared to the never-ending chaos of the E.D. 

You move through the space as if you had always been there. Jack watches you from his spot on the bed, which gives him a perfect view of you in the adjacent bathroom. 

Your hair is still slightly damp from the shared shower, dripping onto the t-shirt swallowing your body whole. Your bare feet pad softly along the tile as you complete the last steps of your skincare routine; your attention flitting between your reflection in the mirror and the video playing on your phone.

It strikes him somewhere deep — swells from his stomach, to his chest, to his throat, until he gets the very sudden urge to cry.

“Should we have a kid, you think?” Jack blurts, as if the question were as simple as asking you if you wanted pizza for dinner.

You still in place in the golden-lit bathroom. Your fingers freeze on your cheeks, mid-swipe of moisturizer, as you flash him a deadpanned glare from the doorway.

“…Do you hear that?” you wonder in a monotone.

“The sound of my sperm dying?” Jack jokes

“The sound of quiet,” you correct before turning away to continue your work in the mirror. “Which doesn’t exist when you have kids. I mean, think about it— We wouldn’t have even been able to come here today if we had a kid. We wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

“Well, that’s just not true,” Jack scoffs, folding his arms behind his silver curls until his biceps strain beneath the sleeves of his black undershirt; the hem rises just enough to reveal the tuft of light brown-blonde hair trailing down into his sweatpants. 

His silver scruff brushes his freckled skin when he turns his head. “Parents take their kids places all the time— or alarm clocks, as you so lovingly called them.”

“Yeah, well, not mine,” you murmur distantly as you chuck your crumpled cotton pads into the bin beside the sink. “They always told me that I was the reason we couldn’t afford to do anything. ‘Cause apparently feed and clothing me was such a burden to them— as if I asked to be here.”

“Your parents were just assholes, babe.”

“The crazy thing is, they were actually pretty nice…” you sigh, bare feet padding softly across the floor as you trudge to bed, plugging your phone into its charger on the nightstand. “Just not to me. Like I ruined them or something.”

Jack’s chest flares with a white-hot warmth that makes his eyes sting. “You know that’s not your fault, right?”

You don’t answer him with words. You just bounce your brows and tilt your head, though he struggles to tell if it’s an agreement or not. He shifts on the mattress when you pull the fluffy comforter down to slide into bed beside him, brows lowered as he keeps his unwavering stare locked on your face.

“Is that why you don’t want kids?” he wonders gently. “Because you think you’ll end up like your parents?”

You scoff, kneeling on the mattress until you settle into place next to his reclined form. “Isn’t everyone terrified of ending up like their parents?”

“Sure, but… You’re nothing like them. I mean, I saw you with that Jane Doe today— You were perfect.”

“Well, you have to say that.”

“No, I don’t,” Jack scoffs. “If I thought any differently, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. But I know you’d be a great mom because I saw that today— Saw the rest of my whole goddamn life in that place…”

He trails off with a faraway look in his eyes.

You watch him with a suspicious glint in yours. 

“…You really mean that?” you murmur, halfway shy, picking at pills of cotton on the blanket thrown over your legs. “The part about me… You know, being a good mom, I mean?”

“Of course I do,” Jack laughs like it’s obvious, eyes glittering as he peers up at you. “And it’s not like I expect you to change your mind right now— or ever, if that’s what you want. It’s just… Something to think about, you know?”

“Well…” you tilt your head and trail off with a mischievous sort of lilt in your voice. “They do say the best part of having kids is trying for one.”

Jack grins up at you, brows raised to his hairline. “Do they?” he hums lowly.

“Mhm,” you nod.

“Should we test that theory out, you think?” he teases, all giddy like a teenage boy.

You shrug lazily, t-shirt sleeping off your shoulder, pretending to remain uninterested despite the excitement flaring red-hot in your chest. “Well, what the hell else are we gonna do?”

Something about your indifference makes Jack ravenous. It always has. It makes him feel like he’s got something to prove. And there’s nothing he loves more than watching your mask slip, than watching all your attempts to tease him fade into moans you couldn’t hold back if you tried. 

You melt for him first, when his long fingers slide your pretty panties to the side, dragging an orgasm from you with an expert hand — and then further when he presses his mouth to the wet spot in the thin cotton, drinking the honey you leak from him until he licks another twitching orgasm from your buzzing body.

Jack’s wearing your slick down to the silver scruff on his chin when he crawls back up your trembling form, massaging his stiff cock through his boxers. “You’re not too sensitive, are you?” he wonders gently despite the proud smile sitting crooked on his face and the honey still coating his tongue.

Your hips buck on their own accord, chasing a pleasure you’re not entirely sure you can take.

“Fuck a baby into me,” you plead in a half-drunken slurs, etching scratch marks long his back in an attempt to ground yourself. “Wanna make you a daddy, Jack— Want feel you leakin’ outta me…”

“Jesus Christ,” Jack huffs, like you’ve just punched all the air out of his lungs. “You can’t talk like that, baby— I’ll cum before we’ve even started.”

He knows it’s just the previous two orgasms talking, ‘cause you’re still on the pill after all —  having a baby now is pretty much out of the equation even if you really wanted to. But Jack isn’t in the business of depriving you of what you want. So he gives you all he has for the time being.

He folds your knees to your chest with a pair of wide, calloused hands, keeping your drooling pussy spread for him as he pierces you slow. The head of his cock, glowing red with need, disappears inside your pulsing confines. His throaty groan entwines with your quiet whimpers as your cunt suckles him further in. Once he’s sheathed fully inside, he stills just against you, with the greying thatch of coarse hair above his cock nestled against your sensitive clit.

“Yeah, you feel that?” Jack croons with a breathy laugh, which turns into a moan when your nails rake down his muscular chest. “You’re so full of me, aren’t you, baby?”

Your heavy head nods lazily against the pillow, eyes bleary and wet with desire. They squeeze shut a second later, when Jack’s hips drag back, until only the head of his cock is left inside you. Then he slides back into you, slow enough that you feel every ridge and vein of his cock, and smiles when your back arches off the mattress.

“I’ll give you a baby one day, honey, I promise,” the man babbles, choppy between his measured thrusts. “Fill you up so much it’ll be leakin’ outta you for days—”

You whine, hips bucking into and away from his cock all at once.

“Yeah, that’s it… I’ll get you all round and full… ’Til you’re walking around the E.D… Showin’ everyone what I did to you— how good I make you feel…”

“Please,” you whine.

“Yeah?” Jack coos sympathetically, beneath the wet schlick, schlick, schlick sound of his thrusts inside you. “That what you want?”

You nod, head tilted back and eyes squeezed shut, though the pathetic “please, please, please”’s continue spilling from your kissed mouth.

“Take it then, baby— Take it.”

He buckles down over you, punching into you with shallow thrusts that slowly start to lose their rhythm. He talks you through every inch of your orgasm, which hits you so hard it makes tears swell in the corners of your eyes. 

“That’s it, honey. Let me have it,” he murmurs in your ear as your body starts to twitch beneath his muscular one. “Give me all of it, baby. That’s it.”

Your stomach pools with heat a second later when Jack tenses on top of you, burying his groans in his neck as his jerking cock spits thick ropes of warm cum inside of your pulsing confines. He deflates on top of you when he’s finally spent, sticky body melting with yours, until both of you are melting into the tousled sheets below.

“You okay?” Jack asks through panted breaths, muffled into your sweat-slick neck. 

You nod wordlessly, swallowing hard as the high fades, and shoving lazily at his bare shoulder. “Get off— I gotta go to the bathroom,” you huff. 

Jack slides off your body and falls heavily onto the other side of the mattress. He watches with lidded eyes as you hurry to the bathroom with your thighs clenched together. You clean yourself up inside and return some minutes later to Jack having wiped himself off and tucking his soft cock back into his grey boxers.

“Do you wanna… talk about all that?” he asks with a knowing squint in his eyes.

“Remind me tomorrow,” you sigh, feet heavy as you trudge back into bed. 

Jack scoffs a laugh, knowing you’ll likely tell him the same exact thing tomorrow, and flips off the lamp on the nightstand. The golden bedroom delves into a midnight-blue darkness.

His limbs entwine with yours on nothing short of muscle memory when he slides back into bed with you. His long legs slot with yours beneath the covers as he throws a heavy arm over your stomach, folding his free one beneath his head.

Quiet settles over the dark bedroom like a blanket. 

“Actually,” you blurt into the silence, catching Jack right before he falls asleep.

“Yeah?” he mumbles, warm breath fanning over your shoulder.

“It’ll probably take about— I don’t know, three or so days for all the results to come back. You know, for Baby Jane Doe’s workup,” you murmur, half-shy. “And we’ll be back to work by then, so… I was thinking maybe we could… Never mind, it’s stupid.”

Jack lifts his head before you can shrink back into yourself, eyes flitting across your shadowed profile. “No, what is it?”

You roll onto your back to meet his darkened gaze with a far more sheepish one. “Maybe we could take her, you know? Just foster her on an emergency basis until we can find her family. Or someone who can foster her long-term. Like a…”

“A trial run?” Jack finishes for you with an audible grin. “Yeah, that’s definitely one way to pitch it, honey.”

You grimace, hiding your burning face behind your hands. “I told you, it’s stupid,” you whine, muffled behind your palms.

“It’s not stupid,” Jack assures you with a quiet laugh. He pries your hands from your face with gentle fingers wrapped around your wrist. “I think it’s a great idea. We can, you know, taste the waters about the whole baby thing and help a kid in need at the same. Sounds like a win-win to me.”

“Yeah?” you hum with a soft wince.

“Yeah,” he nods. “We can look into it when we get back.”

Your chest swells with a sunshine sort of warmth when he settles back into bed beside you, tossing a muscular arm over you to tuck you back into his bare chest. It’s a pure, unadulterated feeling of overwhelming happiness that weirdly makes you feel like crying. ‘Cause only Jack would agree to foster an abandoned baby you found at work not even a day ago; only Jack would see all of you and still love you completely, for a reason you still can’t name.

“I hate when you’re supportive,” you grouse on instinct as you bury your head back into the pillow, even though you mean the exact opposite.

Jack knows this, too, so he just grins into your hair and jokes, “Yeah, I know. It’s definitely my worst quality.”