el

“Got a VIP for you, King,” Dana said, walking a rapid clip and handing Mel a sturdy clip-board, “I’d give her to Robby, but he’s busy.”

“Oh!” Mel took a glance down at the papers, thumbing through them with mild interest. A VIP could be fun… exciting even, she liked to learn more about her co-workers. Some of them were so reticent with her, it was like playing the Nancy Drew CD-ROM mystery games she liked as a kid, just to figure out anything about their personal lives. However, when she finally read the name at the top of the page, she went a bit pale, looking over at Dana with mild concern, “... Is this, um–?”

“Yep, this is Mrs. Langdon,” Dana was already trying to move on to another task, checking her phone for some kind of alert, “Needs a few stitches. You be gentle with her, she’s a good friend of mine.” And Dana was gone.

“Got it.” Mel said, nodding curtly, her palms feeling a bit sweaty.

She had never met Abby before, but had heard quite a lot about her. Once, she’d even tried to look her up on Facebook and was startled to find that she had a whole YouTube channel where she posted work-out routines and dancing exercises: a former college cheerleader turned stay-at-home mom to a doctor husband and their beautiful children, (seldom seen), and frighteningly human looking golden doodle, (occasionally wandered into frame as Abby’s ponytail bounced frenetically).

Mel had watched five or six of the videos feverishly one night, until she got to one where Abby wore a matching Lululemon set that revealed her perfectly toned midsection, at which point Mel started to feel physically ill and slammed her laptop shut with a gasp.

Behind the curtain of room 6, Abby Langdon was there in the flesh, looking mildly annoyed and holding a bloody washcloth to the palm of her hand.

For a moment, Mel couldn’t say anything, because she was even more beautiful in person. It was actually strange how much she looked like Dr. Langdon; full dark hair, big blue eyes, and straight, white teeth. If she hadn’t known any better, she might have assumed she was his sister, which gave her a funny feeling in her stomach.

“Um, hello, Mrs. Langdon,” She said with a thin smile, “I’m Dr. King, I’m sorry we’re not meeting, um, under better circumstances!”

Abby raised her eyebrows, thin and arched, and then looked Mel up and down slowly, “Just Abby is fine... you’re Dr. King?”

Mel, confused by the statement as well as her tone, just nodded with a smile, “Yep, that’s me! So, you cut your hand? Could I take a look?”

Abby, eyes narrowing, produced her bloody palm, “Knock yourself out.”

Mel felt her heart start to race a bit, that familiar feeling that she had done something wrong but hadn’t picked up on it, only able to assess the situation from the reactions of others, which were incongruent. She swallowed down her anxiety and gently took Abby’s hand, examining her injury.

Abby’s hand was soft and well-manicured, red nails and a diamond ring on her finger. Her palm was sliced fairly cleanly down the middle.

“Were you cutting an avocado?” Mel asked, tilting her head slightly to the side as she tried to see how deep the wound went.

“... Yes, actually,” Abby wasn’t amused by Mel’s guessing game, but she said, humorlessly, “That’s funny. Does this happen a lot?”

“Oh, yeah,” Mel conferred, turning her hand around, “Especially when the weather warms up.”

“Hm.” Abby puffed out. For a moment there was an uncomfortable silence, and then, “Do you think you’ll be done soon? I have to pick Tanner up from school.”

“Um, yes, I just need to make sure that you haven’t damaged your tendon. Could you try and make a fist please?”

Abby made a fist.

“Can you wiggle all your fingers?”

Abby wiggled her fingers.

“It doesn’t feel great.” She added, but Mel noted that her hand didn’t seem to be impaired.

“I’ll numb up the area in just a moment. Looks like you got lucky with the cut and avoided the, um, bad spots.”

Abby didn’t look impressed with her assessment, which made Mel wring her hands in front of her nervously.

Desperate to fill the silence, Mel attempted to make small talk as she got out her suture kit, briskly washing her hands and setting up a sterile surface.

“Does Tanner like school?” Mel asked.

She’d heard all about Tanner from Frank, who was about to finish his first year in kindergarten. By all accounts, he was a clever, funny, rambunctious kid that had inherited all of the best of Frank and none of the bad (which he seemed to have saved for Penny, who was a loveable menace). Mel had even seen a few pictures, shown to her on Frank’s phone in the ambulance bay, and some that she had found on Abby’s Instagram where they tastefully faced away from the camera in matching overalls for a family photo. In Frank’s pictures, they were much more lively, Penny with her messy hair and paint-covered t-shirt, and Tanner always mid-way through a sentence and blurry.

“It’s kindergarten, what’s not to like?” Abby said shortly, and Mel, who took this as a completely genuine conversation starter, filled up her syringe with lidocaine and prattled away.

“Well, some kids have, um, a hard time in school,” she began, “Just a quick poke, by the way–” Abby winced, but didn’t make a sound, “I didn’t really like school until I was older. I mean, I liked to learn, but the other kids could be so loud, and messy, and I had some trouble making friends, and sometimes the snack–”

“I get it.” Abby snapped, then sighed through her nose briskly, “I’m just– I’m not in the mood for small talk. Okay? My hand hurts. I tried to go to Presby, but—”

“Everything okay in here?” It was Frank, head poking through the curtains. Mel looked up at him gratefully, her eyes big with relief.

“Dr. Langdon!” She chirped, “Hi!”

Abby glowered at both of them as Mel began to carefully stitch up her hand.

“It’s fine. I just cut my hand.”

“I’ve told you ten times to get rid of that parring knife, it’s dull,” Frank walked in to peer over Mel’s shoulder and assess the damage, shaking his head.

“It’s a nice knife. I’m gonna get it sharpened, it was the damn dog–”

“Blaming poor Fido for this mess?”

“Is the dog’s name Fido?” Mel cut in, looking up with bright-eyed interest, her head tilted to the side.

“Uh, no, it’s actually Teddy. Fido was Abraham Lincoln’s dog’s name, though,” Frank said as he watched Mel’s neat stitches.

“Wow, doubly presidential!”

“Will you both stop?” Abby huffed, “I’m sitting here getting my hand put back together!”

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Langdon,” Mel said politely, shame-faced, “I’m going as quickly as I can.”

“Jesus, Abs,” Frank said with disapproval, “Play nice.”

“I’m not having the best day, okay? Obviously.” She said through her teeth, voice clipped.

“Well, Dr. King is the best we got at PTMC, so take it easy.”

Despite herself, Mel felt her cheeks prickle, a swell of pride welling in her chest.

He gave Mel a light little pat on the back before he left, without another word to Abby.

“Alright,” She carefully tied off her stitch, snipping the extra thread and then covered the wound with a small bandage, “I’m going to get your discharge papers with some, um, care instructions. I’ll also get you a script for some antibiotics, just in case.”

“Great. The sooner I can get out of here, the better.”

“I totally understand,” Mel said, still trying to wear a brave face, but feeling her confidence slipping by the second. Why did Abby dislike her so much? Had she said something wrong, or was it really just the fact that she had to come in for the injury in the first place? Why had she tried to go all the way to Presby? Surely not to avoid her husband, although things seemed to be strained between her and Frank, too.

As she left the room, Dana brushed by her in the opposite direction, and to her dawning horror, she could hear Abby greet her enthusiastically, the two of them laughing about how ridiculous it was to stab yourself over an avocado. So she was the problem. She bit the inside of her cheek, trying not to show her confusion and sadness on her face.

Mel had gotten Abby’s papers together, as well as sent an order to the hospital pharmacy, and then, against her better judgement, had decided to step outside a minute to take a deep breath.

It’s got nothing to do with you, she told herself, although the easy laughter she’d heard from Abby and Dana made her feel like that might not be the case, nothing to do with you at all.

When she made her way back to Abby’s room, she could hear Abby talking, and for a moment thought that Dana was still in there chatting with her. However, it became clear that Abby was on the phone.

“––genuinely couldn’t believe it,” She was saying in a mock-hushed voice that Mel could barely make out, “–– this is the one he’s always going on about? I don’t know how she ended up a doctor, she could barely string two words together––” Mel went completely still, a sickly sort of chill running down her whole body, her palms immediately beginning to sweat, “Just weird. Something off, for sure. Maybe she has some kind of… delay? Anyways— I guess I shouldn’t be worried!”

Mel felt hot and cold all over. Her nose and throat had that terrible burning feeling like she was really about to start crying. She could not cry in front of Langdon’s wife. She remembered her mother’s funeral, when she had cried so hard the night before that her cheeks were raw and her eyes were swollen, but on the day she was buried, Mel had held everything in so that Becca didn’t have to see her so upset. She had seen both of her parents die, held the hands of dying patients, grieving mothers, grieving children–– she could put on a brave face, now.

Walking away as if she hadn’t heard anything at all, she scrubbed her face with her hands and took a big, shaky breath, and then she cleared her throat loudly and walked back into Abby’s room.

“-- Gotta go, Sarah. And thanks for taking the little monster. Yeah, shouldn’t be too long.”

Mel waited politely until Abby hung up the phone.

“Sorry, my sister took Penny. Had to give her a heads up.” Abby explained as she put her cellphone into her purse. Mel nodded, a smile plastered across her face.

“It’s no problem. Um, here are your discharge instructions… don’t submerge your hand for the next 48 hours. Don’t use peroxide or alcohol to clean it, just petroleum jelly. I’m sure Dr. Langdon will keep an eye on it for you.” She said, staring at the floor, trying to focus on the facts so that she could get out of the room as quickly as possible.

Abby let out a little snort at Mel’s last comment, and took the instructions from her.

“Yeah, we’ll see about that,” she said, which made Mel feel hopelessly perplexed.

“Um. Yes! I’m sure you will.”

Abby stared at her, mouth ajar. Mel had the terrible feeling that she had messed up again.

“Am I free to go?”

“Yes,” Mel nodded, “I hope that your hand feels better, Abby,” she added, and despite everything, she really did mean that.

“Thanks,” Abby said curtly, and picked up her purse and left.

As soon as Abby was out of the room, Mel was overcome with tears. Briskly, she left the room and walked down the hallway, furiously wiping her face all the way. Fuck Abby, she let herself think for just a second, fuck fuck fuck!

Sitting down in her corner in the stairwell, she drew her knees up to her chest and let herself just cry into her hands for a minute. Just a minute, she promised herself, then she’d go wash her face in the bathroom and try to pretend like that never happened. But still, it had hurt. Badly.

In school, other kids could be mean. She never cared too much if they called her ugly or insulted her clothes, but it was things like this: someone questioning her abilities, her intellect, that was something that really bothered her. She knew that she was peculiar. That sometimes she had a hard time understanding people, or said the wrong thing. But she was a good fucking doctor, and a good person, and she couldn’t think of a reason why Abby would say such terrible things about her, especially after she had cleaned up her wound and stitched her back together so skillfully.

She sniffled pathetically into her hands until her face began to ache, and then she tried to take a few deep breaths and stop crying.

“Oh, shit,” She started at the sound of the door opening, of Frank Langdon swearing, and then began to sheepishly wipe her face, “You okay, Mel?”

“Um, yes, I'm fine,” she insisted, even as her eyes began to well up again at the shame of seeing him, and of him seeing her.

“Clearly you’re not fine,” Cautiously, he walked over to sit beside her in the stairwell, giving her a concerned look. And then, finally, “… Did Abby say something to you?”

Mel paled, then let out a shaky, humorless laugh. She couldn’t lie to him, couldn’t hide anything. She had always been a terrible liar.

“Not… well, not to me directly…” She explained, trying to minimize the whole thing in a way that would make him stop asking about it. At the end of the day, Abby was his wife. It didn’t matter what Mel thought of her, she was just his co-worker.

To her utter, utter surprise, Langdon suddenly looked furious. He took out his phone and rapidly pulled up his contacts.

“— What are you doing?” Mel said hurriedly, putting up her hands as if it would stop him, but he had clicked the name Abby and put the phone up to his ear.

“I’m fucking calling her—,” Langdon said, jumping up to his feet and stalking back and forth like a tiger in the zoo.

“No, no, no, please don’t!” Mel cried, her face going even redder than before, hot anxiety flooding through her.

Seeing her panicked face, Langdon quickly hung up the phone.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” He said, then went back over to her, “I just— we fucking talked about this last night. This completely crosses a line. What did she say?”

Mel paused, “What do you mean you talked about this last night?”

Looking caught, Langdon’s eyes darted away from hers, and then he ran his hand through his hair nervously, letting out a sigh.

“I… Jesus, Mel,” He bit his lip, looking contemplative for a moment until he seemed to finally relent to just saying it outright, “Me and Abby… we’re having problems. We had… we’ve been having—” Another long sigh, he stared at the floor, seemingly unwilling to make eye contact with her, “She thinks we’re having an affair.”

Mel’s eyes went huge and her shoulders shot up around her ears, it was as if she was caving in on herself with surprise.

“Oh no,” Mel finally said, covering her mouth with surprise, absolutely mortified.

“Oh no?” Langdon couldn’t help but laugh, forgetting his fury for one second, “What do you mean oh no?”

“I didn’t mean to cause you any problems, Dr. Langdon! I’m so sorry!” She almost started crying again, and Langdon reflexively leaned forward to touch her shoulder, which made her jolt backwards. Hesitantly, he drew his hand back.

“Listen, Mel, none of this is your fault… I,” He hung his head, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand sheepishly, “things haven’t… been “okay” for a while now. I mean, not since I left last year. Which is understandable, obviously, listen, I’m not blaming Abby, either— well, she shouldn’t have said anything to you, that is so fucking not okay and crazy— hold on, sorry, I’m not saying this how I want to.” He shook his head as if to clear it and Mel sat, patiently waiting for him to explain, eyes puffy, hands folded politely in her lap.

“Let me start over,” He took a breath, then began again, “Ever since I’ve come back, I haven’t felt exactly… welcome. And it’s the same at home. So, sometimes… a lot of times, actually… you are the best part of my day. And it’s hard for me not to talk about you, which has been upsetting for Abby. And I should’ve told you when I knew she was coming in, or told Dana not to give you the case, but I wasn’t fast enough, and I hoped that when I popped in on you guys it would help, but obviously it made it worse. And for whatever you heard, I’m so fucking sorry, Mel. Abby doesn’t know you, she doesn’t know anything about you. She’s insecure and stressed and, obviously I’ve seriously fucked up her life. I’m not making excuses, but that's the explanation. So… I’m just so, so sorry.”

Mel sat quietly for a moment, just taking it all in, her mind putting things together. What Abby had said to her sister— “I guess I shouldn’t be worried”. She put her face into her hands and rubbed her forehead, her persistently furrowed eyebrows giving her a tension headache.

“Okay,” She finally said, nodding slowly, “I’m sorry… I, um, don’t really know what to say. I’ve never been in this kind of situation before…”

“You don’t need to be sorry about anything. You did nothing wrong, Mel.”

“But,” She groaned, hiding her face completely, “I did.”

“No, no,” He attempted to assure her, wondering how badly he had fucked up to have her blaming herself for this mess that he was responsible for creating.

“I want to have an affair. With you.” The words came out in a rush, and as soon as they left her mouth she blinked owlishly at him, “Wait! That was, um, really bad— hold on—”

She put her head between her legs and took a deep breath like she was on a crashing airplane, then popped back up again, braid flying: “I’m attracted to you. So, really, Abby was right, um, about everything, even though obviously we didn’t do anything, and she did say that she didn’t think I should be a doctor, which I don’t think she was right about, for the record, but—”

“She said what?” It took monumental effort for him to address this last comment before all the rest of it.

Mel stopped, feeling ashamed that she’d brought it up, and further ashamed that he hadn’t reacted to her confession, visibly cringing.

“I told you, it wasn’t to me, it was— I overheard her on the phone, um, to her sister—”

“Mel, I’m so fucking sorry, really, she couldn’t be more wrong. You are the best doctor I have ever worked with. Please believe me.”

“I do believe you,” Mel said, tears inexplicably pricking at the backs of her eyes again, “I trust you, Dr. Langdon. With everything.”

Langdon reached out gently to touch her face, to stroke her cheek with his hand, fully prepared for her to jolt backwards again, but she was prepared this time and leaned into his hand, eager to be nearer, staring over at him with watery eyes.

“You don’t know how much that means to me,” He said, voice low.

“Um, Dr. Langdon?” Mel asked, eyelids fluttering as he cupped her cheek.

“You can call me Frank, you know.”

“Okay,” She demurred, looking down for a moment, “Frank?”

“Yes, Mel?”

“Are you attracted to me, too?”

“Jesus, Mel,” This made Mel frown with mild concern, and before she could pull away, Langdon swiped his thumb against her cheek, wiping her tears, “Of course I am.”

“Oh,” Mel breathed, suddenly hyper-aware of how close he was, his warm hand against her skin, the intensity of his gaze, “Okay.”

“Okay?” He let out a short laugh, “That’s all you have to say, okay?”

Before she could second-guess herself, she surged forward and kissed him hard on the mouth. He stilled for a moment, clearly surprised, before slowly bringing his other hand up to her waist and kissing her back in earnest.

“I’m so sorry, Mel,” he said in between kisses, able to taste the salt on her lips, “That should’ve never happened. It won’t ever happen again, alright?”

“Mhm,” Mel let out a muffled moan of agreement, scrambling to just get closer to him. She’d imagined this since the day she met him. Touched herself thinking about it. Now that it was actually happening, she could hardly contain herself. She almost forgot that she was at work, that the entire ED was just outside the door, that his wife had just left. But, not quite.

“Baby, we can’t,” Frank said, pulling back looking flushed, as Mel whined and leaned closer against him. Her heart was pounding in her ears, head reeling.

“Can’t right now?” She asked, “Or can’t ever?”

Langdon took a deep breath, looking momentarily thoughtful as he considered her question.

“Tonight, I’m going to tell her I’m done,” He finally said, “How’s that sound?”