per aspera ad astra

When he eventually straight up asks her why, she takes him aside in the fanfiction corridor and asks him: “If you went over to someone’s house and they were beating their dog, but the dog kept wagging its tail because it doesn’t know what’s happening to it is wrong… you’d still have to save the dog, right? You can’t keep going over there and let it happen?”

“Is someone hurting our dog?” He asks, horrified.

@kingdonmicrofic - july 17 - wc: 225 - cw: mature

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Frank's pinky is resting against Mel's thigh--Mel's exposed thigh--and she is not moving away.

She wears shorts to the PTMC's softball game, just like every other person around them, but this is Mel, who, until now, he's only seen in scrub pants. While his hand habitually presses into her back at work whenever he squeezes past her, a clothed barrier always prevented any heat from heading south. So this is the first actual touch of her skin that he feels he doesn't have a right to, and she's still letting him, trusting him, the thought of which only makes him harder, like he's some damn pervert, and--

"Langdon, you're up," Robby grunts.

Oh, he's up alright. How the hell is he supposed to stand right now? There's so many people waiting out in the bleachers, a majority of whom he needs to impress if he has any hopes of getting an attending position someday.

Mel suddenly shifts and points her knees towards him, which slides multiple of his fingers to an even higher spot on the back of her thigh, right at the edge of her shorts. He's--he's basically touching her ass--

"Batter up!" she pipes at him with a giggle.

It's, uh... you're... A miracle. Yes. But then, I always thought so.

I’ll add, because people get this wrong all the time:

Quasimodo: “And where is the amulet?” Edgar from Aristocats: “Safe and sound I assure you. Isn’t that right, Lightning McQueen?” *the sounds of revving comes out of the shadows*

i’m imagining her, twenty-six or so with the job she secured straight out of undergrad at an advertising agency or an accounting firm— something where she dresses well in clacky heels and feels accomplished. i see her coming home to the now empty apartment she usually shares with a roommate, one of her sorority sisters from college. she secretly hopes that frank will ask her to move in, once he finally graduates med school im a few months. it wouldn’t even make a lot of sense really. he’s still broke and won’t be making much even once he starts his residency. they haven’t even been together half a year, anyway. but she hopes he still might.

was she alone, when she took the test? pacing around her bathroom with her hands on her head, waiting for the longest two minutes of her life to go by? were they always careful, or was she reckless, too wrapped up in the whirlwind of their sexual connection without stopping to think twice about the consequences? was she scared about the results, or did she already know deep down?

i can picture her sitting on the edge of the tub, heart pounding in her chest as her hearing goes fuzzy, turning the test over in her hands with two distinct lines, not even questionable in the slightest. i can’t help but wonder if she considered not telling him at all. was she worried about his reaction? that he’d get angry at her because he was about to enter the most stressful four years of his life, even if it was nobodies fault? did she think he would be excited? was he? was she?

i can’t help but wonder about who suggested the marriage first. was it her, terrified of being left alone? was it him, bound to his desire to be everything for everyone? did they agree? did they fight? did she think the day of her wedding would be the happiest day of her life?

She mentions eventually her husband being a doctor as well, there’s something in her tone like she thought they would know that which is… odd? How would they?

Dr King has step kids. Which takes them by surprise. Her husband seems to be a dweeb, and he’s been married before? Huh.

Eventually they see her ring. It’s in a silver chain on her neck. It’s surprisingly pretty. It’s got a fairy like unique setting to it. “My husband got me some rubber ones to try when we first got engaged but I hated the feeling. This is just the best option for me.”

Well that’s sweet of him.

For all she talks about my husband made this last night and oh my husband read that and sorry I was just thinking about this joke my husband made comments, she actually seldom discusses the man in question.

Not beyond doctor, married before, tall.

She gives them little to work with.

So it’s quite the shock when one day Dr Langdon takes her hand after a trauma, and softly asks “Hey, you okay Melly?”, bending down to look in her eyes. And she shakes her head, he mutters that he knows, baby, and pulls her into a hug. He rocks her against his chest and mutters in her ear and kisses her head.

And it startles them, because obviously dr King and dr Langdon are friends but they’re both married it’s-

Oh.

They did this thing, sometimes. It was weird and shameful and like nothing Mel had ever heard of before, and they didn’t do it a lot, but it went like this: first, they’d share a look. This part always just kind of happened - it’s not like they ever planned it. Frank’s face would go all intense and serious, and he’d look down at her lips, and that’s how she would know.