Take Care of Yourself

The Pitt

Jack Abbot:

Storm Warning

When your new neighbor, Jack Abbot, moves in, you do what you always do, introduce yourself, apologize in advance, and brace for the look people get when they meet your nonverbal autistic son. But Jack doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t adjust. He just… stays. Through storms, routines, and the nights that get loud, he learns in your world the only way that matters: by showing up, again and again.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 Small Is Still Forward

When you stop answering your phone, Jack tells himself you’re just tired. But the silence stretches too long. He finds you in bed, unmoving, exhausted in a way that has nothing to do with sleep. Instead of panic, instead of anger, he chooses patience. One glass of water. One shower. One steady breath at a time. A story about being seen at your lowest and loved there anyway.

Permission to Fall Apart

When your anxiety spikes and your brain tells you to run, you reach for the door before you can think. Jack doesn’t stop you. He just holds the moment steady, long enough for you to come back to yourself. No fixing. No shame. Just a quiet kind of care, and permission to fall apart.

Back on His Feet

After losing his leg in the war, Jack Abbot begins the long work of learning to walk again. The only problem is that somewhere between the bad days, the victories, and the parallel bars, he falls in love with the one person helping him stand.

Micheal ‘Robby’ Robinavitch:

The Things That Stay

You’ve been coming to the ED long enough that everyone jokes you’re VIP. Dana knows exactly how to take care of you and Robby always makes sure he’s your doctor. Through pain, fear, and a quiet kind of love neither of you fully say out loud, you keep finding small pieces of beauty in the world. Long after you’re gone, Robby is left trying to believe you.

Part 1, Part 2

Is it Still Casual Now?

After months of pretending this is casual, one quiet morning changes everything when Robby finally stays. What starts as coffee in the kitchen becomes the confession neither of you has been brave enough to say out loud.

Don’t Date the Three P’s

There’s an unofficial rule in the Pitt emergency department: don’t date the three P’s. But after one too many handoffs and one shift that leaves you both lingering a little longer than usual, Robby decides breaking the rule might be worth it.

What Happens in Vegas Never Stays in Vegas

After a drunken Vegas wedding, Robby disappears by morning, leaving you with nothing but a ring and a mistake that was supposed to stay in Vegas. But when a pregnancy and state paperwork force you to track down the husband who vanished, Robby learns the truth and this time, walking away isn’t so easy.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7

Paper Rings

You thought the paper rings were just a joke. Robby, apparently, did not.

Liability

Alternate Ending Here

After Pittfest, everyone at The Pitt changes, but Robby changes the most. He used to be the mentor who could catch you before you fell. Now he’s colder, sharper, and crueler, acting like cruelty is the same thing as teaching. But on the Fourth of July, when Robby uses the part of you he once helped save against you, you end up on the wrong side of the hospital roof railing, and he’s forced to see just how far he pushed you.

You & I

After Pittfest, you notice Robby quietly slipping away from the others and ask to walk him home. What starts as a silent walk becomes one night of shared grief, small comforts, and the fragile promise that neither of you has to survive it alone.

Animal Kingdom

Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody:

He Would Be There

At a party at Smurf’s house, one bad drink changes everything. Pope notices before anyone else does and once he does, he doesn’t leave your side.

peace

He’d sign his name on the volunteer sheet, grab a bucket and cleaning supplies, and disappear into the kennel rows. No small talk. No introductions. No standing around the coffee station discussing weekend plans like the other volunteers.

Just work.

At first, you barely paid attention to him.

The shelter always had volunteers coming and going. College students looking for hours. Retirees looking for purpose. People who stayed a month and disappeared. You assumed Andrew would be the same. Then one afternoon, a German shepherd named Tank proved you wrong.

Tank had been returned three times. The first family said he was too anxious. The second said he was destructive. The third brought him back after he snapped at their teenage son. By the time Tank arrived at your shelter, he had a bright red warning sticker on his kennel file and a reputation that followed him into every room.

Nobody liked walking him. Nobody volunteered for his kennel. Nobody expected much from him. Including Tank.

You were carrying fresh water bowls down the kennel row when barking erupted from the far end. Loud. Aggressive. The kind that made visitors jump. Tank. Again.

A new volunteer, a teenager completing community service hours, stood frozen outside the kennel door.

“He’s gonna bite me,” the kid said.

“You don’t have to take him,” you replied.

The teenager looked relieved. 

Tank kept barking. Throwing himself against the chain-link door. You were already reaching for the clipboard to mark him as skipped when another voice spoke.

“I’ll take him.”

You looked up. Andrew stood a few feet away, holding a leash.

The teenager handed it over immediately.

“You sure?” you asked.

Andrew nodded once. That was it. No bravado. No speech. Just a nod.

You expected a struggle. Expected barking. Expected chaos. Instead, Andrew crouched outside the kennel. Not opening the door. Not reaching inside. Just sitting.

Tank barked himself hoarse for nearly five minutes. Andrew waited. The dog barked. Andrew waited. The dog paced. Andrew waited. Finally, Tank stopped. Not because he’d calmed down. Because he got tired. For the first time, silence settled between them. 

Andrew looked at him. Tank looked back.

And then Andrew said, “Yeah.”

Nothing else. Just that. Yeah.

Like Tank had told him something. Like he’d understood it. You frowned. The dog blinked. Andrew held out the leash. Another minute passed. Then another. Eventually, Tank stepped forward. Not much. Just enough.

Andrew clipped the leash on. No struggle. No drama. No barking. Then he stood and walked away with eighty pounds of formerly impossible German shepherd trotting quietly beside him.

You stared after them.

“What the hell?” muttered another volunteer.

You didn’t have an answer. Neither did Tank. But after that day, Andrew became harder to ignore.

You started noticing things. The way he always arrived early. The way broken things somehow stopped being broken after he touched them. The way he remembered every dog’s name after hearing it once. The way frightened animals followed him around the yard like he carried some invisible signal only they could hear.

Mostly, though, you noticed the patience. 

Everybody talked about patience like it was kindness. With Andrew, it felt different. It felt like recognition. Like he understood fear because he’d lived with it long enough to recognize it in someone else. Or something else.

One Thursday afternoon, that understanding got him bitten. Hard.

You were restocking food bins when shouting erupted near the intake kennels. Not panicked shouting. Surprised shouting. You rounded the corner to find three volunteers standing around Daisy’s kennel. Daisy had arrived that morning. Three-legged pit bull. Recently rescued. Terrified of everyone. Especially men.

Andrew stood outside the kennel holding a leash. Blood ran down the back of his hand. A bite. Not severe. But enough.

“Oh my God,” one volunteer said.

“Jesus—”

“Get the first-aid kit.”

The room filled with voices. Questions. Concern. Noise. Andrew ignored all of it. His eyes remained fixed on Daisy.

The dog had retreated to the far corner of the kennel. Trembling. Ears pinned back. Terrified. Not of what she’d done. Of what might happen next.

Andrew noticed immediately. “Don’t.”

The word cut through the room. Everyone stopped.

“Don’t what?” asked a volunteer.

Andrew nodded toward Daisy. “Don’t yell at her.”

Nobody had been. But somehow the entire room understood what he meant. Don’t be angry. Don’t punish her. Don’t make this worse.

Blood dripped from his hand onto the concrete. Andrew barely looked at it.

“She’s scared.” His voice softened. Directed entirely at the dog. “That’s all.”

The kennel fell quiet.

You looked at Daisy. Then at Andrew. Then back again. For a strange moment, neither of them seemed dangerous. Just frightened. And somehow that realization stayed with you long after the bite healed.

—

The bite should have healed quickly. It probably did. The mark disappeared from the back of Andrew’s hand within a couple of weeks. The impression it left behind lasted much longer.

After that day, you started paying attention. Not intentionally. At least that’s what you told yourself. You weren’t watching for him when you arrived each morning. You weren’t checking the volunteer sheet to see if his name was signed in. You weren’t noticing when the parking space near the maintenance shed was empty.

Except you were. A little. Enough that on Tuesdays and Thursdays, your eyes automatically drifted toward the front desk around two o’clock. Enough that you noticed if he was late. Enough that you knew he was never late.

The shelter ran on routines. Feeding schedules. Medication charts. Walking rotations. People were harder. Volunteers came and went. Staff burned out. Life happened.

Andrew stayed. 

Every Tuesday. Every Thursday. Two o’clock sharp. Like clockwork. And somehow, things worked better when he was there.

You’d spend twenty minutes fighting with a jammed kennel latch. Turn around to grab a tool. Turn back. And it would be fixed. A leaking faucet that maintenance hadn’t gotten to yet would suddenly stop dripping. A broken gate would swing smoothly again. A stubborn printer would start working after Andrew wandered past it.

Half the time you never even saw him do it. You’d just notice the problem had disappeared. He never mentioned it. Never waited for thanks. He just noticed things and fixed them, like it was as natural as breathing.

One afternoon, nearly two months after the bite incident, you found him sitting on the floor in the storage room. At first, you thought he was hurt. The sight was strange enough to stop you in the doorway. Andrew sat cross-legged beside a stack of donated blankets, staring at something in his lap.

You stepped closer. Then laughed. A tiny gray kitten glared back at you. The kitten couldn’t have been more than six weeks old. One ear flopped sideways. Its eyes were too big for its face. Its entire body fit comfortably in Andrew’s hands. And it looked furious about it.

“What are you doing?”

Andrew looked up. Then down at the kitten. Then back at you.

“He doesn’t like anybody.”

The kitten immediately hissed.

You snorted. “Clearly.”

Andrew nodded.

The kitten hissed again.

“He’s been doing that for twenty minutes.”

“Why are you sitting here with him?”

Another shrug. Like the answer was obvious.

“Nobody else would.”

The kitten attempted to climb onto his shoulder. Failed spectacularly. Slid into his lap. Andrew steadied him with one careful hand. You felt something strange settle in your chest. Not romance. Just curiosity. Because most people would have laughed. Most people would have walked away. Andrew had apparently devoted half an hour of his afternoon to keeping an angry kitten company.

“You know he hates you, right?”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “Yeah.”

The kitten hissed again.

Andrew nodded toward him. “See?”

You laughed.

This time Andrew actually smiled. Small. Brief. Gone almost immediately. But real. It was the first genuine smile you’d seen from him. For some reason, it felt like discovering a secret.

—

The first real conversation happened because of rain.

Southern California rarely got enough of it to cause problems. When it did, everything stopped functioning properly. The shelter parking lot flooded. The roof leaked near the laundry room. Half the volunteers called out. By six o’clock, only three people remained. You. Andrew. And Ruth. Ruth left at six-thirty.

The storm got worse. You were balancing paperwork, medication records, and tomorrow’s intake forms when the lights flickered.

“Don’t,” you said.

Andrew stood on a ladder near the electrical panel. 

“What?”

“The lights.”

The lights flickered again. You pointed your pen at the ceiling. 

“If the power goes out, that’s fate telling me the paperwork can wait until tomorrow.”

Andrew looked down from the ladder. “No.”

“What do you mean, no?”

“No chance.”

You narrowed your eyes.

He went back to the electrical panel. “You’d stay.”

“I absolutely would not.”

“You would.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“You always finish the paperwork.”

“I could leave it.”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

Andrew glanced down at the clipboard in your arms. “You brought two pens.”

You looked at the pens clipped to the top of the clipboard. Then back at him. “One could die.”

His mouth twitched. “There’s another one behind your ear.”

You froze. Then slowly reached up. Your fingers brushed the pen tucked there.

Andrew turned back to the panel like knowing you that well meant nothing.

You laughed hard enough to nearly drop your clipboard. The sound surprised both of you. Because Andrew immediately looked away. Not uncomfortable. Just… startled. Like he wasn’t used to being the reason someone laughed.

The realization made your chest ache unexpectedly.

—

The friendship happened so slowly neither of you noticed it.

One day he was a volunteer. Then he was Andrew. Then he was somehow part of your routine.

You started saving him coffee if you stopped before work. He always pretended he didn’t expect it. The lie got less convincing every week.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“You say that every time.”

“I mean it every time.”

“You drank half of it before I sat down.”

He paused. “That’s unrelated.”

You laughed.

Andrew looked pleased with himself. Not enough to smile. But close. Very close.

The more time you spent around him, the more you noticed other things too. Not just what he fixed. What he remembered.

Andrew remembered everything.

Which dogs hated thunder. Which ones needed their bowls lifted higher. Which volunteers forgot to latch the side gate. Which brand of creamer you pretended not to care about.

Andrew collected details quietly. And somehow, without meaning to, you started wanting to be one of them.

—

The first time he walked you to your car, you didn’t think much of it.

The shelter closed late. You grabbed your keys. Andrew happened to be heading outside too. The parking lot was mostly empty.

You chatted about a dog adoption event scheduled for the weekend. Normal conversation. Nothing special.

At your car, you unlocked the door. Andrew stopped behind you, hands in his pockets.

“You don’t have to wait.”

“I know.”

“You’re waiting.”

“Yeah.”

You turned, confused. “For what?”

His gaze moved to the empty parking lot, then back to you. “For you to be okay.”

You blinked.

Andrew nodded. Then turned and walked toward his truck.

You stood there staring after him. Nobody had ever made your safety sound so matter-of-fact.

The next week, it happened again. And the week after that. Eventually you realized he wasn’t walking himself to the parking lot. He was walking you.

Not making a big deal out of it. Not asking permission. Not expecting thanks. Just making sure you got there safely. Like he’d decided you mattered.

And once Andrew Cody decided something mattered, he tended to stick with it.

—

The first time you saw him angry, it wasn’t directed at you.

A woman stormed into the shelter carrying a small terrier mix. She was already yelling before she reached the desk. Complaining about the dog. Complaining about the shelter. Complaining about how nobody wanted to help her.

Every answer you gave seemed to make her louder.

You tried to explain the surrender process. Tried to stay polite. Tried to de-escalate. Nothing worked.

The woman leaned across the counter. Voice rising. Finger pointed directly at your face. For a moment you weren’t sure what to do.

Then the room went quiet.

Not because she stopped. Because Andrew had appeared beside you. You hadn’t even seen him walk over. He didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t threaten her. Didn’t posture.

He simply looked at her. And said, very calmly, “You’re done yelling at her.”

The woman froze. The entire room froze. Andrew wasn’t loud. That somehow made it worse.

There was something in his expression. Something absolute. The kind of certainty that made people rethink their decisions.

The woman sputtered another complaint.

Andrew didn’t move. Didn’t blink. “Either surrender the dog respectfully or leave.”

Silence. A long silence. Then the woman sat down. Just like that. The fight drained out of her.

You stared.

Andrew turned back toward you. Asked if you were okay. Then immediately started helping with paperwork as though nothing unusual had happened.

No victory lap. No smugness. No acknowledgment that he’d just shut down a situation everyone else had been struggling with for ten minutes.

That was the first time you started understanding the rumors.

Because there were rumors. You’d heard them in pieces. Whispers from longtime volunteers. Comments that stopped when you walked into a room.

You hadn’t grown up here. Hadn’t lived in the area long enough to know the history everyone else seemed to share. All you knew was that Andrew Cody had a past. People talked about his family in lowered voices. There were stories. Some true. Some exaggerated. Most of them impossible to piece together.

But standing beside him that day, watching an angry stranger back down without another word, you understood why those stories survived.

Not because he was cruel. Not because he was violent. Because there was something undeniably dangerous beneath the surface. Something controlled. Something restrained. Something that chose, every single day, not to be what people expected.

Later that same week, a man arrived looking to surrender a dog.

An elderly lab mix. Gray around the muzzle. Arthritis in both hips.

The owner complained about vet bills the entire intake process. Complained about medication costs. Complained about the dog’s accidents. Complained about how much work he was.

The dog sat quietly beside him. Tail wagging. Still trying to be good.

You saw Andrew standing across the room. Silent. Still. Listening.

The owner finally left. The dog watched the door close behind him. Waited. Waited some more. Then slowly sat down. The room fell quiet. Andrew walked over. Knelt beside the dog. Rested one hand against his neck.

The dog leaned immediately into the contact. Trusting. Hopeful. Heartbroken.

Andrew’s jaw tightened. You saw it. Not the sharp, controlled anger from earlier. Something quieter this time. Older. Grief, maybe. Or recognition.

Then the old lab rested his head in Andrew’s lap. And just like that, the anger disappeared. Gone beneath grief. Beneath tenderness. Beneath something so heartbreakingly gentle it made your throat tighten.

That was the day you started wondering if the world had ever bothered to learn the difference. Between what Andrew was capable of and who he chose to be.

—

The first text arrived on a Sunday.

Your phone buzzed while you were grocery shopping. A picture message. No words. Just an image.

Daisy. Covered in mud. Holding a tennis ball twice the size of her head.

You laughed immediately.

A second message appeared.

Andrew: Found contraband.

You stared at the screen. Then at the grocery store aisle. Then back at the screen.

Before you could stop yourself, you smiled.

You typed back before you could think better of it.

You: Armed and dangerous.

Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.

Then Andrew replied:

Andrew: Very.

You laughed alone in the grocery aisle.

And somehow, without either of you noticing when it happened, Andrew Cody had become someone you were always willing to answer.

—

The texts did not become constant.

They became familiar. That was different. A photo from Andrew every now and then. Daisy muddy. Tank asleep against the fence. The old lab stealing treats with no remorse.

A reply from you. A dry answer from him. Sometimes nothing for hours. Sometimes nothing until the next day, when he’d walk into the shelter and continue the conversation like time had simply paused between you.

It should have been awkward. It wasn’t. By then, you had learned that Andrew did not move through closeness the way other people did.

He did not rush toward it. He circled it. Tested it. Stepped close enough to feel the warmth, then back again before it could burn him.

So you let him. You didn’t chase. You didn’t push. You only stayed steady enough that, eventually, he started trusting the space beside you.

The first time he touched you on purpose, it was barely anything.

You were both in the yard after closing, trying to convince Daisy to come inside. She had decided the patch of dirt beneath the eucalyptus tree belonged to her now and no amount of calling, bribing, or dignity seemed likely to change her mind.

“She’s ignoring us,” you said.

Andrew stood beside you, leash in hand. “She’s ignoring you.”

You looked at him. “She’s ignoring both of us.”

“No.”

“Andrew.”

“She looked at me.”

“She looked at you because you have turkey in your pocket.”

His eyes flicked to yours. “That counts.”

You laughed.

Daisy, unimpressed by your laughter, rolled onto her side in the dirt.

You sighed and stepped forward. “Fine. I’ll get her.”

“She’ll run.”

“She has three legs.”

“She’s fast.”

“She is not faster than me.”

Andrew looked at you for a long second.

Then, dryly, “She might be.”

You turned to glare at him, and your foot slipped in the damp grass. Not badly. Not enough to fall. But enough that his hand closed around your elbow before you could catch yourself.

Quick.

Firm.

Warm.

You froze.

So did he.

His fingers stayed there for one second longer than necessary. Then two.

Daisy barked once from under the tree, like she had opinions about the tension.

Andrew let go first. “Careful,” he said. His voice had gone low.

You looked at the place his hand had been. Then at him.

“I thought I was slower than the dog.”

His mouth twitched. “You are.”

But he didn’t move away. Neither did you. And for the first time, the silence between you felt less like comfort and more like something waiting to happen.

—

After that, touching became dangerous.

Not because either of you did much of it. Because you didn’t. Because every small contact started to matter more than it should.

His shoulder brushing yours in the storage room. Your fingers grazing when you passed him a leash.

His hand at the small of your back once, guiding you around a puddle near the intake gate before he seemed to realize what he’d done and dropped it immediately.

You never called attention to it. Neither did he. But something changed.

Andrew started standing closer. You started letting him.

On slow evenings, after the dogs were fed and the last volunteers had gone home, the two of you sat outside on the bench near the exercise yard.

Not every night. Never planned. It happened naturally, which somehow made it more intimate.

You’d finish locking up. Andrew would still be there, wiping down tools or checking the back gate. You’d sit for a minute because the night air felt good after hours of kennel noise. He’d sit too.

At first with a careful distance between you. Then less. Then none at all.

One night, your knees touched. Neither of you moved. The yard was quiet except for Tank pacing along the fence, ears perked toward the street.

Andrew sat with his elbows on his thighs, hands loose between his knees.

“You okay?” you asked.

He glanced over. “Yeah.”

“You got quiet.”

“I’m always quiet.”

“Quieter.”

He considered that. Then looked back toward the yard.

“Didn’t know if I should move.”

Your heart gave a soft, painful twist. You looked down. Your knee was still pressed against his.

“Do you want to?”

“No.”

The answer came immediately. Too honest to be casual.

Andrew’s jaw tightened after he said it, like he wished he could drag the word back and inspect it before handing it to you.

You kept your voice gentle. “Then don’t.”

He didn’t. 

Andrew looked back toward the yard. Tank had finally settled near the fence. For a long moment neither of you spoke. But the tension didn’t leave.

The two of you sat like that for twenty minutes. Knees touching. Hands separate. Neither of you brave enough to reach further. Neither of you wanting to leave.

—

The first time you went somewhere together that had nothing to do with the shelter, Andrew looked like he expected to be caught doing something wrong.

It was your idea. Technically. The shelter had closed early for fumigation, and you’d both ended up standing beside your cars in broad daylight with nowhere you were required to be.

It felt strange. Seeing him outside the routine. No kennels. No barking. No clipboard. Just Andrew in the parking lot with his keys in his hand and uncertainty written all over him.

You could have said goodnight. He probably expected you to.

Instead you said, “Have you eaten?”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “No.”

“Do you want to?”

“With you?”

The question came out so bluntly that you almost smiled.

You didn’t, because he looked like the answer mattered more than he wanted it to.

“Yes,” you said. “With me.”

Andrew looked toward the road. Then back at you.

“Okay.”

You picked a diner ten minutes away because it was quiet and familiar and unlikely to ask anything from either of you.

Andrew sat across from you in the booth, shoulders tight, hands wrapped around a glass of water he hadn’t touched.

“You don’t have to look so suspicious,” you said.

“I don’t.”

You smiled.

He looked at you then. Really looked. And something in his face shifted. Not a smile. Something softer. Like he was pleased he’d made you do that.

The waitress came by. You ordered first. Andrew ordered second, short and simple.

When she left, he looked relieved.

“You okay?” you asked.

He nodded. Then, after a moment, shook his head.

“I don’t do this much.”

“Eat?”

His mouth twitched. “Go places.”

“With people?”

“Yeah.”

You leaned your arms on the table. “That’s okay.”

He studied you for a long second. “Is it?”

The question had weight under it. Too much weight for pancakes and bad diner coffee.

You answered carefully. “Yes.”

His thumb moved once against the side of the glass.

“I don’t always know what I’m supposed to do.”

“You don’t have to perform dinner correctly, Andrew.”

He looked down. “People notice.”

“People notice a lot of things.”

“I notice when they notice.”

That hurt. Quietly. You imagined him moving through the world collecting every glance, every pause, every shift in tone. Filing them away as proof.

You softened your voice. “I’ll tell you if something matters.”

His eyes lifted. “What?”

“If you say something that hurts me, I’ll tell you. If I need something, I’ll tell you. If I’m uncomfortable, I’ll tell you.”

He stared at you.

You shrugged. “I’m not going to make you guess.”

For a moment, he didn’t speak. Then his shoulders lowered by maybe half an inch. Not much. Enough.

“Okay,” he said.

And this time, okay sounded like relief.

—

Dinner became another thing neither of you named.

Not dating. Not officially. Just sometimes, after late shifts or early closings, you ended up somewhere together. A diner. A taco stand. The beach parking lot with takeout balanced between you on the hood of his truck.

You learned that Andrew ate slowly unless he was nervous. That he hated cilantro but would forget to ask for no cilantro unless you reminded him. That he always sat facing the door. That he noticed exits without seeming to. That he didn’t like crowded places, but tolerated them longer when you sat beside him instead of across from him.

He learned things about you too. How you picked onions off everything but pretended you weren’t picky. How you got quiet when you were tired. How you always said “I’m fine” too quickly when you weren’t. How you hated asking for help but accepted it better if he didn’t make a production out of offering.

The first time his hand found yours, you were sitting in his truck after dinner, watching the ocean move black and silver under the moon.

Neither of you had meant to stay that long. The food was gone. The windows were fogged slightly at the edges. The radio was on low, more static than song. Your hand rested on the seat between you. So did his.

Close enough that you could feel the warmth of him. For a long time, neither of you moved. Then his pinky brushed yours. Accidentally. Maybe.

You turned your hand over. Open. Waiting.

Andrew stared at it.

“You don’t have to,” you said.

“I know.” His voice was rough. 

A moment passed. Then his hand slid into yours. Slowly. Carefully. Like there were rules he didn’t know and he was terrified of breaking them.

His palm was warm. Calloused. His grip loose at first. Testing. When your fingers curled around his, he inhaled quietly. Not sharply. Just enough for you to hear.

You looked over.

His eyes stayed fixed on the windshield.

“You okay?”

He nodded.

Then, after a second, “Yeah.”

You believed him. 

So you looked back at the ocean and let him hold your hand until his grip finally stopped feeling like a question.

—

The first kiss almost happened three weeks before it actually did.

Rain again. Because apparently the universe had a sense of humor.

You had both gotten caught in it while bringing dogs in from the yard, and by the time the last kennel was latched, your shirt clung damply to your skin and Andrew’s hair was wet enough to drip onto the concrete.

You were laughing. He wasn’t. Not exactly. But he was watching you laugh. That had become its own kind of tenderness.

Andrew watched joy like it was something he did not fully understand but wanted to learn.

“You’re soaked,” he said.

“So are you.”

“You should change.”

“I don’t keep spare clothes here.”

He looked away. Then back.

“I have a hoodie in my truck.”

Something about the offer made the air shift. Maybe it was the way he said it. Quiet. Careful. Like he knew a hoodie was not just a hoodie if it came from him.

“Okay,” you said.

He brought it to you without meeting your eyes. Dark gray. Worn soft. Too big. Still warm from the cab of his truck.

You slipped it on in the staff bathroom, then came back out with the sleeves covering half your hands.

Andrew looked at you. Stopped. The expression on his face made your breath catch. Not hunger. Not exactly. Something more vulnerable. Like seeing you in something of his had touched a place in him he had not expected anyone to reach.

“What?” you asked softly.

He shook his head. “Nothing.”

“Andrew.”

His eyes moved to the sleeves. Then to your face.

“It looks…” He stopped.

You waited.

He swallowed. “Good.”

That one word landed harder than it should have. You stepped closer. Not much. Just enough.

His gaze dropped to your mouth. Then lifted quickly, almost guilty.

You could have kissed him then. You wanted to. God, you wanted to. Instead, you touched his wrist. A small mercy. A smaller promise.

“Thank you.”

His fingers flexed once under yours.

“Yeah.”

The kiss waited. Neither of you was ready. Not yet.

—

After the hoodie, something shifted.

Not between you. Inside Andrew.

At first, it was subtle. The sort of thing you could explain away if you wanted to. He left a little sooner after closing. Stopped lingering outside your car. Answered questions with less than before.

Not cold. Never cold. Just measured. And somehow that felt worse.

You spent nearly two weeks convincing yourself it meant nothing. Then one Thursday you found him sitting alone behind the shelter. The sun had already gone down. The exercise yard sat empty. Most of the dogs were asleep.

Andrew sat on an overturned bucket near the fence, staring into the darkness beyond the lot. Not occupied with anything. Just sitting. And that, more than anything, felt wrong.

You approached quietly. “Hey.”

His shoulders tightened before he looked up. “Hey.”

You leaned against the fence beside him. For a while, neither of you spoke. The silence stretched between you. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked once and fell quiet.

Andrew rubbed a thumb along the rim of the bucket.

You watched the motion repeat. “Did I do something?”

His hand stilled. “No.”

“Then what’s going on?”

A muscle jumped in his cheek. He turned toward the field.

You waited.

He let the silence stand. “You should probably stop.”

You blinked. “What?”

He bent forward, forearms resting on his knees. “This.”

Your fingers tightened around the fence wire. “Andrew—”

“You should.” He exhaled through his nose and shook his head once. “You should stop before it gets worse.”

For a moment, the words didn’t land. Then they did. You stared at him. Andrew kept his gaze fixed ahead, jaw locked hard enough to show in the fading light.

“Before what gets worse?”

His tongue pressed briefly against the inside of his cheek. The answer took its time. When it came, it was barely audible.

“Before you start wanting things I can’t give you.”

The fence creaked softly under your grip.

Andrew looked down at the dirt between his boots and dragged the toe of one shoe through it.

Neither of you spoke.

Then he stood. The bucket scraped hard against the ground.

“You don’t know me.”

You looked up at him. “I know you here.”

His mouth twitched. Not a smile. Something worse.

“Yeah.” He nodded toward the shelter. “That’s the problem.”

You frowned. “Why?”

For a moment he didn’t answer. He looked away, toward the kennels, toward the rows of chain-link fencing and concrete runs. Anywhere but at you.

When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter.

“Because this place is easy.”

You waited.

He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “The dogs make sense.” A moment passed. “They need something. You give it to them.” His gaze dropped to the bucket at his feet. “Food. Water. A clean kennel.”

You watched him carefully. “And people?”

A humorless smile touched his mouth. “People aren’t like that.”

The silence stretched between you. You let it. Andrew shifted his weight. Like he was deciding whether to keep talking. Like every word cost him something.

“You see me here,” he said at last. “You see me doing this.” His hand gestured vaguely toward the shelter. “The work. The routine.” His eyes lifted to yours. “You see the version of me that knows what he’s supposed to do.”

You opened your mouth, but he shook his head. Not angry. Just asking you to let him finish. So you did.

“You know what time I show up. You know I bring coffee.” His jaw tightened. “You know I remember things.” He paused. “You know the parts that fit.”

The words hung there. 

You took a slow breath. “And the parts that don’t?”

His expression hardened. “There you go.”

“What?”

“That.” He looked away again. “You hear something bad and immediately start trying to understand it.”

“I am trying to understand it.”

“I know.”

The answer came tired rather than sharp. For the first time, he sounded exhausted. Not angry. Just worn down.

Andrew stared at the ground for a long moment before speaking again.

“You ever meet someone and know exactly what they think you are?”

You blinked. “Sometimes.”

He nodded once. “Most people look at me and decide pretty fast.” His fingers tightened around the bucket handle. “Quiet. Weird. Difficult.”

You didn’t interrupt.

“Sometimes useful.” A bitter edge slipped into his voice. “People like useful.” His gaze dropped. “Useful’s easy.”

You took a step closer. Only one.

“Andrew.”

This time he looked at you. Really looked. And for a second he seemed surprised that you were still standing there listening. A bitter laugh escaped him.

“You know this version. The guy who shows up, does the work, remembers your coffee order.” His eyes met yours. “But you don’t know me.”

“Andrew—”

“No.” His voice sharpened. “You keep acting like if you care enough, you’ll find something worth saving.” He hit a hand against his chest. “What if there isn’t?”

Silence stretched.

“I’ve hurt people.”

Silence.

“Bad.”

His jaw worked.

“Not by accident.”

Another pause.

“Sometimes by accident.”

His eyes squeezed shut.

“I don’t know.”

Your grip tightened on the fence.

“Still looking for the good?” he asked.

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Try to make me afraid of you.”

His eyes flashed. “You should be.” He turned away, then back again. Restless. “You think feeding dogs and fixing things makes me safe?”

“No.”

“You think because I haven’t hurt you yet, I won’t?”

The word hung between you. Ugly. Intentional. A flicker of regret crossed his face before he buried it.

“You should go.”

“No.”

His hands curled at his sides. “Why?”

“Because you’re trying to scare me.”

“I’m telling you the truth.”

“You’re telling me part of it.”

His laugh was harsh. “You don’t want the rest.”

“Then don’t give me the rest. But don’t stand here and pretend cruelty is honesty.”

That stopped him. Briefly.

“I’m not cruel?”

“I said you’re choosing it right now.”

His jaw worked.

You stepped closer. “I think you’re choosing it because it’s easier than letting me choose you.”

Andrew stared at you. His breathing changed. A dog barked inside the shelter.

Then, low and rough he spoke again, “I don’t want you to love me.”

Your heart twisted. “Why?”

“Because I’ll ruin it.” The answer came too fast. “I ruin everything I care about.” He dragged both hands over his neck. Frustrated.

“Take your time,” you said.

“I don’t know how.” The words cracked out of him. He looked at you helplessly. “You. Me. All of it.”

“Okay.”

“It’s not okay.”

“I didn’t say it was.”

He shook his head. “You keep making it not bad.”

“What’s bad?”

“All of it.”

You held his gaze. He wanted fear. Disgust. Something simple. You gave him none of it.

“I’m trying to tell you something,” he said.

“You are.”

“No. That’s the problem.”

His hand pressed against his forehead.

“The thing in my head—it doesn’t come out right.”

“I’m listening.”

His eyes dropped. “I’m not good.” The words were quiet. Simple. “I mean it. There’s something wrong.”

“Andrew—”

“Don’t make it soft.” His voice cracked. “You take everything and make it into something I can live with.”

The anger slipped for a moment. Underneath it was fear. Raw and exposed.

“I don’t know what to do with that.”

You swallowed.

He looked away. “I did everything they wanted. I tried.” His hands opened helplessly. “Useful,” he said finally. “That was the good one.”

Your heart ached.

“I wasn’t easy.”

“You don’t have to be.”

His face tightened. “You say that because you don’t know what it means.”

“Then tell me.”

He hesitated. 

“I get stuck.”

He looked away.

“I miss things. I watch people, try to figure them out, and sometimes I still get it wrong.” His jaw tightened. “That’s not okay.”

“It is with me.”

“You say that now.”

“I mean it now.”

“You’ll get tired.”

“Maybe.”

He froze.

So you kept your voice steady. 

“Maybe some days. People get tired, Andrew. That doesn’t mean they leave.”

His mouth parted slightly. “You don’t know that.”

“I know I’m still here.”

For a second he looked almost young. Lost. Then he stepped back.

“That’s not enough.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t know why you’re still here.”

The words escaped him before he could stop them. You didn’t move.

His face twisted. “I don’t know why.”

“Because I want to be.”

He shook his head. “There are people who don’t do this.”

“What?”

He gestured helplessly between you. “All of it.”

You understood. The anger. The confusion. The sharp edges he couldn’t smooth down.

“There are people who can just be,” he said bitterly. “People who can be loved and not turn it into—” The sentence broke apart. “You should’ve picked somebody else.”

“I didn’t.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want somebody else.”

His eyes snapped to yours. Hope flashed there. Small and terrifying.

“You don’t know.”

“I do.”

His voice cracked. “You like the coffee. The dogs. The hoodie.”

A faint smile touched your mouth. “Yes.”

“That’s not me.”

“It is.”

“It’s not enough.”

“I didn’t say it was everything.”

His eyes were wet now. “You keep finding pieces. Like that makes a whole person.”

“It can.”

He shook his head. “There are other pieces.”

“I know.”

“Bad ones.”

“I know enough to know they’re there.”

For once, he had no answer. You stepped closer. He didn’t move away.

“I’m not asking for every bad thing you’ve ever done. I’m not asking you to explain your whole life so I can decide if you’re worth loving.”

He flinched.

“I already decided.”

Andrew stared at you. His breath shook.

“You can’t.”

“I can.”

“I don’t deserve it.”

“Love isn’t a prize for people who make it through life untouched.”

His brow furrowed.

You swallowed. “You’ve done terrible things.”

Pain crossed his face. You let the truth stand.

“But monsters don’t worry about the damage they leave behind.”

His breathing caught.

“Monsters don’t sit outside kennels because a dog is scared.”

His eyes closed.

“Monsters don’t bring coffee and pretend they didn’t.”

His mouth trembled.

“Monsters don’t stand in front of someone they want and try to protect them from the worst parts of themselves.”

Andrew opened his eyes. They were wet. “I’m not good.”

“I’m not asking you to be perfect.”

“I’m not peaceful.”

“I’m not asking for a life without pain.”

He shook his head, searching for words. Finally, barely above a whisper:

“Would it be enough if I could never give you peace?”

There it was. The real question.

You lifted your hand but stopped short of touching him.

“I think peace is something people build,” you said softly. “Not something one person hands over finished.”

He stared at you.

“I think it’s telling the truth when it’s ugly. Staying when leaving would be easier.”

His throat worked.

“I think it’s this.”

“This isn’t peace.”

“No,” you said. “But it could be the beginning of it.”

For a long moment he didn’t move. Then, slowly, he leaned into your palm. His eyes closed. The breath that left him was unsteady. You stepped closer. His hand caught your wrist. Not to pull you away. To keep you there.

“You’re still scared,” he whispered.

“Yes.”

His eyes opened.

“But I’m not leaving because you’re scared too.”

Something in his face folded. Not dramatically. Just enough to reveal the wound underneath.

“I don’t know what to do.”

“Then don’t do anything yet.”

He swallowed.

“Just stay.”

His fingers tightened around your wrist. Not hard. Enough.

“I can do that.”

The words were rough. Fragile. A promise small enough to carry.

You smiled through the ache in your chest. “Okay.”

The shelter was quiet behind you. Dogs sleeping. The world holding still. Then Andrew glanced at your mouth. Back to your eyes. The question was there. Terrified. Hopeful.

You answered by moving closer. Slowly enough that he could stop you. He didn’t.

The kiss was barely a kiss at first. A brush of mouths. A question. His lips trembled against yours, and your heart broke all over again because even this felt like something he was afraid to want.

You kissed him back. Softly. Clearly. Your hand stayed against his cheek. His hand stayed around your wrist. Then his other hand rose, hesitant, settling at your waist like he was asking permission.

You leaned into him. He made a small, wrecked sound. The sound seemed to surprise him. Like he hadn’t meant to let you hear it. His fingers tightened at your waist. Not possessive. Just desperate. Just real.

The kiss deepened by a fraction. Enough to stop feeling like a question. Enough to feel like an answer.

Andrew’s forehead furrowed as if he was fighting something even now, the instinct to pull away, to apologize, to ruin the moment before it could matter. Instead he stayed. And when your thumb brushed his cheek, he broke. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just a soft exhale against your mouth that sounded painfully close to relief.

His hand left your wrist. For one terrifying second you thought he was retreating. Then he cupped the back of your neck. Careful. Reverent. Like he couldn’t quite believe you were there. The gesture stole your breath. Because Andrew never reached for things he wanted.

He held himself back. Made himself smaller. But not now. Not this time. When he kissed you again, it was still gentle, still uncertain, but there was want in it now. Trust. The beginning of belief. And that felt bigger than passion ever could.

When you pulled back, his forehead rested against yours. His eyes stayed closed. His breath shook. A faint, disbelieving laugh escaped him. Not happy. Not sad. Just overwhelmed.

“You’re still here,” he whispered.

Like he was testing the fact. Like he needed to hear it out loud.

You brushed your nose against his.

“Yeah.”

His eyes opened. Red-rimmed. Vulnerable. And for the first time since you’d met him, he didn’t look away.

You stayed there with him. Not fixing. Not saving. Just holding the moment steady until he could breathe inside it. Nothing was solved. Nothing was erased.

But Andrew Cody, who had spent his whole life being told he was too much and never enough, stood beneath the dim shelter light with your hand against his face and let himself believe, for one impossible second, that maybe love did not have to be earned by becoming someone else.

Maybe it could begin here.

Messy.

Frightened.

Imperfect.

Still chosen.

You texted him when you couldn’t find something. He texted when he was running late. Neither of you had discussed when that started. It just had. A routine forming quietly around the edges of everything neither of you knew how to name. The strangest part was the evenings.

At first, Robby disappeared into his room after work. You understood why. The hospital took pieces out of him some days. Nothing dramatic or visible. Just enough that by the time he got home, he looked like a man whose battery had hit the blinking red line.

Then one night, he wandered into the living room carrying a glass of whiskey and sat in the armchair without explanation. You had been reading. Neither of you said much. An hour later, he finished the drink, said goodnight, and went to bed. The next day, it happened again. And again. Until sitting in the same room became another habit.

Sometimes, he talked. About the elderly patient who finally agreed to use a walker. About a diabetic whose numbers looked better for the first time in months. About a resident who finally got a difficult procedure right after struggling with it for weeks. Little victories most people would never think twice about.

Other nights, he barely said a word. He sat in the chair with his whiskey while you read, watched television, or pretended to understand whatever movie was playing. The silence never felt awkward. Just shared.

You still weren’t entirely sure what that made the two of you. Friends felt wrong. It wasn’t the coffee or the groceries or the dinners. It was the assumption underneath them. The quiet certainty that tomorrow would probably look much the same. Him leaving for work. You being here when he came home. But more than friends felt wrong too.

Neither of you had said anything like that out loud. Neither of you had crossed any lines. You weren’t dating. You weren’t together. You weren’t even sure what pretending would look like. Most days, you weren’t sure what word belonged here.

The father of your child? Technically true.

Except that sounded like somebody you exchanged custody schedules with. Not the man who left coffee beside the machine before work because he knew mornings were rough lately. Not the man who listened to you complain about grocery-store strangers with the same attention he gave trauma reports. Not the man who sat in the living room after impossible shifts because somewhere along the way being alone had stopped feeling preferable.

So maybe there wasn’t a word for it. Maybe that was why it felt so strange. Maybe that was why you kept checking the clock. Because whatever Robby was now, his coming home had quietly become part of your day.

The lock turned.

Your head lifted before you could stop it. A second later, the front door opened and Robby stepped inside, bringing the damp smell of rain and hospital air with him. His helmet hung from one hand. His bag was slung over one shoulder. His jacket was unzipped over rumpled scrubs, and his hair was flattened in the back like he had dragged his hand through it too many times before getting on the bike.

One look was enough. He didn’t have to say anything. You knew. A normal day came through the door talking. Usually with some dry observation about the least catastrophic part of his day. Tonight was not that. His shoulders sat lower than usual. The crease between his brows was faint but familiar now. Not angry. Not frustrated. Tired. The kind that lived deeper than sleep.

He closed the door behind him and stood there for a second, staring at nothing in particular before his eyes finally found you on the couch.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

His gaze lingered briefly, checking. You were starting to realize he always did that. A quick inventory. 

Are you in any pain? 

Need anything? 

Still awake? 

Still here? 

The usual.

Somewhere along the way, his check-ins had stopped feeling like a doctor assessing symptoms and started feeling like someone coming home.

You lifted your phone slightly. “Dinner’s in the microwave.”

Something softened in his expression. Not enough to erase the day. Enough to acknowledge the gesture.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know.”

That earned the smallest hint of a smile.

“Thanks.”

You nodded, but your attention had already dropped back to the phone in your hand.

The notification was still there.

Women’s Health Associates, Appointment Reminder: Wednesday – 10:00 AM Ultrasound Appointment

You stared at it. Then locked the screen. Then unlocked it thirty seconds later. Tomorrow. The word felt heavier than it should have. You were having an ultrasound.

Not the first one. Planned Parenthood in Nevada had done one early on, enough to confirm what the test and your body had already told you. Enough to give you a grainy picture you’d barely been able to look at for more than a few seconds at a time.

This one was different. It was mostly for the new doctor. Baseline measurements. Dating. Making sure the records started somewhere solid now that you were transferring care. Practical. Routine. Except now Robby was here.

Now he was ten feet away, exhausted from a bad shift, with dinner waiting in the microwave and no idea you were sitting on his couch trying to decide whether to ask him to come. And somehow, telling him about it felt less like sharing information and more like giving him a place beside you. It should have made you feel safer. Mostly, it made everything feel harder to pretend away.

Robby shifted near the door, and you looked up again. He was still watching you. Not obviously. Not in a way that demanded anything from you. Just enough to tell you he had noticed your attention kept falling back to your phone.

“You okay?” he asked.

You closed your fingers around it. “Yeah.”

He did not look like he believed you. He also did not push.

Another thing you were learning about him. Robby brought bad days home with him. He just didn’t open them where anyone else could see. You could feel them anyway. In his face. In the set of his shoulders. In the quiet that entered the room before he said a word.

Mostly, he locked it down. He didn’t unload it onto whoever happened to be nearby or spend hours dragging every terrible thing back into the light. He just carried it until it changed the air around him. You were still learning how to tell the difference between wanting to be left alone and not wanting to be alone.

He rubbed one hand over the back of his neck and glanced toward the hallway.

“I’m gonna shower.”

“Probably for the best.”

His eyebrows lifted slightly.

“You smell like hospital,” you added.

He glanced down at himself, then back at you. “That bad?”

“You’re not a biohazard, but you are giving strong antiseptic-and-regret energy.”

This time, he almost smiled. Almost. “Fair.”

He set his helmet on the small table by the door, dropped his bag beside it, and headed down the hall. A minute later, the shower turned on.

You looked back at your phone. The appointment reminder still waited on the screen. You chewed lightly on the inside of your cheek. Maybe you’d bring it up after he ate dinner. Maybe when the movie ended. Maybe tomorrow morning.

The fact that you were strategizing a simple conversation like it required a full operational briefing probably wasn’t a great sign. Neither was the fact that part of you already knew you wanted him there. You just had not figured out how to say it yet. 

The shower shut off. You looked toward the hallway before you could stop yourself. A few seconds later, cabinets opened in the kitchen. The microwave beeped. A fork scraped lightly against a plate. Small sounds. Familiar sounds. The kind you were starting to recognize without meaning to.

When Robby came back into the living room, his hair was still damp, his T-shirt clinging slightly at the collar. He carried the plate you had left him in one hand and a bottle of beer in the other. He paused at the edge of the couch, just long enough to ask without asking.

You shifted your legs under the blanket, making room. “You can sit.”

His mouth moved faintly. “Good to know.”

“Don’t get sentimental.”

“I’ll try to control myself.”

He sat beside you, not close enough to touch, but closer than he would have two weeks ago. The couch dipped under his weight. The movie kept playing, ignored by both of you.

For a while, he ate in silence. You tried not to watch him too obviously. He was quieter than usual. Even for a bad day. His fork moved slowly. His eyes stayed on the television without following any of it. Every so often, his jaw shifted like he was holding a thought in place with his teeth.

You waited until he set the plate down on the coffee table.

“Bad?”

His eyes flicked toward you. He understood you weren’t asking about the shift. Not really. He seemed to understand that, because he didn’t answer right away.

Then he leaned back against the couch and let out a slow breath through his nose.

“Yeah,” he said. Simple. Flat. Honest.

Your fingers tightened once in the blanket.

He looked back at the television. “Just one of those days.”

You nodded. No questions. No digging. No careful attempt to pull the story out of him and make it smaller. You were learning that pushing Robby rarely opened anything. Usually, it only made him seal the door tighter. So you let it go. 

The movie filled the space between you badly. Someone on-screen shouted a name into the rain. Neither of you reacted. After a minute, you looked down at your phone again. Locked. Unlocked. The appointment reminder waited there like it had patience.

You swallowed once. “Are you working tomorrow?”

Robby’s attention shifted to you. “No.”

You kept your eyes on the screen. “No?”

“I’m off.”

“Rare.”

“Try not to sound too impressed.”

“I’m overwhelmed.”

That earned the smallest breath of amusement from him.

He picked up his beer, then set it down without drinking. “I was probably going to stop by Duke’s for a bit.”

“The shop?”

“Yeah. Bike needs looking at.”

You glanced over. “That’s usually what people say right before they spend a thousand dollars.”

“Hopefully I’m lucky and it’s something cheap.”

You snorted softly. “That is not how bikes work.”

Robby looked over. “You suddenly an expert?”

“No,” you said, too quickly. “I just know ‘something cheap’ usually means ‘I haven’t found the expensive part yet.’”

His eyes stayed on you for half a second longer.

“What kind of sound?” you asked.

His brow lifted. “What?”

“The bike,” you said, nodding toward him. “What kind of sound is it making?”

For the first time since he’d come home, his attention sharpened for a reason that had nothing to do with the hospital.

“A rattle,” he said.

“When?”

He blinked. “When?”

“Cold start? Idle? When you throttle? Under load?”

Robby stared at you.

You stared back. “What?”

“You know what under load means?”

“Michael.”

“No, seriously.”

You looked back at the television. “If it rattles cold and settles once it warms up, check the cam chain tensioner.”

The room went quiet. Not the heavy kind this time. The surprised kind.

Robby slowly set his fork down. “You know what a cam chain tensioner is.”

“I know lots of things.”

“No normal person knows that.”

“Maybe I’m secretly fascinating.”

“I already knew that,” he said, then seemed to realize he’d said it.

Your eyes flicked toward him. His jaw shifted once.

You looked away first. “My dad rides.”

“Rides?”

“A lot.”

His expression changed slightly. Not teasing now. Careful. “How much is a lot?”

You adjusted the blanket over your legs. “Enough that I spent half my childhood holding flashlights and being told I was pointing them wrong.”

That got a quiet laugh out of him. “Universal childhood experience.”

“Yeah, well, most kids weren’t learning the difference between primary chain noise and valve train tick before they learned long division.”

Robby’s eyes stayed on you long enough that you felt yourself trying to make the story smaller.

“He tried to teach me to ride when I was six.”

“Six?”

“Dad of the year. My feet didn’t even reach anything. Obviously, it was a very professional operation.”

“Obviously.”

“My grandma chased him with a broom. Called him every name in the book.” You smiled despite yourself. “He laughed the whole time.”

The memory settled over you before you could shove it back. Hot pavement outside an open garage bay. Bikes lined up in crooked rows, chrome flashing under the sun, engines ticking as they cooled. Men in worn leather vests and oil-stained jeans stood around with paper coffee cups, cigarette smoke, and too many opinions. 

Someone laughed loudly near a toolbox. Someone else was already arguing about the right way to fix a problem that had probably been solved twenty minutes ago. Your dad crouched beside a bike with grease on his hands, grinning like trouble was a language he spoke fluently. You loved that part. You didn’t always like admitting it. 

There had been something satisfying about the noise and the order hidden underneath it. About listening closely enough to tell the difference between a healthy engine and one begging for attention. About watching your dad take something rough and stubborn and coax it back into smoothness with patience, profanity, and the absolute confidence of a man who believed every machine owed him an explanation.

You used to like riding too. Not the reckless parts. Not the stupid parts. Not the nights when the whole crowd rolled out together and your grandmother watched from the porch with her mouth pressed into a thin line.

But the quieter parts. The hum under your ribs. The wind pulling the world open around you. The feeling of everything narrowing to road, sound, balance.

You glanced down at your stomach and let out a small, dry laugh. “Obviously not doing that anytime soon.”

“No,” Robby said, a little too fast.

You looked over.

He exhaled. “That was a doctor answer.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I have a license. I feel obligated to use it.”

“Even off the clock?”

“Especially off the clock. Nobody can stop me.”

His mouth twitched when you laughed.

Robby picked his fork back up, but he didn’t interrupt. Just kept eating slowly, like he had nowhere else to be and nothing better to do than listen to whatever pieces of yourself you were accidentally handing over.

That made the joke fade a little.

“My dad had friends,” you said. The words came out lighter than they felt. “Bike friends.”

Robby’s gaze lifted.

“He had a very committed group of biker friends,” you said lightly.

Robby took a sip of his beer. “Biker friends?”

“They had matching jackets and everything.” Your mouth pulled into a small smile before you could stop it. “Very organized. Charity rides during the day, questionable decisions after dark.”

Robby looked over. “Questionable decisions?”

“I’m being generous.”

“That bad?”

“I said questionable, not the kind of story that starts with, ‘Allegedly.’”

His mouth twitched.

You almost smiled too, but it faded before it fully formed. “Sometimes both.”

The room quieted. Robby didn’t make you explain. He just nodded once, slow and understanding.

“Duke was part of a biker club. He’s told me a story or two,” he said.

You looked at him. “Then you get it.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I get it.”

You looked back at the television. “My grandmother actually liked most of his friends.”

Robby glanced over. “Most?”

“She said they were perfectly nice right up until they all got together.” A smile tugged at your mouth. “Then suddenly everybody started having terrible ideas.”

“Group effort.”

“Exactly.”

He took another bite of dinner. “And your dad?”

A laugh escaped before you could stop it. “Usually the one suggesting them.”

That earned a real laugh. Not a polite one. A genuine one.

“That sounds suspiciously specific.”

“Because it is.” You shook your head. “My grandmother used to swear there was a direct correlation between the number of motorcycles in the driveway and the likelihood somebody was about to make a terrible life choice.”

“Solid research.”

“Peer reviewed.”

“Naturally.”

The smile lingered a second longer this time. “She loved him, though.” The words came quieter. Easier somehow now that you weren’t looking at him. “Drove her absolutely insane. But she loved him.”

Robby nodded, not because he knew your grandmother, but because he understood loving somebody who wasn’t easy.

You looked down at the blanket gathered in your lap. “He really was a good dad. Not perfect.” A short laugh escaped you. “Obviously.”

Robby smiled faintly.

“But he never missed birthdays. Never forgot Christmas. Never made me wonder if he loved me.” Your throat tightened unexpectedly. “A lot of things in his life were a mess. His temper. His choices. The people he scared when he decided they weren’t his people.” You shrugged. “But me? That wasn’t one of them.”

The room settled around the confession. Robby nodded once, quiet and certain.

“My dad would’ve liked your bike,” you said after a moment, trying to pull the conversation back into safer territory.

Robby glanced over. “Yeah?”

“Oh, absolutely. She’s a pretty thing. He would’ve pretended not to. Walked around it twice, made some deeply insulting comment, then asked for the keys.”

“That does sound like a healthy level of respect.”

“Very traditional.”

His mouth twitched. “Would he have diagnosed it?”

“Immediately. Then he would’ve been unbearable about it.”

“Naturally.”

“That was kind of his brand.”

Robby looked down at his plate, the faintest smile still there. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You should. He’ll judge your maintenance.”

“Good to know I have supervision.”

You smiled, smaller this time, then let the blanket slide between your fingers. For a few seconds, neither of you said anything. The movie kept going. The rain kept tapping against the glass.

Then Robby said, quiet and almost casual, “I’d like to meet him someday.”

You looked over before you could stop yourself. He was still looking at his plate, like the comment hadn’t cost him anything. Like it was simple. Like meeting your father was a normal thing to want.

It should have made you nervous. Maybe it did. But underneath that, something in your chest softened. Because you had just handed him one of the messier pieces of your life, and he hadn’t stepped back from it. Hadn’t made your father smaller. Hadn’t made you explain why you still loved him. He just wanted to know him.

“You say that now,” you said.

Robby’s mouth shifted faintly. “That bad?”

“He once inspected a bike so silently the owner apologized.”

“For what?”

“Existing near him, I think.”

A small laugh slipped out before you could stop it. And somehow, after giving him a piece of your past you hadn’t meant to hand over, the next part felt a little easier. Not easy. Just possible.

You looked down at your phone again. The reminder waited there. Wednesday. Ten o’clock. Ultrasound. Your stomach tightened, but not as sharply this time.

“Michael?”

He looked over.

You kept your eyes on the phone. “I called that OB you recommended.”

His attention shifted immediately. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just completely.

“Yeah?”

“They got me in tomorrow.”

Robby’s fork stilled near his plate. “Tomorrow?”

“Ten.”

He nodded once, carefully. “Okay. That’s good.”

You turned the phone over in your hands, then back again. “She wants to do another ultrasound.”

His expression changed. Barely. But you saw it.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” you said quickly. Too quickly. “Yeah, it’s routine. Since I’m transferring care, she wants her own measurements and scans and all that. Dating. Records. Making sure everything lines up.”

“Okay.”

“It’s mostly for the new doctor,” you added. “Planned Parenthood already did one early on. You saw that one.”

“I remember.”

His voice was quiet enough that something in your chest pulled tight.

You looked down at the phone again. Your thumb rubbed nervously along the edge of the case. This was the part. Not telling him. That was information. This was asking.

“You can come,” you said quickly. “If you want. I mean, you obviously don’t have to. It’s your day off, and you said you were going to Duke’s, and it’s mostly routine anyway. It’s not some huge dramatic first ultrasound moment or anything. They just want their own scan because I’m switching doctors, and I didn’t want you to think I was making it a thing, because I’m not. I mean, it is a thing, obviously, because there’s a baby, but it’s not—”

“Hey.”

Your mouth closed.

Robby was looking at you now, careful and quiet, one hand still wrapped loosely around his fork.

“Breathe,” he said softly.

Heat rushed into your face. “Right.”

You looked back at your phone. “I just didn’t want you to feel obligated.” The words came out smaller than everything before.

Robby’s expression shifted. Not hurt. Not exactly. Something quieter than that.

“I know.”

For a second, neither of you said anything.

Then he asked, voice low, “Do you want me there?”

Your fingers tightened around the phone. That was the question, wasn’t it? Not whether he could come. Not whether he had a right to know. Whether you wanted him beside you.

You swallowed. “Yeah,” you admitted. “I think I do.”

Robby looked down for half a second, jaw shifting once like he was trying not to let too much show. 

Then he nodded. “Then I’m coming.”

Simple. Immediate. Like there had never been another answer.

Something loosened in your chest so suddenly it almost hurt.

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

The movie kept playing.

Neither of you watched it anymore. 

—

Something had changed on the couch the night before. Not enough to name. Not enough to touch. But enough that when Robby woke up the next morning, the house felt a little less unfamiliar than it had before.

At 8:03, he knocked softly against her bedroom door.

“You awake?”

His voice came out low. Careful. Like he wasn’t entirely sure what the rules were now either.

Silence from inside.

Then her voice, still rough with sleep.

“Unfortunately.”

Robby’s mouth twitched.

“You need coffee?”

Another stretch of silence.

“Maybe.”

Robby stood on the other side of the door with one hand still raised near the frame. He had already made the coffee.

The smell of it still lingered through the house along with butter warming in the pan and the faint sweetness of cinnamon. He’d gone to the grocery store the night before after she’d gone to bed, because somewhere between ultrasound and I think I do want you there, his brain had apparently decided French toast was a reasonable response.

He stared at the door another second anyway. She was awake. She was still there. That thought had started happening before he could stop it. Not in words at first. More like instinct. A glance toward the her room—no, guest room—when he woke up. Relief when he heard cabinets opening in the kitchen. The automatic habit of checking whether her shoes were still by the door before leaving for work. Still here.

He lowered his hand from the frame.

“I made breakfast,” he said instead.

“What kind?”

“Depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“It depends on whether you’re pretending to hate French toast this morning.”

Silence. Then, through the door, “I have never pretended to hate French toast.”

“Good. Because I already committed.”

A soft laugh came from inside the room. Small. Sleep-roughened. It did something unfortunate to his chest.

Robby leaned back against the hallway wall for a second, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. The appointment wasn’t until ten. He had been awake since six anyway.

He had checked the time three times. Not because they were late. They were aggressively not late. He had just apparently become the kind of man who made French toast at eight in the morning and knew exactly how long it took to get to an OB appointment with traffic. Which was fine. Normal. Fine.

Robby went back into the kitchen mostly so he had something to do with his hands. The French toast was already done. The coffee was already done. He had run out of practical tasks twenty minutes ago. Which was unfortunate timing.

He leaned against the counter and stared into his coffee for a second. Ultrasound. The word still did something strange to his chest. Not panic. Not exactly. Just pressure.

Like his brain had not fully caught up to the fact that this was real enough now to have appointments and doctors and blurry black-and-white pictures taped to refrigerators someday.

He exhaled slowly and stared into his coffee. The first ultrasound had happened in the middle of chaos. Shock. Paperwork. Vegas hanging over both of them like a bad decision neither of them knew what to do with. He remembered looking at the photo in her hand and feeling the floor tilt beneath him.

This one felt different. Quieter. Worse, somehow. Because now there was routine wrapped around it. Coffee mugs in the sink. Her blanket on the couch. Dinner in the microwave waiting for him after shifts. Her toothbrush beside his.

Things that made it dangerously easy to picture more. Things he had no business picturing yet. Things he pictured anyway. Robby had wanted this. That was the ugly part. The dangerous part.

The part he never said out loud because wanting made people stupid, and he had spent too many years being practical to start being stupid now.

He had wanted a kitchen that smelled like coffee and breakfast. Someone half-asleep at the counter. Someone to ask if they were nervous before an appointment. A life that didn’t end at his front door every night with silence and takeout containers.

He had wanted it for years. Longer than he cared to admit. When he was younger, before life had gotten sharp around the edges, the dream had been simple enough to embarrass him now.

Two kids. A house near a pond. A woman who loved him enough to stay. That was it. Not impressive. Not complicated. Not some grand ambition. Just a life. The kind other people seemed to stumble into without realizing they had been handed something holy.

Robby had stopped saying it out loud somewhere along the way. Then he had stopped thinking about it. Or he had tried to. Because at some point, wanting started to feel less like hope and more like setting himself up for disappointment. Now the dream felt impossible and close enough to touch at the same time. That was the problem. Because he didn’t know what she wanted. 

He knew what she needed right now. Safety. Insurance. A stable doctor. A room with a bed that belonged to her. Breakfast before appointments. Someone who would show up when asked. But need was not the same thing as wanting. And as far as Robby knew, she had never planned on staying.

Not after the baby came. Not after the dust settled. Not once she figured out what her life was supposed to look like without Vegas, without panic, without him as the emergency option.

Maybe she would want to go back. Back to her own life. Back to something that had existed before he had the nerve to imagine himself inside it. The thought sat under his ribs, sharp and quiet. Because he had no idea how to change her mind. Worse, he didn’t know if he had the right to try.

The bedroom door opened down the hall. Robby looked up before he could stop himself. She wandered into the kitchen slowly, still heavy with sleep, hair twisted up lazily like she had only halfway committed to getting ready for the day. One of his old T-shirts hung loose over leggings, the fabric shifting softly around the small curve of her stomach as she walked.

Not big yet. Still enough to change the shape of her.

Her hand rested there absently for a second before dropping again. Robby’s chest tightened so fast it almost annoyed him. Because she looked comfortable here. Not settled. Not permanent. He knew better than to let himself believe that. But comfortable enough to move through his kitchen half-asleep, reaching for the coffee mug he’d set out like she was starting to know where mornings lived in this house.

The kitchen smelled like cinnamon and coffee and butter warming in the pan. Morning light spilled through the windows over the sink, soft against the countertops, against her face, against the quiet way she moved through the room like she had already learned its rhythms.

Home.

The thought landed hard enough that he had to look back at the stove before his face betrayed him.

She stopped beside the island and blinked slowly at the counter.

“You actually cooked.”

Robby glanced over. “I can cook.”

“I know. I just didn’t expect…” She trailed off, smiling a little to herself.

“Didn’t expect what?”

Her fingers curled loosely around the coffee mug.

“I don’t know.” Her voice softened. “This.”

The kitchen. The breakfast. Him standing at the stove in sweatpants looking half nervous and half determined to pretend he wasn’t. Home, some dangerous part of him thought immediately.

The realization hit hard enough that he had to look back at the stove. Because this was exactly the kind of thing he had spent years convincing himself he was too old, too tired, too late for. And somehow she had walked into his house and made it feel possible again without even trying.

He picked up the plate and set it carefully in front of her. Ridiculously careful. Like French toast required precision.

She noticed. 

“You’re acting weird.”

“I’m always weird.”

“No. This is… specific.”

Robby leaned against the counter and crossed his arms loosely.

“Maybe I just want today to go okay.”

Her expression softened instantly.

“Don’t worry,” she said quietly. “It will.”

The confidence in her voice sounded fragile around the edges. Like she was trying to convince herself too.

Robby swallowed once and nodded. “Okay.” It came out softer than he intended.

She smiled at him over the rim of her coffee mug. Sleepy. Nervous. Warm in the morning light. The thought surfaced again, unhelpfully. Temporary, he reminded himself.

Robby reached for the syrup before the thought could get worse. 

She watched him move around the kitchen for a second before smiling faintly down at the plate. “You even made it look nice.”

“That was accidental.”

“Mm.” She didn’t sound convinced.

He set the syrup beside her and leaned back against the counter with his coffee.

“Eat,” he said gently.

Her eyes lifted to his for a second before she nodded.

“Yes, doctor.”

The quiet that settled afterward felt warm around the edges.

She took another bite, then glanced up at him carefully.

“You know you don’t have to look this stressed about it.”

“I don’t look stressed.”

“Michael.”

“Okay,” he admitted, “maybe a little stressed.”

“It’s just an ultrasound.”

“You say that like there isn’t an entire tiny human involved.”

Her expression changed at that. Softer. Quieter. Like hearing him say tiny human did something to her too.

She looked down at her plate. “Tiny human,” she repeated softly.

Robby’s mouth moved like he might take it back. He didn’t.

“Yeah,” he said. “Tiny human.”

The kitchen went quiet again. Not uncomfortable. Just careful.

She set her fork down and rested one hand lightly against her stomach, almost without meaning to.

Robby noticed. His gaze dropped for half a second, then lifted again quickly, because the last thing he wanted was to make her feel watched.

She smiled faintly. “You’re doing the doctor face again.”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

He looked down into his coffee. “Different face.”

“Oh?”

The answer left his mouth before he could stop it. “Father face.”

The words landed between them. Soft. Awkward. Too honest. Robby froze like he hadn’t meant to say them out loud.

She stared at him. For a second, he thought he had ruined it. Then her expression softened.

“Okay,” she said quietly.

His chest tightened. “Okay?”

The corner of her mouth lifted. “But maybe save the father face for the appointment.”

A laugh escaped him before he could stop it. Small. Relieved. Real.

The tension eased after that. Not completely. Just enough for breakfast to finish without either of them saying anything else that might change the shape of the morning.

By the time the plates were empty, the appointment had started creeping back into the room. Neither of them mentioned it. The clock did enough of that on its own.

Robby loaded the dishwasher while she rinsed mugs at the sink. A normal chore. A normal morning. The kind people did every day. The fact that it felt so normal was probably the problem. When the last dish disappeared into the dishwasher, she dried her hands on a towel and glanced toward the clock.

9:02.

Her shoulders shifted slightly. Robby noticed. His eyes flicked toward the clock too. Then away. Then back again.

“You’ve looked at that thing six times,” she said.

“I have not.”

Her mouth curved faintly. “You absolutely have.”

“Five.”

She rolled her eyes.

The corner of his mouth twitched. Neither of them moved.

Then she pushed away from the counter. “I should probably get dressed.”

Robby nodded once. “Probably.”

She took three steps toward the hallway before stopping. Turning back. “Michael?”

“Yeah?”

Her fingers twisted together briefly. Just once. “I’m glad you’re coming.”

Robby went still. Not dramatically. Just enough. His gaze lifted to hers.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. Then, because he couldn’t help himself, “Me too.”

Something crossed her face. Soft. Scared. Almost gone before he could name it.

Then she pointed at him. “Don’t make this weird.”

His laugh followed her down the hallway. Then the house went quiet again. Robby stood in the kitchen for a second longer, one hand braced against the counter, listening to the soft sounds of her moving around in the guest room.

A drawer opened. A closet door shifted. The old floorboards creaked beneath her feet. Normal sounds. Temporary sounds, he reminded himself.

He looked down at the mug she had left beside the sink. Then at the hallway. Then back at the clock.

9:06.

Plenty of time, which somehow made it worse.

Robby pushed away from the counter and headed for his own room to change, telling himself he was not the kind of man who cared what shirt he wore to an ultrasound appointment. Five minutes later, standing in front of his closet, he realized that was apparently a lie.

He had rejected one T-shirt for looking too much like sleepwear. Then a button-down for looking like he was trying too hard. Now he was holding a plain dark shirt and wondering when clothing had become complicated.

“It’s an ultrasound,” he muttered. 

The shirt remained unhelpful.

Robby pulled it on anyway. By the time he stepped back into the hallway, her bedroom door had opened again. He heard her footsteps pause near the entryway mirror.

Then she came into view, smoothing the front of her sweater with one hand, her bag already hooked over her shoulder. Her hair was neater now, though a few loose strands had escaped around her face.

She looked like herself. Nervous. Still a little sleepy. Standing in his hallway before a doctor’s appointment she had asked him to come to. 

Dangerous, his brain supplied. Because he was starting to like that far too much.

She caught him looking. “What?”

Robby glanced down at his keys. “Nothing.”

“That was definitely a something.”

“I changed my shirt three times for a doctor’s appointment.”

She blinked. “Three?”

“We’re not discussing it.”

A laugh escaped her before she could stop it. “Oh my God.”

Her mouth twitched, but the nerves were still there. He could see them in the way she adjusted the strap of her bag twice.

“You ready?” he asked.

“Define ready.”

“Shoes on. Purse. Phone. Willingness to enter a medical building.”

“Three out of four.”

“Good enough.”

That got a small laugh out of her.

Robby opened the door, then paused. “Do you want me to drive?”

She looked at him. The question hung there, gentle and practical. Not because she couldn’t. Because he was offering one less thing for her to carry.

After a second, she nodded. “Yeah,” she said quietly. “If you don’t mind.”

He shook his head. “I don’t.”

And somehow, when she handed him the keys, it felt like more than driving.

Robby closed his fingers around them before he could examine that thought too closely.

The morning air was cool when they stepped outside. The driveway still glistened from the rain.

She started toward the truck while he locked the front door behind them. By the time he caught up, she was reaching for the passenger handle. Robby stepped around her automatically and pulled the door open first.

She stopped. So did he. For half a second, they just looked at each other.

“Sorry,” he said immediately.

Her eyebrows lifted. “For opening a door?”

“It was a reflex.”

The corner of her mouth twitched. “What a monster.”

“I know.”

“Someone should probably stop you.”

“Probably.”

She shook her head and climbed into the truck.

Robby shut the door gently behind her. Then stood there for a second longer than necessary. Because somewhere between Vegas and now, little things had started mattering. And that was becoming a problem.

The drive took twenty minutes. Twenty minutes Robby had made a thousand times before. He knew every turn. Every traffic light. Every shortcut.

Usually, he drove toward the hospital thinking about patients. Charts. Residents. Coffee. Today, he spent most of the drive trying not to think about the fact that there was a baby waiting at the end of it.

Beside him, she stared out the window. Quiet. Her fingers twisted once around the strap of her bag. Then stopped. Nervous. He recognized it immediately. Because he wasn’t exactly calm himself. The hospital came into view. And for the first time in years, walking into Pittsburgh Trauma didn’t feel routine. Usually, the hospital put him on autopilot. Badge. Waiting room. Coffee. Floor.

Today, he found himself checking whether she was keeping up. Which was ridiculous. She was walking directly beside him. Still, every few steps, his attention drifted back anyway. Not because she needed help. Just because she was here. Beside him. At his hospital. For his baby.

That familiarity usually made him comfortable. Today, it mostly made him aware of where they were going. Women’s Health. Ultrasound. Baby.

Beside him, she adjusted the strap of her bag again. Nervous. Somehow reassuring. At least one of them was behaving normally.

They rode the elevator up in silence. Not awkward silence. Elevator silence. The kind everyone fell into when trapped in a metal box with strangers. A woman carrying a toddler got off on the third floor. An older man with a cane got on. The doors opened and closed. 

The hospital moved around them in its usual rhythm, which made it stranger when the Women’s Health waiting room appeared around the corner and his stomach immediately tightened.

A receptionist looked up from behind the desk.

“Good morning.”

She stepped forward before he could. Which was probably better for everyone involved. He had already caught himself reaching for her paperwork twice in the parking garage.

She handled the check-in while he stood beside her pretending not to notice that he was suddenly very interested in a framed poster about prenatal nutrition.

A few minutes later they were sitting side by side in the waiting room. Not touching. Not talking much. Just waiting. Across from them, a couple flipped through a baby name book. Somebody’s phone played a lullaby from across the room trying to soothe their baby. A nurse appeared in the doorway and called another patient’s name. The room settled again.

Robby looked over. She was staring at a spot on the floor. Thinking. Worrying. Probably both.

“Hey.”

Her eyes lifted. “Yeah?”

“You okay?”

She exhaled through her nose. “Ask me again in an hour.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “Fair.”

For a while, neither of them spoke. Somehow, sitting beside her made all of it feel different. The appointment sat only a few doors away now. No longer tomorrow. No longer later. Just waiting.

The waiting room door opened. A nurse stepped out with a tablet in one hand, glanced down at the screen, then looked up.

“Robinavitch?”

Robby’s chest tightened before he could stop it. Strange. Almost nobody called him Robinavitch. 

He was Robby. To patients. To nurses. To friends. Hell, half the hospital probably wasn’t entirely sure Robinavitch was his actual last name. Usually when he heard it, it meant paperwork. Administration. Somebody looking for a signature. Something official.

Beside him, she looked up too.

Robinavitch.

Her name now. Technically. Legally. Temporarily, he reminded himself. Except it didn’t sound temporary coming from someone else’s mouth. It sounded real. Like the world had decided what they were before either of them had figured it out themselves.

The nurse glanced between them.

“Robinavitch?”

She stood first. “That’s us.”

Us.

The word shouldn’t have done anything. Casual. Harmless. Meant to answer a nurse’s question and nothing more. Instead it landed somewhere behind his ribs and stayed there. Because first it had been the house. Then breakfast. Then the drive. Then walking through the hospital together. And now a waiting room full of strangers hearing a name neither of them quite knew what to do with.

Robby stood a second after her. The roller coaster had officially left the station.

The nurse smiled politely, either not noticing or choosing not to.

“This way.”

Robby stepped beside her as they followed the nurse through the door. The hallway beyond was quiet. That was the first thing that threw him. Not hospital quiet. Outpatient quiet. No alarms. No trauma pagers. No shouted orders. No wheels rattling too fast over tile.

Just muted voices behind closed doors, posters about prenatal vitamins, and the soft click of the nurse’s shoes ahead of them.

Robby knew the ER. He knew the route from ambulance bay to trauma room half-asleep. This side of the hospital was different. Not foreign exactly. Just not his. Not in the way the ER was his. And this was her first time here with this office. Her first visit with the new doctor. Her first step into the version of care he had helped point her toward. That realization made him keep his hands in his pockets.

The nurse glanced over her shoulder. “Any changes since you scheduled?”

She answered before Robby could even think about helping.

“No. Everything’s the same.”

Robby kept his hands in his pockets. Better. Because every instinct he had was already leaning too far forward. She didn’t need him to take control. She just needed him here.

The nurse pushed open the exam room door.

“You can go ahead in. The sonographer will be with you in a few minutes.”

She stepped inside first. Robby followed. The room was smaller than he expected. Not cramped. Just close. The exam table sat against one wall, covered in fresh white paper. Cabinets lined the other. A large monitor screen hung opposite the bed, dark and waiting.

Robby’s eyes immediately landed on it and stayed there.

“Well.”

She glanced over. “What?”

He pointed at the screen.

“I see where the hospital budget went.”

Her eyes followed his. The corner of her mouth twitched. “The monitor?”

“That thing is bigger than the TV at the house.”

“That seems like a very specific complaint.”

“It is.”

She shook her head.

Robby nodded toward the screen.

“Meanwhile, there’s a supply cart downstairs that only turns left.”

A small laugh escaped her. It wasn’t much. But he’d take it.

The paper crinkled softly as she sat on the edge of the table. Robby looked away before his brain could do anything stupid like offer a hand she didn’t need.

Instead he dropped into the chair beside the wall. Not too close. Not too far. Close enough that if she wanted him there, he was there.

The room settled around them. Quiet. The kind of quiet that made every thought louder.

His gaze drifted back to the screen. Still dark. Still waiting. Because the second that screen turned on, this stopped being an appointment. It became a baby. Her baby. His baby. Their baby. The thought hit harder than he expected.

He cleared his throat.

“So,” he said, because apparently silence was no longer an option, “what are we hoping for today?”

She looked over. “A healthy baby?”

“Good answer.”

“I feel like there was a right answer and I missed it.”

“There wasn’t.”

Her smile softened. “Then healthy baby.”

Robby nodded once. Healthy baby. Simple enough. The problem was that his chest had already moved several steps beyond simple. And judging by the way his eyes kept drifting back to the dark screen, it wasn’t slowing down anytime soon.

The room settled into silence again. Not awkward. Just waiting. Somewhere down the hall, a door opened and closed. Voices drifted briefly through the wall before fading again. The hospital carried on around them. Appointments. Lab work. Routine. Ordinary.

Robby had spent years watching people walk into rooms like this. Nervous. Excited. Terrified. Sometimes all three at once. Then they came back out carrying grainy black-and-white photos like they had been handed proof of magic. He understood it in theory. He wasn’t sure he understood it in practice.

Beside him, she adjusted the hem of her sweater. A small movement. Restless. His eyes dropped automatically. Seventeen weeks. Still early enough that most people probably wouldn’t notice. Early enough that she could still hide it beneath loose clothes if she wanted. Not that she had been trying lately.

His throat tightened unexpectedly. Because there was a baby in there. An actual baby. Not paperwork. Not a Vegas mistake. Not an abstract future problem for Responsible Future Robby to figure out. A baby. Their baby.

The exam room door opened before his brain could make the situation worse. A woman in navy scrubs stepped inside carrying a tablet. Smiling.

“Good morning.”

Robby immediately sat up straighter. The sonographer looked between them and smiled.

“I’m Melissa. How are we doing today?”

Robby opened his mouth. Then immediately closed it. Because the question wasn’t for him. 

Beside him, she let out a breath. “Nervous.”

Melissa laughed softly. “Good. That means you’re normal.”

Robby glanced toward the giant screen. Melissa followed his gaze, amusement softening her face.

“First ultrasound together?” Melissa asked.

Robby cleared his throat. “You can tell?”

“Little bit.”

Beside him, a quiet laugh escaped her too. “We’re being subtle.”

“Extremely,” Melissa agreed.

“Good,” Robby said. “That was the goal.”

The smile stayed on Melissa’s face. “Trust me. You wouldn’t be the first nervous parents I’ve seen.”

Parents. There it was again. Another word that should have felt simple. Another word that somehow didn’t. Beside him, the mother of his child shifted slightly on the table.

Melissa picked up the ultrasound wand. “Alright,” she said gently. “Let’s meet this little person.”

And just like that, every thought in Robby’s head disappeared. The room got very quiet.

Melissa dimmed the lights. The screen glowed softly against the wall. The sonographer rolled the stool closer and pulled the machine beside the table. Routine. Efficient. Movements they probably performed thousands of times.

Robby watched every single one.

“Alright,” Melissa said gently. “This gel is going to be a little cold.”

“I’ve been warned.”

Melissa laughed. “Good.”

The bottle clicked softly against the counter.

A second later, a sharp breath escaped from the table.

Melissa smiled. “Cold?”

“I feel like that question answers itself.”

Melissa picked up the probe and turned toward the monitor.

Robby’s gaze followed automatically. Nothing. Gray static. Shadows. Shapes he couldn’t make sense of. His heart started pounding anyway.

Beside him, the tension coming from the exam table matched his own. The room seemed to shrink. Melissa moved the probe slightly. The image shifted. Then shifted again. Melissa’s smile softened.

“There we go.”

Robby leaned forward before he realized he’d moved. On the screen, something appeared. Not a blob. Not this time. A baby. Small. Curled. Unmistakably a baby.

Robby’s breath caught. Seventeen weeks. He knew what seventeen weeks looked like. He knew the developmental milestones. He knew the anatomy. He knew all the medical facts. None of them prepared him for seeing it.

Seeing them. Tiny arms. Tiny legs. A head. A spine. A whole person where his brain had apparently still been expecting an idea.

“Wow,” came the soft whisper from the table.

The word barely made it out.

Melissa smiled at the screen. “Baby’s moving all over the place today.”

As if on cue, one little arm jerked upward.

Robby stared. Then stared harder. Because the baby had moved. Actually moved. Not in theory. Not in a textbook. Not on someone else’s ultrasound.

Hers.

His.

Their.

The realization hit so hard it left him momentarily speechless. Which, judging by the way she immediately looked over from the table, was unusual enough to be concerning.

“You okay?” came the soft question from the table.

Robby didn’t answer right away. His eyes never left the screen.

“That’s a baby.”

Melissa laughed. “That is generally what we’re hoping for.”

He heard the joke. He even understood the joke. But he couldn’t stop staring.

Because somehow, somewhere between Vegas and this room, a future he’d spent months trying not to imagine had just waved at him from a television screen.

Melissa clicked another measurement, then another. “Growth looks right on track.”

From the table beside him, a breath slipped out like it had been held too long. Robby looked toward her, but her eyes stayed fixed on the screen. So did his.

“Everything looks good so far,” Melissa said gently.

Good. The word should have helped. It did. It also made something in him worse. Because now there was room for the feelings he had been keeping behind locked doors.

Melissa adjusted the angle again. “Have you heard the heartbeat yet?”

Robby’s eyes lifted.

Beside him, the question seemed to freezed the room for a second.

“No,” came the quiet answer.

Melissa smiled. “Want to?”

The answer was obvious.

Still, Robby couldn’t seem to find his voice.

Beside him, she nodded first. “Yeah.”

Melissa adjusted something on the machine. For a second, there was only static. A rushing sound filled the room.

Then—

Fast. Steady. Unmistakable. The heartbeat filled the small room.

Robby froze. Completely. His eyes stayed on the screen, but the sound moved through him before he could do anything to stop it.

That wasn’t a possibility. That wasn’t paperwork. That wasn’t Vegas. That wasn’t a mistake he could organize into something manageable. That was a heartbeat. His child had a heartbeat. The sound kept going. Rapid and strong and real.

And Robby felt something inside him give way. Not dramatically. Not loudly. Just enough that the breath left his chest and did not come back right. He blinked once. Then again. It didn’t help. From the table, a small sound slipped out, barely more than a breath. He still couldn’t look at her. If he looked at her, he was done. So he stared at the screen. At the tiny shape. At the flicker of movement. At proof.

Melissa kept talking softly, explaining the rate, explaining that everything sounded good, but Robby barely heard the sonographer.

The heartbeat was too loud.

Not in the room.

In him.

It filled every place he had tried to keep empty. Every careful corner he had used for logic. Insurance. Appointments. Schedules. The guest room. The car seat he had not let himself think about yet. The crib he had refused to picture. The future he had kept folded up small enough to pretend he wasn’t holding it.

There was no folding this.

No making it manageable.

No pretending this was still an abstract problem two adults could calmly solve if they just stayed reasonable enough.

That sound was not reasonable. It was alive. Fast and steady and stubborn.

His child. His child was real. 

Not someday. Not later. Not after they figured out what they were, where she would live, whether she would stay, what name would go on the forms, how much of this life he was allowed to want.

Now. Right now.

On a screen in front of him. Inside her. Beside him.

Every thought Robby had been using to hold himself together split clean down the middle.

He blinked once. Then again. It didn’t help. The heartbeat kept going. Rapid. Relentless. Beautiful. And somewhere between one beat and the next, he realized he was crying.

Quietly. Completely. Without any ability to stop it.

He tried to look away. Couldn’t. Tried to breathe through it. Couldn’t do that right either. The tears slipped down before he could stop them, hot and quiet against his face.

Robby lifted one hand, like maybe he could wipe them away quickly enough that no one would notice. Too late. From the table, movement shifted. Then her hand found his. Not careful. Not pitying. Just there. Warm fingers sliding into his like she had decided, in the middle of all that sound, that he didn’t have to stand outside it alone.

Robby looked down at their hands. At first, he didn’t move. Then his fingers closed around hers. The heartbeat kept going. Fast. Steady. Alive.

Melissa said something about the rate being strong, but Robby barely heard it.

Robby looked back at the screen, heart cracked wide open, and thought helplessly that if this was what temporary felt like, he was in serious trouble. 

He still didn’t fully trust his voice. On the monitor, the baby shifted again, one tiny leg kicking out before disappearing into gray.

A breathless laugh slipped from the table. “That’s so weird.”

Robby looked down. Her bright eyes stayed fixed on the screen.

“Yeah,” he said roughly. “A little.”

Melissa smiled. “I can print some pictures for you.”

Robby’s chest tightened all over again. Pictures. Something real. Something to take home. He glanced over before he could stop himself. This time, he wasn’t the only one looking.

Neither of them spoke. Then the hand in his squeezed once.

“Yeah,” came the soft answer. “We’d like that.”

We.

Robby looked back at the screen before his face could do anything else stupid.

Melissa printed the pictures before they left.

Robby accepted them like he knew how to hold trauma shears, scalpels, a whole human life in his hands, but not this. Not paper. Not proof.

—

The drive home was quieter than the drive there.

She rested her head against the window, one hand curled loosely over the folded strip of ultrasound photos in her lap. Robby kept both hands on the wheel and did not look at the pictures again.

Not because he didn’t want to. Because he wanted to too much.

Back at the house, she made it halfway through lunch before the exhaustion caught up to her. He noticed the yawn. Then the second one.

By the third, he said, “Go lie down.” 

She argued on principle. Badly. Ten minutes later, her bedroom door clicked shut. Her room. Robby stopped with one hand on the counter. No—guest room—Temporary. The correction sat badly in his chest. Then the house went quiet.

Robby stood in the kitchen. The ultrasound pictures sat on the counter. Her mug sat beside the sink. Her shoes were by the door. The house looked exactly the same as it had that morning. It felt completely different.

He looked at the pictures. Then away. Then back again. One small strip of glossy paper, and somehow it made the whole house feel rearranged. He picked one up carefully, thumb resting against the white edge so he wouldn’t smudge the image. Tiny profile. Tiny spine. A shape he could recognize now.

His throat tightened. “Jesus,” he muttered.

The picture did not answer. Probably for the best. He set it down. Then immediately picked it back up. Worse. Definitely worse. The baby was real.

Not that the baby hadn’t been real before. He wasn’t an idiot. He knew how biology worked. He had known since she came to Pittsburgh, since the first ultrasound photo she’d shown him, and every insurance form and practical conversation after.

But there was knowing. And then there was hearing. There was seeing movement on a screen. Hearing a heartbeat fill a room. Bringing home proof in glossy black and white and setting it on his counter beside her half-finished glass of water.

That was different. Worse. His gaze drifted toward the hallway. Nothing moved. She was asleep. As she should be. She needed it. He told himself he was checking. Not lingering. There was a difference. Probably.

The house pressed in around him. Not unpleasantly. That was the problem. It was warm. Lived in. Quiet in a way that had started meaning something else now. Her mug. Her shoes. Her room. No. Guest room.

Robby exhaled sharply and set the ultrasound picture back on the counter like it had personally complicated his life. He grabbed his keys before his brain could start another argument. He needed air before the house started feeling any more like something he could lose.

Twenty minutes later, he was on the bike. The city moved around him in familiar pieces. Wet pavement. Traffic lights. A delivery truck double-parked in a lane it had no business occupying. Construction cones that had apparently become permanent residents of the street.

Usually, riding helped. Usually, the engine gave his brain something simple to hold onto. Throttle. Brake. Lean. Balance. Road. Today, all it did was make the quiet inside his helmet louder. He stopped at a red light and looked straight ahead. A woman crossed the street pushing a stroller with one hand and holding a toddler’s raincoat hood with the other.

Robby stared. The light turned green. Someone honked behind him. He rolled forward.

“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered.

That was the problem, apparently. Three weeks ago, he would not have noticed the stroller. Or maybe he would have noticed it, because he noticed everything, but it wouldn’t have landed. It would have been a detail. A scene. Somebody else’s life happening at the edge of his.

Now everything had hooks. A car seat in the back of a minivan. A man carrying a diaper bag over one shoulder with the stunned expression of someone who had not slept since 2005. A kid in yellow boots stomping deliberately through a puddle while his father pretended not to see it.

Ordinary things. Everywhere. Ridiculous. Unavoidable.

The bike turned onto Duke’s street almost by habit. Robby didn’t remember deciding to go there. Which was probably telling. He pulled into the lot and cut the engine. The silence after the engine died felt too sudden.

For a moment, he stayed there, helmet still on, both hands wrapped around the handlebars, staring at the shop doors. Temporary. The word surfaced again. He hated it more every time. Finally, he climbed off the bike and headed inside.

Duke was bent under the hood of an old truck when Robby walked in, one arm buried elbow-deep in an engine bay, a rag hanging out of his back pocket. The radio played low from somewhere near the workbench.

He didn’t look up right away.

“You’re late,” Duke said. “I was starting to think the bike fixed itself.”

“It didn’t.”

“Good.”

Robby frowned. “Good?”

“If it fixed itself, I’d be out of a job. What took so long?”

“Got distracted.”

“By what?”

“Life.”

Duke stared at him. “That’s usually a bad sign.”

“Hasn’t killed me yet.”

“Give it time.”

Robby snorted.

Duke tossed the rag onto the workbench.

“So,” he said, turning toward the bike. “You gonna tell me what it’s doing, or am I supposed to commune with it spiritually?”

“It’s got a rattle.”

“Beautiful. Very descriptive.”

“Cold start mostly.”

Duke’s expression shifted slightly. Not much. Just enough to show the mechanic in him had taken over.

“Idle?”

“Yeah.”

“Settles once she warms up?”

“Usually.”

Duke crouched beside the bike and tilted his head like he was listening to something that wasn’t there yet.

“Mileage?”

Robby told him.

Duke made a face.

“That your professional opinion?”

“My professional opinion is that you should’ve brought her in sooner.”

“Helpful.”

“I try.”

Duke reached for a flashlight from the rolling cart and angled it toward the engine. “Could be a couple things.”

“Such as?”

“Cam chain tensioner’s high on the list.”

Robby looked down at the bike. “That’s what she thought.”

Duke paused just long enough for Robby to notice.

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“She heard it?”

“No.”

Duke blinked. “No?”

“I described it.”

Duke stared at him for another second, then slowly looked back at the bike. “You described a noise.”

“Yes.”

“And she landed on cam chain tensioner?”

“Apparently.”

Duke was quiet and crouched again, flashlight sweeping along the bike. “She ride?”

“Not really. Her dad does.”

“Worked on his own bikes?”

“Yeah, taught her how to fix them and everything.”

Duke nodded slowly. “Sounds like it.”

Robby watched him work a little longer.

The shop smelled like oil, metal, rubber, and old coffee. Familiar. Easier than the house had been. Easier than the hospital room. Easier than the strip of ultrasound pictures still sitting on his kitchen counter.

Duke stood and stretched his back.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s right.”

Robby looked away too fast.

Duke saw it. “Well.”

Robby immediately frowned. “What?”

“Now I’m curious.”

“About what?”

Duke looked at him like the answer should have been obvious. “The woman you’ve got hiding in your house.”

“She’s not hiding.”

“Living in your house.”

“Temporarily.”

Duke’s eyebrows lifted. “Sure.”

Robby sighed. “Don’t.”

“I haven’t done anything.”

“You’re about to.”

“Probably.” Duke grinned. “I’m just saying, most people describe a motorcycle noise with words like weird.”

“Fair.”

“They don’t usually jump straight to possible causes.”

“Like I said, her dad taught her.”

“Apparently he knew what he was doing.”

Robby shrugged, but it came out too small to mean much. “Apparently.”

Duke looked at him for half a second longer, then seemed to decide something. He reached for a wrench and tossed it toward him.

Robby caught it automatically.

“You helping or standing there looking tragic?”

“I don’t look tragic.”

“You look like a man who lost a fight with his own face.” Duke pointed toward the side panel. “Take that off.”

Robby crouched beside the bike without arguing. That was easier. Tools were easier. Metal was easier. Engines made sense. A rattle meant something was loose, worn, tired, misaligned. There was always a reason. Always a source. Always something to tighten, replace, adjust, or take apart until the problem finally admitted what it was. People were worse.

He loosened the first bolt. Duke worked on the other side of the bike, quiet now. Not ignoring him. Just waiting. That was the thing about Duke. He acted like a pain in the ass, and usually was, but he knew when to shut up better than most people Robby knew.

The ratchet clicked between them. Once. Twice. Three times.

Then Duke said, not looking up, “Ultrasound today?”

Robby’s hand stopped. Only for a second. Then he kept working.

“Yeah.”

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah.”

Duke nodded once. “Good.”

Robby loosened another bolt. The word sat there. Good. Simple. Too simple.

He stared down at the bike. “We heard the heartbeat.”

Duke didn’t look up right away. Just handed him another tool.

“That’s a hell of a thing,” he said.

Robby swallowed. “Yeah,” he said, voice rougher than he wanted. “It is.”

Duke kept the flashlight steady.

Robby stared at the bike. “I’ve heard thousands of heartbeats.”

Duke glanced over.

Robby kept his eyes on the engine. “Probably tens of thousands at this point.” His fingers tightened around the wrench. “Trauma bays. Exam rooms. ICU monitors. Ultrasounds.” He shrugged. “It’s just physiology.”

Duke’s mouth twitched. “Just physiology.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I do.”

Robby looked down. “Heart’s supposed to be beating at seventeen weeks.”

“That’s generally the goal.”

“Everything looked normal.”

“Good.”

“Yeah.”

Duke adjusted the flashlight.

“And that’s not what’s bothering you.”

Robby stared at the bike.

“No.”

Duke nodded like he’d expected that answer.

“Didn’t think so.”

Normal didn’t settle. Because normal wasn’t the problem. That’s what he’d been trying to explain to himself all day. Nothing was wrong. Nothing. Healthy pregnancy. Healthy baby. Appropriate development. Appropriate heart rate. Every box checked. Every milestone exactly where it was supposed to be. And somehow that had made it worse.

Robby stared at the bike for a long moment. “I spent weeks thinking about this like it was a problem to solve.”

Duke stayed quiet.

“Insurance. Housing. Appointments. Logistics.” Another turn of the wrench. “Action items.”

“You like action items.”

Robby exhaled. “Then today happened.”

The words hung there.

“And?”

Robby laughed once. Short. Disbelieving.

“And apparently that’s not an action item.”

Duke’s eyebrows lifted. “Hearing your kid’s heartbeat isn’t a problem you can solve.”

Robby’s jaw tightened. “No.”

Because that was the thing. He couldn’t organize it. Couldn’t schedule it. Couldn’t chart it. Couldn’t put it in a folder and come back to it later. It had simply happened. One second there was a monitor. The next there was a person. And Robby had not been prepared for the difference.

Duke didn’t answer right away. He just shifted the flashlight slightly and let Robby sit with it. That was worse, somehow.

The shop sounds filled in around them. The low radio. A socket rolling somewhere on the workbench. Traffic hissing past outside on wet pavement.

Robby turned the wrench again. Too tight. He stopped before he stripped the bolt.

Duke noticed.

“Careful,” Duke said.

“I know.”

“Do you?”

Robby shot him a look.

Duke only lifted his brows and held the flashlight steady.

For a while, neither of them said anything.

Then Robby looked back at the engine and said, quieter, “I thought the baby was what scared me.”

Duke stayed still. “Isn’t it?”

Robby’s jaw shifted once. “No,” he said. “Not anymore.”

The admission sat between them, small and ugly and too honest for the middle of a mechanic’s shop.

Duke waited. Robby hated that too. He loosened another bolt. Set it carefully on the floor beside him.

“I can handle being a father,” he said, like he was trying the words out for size. “I mean, I’ll screw things up. Everybody does. But I can show up. I can learn. I can be there.”

Duke nodded once. “Yeah.”

Robby stared down at the bike. The next part got caught somewhere behind his ribs. He almost swallowed it. Almost.

“She’s probably going back to Nevada.”

Duke’s hand stilled around the flashlight. Not much. Just enough.

“There it is,” he said quietly.

Robby’s mouth tightened. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You said ‘there it is.’ That’s something.”

“Barely.”

Robby exhaled through his nose and looked toward the open garage door. “She has a life there.”

“Does she?”

“I don’t know.” The answer came too fast. Too sharp. He forced his voice flatter. “Friends. Work. History. A place that isn’t here.”

Duke was quiet.

Robby kept going, because apparently the damage had already started.

“This was never supposed to be permanent. The house. The room. Any of it.” He glanced down at the wrench in his hand. “She needed somewhere safe. I had somewhere safe. That’s all it was.”

“Was?”

Robby closed his eyes for half a second. Damn it. Duke didn’t even sound smug. That made it worse.

Robby opened his eyes and looked back at the bike. “I don’t know what it is now.”

Duke nodded slowly. “Yeah,” he said. “That sounds about right.” Duke shifted the flashlight again. “Sounds like you’re waiting for her to decide what your life looks like.”

Robby’s head snapped up. “That’s not what I’m doing.”

“No?”

“No.”

Duke gave him a look.

Robby hated the look.

“I’m trying not to decide it for her,” he said.

Robby looked back at the bike. “She didn’t ask for this. Any of it. Vegas happened. The baby happened. Then Pittsburgh happened because it was the practical choice.”

“Practical,” Duke repeated.

“Yes.”

“You hate that word right now.”

Robby tightened his grip on the wrench.

Duke leaned back against the workbench. “You want her to stay.”

Robby didn’t answer. The silence did it for him.

Duke nodded once, like that was all the confirmation he needed.

Robby stared at the engine. “I want the baby to have both of us.”

“Sure.”

His jaw flexed. “That’s a good reason.”

“It is.”

“And the house has room.”

“Also true.”

“And it would make appointments easier. Schedules. Work. Childcare.”

Duke’s mouth twitched faintly. “Lot of action items.”

Robby looked at him.

Duke lifted both hands. “Just saying.”

Robby exhaled hard and looked away. Because Duke was right. Those were reasons. Real ones. Good ones. They just weren’t the whole truth. The whole truth was quieter. More selfish. More dangerous.

The whole truth was that Robby had come home too many times to her dinner in the microwave. Her blanket on the couch. Her voice from the kitchen asking if he wanted coffee. Her shoes by the door. And now he knew what the house sounded like with her in it. Which meant he knew exactly what it would sound like without her.

“I don’t know how to ask,” he said finally.

Duke’s expression softened, but only barely. He wasn’t cruel enough to joke there.

“Then don’t ask yet.”

Robby frowned. “That your advice?”

“That’s my advice.”

“That’s terrible advice.”

“No,” Duke said. “Terrible advice would be telling a pregnant woman who just moved her whole life across the country that you’ve decided she should stay because your house feels less depressing with her in it.”

Robby winced.

“Yeah,” Duke said. “See? Bad pitch.”

“Glad you’re enjoying this.”

“I’m enjoying you finally having a problem you can’t organize into a spreadsheet.”

“I don’t use spreadsheets.”

“You know what I mean.”

Robby rolled his eyes.

Duke leaned back against the workbench.

“Besides, you’re looking at this wrong.”

“Am I?”

“Yeah.”

“How?”

Duke shrugged. “You’re acting like she’s already got one foot out the door.”

“She does.”

“Does she?”

“Nevada’s home.”

“Nevada’s where she used to live.”

Robby frowned.

Duke pointed a wrench at him. “Not the same thing.”

“That’s a stretch.”

“Is it?”

Duke walked back toward the bike. “Let me ask you something.”

Robby immediately regretted that sentence. “No.”

“She’s been in Pittsburgh how long now?”

Robby told him.

“And what’s she doing all day?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean exactly what I said.”

Robby shrugged. “Reading. Cleaning. Watching TV. Grocery shopping.”

“That’s it?”

“Mostly.”

Duke made a face. “I’d lose my mind.”

“She’s pregnant, not imprisoned.”

“Same difference after enough weeks.”

Robby snorted despite himself.

Duke nodded. “See?”

“See what?”

“You’re talking about Nevada like she’s sitting around homesick all day.”

“Maybe she is.”

“Maybe.”

Duke set a socket on the workbench. “Or maybe she’s bored.”

Robby looked at him. “What?”

“She’s a nurse, right?”

“Was. Then a bartender.”

“Still has the brain.”

“Fair.”

Duke pointed toward the shop. “Girl diagnoses a motorcycle from your description and you’re telling me she’s happy sitting around a house waiting for the next appointment?”

Robby opened his mouth. Closed it.

Duke's mouth twitched. “Thought so.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is she sounds like she’s got a brain that doesn’t do well sitting still.” Duke folded his arms. “Half the reason this place still exists is because people smarter than me occasionally stop me from doing something stupid.”

“That’s not reassuring.”

“What I’m saying,” Duke continued, ignoring him completely, “is maybe she needs something that’s hers.”

Robby’s eyebrows pulled together.

Duke gestured around the garage. “I’m not talking about a job.”

“Then what?”

“Somewhere to go. Something to do. A reason to leave your house that isn’t an appointment.”

Robby didn’t answer.

Duke shrugged. “I hate answering phones.”

Despite himself, Robby laughed. “You do.”

“I hate ordering parts.”

“You definitely do.”

“I hate customers describing noises.”

“Nobody likes that.”

Duke pointed at him. “Exactly. And apparently she’s better at it than half the people who walk in here.”

“So your solution is to put a pregnant woman in a garage?”

“My solution is giving a smart woman somewhere she can be useful without feeling trapped.”

Robby looked away.

Duke’s voice softened just a little. “There’s a difference.”

And the worst part was, Robby could actually picture it.

Her sitting behind the counter. Arguing with Duke. Rolling her eyes at customers. Calling him an idiot when he ignored obvious advice. Laughing. Comfortable. Like she belonged there. The image settled somewhere dangerous in his chest.

Duke caught the look on his face. “See?”

“Don’t.”

Duke grinned. “Didn’t even have to say anything.”

Robby looked down at the wrench in his hand. “You’re making it sound simple.”

“It’s simple.”

“It’s not.”

“No,” Duke agreed. “But it’s less complicated than whatever you’re doing in your head.”

Robby huffed a humorless laugh.

Duke picked up the flashlight again and angled it toward the engine. “You don’t have to ask her to stay forever tomorrow.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

Robby shot him a look.

Duke ignored it. “You know, this isn’t really about her.”

“Here we go.”

“No, hear me out.”

Robby immediately regretted staying.

Duke pointed between them. “You need other people involved.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means right now her entire Pittsburgh social circle is you.”

Robby stopped.

Duke shrugged. “That’s a lot of pressure for two people who are still figuring out what the hell this is.”

“That’s annoyingly reasonable.”

“I know.”

“I hate it.”

“Also know that.”

Duke pointed toward the office. “Bring her by sometime.”

“Terrible plan.”

“Best I’ve got.”

Robby looked toward the open garage door. The idea sat there. Small. Practical. Dangerous. Not asking her to stay. Not asking her to choose Pittsburgh. Just giving her one more place where she could breathe. One more person who might know her as something other than pregnant, displaced, temporarily living in his house. One more root. The word made his chest tighten.

Something in Duke’s face softened.

“You want her to stay?” he asked.

Robby didn’t answer.

Duke nodded once, like the silence had done the work for him.

“Then don’t build a cage,” he said. “Build a place she might actually want to come back to.”

Robby looked at him then.

Duke shrugged and turned back to the bike. “And maybe start with the shop. Low stakes. Worst case, she hates me.”

“She probably will.”

“Perfect. Common ground.” Duke snorted and ducked back toward the bike.

After that, they worked in silence. Real silence this time. Not empty. Just easier.

Robby loosened bolts. Duke muttered insults at the engine. Somewhere outside, tires hissed over wet pavement. The radio kept playing low, some old rock song neither of them commented on.

The conversation didn’t fix anything. That was the annoying part. The baby was still real. The house still felt different. Nevada still sat somewhere in the back of Robby’s mind like a door he couldn’t lock. But the panic had shifted shape. Not gone. Just smaller. Something he could hold without bleeding all over it.

Duke tapped the side of the bike with the wrench. “Yeah. I’m gonna need to get in there properly.”

“Expensive?”

“Emotionally or financially?”

“Duke.”

“Probably both.”

Robby sighed.

Duke grinned. “Tell the motorcycle whisperer she may have been right.”

Robby looked down despite himself, mouth twitching. “I’ll mention it.”

By the time Robby left the shop, the sky had started clearing. The streets were still damp, but the clouds had thinned enough for late afternoon light to catch in the puddles along the curb. He pulled his helmet on and stood beside the bike for a second longer than necessary.

The shop. Low stakes. A place that wasn’t his house. A person who wasn’t him. One small root. Robby swung onto the bike and started the engine. This time, when the rattle caught beneath the idle, he heard her voice in his head before Duke’s.

Cold start? 

Idle? 

When you throttle? 

Under load?

His mouth twitched inside the helmet.

“Motorcycle whisperer,” he muttered.

Then he pulled out of the lot and headed home.

Mateo was trying.

That was the only word for it.

He sat near you with his back against the bench, explaining how hospital administration now legally owed all of you at least one free vending machine item and possibly a parade.

Princess laughed into her sleeve.

Not a real laugh.

But close enough that everyone let it count.

“Forget the parade,” Donnie muttered. “I want hazard pay and a chair that doesn’t feel like it was designed by someone who hates nurses.”

“That’s every chair in the hospital,” Mateo said.

“Exactly. I’m convinced they’re designed to discourage sitting.”

Javadi made a quiet sound that might have been amusement. She sat beside Mohan on the bench, shoulders folded inward, her beer unopened between her knees. Mohan looked hollowed out beside her, like part of her was still somewhere inside the department.

“I would settle for a working printer,” Princess said.

Donnie pointed his beer at her. “Don’t get greedy.”

They all laughed. That was the rhythm of the park now. Tired voices. Long silences. Traffic hissing past on wet pavement.

The hospital glowed across the street like it hadn’t swallowed all of you whole and spit you back out in pieces.

You sat in the grass with your untouched beer between your hands, knees pulled close to your chest. No one had changed out of their scrubs. No one had the energy. Everyone looked exactly like what they were.

Survivors of a shift that had asked too much.

For a while, the six of you stayed like that, trying to joke your way around the edges of the day.

Mateo declared the beer a wellness initiative. Donnie said if this was wellness, he wanted a refund.

Princess swore she would never trust anyone who said, “At least it’s been quiet.”

“Ban that phrase,” Javadi said suddenly.

Everyone looked at her.

Her voice was flat, but frayed underneath.

“Hospital-wide policy,” she added. “Immediate termination.”

Mateo lifted his can. “Seconded.”

“Third,” Donnie said.

Mohan nodded solemnly. “I can draft the memo.”

“Make it threatening,” Princess said.

“It’ll be very professional,” Mohan replied. “But legally terrifying.”

This time the laughter came easier. Still tired. Still cracked around the edges. But real enough to hold onto for a second.

Then, across the street, two figures stepped off the curb together.

Abbot and Robby.

Abbot carried a slight but noticeable limp, one hand shoved into his pocket. Robby walked beside him with his hands empty, shoulders set, his expression arranged into something almost normal.

Almost.

The group noticed them at nearly the same time.

Mateo lifted his beer. “Look who escaped.”

Abbot glanced back toward the hospital. “Barely. The building tried to keep custody.”

Princess made a tired sound. “It does that.”

Robby’s mouth twitched. “You all started drinking without us?”

Donnie looked up from the grass. “We were honoring your memory.”

“That’s touching,” Robby said. “Premature, but touching.”

Abbot lowered himself onto the bench with a muted grunt just as Donnie reached into the cooler and held a beer out toward him.

“Here,” he said. “Medical intervention.”

Jack took it, letting it dangle loosely between two fingers. “Finally. Evidence-based care.”

Mateo eyed him. “You good, Abbot?”

Jack looked at the beer. “Balanced meal. Grain. Water. Emotional avoidance.”

Mateo snorted. Even Mohan’s mouth moved faintly.

Robby huffed something that passed for a laugh and settled near the edge of the group, close enough to be included, far enough not to be touched.

Your chest tightened. Because you knew that laugh. Or more accurately, you knew what it wasn’t.

It wasn’t the sharp, reluctant laugh that escaped him when someone genuinely caught him off guard. It wasn’t the tired but real one he gave after a resident said something so ridiculous it circled back around to funny. This one was deliberate. Placed carefully over the cracks.

Abbot leaned forward beside him, gaze fixed on the grass between his shoes. He looked exhausted too, scraped raw around the edges, but Robby looked different. Quieter. Smaller somehow. Like holding himself together had become an active effort.

Princess reached into the cooler beside the bench and handed him a beer. “Cold enough to legally qualify as self-care.”

Robby took it from her. “Good. I was worried we’d have to process emotions instead.”

“Absolutely not. We’re medical professionals.”

He curled his fingers around the can but barely drank from it.

Around him, everyone kept trying. Trying to talk. Trying to joke. Trying to feel like people again instead of survivors clawing their way out of disaster.

Javadi muttered that she never wanted to hear the phrase “It can’t get worse,” again.

“Ban that too,” Donnie said.

“Second memo,” Mohan agreed.

Mateo pointed at her. “You’re our entire legal department now.”

“I’m an R3.”

“Same thing after today.”

“That is deeply incorrect.”

“Bright side,” Princess said softly, lifting her beer, “none of us are in the trauma bay right now.”

The group went quiet. Not because it wasn’t true. Because it was. Because even the bright side still had blood under it.

Then Abbot tipped his can toward her. “I’ll drink to low standards.”

That saved the moment. Barely. A few tired laughs moved through the group.

Robby smiled. Half a second late. You watched it appear, hold, then disappear before it ever reached his eyes.

You had worked with Michael Robinavitch for years. You knew every version of his exhaustion: the irritated kind, the over-caffeinated kind, the dangerous kind where his voice got calmer the worse things became. And today had been hurting him long before Pittfest cracked the shift open.

You had seen it early that morning in the tightness around his mouth, the way he kept forcing himself back into focus, the jokes that came a little too quickly.

Now he sat surrounded by people who cared about him in every way emergency medicine allowed, and somehow he still looked completely alone.

That was what made you watch him. Not obviously. Just enough.

Robby took another sip of beer. His gaze kept drifting across the street toward the hospital. Like part of him was still inside it.

Jack said something low beside him. You didn’t catch the words. Robby answered with a dry comment that made Mateo laugh for real this time. The sound warmed the space for half a second.

Robby’s smile didn’t. Then, quietly, he shifted. Small enough most people wouldn’t notice. One hand pressed briefly to his knee before he stood. But you knew him. You saw the exit before anyone else did.

Robby brushed a hand over his scrub pants. “Well,” he said casually, “this has been sufficiently depressing.”

Jack looked up at him. “You’re leaving before the trust falls?”

“I’d rather be intubated awake.”

Princess barked out a tired laugh.

Mateo lifted his can. “Get home safe, man.”

Robby gave a small two-finger salute. “That’s the plan.”

As if plans had meant anything today.

He started walking before anyone could say anything else. And for one second, nobody moved. Not because they didn’t care. Because everyone was exhausted enough to accept the performance.

But you didn’t.

You watched him cross the grass, hands sliding back into his pockets. The second he thought no one was looking, his shoulders dropped. Not much. Just enough to tell the truth.

Your throat tightened. Then you set your beer carefully in the grass and stood. Jack’s eyes flicked toward you for half a second. He didn’t say anything. Maybe he knew too.

You crossed the park slowly, your legs stiff, your whole body heavy with the delayed ache of the day. Your shoes sank slightly into the damp grass. Somewhere behind you, the conversation started again, quieter than before.

Robby had almost reached the sidewalk by the time you caught up.

“Robby.”

He stopped. Two steps late. Then he turned halfway, his face already pulled back into something manageable.

“Yeah?”

You slowed before you reached him, leaving a careful amount of space between you. Close enough to follow. Not close enough to corner.

That mattered with him. Especially now.

“You heading home?” you asked.

His mouth twitched. “Unless you know somewhere better to emotionally decompose.”

There it was again. The joke. The shield. The thing he gave people so they wouldn’t ask about the wound underneath.

You let out a soft breath that almost became a laugh.

“No,” you said. “Not really.”

His eyes moved over your face out of habit, checking you over. Looking for damage, even when he was the one bleeding where no one could see.

“You okay?” he asked.

It hurt, somehow. After everything, his first instinct was still to check.

You held his gaze.

“Can I walk with you?”

Robby blinked once. The question seemed to land harder than you meant it to. For a second, he looked past you toward the park. Toward the people still sitting together in the bruised evening light, trying to remember how to breathe.

“You don’t have to,” he said.

“I know.”

“You should stay with them.”

“I’ve been with them all day.”

His jaw moved faintly.

You softened your voice.

“I’m asking if I can walk with you.”

That did it. Not fully. Not visibly. But something in his face shifted. A tiny fracture in the careful, casual mask.

The smallest surrender. 

Robby looked down at the sidewalk, then back at you.

His voice came out quieter.

“Yeah,” he said. “Okay.”

You stepped beside him. Not touching. Not yet. Just there. And together, you walked away from the park, the hospital glowing behind you, the others fading into low voices and tired laughter at your backs.

For the first few blocks, neither of you said anything. There didn’t seem to be anything left to say.

The city moved around you like it had not been changed by the day. Cars rolled through green lights. Someone’s music thudded faintly from an open window. A couple crossed the street ahead of you, laughing about something on a phone screen, their shoulders pressed together, their lives still ordinary enough for that kind of laughter.

You watched them pass. Robby didn’t. He kept his eyes forward, hands tucked into his pockets, his steps slow but steady beside yours. Not his usual walk. Not the clipped, purposeful stride he used through the department when everyone knew better than to get in his way.

This was different. Looser. Emptier. Like momentum was the only thing keeping him upright.

You matched his pace without making it obvious. That was one of the first things you had learned about him, years ago.

Robby noticed being managed. He noticed being handled. He noticed pity like it had a smell. So you didn’t manage him. You just stayed.

The park noise faded behind you. The hospital remained at your backs, but you could still feel it there, huge and bright and wounded. A place you both knew too well. A place that had taken too much from everyone today. A place that had taken too much from him long before today.

At the corner, the crosswalk sign glowed red. Robby stopped beside you. For a few seconds, the two of you stood beneath the streetlight, evening cooling around you, neither of you quite looking at the other.

Then Robby said, “You realize this is the part where you’re supposed to say something inspiring.”

You glanced over. His mouth had barely moved. Dry. Automatic. Tired.

You looked back at the light.

“I’m off the clock.”

A breath left him. Not quite a laugh. Closer than the ones in the park, though. You counted it anyway.

The crosswalk changed. You walked. Halfway across, his shoulder brushed yours. Barely. An accident. Neither of you moved away.

On the other side, the silence came back, but it had changed shape. Less empty now. Less dangerous. Still heavy, but shared between two sets of hands.

Robby glanced at you once. “You don’t have to babysit me.”

“I’m not.”

“Feels like babysitting.”

“You’re taller than most babies.”

That got something from him. Small. Cracked. Real enough that your chest tightened around it.

He shook his head, looking down at the sidewalk. “That was terrible.”

“I’ve had a long day.”

“Yeah,” he said.

The word landed softly. Too softly.

You looked at him. His eyes were still on the pavement, but his face had shifted again. The joke had taken him somewhere he hadn’t meant to go. Back into the day. Back into all of it.

You wanted to ask what part he was seeing. You didn’t. You had your own ghosts walking beside you. The girl with glitter still stuck to her cheek. The father who kept asking for his son after you already knew. The sound of someone crying into a disposable mask because there hadn’t been time to go somewhere private.

You swallowed and looked ahead.

“I keep thinking I’m hearing monitors,” you said.

Robby’s steps slowed for half a second. Then kept going.

You didn’t look at him when you said it. That made it easier somehow.

“Every time a car beeps or someone’s phone goes off, I keep turning like there’s a room I’m supposed to check.”

Robby was quiet for so long you thought he might not answer.

Then, very quietly, he said, “Yeah.”

One syllable. But it carried too much. You nodded. That was enough.

For a while, the only sound was traffic and the soft scuff of your shoes against the sidewalk.

Then Robby said, “I keep seeing the floor.”

Your throat tightened. He didn’t elaborate at first. You let him have the space.

“Faces,” he said finally. “Blood. Carts. Who went upstairs. Who never made it.”

His voice stayed calm. Too calm. The same voice he used when calling out orders over chaos.

“I keep thinking there’s something I missed.”

There it was. The thing under everything. Not all of it, maybe. But enough.

You turned your head slightly. “Robby.”

“I know,” he said, already bracing. “I know what you’re going to say.”

“No, you don’t.”

That made him look at you. 

You kept walking, voice quiet.

“I’m not going to tell you that you did everything you could.”

His face changed. Just barely.

You stared ahead at the sidewalk because looking right at him felt too much like touching an open wound.

“You know that already,” you said. “And if you don’t know it tonight, me saying it isn’t going to make you believe it.”

Robby looked away first. The city hummed around you. A bus passed with its windows lit gold, full of people going somewhere that had nothing to do with blood or triage or death notifications.

You kept your hands at your sides.

“I’m just walking with you.”

The words sat between you. Simple. Almost nothing. Everything, anyway.

Robby breathed in slowly through his nose. When he spoke again, his voice had gone rougher around the edges.

“That’s your plan?”

“Pretty much.”

“Terrible plan.”

“Probably.”

“You always this bad at discharge instructions?”

“Only with difficult patients.”

He huffed again. This time, it almost sounded like him.

You glanced over before you could stop yourself. His eyes were still tired. His whole face was wrecked with it. But for half a second, the corner of his mouth tilted in a way that belonged to him. Not the attending. Not the person everyone had needed. Just Robby.

Then it faded. But you had seen it. That was enough to keep walking.

At the next block, he slowed. Not stopped. Just slowed enough that you noticed.

His apartment building waited farther down, plain brick and dark windows, close enough now to feel like a question.

He stared at it like he didn’t recognize the place. Like home was just another room where the day could follow him.

“You can go back,” he said.

You looked at him.

His voice had gone careful again. Controlled. Making an exit for you before you could need one.

“I made it this far,” he added. “Gold star for civic service.”

You didn’t smile. Not this time.

“Do you want me to?”

He didn’t answer. That told you enough. Still, you waited. Because he deserved the dignity of choosing.

Robby’s jaw tightened. His eyes stayed on the building. For a moment, you thought he might make the joke. The one that would put the wall back up. The one that would let him walk inside alone and convince himself he had spared you something.

Instead, he said, “I don’t know what happens when I stop moving.”

Your breath caught.

He looked furious with himself for saying it, like the words had slipped through before he could triage them.

You softened.

“Then don’t stop alone.”

Robby closed his eyes. Just for a second. When he opened them, he didn’t look at you. But his hand shifted beside yours. Not reaching. Not quite. Close enough that your fingers could have found his if either of you were braver.

You didn’t take his hand. Not yet. You just stepped forward. He followed. And together, you walked the last half block home.

His building was quiet in the way apartment buildings got after everyone else had already made it inside. A few windows glowed warm above you. Someone had left a bike chained crookedly near the front steps. The lobby light flickered once, then steadied, yellow and tired.

Robby stopped at the door. For a second, he didn’t reach for his keys. He just stood there, staring at the lock like it had asked him a question he didn’t know how to answer.

You waited beside him. Not looking too hard. Not making it a thing.

Finally, he exhaled through his nose and dug into his pocket. The keys scraped together softly in his hand. It took him two tries to find the right one. He noticed. Of course he did.

His mouth pulled into something bitter. “Great. Fine motor skills are apparently decorative now.”

“You’ve had a long day.”

“Don’t start being nice to me. It’s disorienting.”

“I’m always nice to you.”

He got the key into the lock and glanced back at you. “You once told a med student I looked like I survived off spite and cafeteria coffee.”

“You do.”

“That wasn’t nice.”

“It was accurate.”

For half a second, the corner of his mouth moved. Not much. Enough. Then the lock turned, and he pushed the door open.

The lobby smelled faintly like floor cleaner and old mail. Robby held the door for you without thinking, because even exhausted and hollowed out, some habits survived everything.

You stepped inside. He followed. Neither of you spoke in the elevator. The silence pressed close, made smaller by the mirrored walls and the hum of machinery dragging you upward. Robby stood with one shoulder near the panel, eyes fixed on the numbers as they changed.

Three. Four. Five.

His reflection looked worse than he did straight on. Paler. Older. Like the fluorescent light had found every place the day had carved into him. You looked away before he caught you staring. The doors slid open.

Robby led you down the hall to his apartment, slower now. Like every step away from the hospital made the exhaustion heavier instead of easier to carry.

At his door, he paused again. Not as long this time. Then he unlocked it and stepped inside. The apartment was dark except for the dull gray-blue wash of evening through the windows.

Quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that didn’t feel restful. The kind that waited.

Robby stood just inside the doorway. You stayed behind him, giving him room.

His keys were still in his hand. His shoulders rose once with a breath that didn’t quite finish. Then he seemed to remember you were there.

“Sorry,” he said, flipping on a lamp near the door. Warm light spilled over the living room. “It’s, uh…” He looked around at the perfectly ordinary space, like he was searching for something to apologize for. “It’s not exactly guest-ready.”

There was a coffee mug on the side table. A stack of books near the couch. A sweatshirt thrown over the back of a chair.

That was it.

You looked at him. “Robby.”

“What?”

“This is cleaner than the staff lounge on its best day.”

“That’s not a standard. That’s a biohazard comparison.”

“Still.”

He let out a breath that almost wanted to be a laugh and shut the door behind you.

The click sounded too loud. Both of you heard it. Both of you pretended not to.

Robby set his keys in a bowl near the door, then immediately picked them back up like he had forgotten why he put them down. He stared at them for a second.

You watched his fingers tighten around the metal.

“Hey,” you said softly.

He looked over.

You kept your voice easy. “Do you want me to make coffee and pretend it isn’t a terrible idea right now?”

His eyes searched your face. The question was small enough to be safe. That was why you’d asked it.

Not “Are you okay?”

Not “Talk to me.”

Not “What do you need?”

Just coffee.

Something normal. Something survivable.

Robby swallowed. “Coffee sounds irresponsible at this time.”

“Tea?”

“Worse.”

“Water?”

He grimaced. “Now you’re just being aggressive.”

You smiled faintly. “Water it is.”

You moved toward the kitchen before he could argue with you. Not because you wanted to take over. Because standing still in the doorway felt too much like waiting for him to break. And you weren’t sure he could do that with an audience.

The kitchen was small but neat. You found two glasses in the cabinet beside the sink on the second try. Robby followed after a moment, leaning against the counter like he didn’t trust himself to sit down yet.

You filled one glass and set it beside him. He looked at it. Then at you.

“You always this bossy off shift?”

“Yes.”

“Good to know.”

“You’re welcome.”

He picked up the glass, took one obedient sip, and set it down.

“Heroic,” you said.

“Don’t patronize me. I’m fragile.”

The joke came easier. Then disappeared. 

His eyes drifted to his hands. There was still dried blood near one knuckle. Not much. Just a rust-colored crescent caught at the edge of his skin. You saw the exact moment he noticed it too. Everything in him went still. The apartment seemed to go still with him.

Robby stared at his hand. His face emptied. Not dramatically. Not with a sob. Just gone. Like some vital part of him had stepped backward out of reach.

You didn’t move at first. Then you turned on the sink. The rush of water filled the silence.

Robby blinked once, like the sound brought him back half an inch. You reached for a dish towel, wet the corner, and held it out. 

He looked at it. Then at you.

“I can do it,” he said.

“I know.”

For a second, neither of you moved. Then he took the towel. His fingers brushed yours. Cold. He scrubbed at the blood too hard.

“Robby.”

“I know.”

He kept scrubbing.

You stepped closer, slowly. “You’re going to take the skin off.”

That got a breath out of him. Sharp. Bitter.

“Wouldn’t be the worst thing that came off me today.”

The words landed badly. He knew it as soon as he said them.

You saw the regret flash across his face, quick and wounded.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

You shook your head. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“I know.”

He looked down again. The towel hung from his hand now, damp and stained faintly pink.

His voice dropped so low you almost missed it.

“I thought I washed it off.”

Your chest tightened. You reached for the towel, and this time he let you take it. Carefully, you wiped the last mark from his knuckle. Not because he couldn’t. Because maybe, for once, he didn’t have to.

Robby watched your hand move over his. His breathing had gone shallow. You finished and folded the towel closed around the stain.

“There,” you whispered.

He didn’t pull away. Neither did you. For a moment, the whole day narrowed to the space between your hands.

Then Robby closed his eyes. His chin dipped. And when he spoke, his voice broke just enough to make your heart hurt.

“I don’t know how to go to sleep after this.”

You held his hand a little more firmly.

“Then we don’t start there.”

His eyes opened.

You kept your thumb resting against the back of his hand.

“We start with water,” you said softly. “Then maybe sitting down. Maybe taking off your shoes. Maybe turning on the TV so the quiet doesn’t get too loud.”

Robby stared at you like he wanted to argue. Like he wanted to make a joke. Like he wanted to say you had no idea what you were doing. But he didn’t. He just looked tired. So tired.

“Sounds like a terrible plan,” he said.

You nodded. “It’s the only one I’ve got.”

A faint, ruined smile touched his mouth.

“Figures.”

Then, very slowly, he let you lead him out of the kitchen. You led him to the couch like it was not a mercy. Like it was not a decision. Like it was simply the next thing.

Robby let you. That alone felt enormous.

He sank down slowly, elbows coming to his knees, hands hanging loose between them. For a second, he stared at the floor. Then he reached for the laces of one shoe and stopped halfway there. His fingers hovered. Nothing happened. 

You crouched in front of him. Not too close.

“Can I?”

His eyes lifted to yours.

For one second, you saw the argument in him. The reflexive no. The offended dignity. The dry comment about not being eighty-seven years old or post-op.

But it never made it out. Instead, Robby’s throat moved. Then he gave one small nod. So you untied his shoes. Carefully. One lace, then the other. You eased the first shoe off, then the second, setting them side by side near the coffee table. Such a stupid little thing. Such an ordinary act. And somehow it felt more intimate than anything else could have.

Robby looked down at you, wrecked and quiet.

“You don’t have to do that,” he said.

“I know.”

“You keep saying that.”

“You keep giving me reasons to.”

A breath moved through him. Almost a laugh. Not quite.

You stood and sat beside him, leaving space between you. Enough that he could breathe. Enough that he could pretend this was casual if he needed to.

Robby leaned back against the couch, head tipped slightly toward the ceiling, eyes open and unfocused.

The lamp threw warm light across his face. It made him look human in a way the hospital never did. Not smaller. Just less armored.

You picked up the remote from the coffee table. “Background noise?”

He didn’t look over. “Depends.”

“On?”

“How bad your taste is.”

You glanced at the dark TV. “At this point? Catastrophic.”

“Great.”

“You want medical drama?”

His head turned just enough to give you a look.

You held up both hands. “Too soon?”

“Forever too soon.”

“Game show?”

“I don’t want to watch people make decisions under pressure.”

“Cooking show?”

Robby stared at the ceiling.

Then, after a long second, said, “Cooking show.”

You turned on the TV and clicked through until you found something bright and harmless. People in aprons were panicking over pastry. No blood. No sirens. No one asking for a bed that didn’t exist. Just flour and timers and overly intense commentary about custard. 

The volume stayed low. Enough to soften the quiet. Not enough to demand anything. For a while, neither of you spoke. Onscreen, someone dropped a tray. A judge made a wounded noise.

Robby exhaled through his nose. “Rookie mistake.”

You looked at him. “You bake?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know?”

“I’m judgmental.”

That one got you.

A real laugh slipped out before you could stop it. Small. Tired. Cracked at the edges. But real.

Robby looked over at you. And something in his face changed. Not relief, exactly. Something more painful than that. Like your laugh had reminded him that life still existed outside the hospital, and he didn’t know what to do with the proof.

Your smile faded gently.

“What?”

He shook his head. “Nothing.”

“Robby.”

“It’s nothing.”

You let him have the lie for two seconds. Then you looked back at the TV.

“Okay.”

His gaze stayed on you. You could feel it. The weight of it. The uncertainty. The part of him that didn’t know what to do when someone didn’t pry open the wound just because they had noticed it.

Finally, he looked away too. Onscreen, the pastry disaster somehow got worse. You both watched in silence.

Then Robby said, “I heard you earlier.”

Your fingers tightened around the remote. You didn’t ask what he meant. You knew.

There had been so much noise. So many people. So many names. You had moved through the day with your face set and your voice calm because calm was useful. Calm got families into rooms. Calm got information out of chaos. Calm made horror easier for other people to receive.

But there had been one moment. One. A supply room with the door mostly closed. Your hand pressed over your mouth. A sound you had not meant to make. Small. Broken. Gone almost as soon as it escaped. Then you wiped your face, stepped back into the hall, and kept going.

You thought Robby had been across the department. 

You stared at the television. “I didn’t know anyone heard that.”

“I did.”

Of course he had. He noticed everything. Especially the things people hoped he wouldn’t.

You swallowed. “I was fine.”

“No, you weren’t.”

The correction was gentle. That made it worse. You looked down at your hands.

Robby’s voice stayed low beside you.

“You came back out thirty seconds later and talked to that father like you hadn’t just—”

He stopped. Couldn’t finish. Neither could you.

The father. The room. The name. The way his whole body had folded around the news.

Your eyes burned. You blinked hard, but it didn’t help.

“I had to,” you said.

“I know.”

The same words you’d given him all night. Returned now. Soft. Devastating. Your breath caught once.

You turned your face away, but it was too late. The first tear slipped free anyway, hot and humiliating after a day spent refusing to fall apart where anyone could see.

“Sorry,” you whispered.

Robby moved immediately. Not dramatically. Just there. One second there was space between you, and the next there wasn’t.

His hand found your wrist first, careful and grounding. Then your shoulder. Then he pulled you toward him with a restraint that nearly broke you more than force would have.

You went. Because you were tired. Because it was him. Because maybe you had been waiting for permission too.

Your forehead hit his shoulder, and the smell of him, soap, hospital, beer, the day, made something in you come loose.

You cried quietly at first. Then not quietly enough. Robby’s arm came around you. His hand settled at the back of your head.

“Hey,” he murmured.

Not fixing. Not shushing. Just there.

You gripped the front of his shirt like you were afraid of sliding off the earth.

“I keep seeing them,” you choked out.

His hand stilled.

“I know.”

“I keep hearing the monitors. I keep hearing people asking me if their kids were alive, and I knew, Robby. Sometimes I knew before they finished asking.”

Your voice cracked.

“I knew.”

Robby closed his eyes. His face pressed briefly into your hair.

“I know.”

“It felt like lying every time I told someone it’ll be okay.”

His arm tightened around you.

“Yeah.”

“And I can’t stop thinking about the ones who were alone.”

That did it. You felt him break before you heard it. The breath went out of him wrong. Hard. A sound caught low in his chest and stayed there, trapped behind all the things he had refused to let himself feel in front of anyone else.

You lifted your head. Robby was looking past you, jaw clenched, eyes bright in the lamplight. Trying. Still trying. Even here. Even now.

“There you are,” you whispered.

His face shifted. A warning. A plea. Don’t. Don’t see this. Don’t make me name it. But you already had.

You lifted a hand slowly and touched his cheek. He flinched once. Not away. Just from the tenderness of it.

“Robby.”

His eyes closed. And then the first tear fell. Silent. Angry. Like it had escaped without permission.

He shook his head once. “I can’t—”

“I know.”

“No.” His voice broke around the word. “No, I can’t do this. I can’t keep doing this.”

You held his face between your hands, gentle but steady. He tried to look away. You didn’t let him disappear.

“Tonight?”

His mouth trembled. He hated that too.

“All of it,” he said. “The whole goddamn thing.”

The TV murmured in the background. Someone laughed about pastry cream. The apartment stayed warm around you, absurdly normal while Robby came apart in your hands.

“I can’t keep walking back into that place and pretending it doesn’t take pieces out of me.”

His voice dropped. Raw now. Ruined.

“I don’t think I know what’s left.”

Your own tears kept falling. You brushed your thumb under his eye, catching what he would have wiped away if he’d had the strength to care.

“You’re left,” you whispered.

He let out a broken sound. Not quite a laugh. Not quite a sob.

“Barely.”

“Barely counts.”

His forehead dipped toward yours, and you let it. For a second, that was all there was. His breath uneven against yours. Your hands on his face.

The two of you came undone in the low glow of the living room, with the city outside and the hospital behind you and the whole terrible day still breathing down your necks.

Then Robby whispered, “I don’t want to be alone tonight.”

There it was. The truth. Small. Terrified. Everything.

Your throat tightened so hard it hurt.

“You’re not.”

His hands closed around your wrists. Not pushing you away. Holding on.

“I mean it,” he said, like you might not understand. Like he needed to make the warning clear. “I’m not good company right now.”

“I didn’t come for company.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Me neither.”

His eyes opened.

You gave him the smallest smile you could manage.

“That’s kind of the theme.”

A breath shuddered out of him. This time, when he laughed, it broke in the middle. But it was real. You felt it against your palms.

Then he leaned forward and pulled you into him, not carefully this time. Not politely. His arms wrapped around you with something close to desperation, and yours went around his shoulders just as fast.

You held each other like neither of you knew which one was saving the other. Maybe that was the point. Maybe nobody had to. Maybe tonight it was enough to stay. His face pressed into the curve of your neck. Your hand found the back of his head.

Outside, traffic passed in soft waves. Inside, the cooking show kept playing to no one. And for the first time all day, Robby stopped moving.

He did not fall apart cleanly. Neither did you. But you fell apart together. And somehow, somehow, that made the room feel survivable.

Not better. Not healed. Just enough.

Robby held on like he had forgotten how to let go without falling. His breath came unevenly against your neck, warm and broken, while your fingers stayed buried in his hair.

Neither of you spoke. There were no words useful enough for this.

The cooking show kept murmuring from the television, absurdly bright and cheerful in the corner of the room. Someone laughed about a collapsed cake. A judge said something grave about texture. Life, impossibly, kept offering ordinary things.

You closed your eyes. Robby’s grip tightened once at the back of your shirt.

“I’m still here,” you whispered.

His answer was barely sound.

“I know.”

But he held on like he needed the proof anyway. So you stayed.

Minutes passed. Or longer. Time had gone strange somewhere between the park and his apartment, stretched thin by grief and exhaustion until it no longer meant much of anything.

Eventually, Robby’s breathing slowed. Not sleep. Not peace. But closer.

His forehead rested against your shoulder now, his body heavy with the kind of exhaustion that came after running too long on nothing.

You kept one hand at the nape of his neck. Steady. Quiet. There.

Outside, traffic moved softly through the dark. Behind you, somewhere across the city, the hospital kept glowing.

Tomorrow would come. The shift would end and begin again. The board would fill. The rooms would turn over. The grief would still be there, waiting in corners neither of you knew how to clean out yet.

But not tonight. 

Tonight, there was only the low hum of the television.

The warmth of his hands still holding on. 

Your breath and his, uneven but matching.

You and him.

He had ordered them from the little florist two blocks over because he’d noticed, weeks ago, that you paused outside their window whenever they had tulips in the display.

Soft yellow tulips. A few white ranunculus tucked between them. Greenery around the edges.

Bright without being loud.

Like morning.

Like you.

He set them carefully on the kitchen counter, still wrapped in brown paper, then glanced toward your bedroom.

Your alarm was set for seven.

Jack knew that because he knew your routine now. Knew how quickly you moved once the alarm went off, like the day had grabbed you by the wrist before your eyes were even open.

But not today.

He crossed the apartment quietly, every step measured.

Your bedroom door was cracked open.

You were asleep on your side, tucked under the blanket, one hand curled near your face. Your hair was messy against the pillow. You looked peaceful. Truly peaceful. The kind that almost never found you once you were awake.

The alarm clock on your nightstand glowed.

6:41 AM.

Jack moved carefully around the edge of the bed and turned the alarm off.

No snooze. 

Off.

You shifted slightly, brow pulling together like some part of you sensed a routine being interrupted.

Jack leaned down and pressed the softest kiss to your temple.

“Not today,” he whispered.

You settled again.

He stayed there one extra second, looking at you. Then he slipped back out and pulled the door nearly shut.

The kitchen became his next mission.

Tommy’s routine.

Jack unplugged the tablet from the charger and set it at Tommy’s usual place at the table, screen already awake and ready. Then he opened the cabinet where you kept Tommy’s morning meds, took out the organizer, and checked the label twice because he was careful with things that mattered.

Medication.

Glass of milk.

Strawberry Pop-Tart. Not toasted.

Jack had made that mistake exactly once and had been corrected with the full force of Tommy’s disgust and three tablet presses of:

“No hot.”

“Not again.”

He placed everything where Tommy expected it.

Tablet to the left. Milk above the plate. Pop-Tart centered. Meds beside the glass.

Predictable.

Steady.

Done.

Then Jack washed his hands, rolled up his sleeves, and started breakfast.

Real breakfast.

Not “man tries pancakes and hopes for the best” breakfast.

Jack could cook. Well, actually. It was one of the things people didn’t always expect from him, probably because he gave off the energy of someone who could survive on black coffee, hospital cafeteria sandwiches, and spite.

But he liked cooking.

Liked the structure of it. The sequence. The quiet precision.

He set out eggs, flour, milk, butter, vanilla, cinnamon, and the maple syrup he’d brought over because Mother’s Day pancakes deserved actual syrup, not the bottle shaped like a cheerful lie.

He was measuring flour when Tommy’s bedroom door opened.

Soft creak. Bare feet. Slow, sleepy steps.

Tommy appeared in the hallway wearing dinosaur pajama pants and an oversized shirt, hair smashed flat on one side from sleep.

He stopped when he saw Jack.

Jack looked up from the counter and smiled.

“Morning, buddy.”

Tommy blinked at him.

Then his eyes moved to the table.

Tablet. Pop-Tart. Milk. Meds.

His shoulders lowered slightly.

He walked to the table, picked up the tablet first, and pressed:

“Jack is home.”

“Yeah,” Jack said, keeping his voice low. “Early today.”

Tommy looked toward your bedroom door.

“Where is Mom?”

Jack softened.

“Still asleep.”

Tommy’s brow furrowed.

Jack dried his hands on a towel and came closer, lowering himself into the chair across from Tommy so they were on the same level without crowding him.

“Today is Mother’s Day,” Jack said. “That means it’s a day where we say thank you to moms.”

Tommy watched him.

Jack looked toward your bedroom door. “Your mom takes care of people all day long. She makes breakfast, helps with your tablet, remembers medicine, checks weather reports.” His expression softened. “She makes you feel safe and loved.”

Tommy looked toward your door.

“So today,” Jack said, lowering his voice like he was telling him something very important, “we let Mom sleep. We make her breakfast. We give her flowers. And we do not wake her up unless the apartment is on fire.”

Tommy blinked.

Jack paused.

“And even then,” he added, “we bring the flowers.”

Tommy’s mouth twitched.

Then his tablet spoke.

“Mom day.”

Jack smiled. “Exactly. Mom day.”

Tommy paused and looked toward the bedroom again.

“Mom still sleep.”

“Yep,” Jack said. “First Mother’s Day rule. Mom sleeps in.”

Tommy stared at him.

Jack leaned in slightly and lowered his voice like he was sharing classified information.

“Second rule is we do not wake mom up.”

Tommy blinked.

“Mom works hard. Today, sleep is her first gift.”

Tommy looked toward your bedroom door again, then down at the Pop-Tart.

He picked it up carefully with both hands and took a bite.

Jack stayed where he was, giving him space to wake up fully at his own pace.

Tommy chewed slowly, eyes drifting around the kitchen while his brain caught up to the morning.

The flowers on the counter.

The mixing bowl.

The eggs.

The flour.

The stove.

Then back to Jack.

His tablet spoke.

“What are you cooking?”

“Pancakes,” Jack said softly.

Tommy watched as Jack moved back to the counter. Not anxious watching. Curious watching.

Tommy always liked seeing how things worked once he trusted the pattern.

Jack measured flour into the bowl.

Tommy watched the flour closely.

“It is too much.”

Jack looked down and smiled slightly.

“Good catch, chef.”

He fixed it before pouring it into the bowl.

Tommy nodded once, satisfied.

Jack paused.

“You’re using full sentences a lot more lately,” he said.

Tommy looked at him.

Jack kept his voice easy, not making it too big. “Good job.”

Tommy’s fingers hovered over the tablet for a second.

Then he pressed:

“Ms. Molly says I have to.”

Jack’s mouth twitched. “Ms. Molly sounds tough.”

Tommy nodded seriously.

Then pressed:

“Mom says too.”

“Yeah?” Jack leaned against the counter. “Well, Mom and Ms. Molly are right.”

Tommy watched him carefully.

Jack nodded toward the flour. “That was clear. I knew exactly what you meant. Proud of you kid.”

Tommy’s shoulders lifted a little.

Not much.

Just enough.

Proud.

Jack smiled softer.

“Nice work, buddy.”

Tommy looked down at the tablet, then back at the bowl like he was trying not to show how much that landed.

But he stood a little taller anyway.

Jack let him have the moment.

Then he reached for the cinnamon.

Tommy’s eyes followed immediately.

“You have cinnamon.”

“Yep.”

Jack reached for the vanilla.

“And vanilla.”

Jack held up the bottle briefly. “Secret ingredients.”

Tommy looked at the batter.

Jack smiled slightly. “Well. Not very secret anymore.”

Tommy’s mouth twitched.

Jack cracked the eggs into a smaller bowl first, clean and easy. Tommy watched closely.

Not because the eggs interested him specifically.

Because Jack did.

Tommy leaned slightly closer as the second egg dropped into the bowl.

“Two eggs.”

Jack nodded seriously. “Couldn’t sneak a third past you if I tried.”

Tommy accepted the praise with complete seriousness.

Jack poured milk into the bowl.

A tiny splash hit the counter.

Tommy’s eyes dropped to the milk immediately.

“You made mess.”

Jack sighed softly. “I’m losing credibility as a chef.”

Tommy’s shoulders bounced once in silent amusement.

Jack started whisking the batter slowly.

Round and round.

The flour disappeared into the batter.

“Mixing good.”

Jack glanced over. “That’s years of pancake training.”

Tommy took another bite of Pop-Tart while he watched.

Jack slowed the movement of the whisk just enough for Tommy to follow it easier.

“Now it’s getting smoother,” he said quietly.

Tommy looked between the whisk and the batter.

Jack nodded once. “That’s what we want.”

The batter smoothed out gradually.

Tommy watched the consistency change.

“More milk.”

Jack paused, looked into the bowl, then back at Tommy.

“You might actually be better at this than me.”

Tommy straightened slightly in his chair.

Jack added a little more milk.

“There. Better?”

Tommy studied the batter carefully, then nodded once.

Jack pointed at him with the whisk. “Natural talent. I might have to promote you to sous chef.”

Tommy made another soft amused sound.

Jack handed him the whisk.

“You wanna try?”

Tommy looked down at it.

Then at Jack.

Then carefully climbed down from the chair.

Jack stepped sideways automatically to give him room at the counter.

Tommy came to stand beside him, still sleepy around the edges but more awake now.

He wrapped both hands around the whisk.

Jack leaned one elbow against the counter.

“Alright,” he said quietly. “First pancake rule.”

Tommy looked up at him.

“Keep the batter inside the bowl.”

Tommy stared at him.

Jack nodded once. “The bowl worked hard to be included.”

Tommy’s mouth twitched.

Then he started whisking.

Carefully at first.

Small circles.

Jack watched him for a second before nodding. “That’s solid whisk technique.”

Tommy whisked a little faster.

The batter sloshed slightly against the side of the bowl.

Jack pointed immediately. “Easy there, chef. We stay below tornado level.”

Tommy slowed right away.

Tommy kept mixing while Jack stayed beside him, not taking over, just there if needed.

Then Tommy glanced toward the flowers.

His fingers moved over the tablet.

“Yellow flowers.”

Jack followed his gaze.

“Yellow tulips.”

Tommy looked at them for a long second.

“Mom likes yellow flowers.”

Jack’s expression softened around the edges.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “She does.”

Tommy stepped closer to the counter, whisk still held carefully in both hands.

He studied the flowers the same way he studied weather radar and pancake batter.

Then his tablet spoke again.

“Pretty.”

Jack glanced at them.

“Thought so too.”

Tommy tilted his head slightly, still staring at the tulips.

“Like Sun.”

Jack looked at him.

“You know what? They are kinda sunny.”

Tommy nodded once like this was obvious.

Jack reached for the kitchen scissors and carefully cut the paper away from the stems.

Tommy immediately stopped whisking to watch.

Jack noticed.

“Flower inspection?”

Tommy pressed the button without looking away from the flowers.

“Watching you.”

“Right,” Jack said seriously. “Can’t proceed without supervision.”

Jack trimmed the stems one at a time over the sink.

Snip. Snip. Snip.

Tommy watched each stem fall into the sink.

“Flowers need water.”

Jack nodded. “Exactly. Can’t have thirsty tulips.”

Tommy’s shoulders lifted slightly with quiet pride.

Jack pulled down a tall glass from the cabinet, filled it halfway with water, and arranged the flowers inside. Tommy watched him adjust one tulip that leaned too far forward.

“You know,” Jack said, stepping back, “I think we crushed it.”

Tommy looked at the flowers.

Then at the batter.

Then toward your bedroom door.

His tablet spoke.

“Mom day.”

“Yeah.”

“Mom sleeping.”

“Still sleeping.”

Tommy considered that.

“Cooking breakfast.”

Jack glanced toward the stove. “Everything’s almost ready to go.”

Tommy watched the pan carefully.

“Hot now.”

Jack nodded. 

“Perfect pancake temperature.” Then he picked up the bowl again. “You ready?”

Tommy immediately straightened.

Jack poured batter into the pan.

Soft hiss.

Tommy watched closely as the edges started to cook.

“Now,” Jack said quietly, “we wait for bubbles.”

Tommy leaned in slightly.

A tiny bubble appeared near the middle.

Tommy pointed instantly.

“Bubble.”

“First bubble sighting.”

Another one appeared near the edge.

Then another.

Tommy’s whole focus narrowed onto the pancake like he was personally responsible for monitoring its development.

Jack crossed his arms loosely beside him.

“Now we wait until the bubbles spread a little more.”

Tommy watched the pancake carefully.

A few more bubbles appeared.

Jack slid the spatula beneath it.

“Okay. Now we flip.”

Lift.

Turn.

The pancake settled back into the pan with a soft hiss.

Tommy watched it carefully.

“Looks good.”

Jack glanced down at the uneven edge and smiled slightly.

“Yeah. Homemade always looks a little imperfect.”

Tommy accepted this immediately.

Jack nudged the spatula toward him. “You wanna try the next flip with me?”

Tommy looked at the spatula.

Then at Jack.

Then nodded once.

“Alright. Team effort.”

Jack moved the next pancake into the pan.

Tommy watched the batter spread, round and pale against the buttered surface.

“Now we wait,” Jack said quietly.

Tommy leaned lightly against the counter, eyes fixed on the pancake.

A few quiet seconds passed before he pointed toward the pan.

Jack glanced down. “Yeah. First bubble.”

Tommy watched another one appear near the edge.

Jack nodded. “Now we’re close.”

The bubbles spread slowly across the surface after that.

Jack picked up the spatula and slid it carefully beneath the pancake.

“Okay,” he said softly. “Now we flip.”

Jack kept one hand loosely over Tommy’s.

“Alright, chef,” he said quietly. “Slow and careful.”

Tommy focused on the pancake with complete concentration.

Together, they slid the spatula under the pancake.

Jack kept his touch light.

Tommy did most of it.

“Lift,” Jack murmured.

Tommy lifted.

“Turn.”

The pancake folded slightly on one side as it flipped, landing a little crooked in the pan.

Tommy froze.

Jack looked down at it.

The pancake sat there, half-perfect, half-wrinkled.

Jack nodded slowly. “Abstract.”

Tommy blinked.

“That means fancy weird.”

Tommy’s shoulders bounced once.

Jack used the spatula to smooth the edge back out.

“There we go.”

Tommy stared at the pancake another second.

“Mom pancake.”

Jack’s expression softened.

“Yeah, buddy,” he said quietly. “For Mom.”

Tommy stared at the pan another second.

“Mom still sleep.”

“Yeah,” Jack said. “We’ll let her sleep.”

Tommy nodded once.

A plan he could hold.

Jack could almost see it settle in him.

The morning made sense now. Not regular routine, but a special one. A different pattern with clear rules.

Mom sleeps.

Jack cooks.

Tommy helps.

Breakfast waits.

Mother’s Day.

Jack transferred a pancake to the growing stack.

Tommy watched him line it up with the others. The stack was getting taller now, warm steam curling beneath the kitchen lights.

“More pancakes.”

Jack looked over. “Still not enough pancakes?”

Tommy nodded his head once.

Jack nodded solemnly. “Excellent. I’m glad we agree.”

They made more.

Tommy stayed close while it cooked, quieter now, just existing beside Jack in that easy morning rhythm.

The kind Tommy only settled into with people he trusted.

The Weather Channel shifted into a radar update in the living room. Tommy’s attention flicked automatically toward the sound before returning to the pan.

Jack caught it.

“No storms today.”

Tommy shook his head once.

“It is sunny.”

“That’s the rumor.”

Tommy looked toward the flowers again.

“Yellow flowers are sunny.”

Jack smiled slightly. “They are, aren't they.”

Another bubble appeared.

Then another.

“Ready.”

Jack looked down.

“You’re getting real good at this.”

Tommy looked mildly pleased with himself.

Jack handed him the spatula.

“This one’s yours.”

Tommy’s eyes widened slightly.

“I’ll help if you need it,” Jack said.

Tommy wrapped both hands around the handle and slid the spatula under the pancake slowly.

Too slowly at first.

The edge bent.

Tommy paused.

Jack didn’t correct him right away.

“Little farther,” he said quietly. “You got it.”

Tommy adjusted.

The spatula slid fully underneath this time.

Jack nodded once.

“There you go.”

Tommy lifted.