seitmai

Friends with benefits is only good up to a point. It’s only good when there aren’t feelings involved, when feelings are never involved, but the thing is, is that intimacy like that only holds out against feelings for so long. No one is made of steel—everyone has a heart. 

            Although, maybe not Brendan. 

            “You almost decided on what you’re doing after?” he asks you now, his body half-in a tight black shirt and half-out, his back to you, a sliver of that toned back still showing. 

            “Still debating my options,” you tell him, your hands still pressing the covers to your chest, your body naked underneath them from the filthy yet wonderful acts the two of you have just committed, the evidence still leaking from between your thighs onto his sheets. 

            “But surgery for sure, right?” he replies and you sigh, shrugging even though he can’t see you, that same burning and constricting feeling emerging in your chest. 

            “Yeah, I’m thinking of a paediatric surgery fellowship,” you say as he turns around, those perfect ocean eyes locking onto you, one eyebrow arched as he snorts, shaking his head, his finger-mussed hair so different from the way he normally gels it back. 

            “Why would you want to work with kids?” he asks you, his tone harsh and punishing, the meaning cutting you to the quick, the dismissal. 

            “Because I like them,” you counter and he sighs, shrugging and running a hand through his already mussed hair, the hair you mussed pulling on it as he ate you out just moments ago. 

            “Sounds like hell,” he says and the way you press your lips into a thin line is enough to end the conversation. 

            “Did you apply?” are the first words out of your mother’s mouth as you step out onto the floor of the ED, her blond hair coming loose from the chignon she insists is fine for her hair’s health. 

            “Geez, Ma,” you call out, “you couldn’t even ask me how I’m doing first?” Dana simply narrows her eyes at you, jaw flexing as she bites down on her gum, a particularly hard chew, emphasizing her displeasure at your tone.

            “Did you apply, sugar, or not?” her tone leaves no room for argument as you step deeper into the ED, watching as your friends rush past, a Trauma arriving through the ambulance bay, the noise and hum of the place you’ve been raised in sending a form of calm through you. 

            “I did,” you reply, your sardonic enough to match hers, enough to make her smile at you, the one that only you get, the one of the mother not the nurse. “But I’ve also looked into attending positions open here at PTMC.” You can see your mother’s face fall, just slightly, the way it folds in, in the expression you’ve grown up with, the one you see when she disagrees with your choice, your thoughts but she won’t say anything because you’re growing and to grow means to make your own decisions. 

            “Did anyone say anything to you?” She’s too carefully neutral and that’s when you realize what she’s getting at, what she’s saying—what she’s hinting. 

            “Brendan has nothing to with that, Mom,” you tell her as you reach the nurse’s station, leaning on it on your forearms, right hand straying to fiddle with the bracelet your mom got you when you graduated med school, the one with the handmade charm in the shape of a compass, the back inscribed with however far you go, you are the one who will get you where you need to go. 

            Something she’s told you all your life. 

            “I didn’t say anything, sugar,” she says, but the way her lips curve up just slightly on the edges tell you all you need to know. 

            “Uh-huh,” you reply, rolling your eyes as she lifts her hand, fingers closed around the digital pencil, her hand ruffling your hair like she’s done since you were a kid, small enough to tuck up against her side, curled up in one of the chairs at the station, claiming that the daycare was for kids and you were not a kid. 

            Your daycare was the ED; you grew up on Traumas and broken bones and consults. You grew up on adrenaline and flashing lights. You grew up on codes, knowing the order of them before you knew the alphabet. You grew up with your mother and your Uncle Robby and your Uncle Jack, your sisters ensconced at home with your dad while you snuck behind the pillars to make out with med students. 

            It’s not Brendan that you want to stay for as much as you feel for him, for his sardonic nature and easy cruelty that he never even realizes is cruel. You want to stay for this place, this hospital, your home away from home. It’s the place you had your first kiss—a sloppy make-out with an MS3 that Uncle Jack walked in on and dragged the boy from you, swearing that he’d have the kid’s tongue. It’s where you met your first boyfriend—John Shen, now an attending and your closest friend. 

            It’s where your life began, your mother having gone into labour on the job because she refused to take maternity leave when she should have. It’s where everything started for you and you don’t want to leave, don’t want to travel halfway across the country for a pediatric fellowship, yet at the same time you do.

            You want to leave and grow and change in a place that is your own and not the place where you were molded into the person you are now. 

            You want it and you don’t. 

            And maybe Brendan has a bit more to do with it than you care to admit. Maybe you’d miss him a bit too much. 

            Friends with benefits fucking sucks. 

            “Brendan!” you cry out as your back arches, rising at the same time that he thrusts into you, his hand pressing you down onto the mattress, his hands pulling your hips back until he’s completely sheathed inside, his one hand playing with your clit and folds, stroking and twirling, playing at every sensitive part, his fingers working magic, his knowledge of anatomy making it all the smoother. 

            “Shh, baby,” he whispers as he presses down with his thumb on your clit, a pressure building in your body, the kind that hurts while also heals, the kind that has every part of you burning and writhing underneath him. “I got you, sweetheart. I got you.”

            He pulls back, pulls out completely, dragging the head of his cock along your entrance, between your folds to take the place of his thumb, circling it on your clit, the feeling so good that you moan, your hands fisting in the sheets.

            When he called you, telling you he needed release that it was a hard day at work, you expected it to be rough, for him to be angry and needing the harshness and the quick and the rough edges that both of you have—not this. Not him being gentle and sweet and coaxing you through it, praising you. Assuring you that he’s there, that he’s not leaving. 

            The head of his cock is still circling your clit, and he guides it, pressing it just slightly, just enough that the coil snaps and your orgasm rams through you, just as he enters you again, the flutters of your walls, wrapping around his cock as he thrusts in and out, just once before spilling inside of you as your walls clamp down around him and he groans, eyes closing in bliss, his head tipping back.

            “Jesus!” you hiss as he pulls out, guiding you off your stomach, to sit up before him, your body hyper-sensitive, the Greek god of a man before you having coaxed four orgasms out of you, most with his mouth, that tongue of his that bring people to tears from biting words reducing you to whines and mewls, body burning. 

            “That good, huh?” he asks you, with a smirk, guiding you up and to your feet, pulling your body tight against his, his semen and your release dripping down your thighs in a way that tickles and itches at the same time. 

            “Shut up, Park,” you reply, one side of your mouth curving up into a grin as you push him away, one hand connecting with his solid shoulder, already missing his presence against you, the way his body felt when pushed up against yours. 

            “That’s not what you were saying, like, thirty minutes ago,” he counters, his hand twining around your wrist, pulling you back against him, your breasts pressing against his chest. “You were urging me to make noise, if I remember right,” he says, his voice dropping to a whisper as he trails his free hand down the side of your face, your skin lighting up under his touch, the shiver running through your body at his tender touch. 

            “A lot can happen in thirty minutes,” you reply, your lips curving in a sardonic smile, one he kisses off, pressing a quick, open-mouthed kiss against you, his teeth drawing your bottom lip between them, nipping playfully. 

            “I know,” he murmurs, pulling back and placing his forehead against yours, pupil-blown eyes gleaming, “wanna find out just how much?”

            And you say yes, but a twinge in your stomach tells you that something isn’t the same. 

            That maybe nothing will be the same again. 

            “Have you ever wanted kids?” you ask Brendan, leaning back against his counter, your body clad in only his t-shirt, hands twirling a spatula between them as he spins from the fridge, a container of milk in his hand as one eyebrow arches, his hair loose, not slickly gelled back like a Gator Tillman wannabe. 

            “No,” he says, the word abrupt and harsh and stinging even though it was just a question, just…a curiosity. “Told you, kids are little demons. Why the hell would I want my own?”

            “You were a kid once, you dick,” you reply and he glances over his shoulder at you while he pours milk into the bowl, the cookie dough not quite resembling dough. Yet. 

            “That’s how I know if I had one, they’d be a terror,” he says and you roll your eyes at him, shaking your head affectionately while he sets the milk back on the counter and waves his hand, gesturing you over, which you follow, tucking up into his side and pressing a kiss to his cheek. A tender gesture you usually avoid. 

            “Good thing you don’t do relationships then,” you tease him, feeling him stiffen against you before he joins in your slight laughter, the sardonic chuckle. 

            “You’re right, sweetheart.”

            The bile burns in the back of your throat as you race for the bathroom, reaching the toilet in just enough time, your eyes watering and noise stinging as you hurl, coughing, into the porcelain basin. Your eyes are streaming, tears falling from your cheeks into the bowl as you cough and burn, the smell of your own stomach acid permeating everything, sinking into your skin and when you’re done, your body empty, you slump back against the bathroom wall, pressing a hand against your stomach, a small fear creeping into your mind as you take into account that this is the fifth morning you’ve been sick. 

            You might just be pregnant. 

            In front of you sit two things, an acceptance letter for the pediatric surgery fellowship and a white a pink stick with two digital pink lines, six more identical tests sitting in your bathroom garbage. 

            It took six to get the meaning to stick, the idea that you were pregnant to resonate as real and not fake, not some cosmic joke. 

            It took calling your mother, crying that you were stupid, that you messed up and ranting to her about how much of a fuck-up you are for that idea that maybe you didn’t fuck up to stick.

            It took hearing your mother’s soft voice, the encouragement, the facts and the options for you to decide that you don’t want to get rid of it. You want to raise a child like you were raised, with endless opportunity and belief and hope and love. 

            And you don’t want to wait and risk losing that chance. 

            In front of you sit two things, both chances given to you to give you the life you’ve always wanted, the only thing holding you back is Brendan, his part in all of this. Because a part of you wants to tell him, but the other part knows that it wouldn’t go well, that you can’t. You can’t because you don’t want to see how his face twists in anger. 

            You can’t handle that. So, your choice is easy—you make the choice that sets you free, that sets Brendan free. 

            Looks like you’re going to California.

            When Brendan found that you had left, his heart had left him completely. It was like the ground beneath him had cracked and everything had fallen away. He thought things were good, he thought that you liked him—for more than just casual sex. 

            He had thought you understood until that one night that you whispered “good thing you don’t do relationships then” and he realized that you still thought it was FWB, not something real like he did. 

            He had thought that you had noticed the way he started making cookies after sex because you’d once mentioned that you always wanted something sweet after. He thought you had noticed the dinner; the coffees he brought to you on your floor for your break. He thought you had noticed the change in the sex, the way he focused more on you, the way he wanted you and you alone and not for stress relief, simply because he wanted to be close to you, as close as he could get. 

            But apparently, he had thought wrong. Because you were gone—completely and totally absent from his life. 

            And you didn’t even say goodbye, just up and left for California, to the pediatric surgery fellowship. 

            Which was great…he just wished you could have said goodbye. 

            And from then on, life was rote and boring and empty for three long years, the most he would hear of you was the proud bragging of Robby and Abbot when he went for ED consults and they couldn’t not rave about you. 

            Dana remained close-lipped no matter how he pried, no matter how he tried to get any updates about you. She wouldn’t talk. 

            “If she hasn’t reached out then she doesn’t want you knowing. Now go back to your job, Dr. Park.”

            He just hoped, with all his heart that you would come back after the fellowship was done. That you would come back when it was over so he could try and tell you how much he fucked up. How sorry he was. How much he loved you. 

            How he would do anything to have you back. 

            Moving back to Pittsburgh wasn’t really a choice—it was just something you had to do. The pediatric surgeon attending position was open, you needed help looking after your two-year old son and your family was there and, if truth be told, you needed to confront your demons. You needed to be in the same place as your family, the same place you ran from to spare yourself the look in Brendan’s eye when he found out that you were pregnant when he never wanted kids at all.

            Moving back to Pittsburgh was the right thing to do. The only thing to do. You missed your family and you missed the seasons and you missed PTMC, your home away from home. You missed Brendan too. More than you cared to admit. 

            “Look at this little one!” Cassie calls out, striding over to the nurse’s desk, her lips curving up in her characteristic grin as she smiles at your son, bending just a little so her eyes are level with his as he stands on the top of the desk, held up by his grandma’s hands. “How old are you, bud?”

            “Just turned two,” you answer, your lips curved up in that perpetual smile that you have now, the smile that you have at everything your son does, everything he manages to do. He’s the light in your life, the star that guides you back because here is this life that needs you. Needs you not just to give him food and shelter, but love and guidance. He needs all of you and you have to stay to give him that. 

            “You’re gonna miss these years when they’re gone,” she says, straightening up and taking an iPad from the holder, smiling again at your little boy, the smile tinging with sadness as she looks up, her eyes meeting yours. “They go by fast.”

            “That they do,” your mother chimes in, turning back to you, her eyebrows knitting together as she looks at you, her eyes gleaming with sadness and love and loss. “It seems like just yesterday that it was you, I was holdin’ on this desk, missy.”

            “Ah, Ma,” you reply, pressing the heels of your hands against your eyes. “You’re gonna make me cry on my first day.”

            “I’m sorry, sugar,” she says, “but I just miss the times before. You’re my little girl and now…you’re not so little anymore. Now…you’re a mother of your own and I…I’m a little emotional about it, that’s all.”

            “Ma,” you whisper, your voice cracking at the same time your name resounds through the ED, through the walls that have been your home for so long, through the walls where your life began and continues. Your voice resounds in a voice that you had hoped you wouldn’t have to hear again. 

            “Bren,” you breathe out, flicking your eyes up, landing on the man who hasn’t changed, who still wears his hair gelled back like a Gator Tillman wannabe, his face still stern and predatory like the shark he’s nicknamed for, his body still built, large and imposing. He’s still the man who took the word scary and made it a public personality. 

            You wonder if he still melts to soft in private. 

            “You’re back,” he says, the whole ED having fallen silent as he walks to you, every step slow and yet too fast, the world frozen and yet speeding by as your heart tightens in your chest, lungs constricting and burning. 

            “Ma,” you whisper, tearing your eyes from Brendan even when you want to know what will happen if you stay. “Ma, I gotta get Reed to the daycare.” Dana lifts your little boy—a solid two-year old with dark brown hair and ocean blue eyes—pressing a kiss to his chubby cheek and passes him to you, settling him on your hip. 

            “It doesn’t hurt to talk, sweetheart,” she whispers in reply, eyebrows arching in the way that only a mother can have before she turns back to her desk, barking out an order at Whitaker who looks like a startled deer at her voice. And you take off to the elevator, bouncing Reed on your hip while he claps his hands, gurgling happily, murmuring some small words like mama and teddy.

            You tap your foot, impatient for the silver doors to open and let you in, let you run from the man who gave the chance to have a child and yet doesn’t know. 

            You hear him call your name again as the doors slide open and you step in around the crowd of people rushing out, pressing the button for the daycare floor and the button to close the doors, the silver halves sliding to one another as your eyes lock with ocean blue ones, glimmering with hope and love. 

            With knowledge. 

            Brendan knew as soon as he saw you, saw your son that you had been pregnant when you left. Because the boy is old enough to be his and those eyes that he saw in that perfect, chubby face are his, exact. Father to son. His grandfather had them and his dad had them, and if the stories are to be believed, every single man in his family—including his son. 

            He knows you, loves you and he knows that you need time. You need to wrap your head around him being here, being present. 

            Being real. 

            You need to figure out how to tell him and he’s patient. He’s patient because he loves you and he wants whatever you are willing to give him. 

            And as the elevator doors slide closed before him, sealing you and his son away, he’s willing to accept that you just might give him nothing after all. 

            “Reed is my son, isn’t he?” you hear Brendan call out, his voice echoing across the parking lot, reverberating through your body, echoing down your spine. 

            “Yes,” you reply, your voice barely above a whisper, yet carrying all the same through the still night air, broken only by the vague sound of sirens, the night sky polluted by streetlights and skyscrapers and emergency lights, the blue and red flashes strobing across and silhouetting Brendan. 

            He stands not far from you, his backpack over his shoulder, normally pulled back shoulders hunched in, rolled close. 

            You’ve been avoiding him for weeks, arriving early and leaving late, taking your lunches in the daycare or the ED, bringing Reed up on those times to join his grandma and hang out in the place you spent your formative years, molded into a person by adrenaline junkies and jaded, near-suicidal doctors. 

            “Do you want me in his life or no? If it’s no, I’ll never bring this up again,” he says, his steps soundless as he steps closer to you, your heart in your throat, pulsing as you feel the sting of tears in your eyes. 

            “You said you didn’t want kids,” you whisper and his hands reach out and cup your cheeks, Reed’s chubby hands slapping up on his forearm and something in you breaks when you see him take in Reed, his expression melting into one of awe and disbelief, one that says I can’t believe this is real. And then, one warm calloused hand leaves your face to cup Reed’s, his touch reverential and gentle, as if Reed is both the strongest and most breakable thing he’s ever seen. 

            “I said that because I didn’t think I deserved them,” you hear him whisper, the words cracking something open inside of you. The idea that this man, this perfect brutal man didn’t think he deserved a family even when he wanted it, destroys you. 

            Especially because you deprived him of a part of that because you didn’t want to risk telling him and seeing him change. 

            “I didn’t…” you pause, swallowing around the lump in your throat as he looks up at you, his eyes reflecting back the question of can I hold him? and you nod, helping Brendan take his son, watching as his face breaks into a smile as he lifts the boy, laughing just slightly, the sound rich and deep and warm as Reed claps his hands on Brendan’s cheek, gurgling happily. 

            “Thank god, he got your nose, sweetheart,” he says and those are the words that undo you, make you fall apart, the tears that were threatening now falling in earnest down your cheeks, searing the skin as your son giggles, one small hand closing around the point of Brendan’s nose. 

            “He…uh, I guess he thinks so too,” you whisper, your throat thick and voice shaking as your one hand goes to stifle the sob that works its way out of your throat, tearing free as you glance away, glance away from Brendan and the way he rests Reed on his hip, his touch gentle and paternal and perfect. 

            “You okay, Evans?” he asks you and you hear the pause and you know he wanted to say your name but he wasn’t sure if he should, or how he should and you give your head one quick shake before back to him, your arms outstretched for your—his—son.

            “I just need to get home,” you say, your voice still cracking, still broken in a way and breaking more. “It’s way past Reed’s bedtime.”

            “Then let’s get him in his seat,” Bren whispers, his eyes soft and worried as he looks at you, waiting while you open the backdoor, Reed’s back-facing car seat right there. It hurts your heart to see the way Bren carefully lifts Reed into the seat, doing the buckles like he’s been doing them forever, his face soft and open and tender. 

            Like scary has never been a part of his persona at all and he’s only ever been this man before you, this soft and sweet man who tweaks your—his—son on the nose, his lips still in that same awed smile. 

            And your heart breaks even more when Reed says, “dada” the sound a question not a statement, his large ocean eyes tired and innocent yet looking at you beseechingly.

            “Yeah, that’s Dada,” you whisper in reply, watching as Reed’s face brightens and he claps his small, frail hands together, letting out a squeak of excitement. “Bren?”

            “What is it, sweetheart?” he asks you, turning, his face shuttering just slightly, worry and fear seeping in and tainting the image of him always being there with reality—a man afraid of what you will say, of what part in the family you are giving him. What role you will relegate him too. 

            “I didn’t not tell you because…” you pause, coughing, trying to dislodge the block in your throat, the crack in your voice, the tears that stopped some time ago that have now started again. “Because I didn’t want you to know, I…I didn’t t-tell you because…I was…I was scared.” You can feel his hands on your arms, his touch soft and gentle and calming. Just there. 

            “It’s okay, sweetheart,” he whispers, pulling you against him, his one hand smoothing down your hair, the other holding you, palm flat in the middle of your back, his chin on your head. “You have nothing to be sorry for. You were under no obligation to tell me…and…I know I didn’t make it easy to believe that I wouldn’t react in anger or…something else. I know, Evans. I know.”

            “But I—” you break off, a sob tearing its way out of your chest again, muffled by him, by his body, his embrace. “I took those early days with Reed away!” He pulls back just enough that you can see him, see his expression, the way his eyes shine with love and pain and hope. 

            “You took nothing from me, sweetheart,” he says, his tone leaving no room for argument, the tone he uses when telling a patient something they can’t ignore. “I am here and will take only what you’re comfortable to give me. If that means I see Reed on week-ends only and I’m not—” here he pauses, swallowing hard and glancing away from you for a second, looking like he’s gathering his composure before continuing, “a part of your life, then I will take that. Whatever you want to give me, Evans because you’re the one driving this boat. You’re in charge—always. I’m just the hopeless idiot in love with you.”

            “You’re not an idiot,” you whisper, a small smile creeping across your tear-stained face, skin drying from the salt tracks. 

            “Then I’m just the one in love with you?” He phrases it like a question, but you know him well enough to know that it’s a statement, that he’s telling you he loves you. 

            “Yeah, I guess so,” you whisper and you watch his arm move, can feel his palm as it presses against your cheek, his thumb moving back and forth across your cheekbone, your skin feeling alive in a way it hasn’t in three years, not since the last time you were with him. “And…I want you in our lives…I just don’t know how, yet.”

            “Take your time, sweetheart,” he whispers, leaning forwards and pressing a kiss against your forehead, one that will linger. “I’m not going anywhere because you don’t have to go it alone anymore.”

            “You need to eat,” calls out Brendan, his voice flat. His work voice, he used to call it, the one he has when at the hospital, when he doesn’t want people to question him, to see him as anything other than Park the Shark. 

            “I’m fine,” you call out, not even lifting your head from the computer where you sit, charting, your watch buzzing against your wrist—texts from your mother, telling you to get your ass down to the ED to have lunch. “I’m heading down to the ED in a couple minutes for my lunch break. I’ll have something to eat with Ma and Reed when I pick him up from the daycare for a bit.”

            “You’ll have something like actual food?” he asks, his body now just in your sight frame, leaning on the table of the nurse’s station where you sit. You have an office; you just don’t like to use it because it makes you inaccessible to patients. 

            “I packed a smoothie,” you tell him, leaning back in your seat, crossing your arms, one eyebrow arching. “Why?”

            “Because, I was wondering, if you wanted to pick up Reed and get lunch with me,” he says, his shark expression faltering, turning to the softer one he has—the one for you, the one for your son. 

            “Yeah,” you say, watching as his expression brightens. “Yeah, I’d love that.”

            “You’re fucking kidding me,” you say, your eyebrows up to your hairline as you look over at Brendan who holds Reed on his hip—Reed whose hair is slicked back just like Brendan’s. “You’ve made our son into a mini you.”

            You look over at Brendan, noticing the way his smile has shifted, brightened and softened, his eyes warm and deep and perfect, reflecting love at you. 

            “What?” you ask him, one hand flying to your face, checking your cheek while you run your tongue over your teeth. “Do I have something on my face?”

            “No, sweetheart,” he says, stepping closer to you, closing the small distance in no time, Reed’s small hands stretching, one landing on Bren’s shoulder and the other clasping around your fingers, “you called him our son.”

            “Because he is, Bren,” you say, stepping closer, your free hand coming to rest on his cheek, his eyes locked on yours, the expression in them so vulnerable that it takes you by surprise for a moment. “He’s our son. And…I was thinking…do you want to give him your last name?” You watch as Bren breaks down for the first time, a strangled noise escaping from his throat as tears slip down his cheeks. Tears you wipe away with one hand, gentle ever so gentle. 

            “Please,” he says when he’s calmed down, when the tears have slowed and he can speak again, his throat no longer strangled. 

            “Reed Flynn Park,” you whisper, delighting in the way that Brendan’s face completely changes with awe and love and hope. “I like the sound of that.”

            “Sweetheart,” Bren calls out and you turn, taking in the sight of him in a plaid overshirt, tight grey tank top underneath and dirt-stained jeans on from the work you two have been doing all day, assembling Reed’s play-structure outside. 

            “What’s wrong? Is Reed okay?” you ask, hands stilling from their task of putting Reed’s toys away, instead helping push you to your feet. 

            “Reed’s fine,” he says, stepping into the room, his eyes steady in a way that you love, have always loved. The Shark steadiness, but the Brendan warmth. “I just have a question.”

            “What is it?” you ask him, tongue darting out to lick your lips, the skin dry from the heat of the summer’s day. It’s been a year of this—of Brendan being present, being a dad, proving that he’s here for Reed, for you. It’s been a year of slowly falling in love. Slowly returning to the man you remember, the man you fell for when you shouldn’t have—yet he fell for you all the same. 

            It’s been a year of waking up in an empty bed, wishing he were there beside you. Wishing the house wasn’t just a home for you and Reed, but you and Reed and Brendan. A family unit. 

            It’s been a year of pining. 

            “You know I love you, right?” he asks and you nod, the movement cautious as your brows knit together. “Well, I loved you even before you left and I’ve fallen even more in love with you this year…this year of raising our son so I was…Well…Will you marry me?” As he speaks, he gets down on one knee in the room of Reed’s playroom, a platinum ring inset with three stones—your birthstone, his and Reed’s. 

            “Yes,” you whisper and then he’s up and sliding the ring on your finger, his hands cupping your face and pulling you to him, pressing an open-mouthed kiss against your lips, one that tastes of passion and hope and love and second chances. One that tastes of family and promises and permanency. One that has the lingering sweetness of raspberries and the sour notes of lemon. 

            Summertime in a kiss; promises in an embrace. 

            And Brendan never goes back on a promise. 

            “ICK! Mama and Daddy, no kiss!” comes the shriek of your son and you pull back from Brendan just slightly woozy as you turn to your son, one eyebrow arching. 

            “Oh no?” you ask him and he shakes his head, violently, his whole little body following on the movement. “While, then we just have to kiss you instead!”

            And in a move so synchronized, you would have thought it was planned, the two of you bend and press kisses against his chubby cheeks, his giggles echoing through the room as Brendan’s hand finds yours, his fingers tangling with yours as if he can’t fathom letting you go for an instant. 

            And in that moment you can hear him, a year ago, telling you “you don’t have to go it alone anymore.” And you realize that you never will go alone again. 

            Because you have Brendan. 

            You have your family. 

a/n: guys this is lowkey a mess 💔 sorry for taking FOREVER. keep the reqs coming + i love u all!

let me know if u want to be added to taglist for all jack text fics! if u asked to be on the taglist and don’t see ur name, it either won’t let me tag u or u updated ur username. pls be patient w/ me 💌

taglist: @escapingrealityalways @quicksilver21 @popecodysgirl @theariespov @carthxorns @croissant31 @kissalready @thehockeynerd30 @virgoalert123 @psclcain @777bambi777 @sofianotvergara @blurryboundaries @pear-1206 @stylesonlyangel4 @harhar0777 @honeygl0ws @pinguphd @bathtimejaffacakes @canigon0w @anthropsych @chronic-fangirl-222 @user2459686034 @friedmagazineprincess @strawberryshortcake3sstuff @shawnyhats-girlwhatever @lizziesfirstwife @shesareader @pearlessance @lost444ariess @tehecianatehe @0anodite0 @yeswhale456 @nyxmoretti @toxicwasteee @kissatelier @bsbdxsworld @iheartmen28 @saralovesjoelmiller

a/n: this is my first time making a smau so pls bear w/ me.

let me know if u want to be added to taglist for all jack text fics!

a/n: enjoy cuties <3

let me know if u want to be added to taglist for all jack text fics!

taglist: @escapingrealityalways @quicksilver21 @popecodysgirl @theariespov @carthxorns @croissant31 @eternalseeker999 @kissalready @thehockeynerd30 @virgoalert123 @psclcain @777bambi777 @sofianotvergara @blurryboundaries @pear-1206 @stylesonlyangel4 @harhar0777 @honeygl0ws @pinguphd

𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐨𝐬 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘜𝘗🤩

𝐯𝐣𝐚𝐯𝐚𝐝𝐢 𝘮𝘳𝘴. 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘳𝘳𝘬 𝘳 𝘶 𝘵𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘯😩

𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐧𝐲_𝐰 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘵 𝘣𝘦𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘴🍿👀

𝐬𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐫𝐚𝐦𝐨𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝘰𝘮𝘨 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘨𝘦𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘯𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘴 𝘥𝘰𝘯𝘦?? 𝘪 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘰𝘷𝘦

𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐨𝐨𝐨.𝐝 𝘶𝘳 𝘥𝘦𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘧𝘢𝘷 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘬

𝐟𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐤.𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐧 𝘪𝘵’𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘬 𝘵𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘳🦈

_________________________________________________

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Your stomach drops, and you’re like Jack in letting the fear overtake you enough that you almost forget you’re at the cash register. 

“Cute baby.”

The cashier smiles at you. Your hands tighten on the stroller. “Thank you.”

“She’s got perfect cheeks.”

“Yes, she does.” It’s true, and as her mother, you have every right to talk about her perfect, fat cheeks until the sun explodes.

“I'm very proud of them.”

But you’re too busy trying to convince yourself that you’re a little crazy. It’s a small store. People are allowed to buy only one thing, and awkward moments where your glance catches someone else’s happen all the time. 

By the time you look back to where the stranger was checking out, he’s gone. By the time you get to the parking lot, you’ve convinced yourself that you are ridiculous. Your nervous system has just been heightened by the beauty of motherhood.

There’s a beauty in that, even if it’s the reason you’ve been googling ‘is my baby choking or discovering she has saliva?’ recently. You have to find the silver linings. 

You load the bags and buckle Chubby in. You get behind the wheel. 

Your stomach turns when you see the man in denim near the cart return area, and you don’t think it’s your fear clocking that he’s watching you. 

But you don’t…you don’t panic. You see no need to peel out or to call Jack, because that would mean him asking a million questions that could turn a relatively good day cold.

If you were to even just slightly mention being uncomfortable because a weird man has decided to stare at you, he’d probably abandon his shift, and that would mean probably abandoning a patient. Poor, hypothetical patient. 

Calling or texting him your worries wouldn’t do anything but give a gruff n’ tough fear to a beautiful, thick, freckled body.

Yeah, let’s make it about it being for Jack’s sake instead of yours. That’s much easier. 

The park’s for kids, but it really does calm you down. Compare that to Chubby, who might excite herself in the swings so much that it’s not going to be hard to put her down for her nap later.

You press your mouth into the warm, sweet smell of your daughter’s hair. Inhaling all her sweetness is enough to cancel the sourness crawling along your nerves, and you’re just so, so enamoured by the squeaky-bellied laughs she gives every time you push her.

You hope it’ll always be this easy to entertain her.

“Are you having fun, my little tax deduction?”

Chubby kicks both feet, and your smile drops when you see that one is only socked. 

“Where did your shoe go?”

Just as she grins suspiciously proud with her gums, you look past the swing set to see a car you’re not supposed to recognize.

You don’t know why you do. It’s not like recognition in the way of seeing something you’ve seen 1,000 times before.

It’s an older, dark car. You don’t know how long it’s been parked. It gives you nothing as you watch it for ten to fifteen seconds. The windshield’s reflecting a blur, you’re not even sure if there’s anyone inside. 

..But you’re sure you’re recognizing it in the way of recognizing something you’ve just seen. 

You’re scaring yourself, but pretending it’s nothing won’t stop you from being scared. Time to go home. 

The thought comes with Jack’s voice, except Jackie would never tell you you’re scaring yourself. You take Chubby out of the swing, cooing when she fusses and not giving a damn about finding her shoes. Her dad would buy her every pair if she wanted. 

“Sorry, sweetheart. We gotta go.”

You drive home while checking the rearview mirror more times than you can count, but even as every dark car becomes that one, you’re selfish in the safety you feel as you walk through the door, past the plants you keep forgetting to water.

At least Jack keeps watering them without comment. He’s against plant murder. You can only try to be.

The camera Jack installed when Chubby was born watches you go inside. You remember rolling your eyes when he kept lecturing you on home invasions and the statistically unlikely but not impossible chance of some “freaky fuck” trying to get near you while he’s not home. 

You’re certainly not rolling them now, are you?

You lock the door. Then the deadbolt. Then the chain. You set your chubby baby down in her playpen, and you can’t even give a shit about the way your hands tremble once you’re not holding her.

Your phone buzzes. It’s Jack. 

You home?

You text back.

yes ❤️all good. Chubs kept kicking off her shoes in public and i think she's taken to trying to do the same with her socks

The dots appear immediately.

Send proof of life.

You laugh despite the day. You're home. You're safe. The both of you are safe.

You enter the playpen to take a picture of Chubby on her back, both fists around her bare foot. She looks innocent, like she's never committed the crime of wasting shoes in her life.

You send it. Jack answers immediately. Duh.

Sockless and disgraceful. That's my girl. You okay?

...You know what? For the sake of you both, you can take to half-truths.

yeah, just tired.

Eat something.

You smile faintly and look down to find your daughter has managed to take off her other sock.

You hunch over to kiss her baby belly.

"I think your dada's teaching me how to be a worry wart, are you gonna grow up to be a worry wart---"

A knock on the door interrupts your tease.

You nearly drop your phone as Chubby startles. After she decides to not care, she blinks up at you with mild interest. You do not move.

The knock comes again.

"Ma'am?"

It's the voice of a man through the door.

Your blood goes as frozen as you are.

...He sounds polite.

"...Yes?"

You try putting on your nurse voice, but it's cracked.

"Sorry to bother you, but I think you dropped something. At the park. Your baby dropped something. I didn't want you to lose it."

You slap your hand to your mouth.

Oh. What the fuck? What the actual hell?

You think you might black out, everything within your line of sight stretches and blurs with the beat of your heart harsh against your bones.

"...What is it?"

"A shoe."

At that, your heart just might lurch out of you and turn you into a screaming mess.

"I---thank you," You can hear yourself becoming smaller, even though you want to ask him if he followed you all the fucking way home to give you your daughter's shoe. "You can leave it where you now."

Being harmless might make this situation easier. Maybe not. Maybe you should scream at him to leave. Maybe you should call the police.

But you don't know how many windows are locked, and making him angry might make him want to figure it out.

“I don’t want it to blow away. It's pretty windy. I can hand it to you.”

“It won’t. Please, leave.”

Leave, weirdass! Leave---

You almost drop your phone when it buzzes again. Again.

What’s going on?

Your thumb hovers over the keyboard as the man knocks again.

“You there?”

You type fast.

Nothing

...Jack's reply comes so impossibly quickly that it feels more like his fingers pinching the back of your neck than an actual text.

Nothing is the man at the door?

You freeze. Again.

Move away from the door. Now.

...You had forgotten that he'd be able to see everything through the app on his phone, the one linked to all the cameras around the house. He can see the man.

He can see your lie.

And you practically jump when you hear his voice come through the speaker outside. It's low, rough in the gravel of his beautiful throat. Too calm.

“Step away from the door and leave.”

You can hear a scuffle outside, maybe the man shuffling back as he gives a nervous laugh.

"I'm just returning something. She dropped---"

"No."

Jack's decided not to yell or get loud, which is worse. You hate the voice he uses when he doesn't want to ask people for compliance more than once. It's usually with residents. Or drunk patients.

It's funnier with them.

You can hear scraping against the porch.

“Look, man, I was just trying to help.”

“You followed my wife to my house? How else would you have my daughter's shoe?”

“I didn’t follow her.”

The man sounds genuine, at least. Like, he actually believes that. You imagine Jack at the hospital, his shoulders high and tight, and face emptied out to let rage in. He's watching the camera feed, the man with Chubby's little shoe in his hand.

...But Jack, seeing that, calling him out on that, tells you he does have her shoe. Isn't that a perfect excuse to stalk you for miles?

“...You’re on camera, fucker. Leave."

Jack's voice puts the chill in you. Chubby starts fussing.

You back away from the door and hurry to the playpen, scooping her up. She's offended by the suddenness and tells you that with another fuss, but she just presses her warm cheek against your collarbone.

Not afraid like you, thank God.

Your phone rings. Jack's name flashes on the screen. You answer instantly.

"Jack—"

"Bedroom. Lock the door."

"Jack, I’m sorry—"

His voice is now in your ear. You can hear his clipped breath.

"Bedroom. Lock it. Take the baby."

"I have her."

You hear him swallow.

"Good. Good girl. Go."

You move down the hall with Chubby clutched to your chest. She grabs a fistful of your shirt and chews on the neckline.

You get into the bedroom and scramble to lock the door.

"I'm in the bedroom, it's locked. Is he gone?"

You can hear movement on Jack's end now, the sound of the Pitt before a demand leaves him, away from the phone and controlled.

"Robby. Take my rooms." A pause, a muffle. "No, I’m not asking. I'm supposed to be leaving here, anyway."

A muffled, distant voice sounds out. Robby, probably. The sound of footsteps, Jack's, are what become the forefront of noise.

"There’s a man at my house. I have to go."

"Jack, I’m locked in. He’s probably gone. You can't just leave. I'll call the police if you want---"

Jack's voice drops when he decides he's having none of your excuses.

"You lied to me."

You feel your spit caught in your throat. Chubby nuzzles.

"You were scared, and you lied to me."

"I didn’t want you to---"

"What?" ...He's snapping. "To know? React like anyone would? Come home? Keep you alive? Pick one."

Your throat might close up on you. It makes for the rushing silence that sits between you and him, just until you hear him inhale.

"Sorry, I’m sorry. I’m not---kid, I’m not mad at you. I'm just out of my fucking mind."

His apology comes out angry, really. Ironic. Like he can still find ways to be mad at himself in this situation.

"I saw him at the store, then I thought--I thought I saw his car at the park. But I didn't know. I didn't want to be dramatic---"

"You saw him at the store. And at the park. And you came home?"

...Jack might as well be swallowing the knives in the kitchen with how he sounds. You stutter things that are barely words, bouncing Chubby.

"I didn’t know what else to do, Jack."

I did. But I didn't want to deal with this on top of everything else.

"You call me!"

"I didn’t want you to scare me more!"

That's your and Jack's talent. Escalating. You regret your words when the lines go quiet.

When Jack's voice returns, it sounds stripped. It's quiet, and you'd rather he'd yell like he just did.

"Yeah. Okay. That makes sense."

"...Did I hurt you?"

There's a breath with a hmph. That's an answer enough. You hold in your breath, only letting it go against Chubby's hair.

"You did. And that doesn’t matter right now. Stay where you are. I'm going to hang up to call the police. I'll be there soon, Sleepy."

Jack hangs up. You start crying then, and your baby lifts her head and stares at you with confusion, even more offended than before.

You don't know how long you cry, but you're finished when Jack's truck tears into the driveway. He gets home before the police do. The distance between here and the Pitt...him getting home so quickly shouldn't be possible.

But shouldn't be one to not believe in him.

The front door opens, and you think it's okay to disobey his demand and leave the bedroom.

You find him pale with a jaw locked down so hard that you want to tease him and tell him that he's going to eat his lip. He looks at you, then at Chubby, then at every window in the room.

Chubby lights up.

"Da bah bahhhhh!"

He crosses the room, and you want this to be something you can tease later so badly, even though you're sputtering and reaching for him, because he looks like he could be called Dr. Violence right about now. Violence got himself a medical degree and scrubs and beautiful, silver hair.

Dr. Violence. Papa Bear. Jackie.

"Jack."

His arms come around you and your baby. One hand cradles the back of your head as you instantly fall into his stern, stoic body. He holds you too tightly. Never too tightly. Never tight enough.

"I’m sorry I lied."

He slips his fingers to your neck, squeezing there with the rough tumble of his voice against your skin.

"Don’t apologize yet. I’m deciding how mad I’m allowed to be without becoming fucked about this.”

Call the progress, baby. He's trying.

You pull back just enough to look at him.

"You’re shaking."

"I watched a man stand on my porch with our daughter’s shoe in his hand. It's there. I can't touch it. I need to...I need to check the locks. The police should be here soon."

"Jack...let's just...let's just talk about this---"

"I need to check the locks. And the windows. And I'm getting more cameras tomorrow. And motion lights. I don't know why I didn't get motion lights before. That fucking...that fucking bastard. You don’t know what it was like seeing him there and knowing you told me nothing. Knowing there was a whole day of you being afraid that I wasn’t inside. I wasn’t there. I didn’t know. I didn’t---"

"Jack, let's get you sitting down---"

"You’re not going anywhere alone for a while."

...You should've guessed that's what would be the answer to this at some point. You swallow, voice softening carefully.

"We can talk about that."

Jack blinks. He rubs your neck. He only looks slightly helpless when he glances at Chubby.

He kisses her perfect, tubby cheek.