He spends a lot of time on his phone these days. Scrolling through his camera roll and letting the corner of his lips twitch in amusement at the numerous photos he keeps of Tanner and Penny, flicking through social media and slowly feeling his brain rot away, whatever it takes to keep his mind busy and away from his situation.

Tonight, he lays on the couch, Petunia tucked into the crook between his outstretched legs despite how large she has gotten in the past year. The weight of her against his body is reassuring – a reminder that he’s still loved despite it all, even if it was mainly by his spur-of-the-moment dog. One hand drags a soothing line along the crease between her eyes while the other scrolls through social media, half-lidded in that weird liminal space between boredom and mildly entertained.

Just as he’s about to finally set the device down and let his brain wash away with Survivor re-runs, his phone buzzes with a singular text, peaking his interest again. The name on the message is what has him sitting up so fast that it startles the golden retriever on his lap.

If he looked back on any time in his past, Frank would find you. He had been great friends with your older brother, especially since your family had lived next door for as long as he could remember. He had spent a lot of time at your house or at social mixers that your parents tended to throw for the neighborhood, smiling at the side of your brother as you had bickered as siblings do.

It wasn’t like you had spent a lot of alone time together. A quick conversation in the kitchen as he came down for a snack, a playful taunt from his lips when you had tried a new outfit or hairstyle, splashing you with the hose when you were just watching them gallivant outside during the hot summers.

One of the last times Frank saw you, you were still a teenager. Wide-eyed and yet still believing that the entire world was against you, friendship bracelets littering your wrists and a streak of red in your hair from when your mother had finally allowed you to add just one color.

You had sat behind the shoulder of your brother, arms crossed over your chest as both of your families and numerous friends from the neighborhood crooned their sadness that he was leaving for college. The entire day of his going away party, you had stayed quiet and compliant, although you had never attempted to leave.

That night, as the crowd dwindled and everyone started cleaning up, you had curled one arm around his waist like you were afraid to touch him and murmured an “i’ll miss you” into his ribcage. He had simply pulled you closer until you were forced to add your other arm around him, squeezing you closer and whispering the secret right back into your hair. You’ve talked every now and then since he left. Your parents are still close to his own, which means he tends to see you every time he visits his family, although the two of you never mention the night he left. Sometimes, you’ll send him a quick text asking a medical question. 

How do you know if your sunburn is sun poisoning? 

What’s an emergency-room level fever? 

My finger is swollen but I can move it. Is it broken?

He always entertained the small bits of conversation he could grab from you, even when he had been with Abby. When she had asked about you, he had just called you his childhood friend’s younger sister, even if it made something churn in his stomach.

And now, after a few months of no medical inquiries hitting his inbox, there you are.

YOU: i have a question FRANK: you always do YOU: this isn’t about my health FRANK: didn’t know you could ask questions that weren’t about your health YOU: ha ha YOU: listen YOU: hold on. can i call you?

Frank sits up a little taller, passing an apologetic glance towards Petunia when she lets out an annoyed groan at how much he’s fidgeting. He looks around his apartment like you’re going to be able to see his cluttered living room through the phone before responding with the most nonchalant yes he can muster.

His phone rings only a few moments later, a young photo of you filling his screen from your contact. He answers after letting it vibrate once against his palm, clearing his throat before the microphone turns on. “Hello?”

“Frank!” His name comes out in a squeak. “Uh, hey. How are you?”

He can’t help the small smile that blooms, looking around his empty apartment. You weren’t filled in on his divorce yet, he assumed. “Peachy,” he lies easily. “What’s up?”

There’s rustling on your side of the line before a heavy sigh. “Hey, I need to ask you a favor. It’s big, and it’s okay if you don’t have an answer right now, but I just… I don’t know.” Your words are rushed, nervousness seeping through every word.

“Hey,” he coos calmly. “Stop freaking out or you’re gonna make me think you need help hiding a body.”

“Ha-ha.” A sarcastic response just like the one you had texted him. He grins again at the thought. “Okay. I’ll cut to it.”

Another heavy sigh seeps through the speaker, crackling in his ear. “Is there any way I can stay with you for a week? I know that you have Tanner and Penny, plus I don’t know how Abby will feel about it, but I’m waiting for my new place in Pittsburgh to open up, but my new job needs me to start this week and it won’t be available until Tuesday at the latest and I don’t really know how many nights at a hotel I can afford or mentally stand.”

Frank’s eyebrows raise so high on his forehead that he’s sure they’ve integrated themself into his hairline. His lips part, then close, then part again as he runs your rushed words through his head over and over. Then, he swallows, shaking his head. “You’re moving to Pittsburgh? I thought you were living with a boyfriend or something, a few minutes from home.”

“Uh, yeah.” You laugh, although it sounds strained. He can imagine you now, twirling a strand of hair around your pointer finger as you paced. He saw it a lot during the teenage years, watching you try to convince your parents through the phone that you really wanted to go to a friend’s sleepover, even though you were actually trying to sneak out to some house party. “No boyfriend anymore. No boyfriend, no home. Bye-bye. To Pittsburgh, I go, seeking employment opportunities.”

He’s quiet again for another moment, mulling it over. His thoughts run so fast that he finally peels himself off of his couch, taking a page out of your book and pacing along the line of his rug. 

He must’ve been quiet for way too long, because you speak again. “You can take your time to give me an answer. I’ll drive down there at the end of this weekend, so there’s a few days to think it over. I just wanted to ask in advance rather than show up on your doorstep.”

And thank God you didn’t. You’d find your way to “his” house and be greeted by his ex-wife, who still says his name with a slice of distaste. You’d find out from her about everything that’s happened in the past two years of his life – drug addiction, rehab, divorce, custody agreements, consistent loneliness minus man’s best friend, Petunia.

“Uh,” he says stupidly.

Everything he could say turns into dust on his tongue, unable to get out a single word. How does he explain all of this? That the charming teenager you once knew, who was consistently surrounded by good friends that were always willing to celebrate him, had lost his college sweetheart in a messy divorce after throwing his back out, getting addicted to benzos and almost losing his job?

Lord knows Frank has lost all of his ego at this point in his life, other than his promise of being a good doctor, but he can almost ensure that you liked who he was as a teenager. His childhood and teenage years were filled with your wide eyes, asking him to open jars for you or to drive you to some friend’s house. When your first boyfriend had broken up with you, he had been the one who had picked you up from his house, ignoring the squeeze in his chest at the sight of your red eyes as he promised not to tell your brother.

“Can we talk about it? When you come in on Sunday?” He asks. 

Three days. Three days is all he has to figure out what exactly he’s going to tell you. Three days to come to terms with the fact that you may never see him the same ever again.

He isn’t sure why he cares so much. His parents knew of his divorce, of his ten-month stint in rehab. It’d been hard enough to tell them, and he had survived, but telling you feels like an entire weight sitting on his chest.

Your next words come out too hopeful. “Yeah! Okay!” Then, with a grin so wide he can hear it without seeing your face, you make a last minute addition. “At least I get to see you once, even if Abby ends up saying no to me staying.”

Abby, Abby, Abby. Why did you feel the incessant need to bring her up? Even if he was still married to her, he had known you way before she had even existed, had had numerous conversations about topics that didn’t include her.

Instead of being annoyed about it, he chooses to instead stick to the happy feelings that you being excited to see him gave him. “Yeah. It’ll be good to hang out again,” he responds. “Can update me on what Adrian did to have you runnin’ from him.”

“Adam,” you correct. He knew that, of course, but he feels warm at the laugh that shortly follows. “I’ll happily get into that. My brother doesn’t allow me to talk about him much anymore, so I have a lifetime worth of bad stories and ruined memories and icks to rant about.”

Now, it’s Frank’s turn to laugh. “Noted. I will happily listen.”

“I know you will. You always did.” Your voice gets softer as you trail off. 

Warning bells go off in his head at the first fluttering beat of his heart. Oh, this is wrong. So, so wrong. 

Before you can say anything else and mess with his head more, he lets out a heavy sigh. “Alrighty, sunshine, I have to get to bed so I can get to my shift in time tomorrow. Text me on Saturday and we can figure out a place to meet, okay?”

You let out a soft groan into the phone, probably evidence of a late-night stretch. “Okay, Frank. Talk to you Saturday.”

“See you Sunday,” he responds in a murmur.

He’s not the one that hangs up.

For all of Friday, your name does not grace his phone. He checks every free moment that he gets during his shift, but each time he is met with a blank notification screen.  If it wasn’t for the fact that you sat at the top of his messages and call log, he’d be able to convince himself that he made the whole situation up. You weren’t moving to Pittsburgh, you weren’t asking to stay at his apartment, he didn’t have to finally owe up to all of his transgressions.

Every time Frank reminds himself of the fact, an uncomfortable feeling crawls up his spine until it settles in his chest, pressing down on his lungs until he is aware of every heartbeat. He feels foolish for the way he digs the heel of his palm into his sternum, pressing his eyes closed and trying to will his body to stop punishing him for his brain’s doing.

He’s never been good at being vulnerable. As a child, he’d split his knee open falling off of his bike just to get up a moment later, laughing until he wheezed despite the dull ache in his leg and the blood trickling down his calf. As a teenager, he’d met heartbreak and hard times with a persistent need to show how well he was doing despite it all, even if he was just proving it to himself.

And now, as an adult, he goes the route of just ignoring it. Letting himself indulge in the things that he knows he shouldn’t, not allowing anyone to see past the mirage he has set up. He’s Frank Langdon, MD, an excellent emergency medicine resident with a confidence big enough to outweigh any Olympic athlete.

Unfortunately, with you, he cannot act like everything is okay. He knows that the second he looks into your wide eyes, staring into a memory of what he used to have and what he used to be, everything will fizzle up like the spark at the end of a detonating cord. You’ve always brought out his honesty, a personal truth serum in the form of billowy hair and flavored lipgloss.

Saturday morning, it rains in Pittsburgh. He doesn’t get to see it much due to being in the hospital all day, but the smell of petrichor seeps in the ambulance bay and water droplets cling to the hair of everyone who comes through the doors. Whenever he gets a free chance, he sits in the bay, listening to the rain hit the concrete and letting his mind dull for a moment.

It’s late, moonlight filtering through dark clouds to barely illuminate the flooded street. The thunderstorm that’s been threatening to arrive all week has finally decided to make its dramatic entrance, just in time to add upon Frank’s soured mood.

His mother would throw a fit if she saw what he was doing now. Clothes soaked and stuck to his skin, his hoodie doing absolutely nothing to keep the cold out, perched on his family’s roof. It’d been too easy to climb out of the window in his bedroom, especially with everything in his head screaming at him to just get out of the house.

Now, he sits in the rain, arms wrapped around his knees as he watches the raindrops glide down the shingles and into the gutter. All the collected water pours out into his yard, creating a larger and larger puddle as the night goes on.

He’s not sure how long he’s been out here, listening to the soft patter of the rain and the frequent booms of thunder. His mind has been more occupied by other things, such as the heavy scolding he had gotten from his coach after tonight’s game, or the passive-aggressive brush-off he had gotten from his girlfriend when he had tried to invite her out to the diner afterwards.

It was stupid, how much the sport controlled every aspect of his life. He had no intention of becoming a D1 athlete, and the only reason he had committed to the team in the first place was due to the need for a social life and perhaps the chance at a scholarship. Instead, it had affected everything else in his life. His classmates and teachers opinion of him, his father’s pride, his schedule, his own self-esteem.

“You’re gonna catch a cold! Or get struck by lightning!”

Frank barely hears the yell over the downpour, head turning and eyes squinting to try and look through the mist. Your bedroom light sticks out like a lighthouse on the shore, backlighting your silhouette from where you lean out your window.

His brow furrows. “It is way past your bedtime!” he calls back. It’s all an assumption. He has absolutely no idea what time it is.

Rather than respond, you disappear away from the window. He’s just about to turn around and pretend you had never been there when your outline appears again, now in a thick coat. Before he can even think about what you may be doing, your foot peeks out of your window, finding the thick branch of the tree that stretches between your houses.

“Hey! No!” He scolds. Either his voice is carried away by the storm or you choose to ignore him, because a few minutes later, your boot-covered feet are atop his roof.

As soon as you find solid footing, you unfurl an umbrella that he hadn’t been able to see before. You clutch something to your chest as you slide over to where he sits, thigh pressing against his as you settle.

“Here,” you say. “I brought you a new sweatshirt so you don’t turn into an ice cube. It’s one of my brother’s, I think.”

You hold the umbrella up and pass the hoodie over to him. He palms it for a moment, stealing the warmth before glancing at you in his peripheral. “How am I supposed to change into this?”

“I won’t look, if that’s what you’re worried about. But, just a fair warning, I’ve already seen your bare torso plenty of times in the last years we’ve known each other.” The remark is deadpan, but even in the dark, he can see the amusement in your eyes.

He rolls his eyes, reaching over to gently nudge you in the side. Without another word, he reaches down to pull off his drenched hoodie, setting it beside him. His chest is bare for just a moment before he tugs the new hoodie on, arranging his body so that he doesn’t accidentally stick his now-dry sleeve back into the rain.

After he has it situated, Frank turns back to you. “Thank you,” he murmurs.

You squirm to make sure the both of you fit comfortably beneath the umbrella, pressing closer to Frank. If you notice the way you’re practically tucked into his side, you don’t give any inclination, and he’s not exactly itching to bring it up. 

“Don’t mention it,” you reply sheepishly. “You look sad enough without the wet dog look.”

A cold wind breezes over the two of you, a shudder wracking your body. Without thinking about it too hard, he raises his arm to drape it over your shoulders, fingers pressing into your bicep as he rubs up and down to create friction. Rather than fight, you sink into the touch, relaxing beneath his touch.

This was fine. This is what friends did, he lies.

“Why are you choosing to torture yourself with this weather?” You ask, forehead leaning against his chest. “We could be cozy in bed right now.”

You pause, then quickly add, “Our own beds. In our separate houses.”

He laughs, giving you a soft squeeze. The sound fades out slowly as he thinks more about your question, eyes looking out upon the neighborhood again. “Had a hard day.”

A knowing hum is your answer, plucking at the ends of your sleeves to keep your hands busy. “Because of the game?” You guess.

Now that you’re not shivering anymore, he drops his arm, palm flattening on the roof behind your hips. He’s not exactly ready to uncurl himself from you, but there had to be a bit of distance, for his sake. “Something like that.”

Your lips twitch in dissatisfaction at the answer, brow furrowing as you look up at him. As soon as he finally catches your eye, your palm covers his knee, ignoring the way his jeans stick to his skin. “You can talk about it if you want, Frank. Or even if you don’t want to and it’s just that it’ll help.”

A smile unfurls on his lips before he can stop it, a fond look eclipsing over his face. He wraps his arm around your waist, pulling you in for a hug and letting out a relieved sigh when you prop your chin on his shoulder. “I don’t need to but thank you, sunshine. I‘m glad you came out here.”

Your nose presses into his skin, breath brushing against the side of his neck. “Of course. Couldn’t let you catch a cold all on your own, you’d get lonely.”

After a moment, you finally pull back, lips spreading into a grin. “Wanna come over? We can watch a movie if you’re still not able to sleep.”

“I am not climbing across a tree into your room,” he immediately responds. Your face falls and he scrambles to add, “but you can come over to mine?”

Immediately, that grin is back, making him laugh. He pats at your arm playfully before grabbing the umbrella from you, gesturing towards his window. “Go ahead. I’ll keep you dry.”

Frank’s interrupted from his reminiscing by a few buzzes in his pocket, pulling out his phone with a hefty sigh. Almost like he’s summoned you, his screen is littered with multiple texts from you.

YOU: it is saturday YOU: we need to plan a place to meet tomorrow YOU: and by we, i mean you. i don’t live there YOU: what do you suggest?

He responds quickly with the location of some diner he used to frequent when he just got out of rehab, his second text a simple thumb’s up emoji and a question mark. The less words he used, the better, especially with the way all of his emotions tend to go on overdrive talking to you.

You respond quickly. It’s simple, an agreement and a note about how you were excited to see him, but it still makes his chest tighten.

That night, alone in his apartment yet again, Frank sits down on his couch with a journal on his lap. It’s still wrapped in the plastic, purchased brand new on his way home from work alongside the pack of pens resting next to his thigh. He glances down at Petunia, who’s draped herself over his feet in the exhaustion lingering from her nap, chewing on the inside of his cheek in thought.

Finally, he presses his thumbnail into the plastic until it gives way, ripping the rest of it off soon after. He cracks open the pens next, curling his fingers around one and leaving the rest in the package.

He had journaled a lot during his time in rehab. His therapist had brought it up after he’d stonewalled her during his first few appointments, retreating into an invisible shell as he went through withdrawal and felt the dull pain in his back for the first time in what felt like ages. She’d ran the pad of her finger over the outside of the journal as she explained to him that it’d be good for him to get all of his feelings out, even if he continued to ignore her in person.

At first, he thought it was stupid. Writing until his hand cramped wouldn’t take back the fact that he was an addict, or that he craved these stupid pills that he thought he was only taking for a persistent pinched nerve, or that his wife had looked at him like some kind of criminal as she tucked a crying Tanner behind her back when he said goodbye. The cramps wouldn’t cover up the persistent ache in his chest that everything he had ever worked so hard to have and to keep had been wiped away by a stupid mistake, something that he could’ve controlled if he was even an ounce of a better man.

It started as letters to Abby. She never answered the ones that he actually sent, so he decided to stop embarrassing or restraining himself. He filled up page after page with his crimes and confessions, writing about their good memories in hopes of trying to push away the present. At the end of each letter, he’d tally up how many times he had written out an apology and try to push to add more the next time he wrote, as if any condolences would be enough to cover up what he had done.

Then, he branched out. He wrote to Dana and Robby and his parents, keeping all of the words hidden and safe and locked in his journal. Within the pages he could confirm that none of his words would be twisted by those who already thought negatively of him. He could just be the Frank Langdon he knew himself to be, even if his opinion got a bit shaky sometimes.

He wrote to you. After he had scrawled your name on the page in his doctor handwriting, he stared at it for a while, wondering what had possessed him to think of you in a time like this. Admittedly, he hadn’t remembered the last time you had crossed his mind and it wasn’t because you had shown up at a family event with a new boyfriend and a new hair color.

Rather than stop himself, he let himself write whatever came to mind. He wrote about all the times he had helped you out and you had said “I’m sorry,” until he pinky-promised you that he didn’t mind. A subconscious smile pulled at his lips when he wrote about the time his father had burnt the hot dogs on his grill for the fourth of July and you had still eaten the entire thing, even if he could see the grimace on your face with every bite. 

He talked about how it was now his turn to apologize to you. For not thinking of you as often now that he had moved away and gotten out of medical school. For all the times he had secretly judged you for all of your vices, such as your need for constant change or your inability to find your boyfriends interesting after a few months. For not being the perfect guy you always saw him as.

Frank’s newly eighteen. He sits on his roof, the same spot he’s gone to every single time he finds his mind to become a bit too much. It’s become a sanctuary without walls since that night you had crawled out here and sat with him, even if it ended in the both of you waking up with a cold when the morning light came in. Some nights, you still come out and join him, limbs pressed together as you both acted like they weren’t.

Like clockwork, you join him about ten minutes after he’s settled onto the shingles. You don’t even grace him with a greeting. You just sit down, pulling your knees to your chest and trying to find what his eyes have decided to focus on.

“The cardinal over there?” You guess.

He nods without looking at you. He doesn’t need to look at you, not when the wind brings your perfume to him like an offering and your body heat seeps through his clothes despite how cold your hands always tend to be. 

The both of you are quiet for a moment, listening to the sounds of the cars driving through the neighborhood or the planes flying overhead. Every once in a while, he catches you trying to find what he’s looking at, like a curious child.

You break the silence with a heavy sigh, head turning to look at him. He finally allows himself the grace to look at you, giving you a soft smile to show that he’s okay. 

“I’m going to miss you,” you confess. “While you’re away at school.”

Frank nods again, even though it’s not really a rebuttal to what you had said. Realizing his lack of response, he reaches out to wrap his fingers around your forearm, giving it a soft reassuring squeeze. “I’ll come back,” he promises. “I’m not gonna leave this place in the rearview mirror.”

Now it’s your turn to smile, eyes following his hand as he returns it back to his lap. “Good,” you reply. “Who else is gonna pick me up from bad dates and sneak me cigarettes?” That mischievous grin that you wear like a second skin, or like an armor depending on the conversation, pops up. 

“Some other sucker,” he retorts. 

That silence returns when your giggle ends, hanging over the both of you. Unable to sit in the silence, you break it with another confession.

“I always thought you were too cool for anything when I first met you.” Your thumb brushes over your kneecap, wrinkling and smoothening the fabric of your jeans. “Even as young as we were, you seemed like you didn’t want to hear anything from anyone. Always your way or the highway. And then you became friends with my brother and you were everywhere and you were such a nerd.”

You laugh at his eye roll, passing him a look that tells him to wait for your point and not say anything. “I realized you weren’t too cool very quickly. Your limbs were too lanky and you fumbled over your words and you overcompensated by holding onto that same oozing confidence I had seen the minute we had moved in.”

Your teeth dig into your bottom lip for a moment before you continue. “But even if you’re not as untouchable as I thought you once were, I still think you’re perfect, Frank.” Despite the raw way the words come out, you say them louder than your murmured confessions, sporting a wide grin. “I hope you remember that when you’re becoming a big hotshot doctor.”

Frank sighs as he runs his fingers over the fresh pages of his brand new notebook, listening to the sound of paper fluttering. He grips the pen in his hand tighter, finally cracking the spine of the journal as he peels it open on his lap.

For the first time since he left rehab, he writes.

On Sunday morning, Frank arrives at the diner half an hour early. As he settles into the booth, his fingers tighten around the bag he carries, glancing around like you’d pop up out of nowhere.

While he waits, regretting his decision to have come in early in order to avoid the awkwardness of an introduction, he finishes two glasses of water and asks for another refill. His body feels unbelievably hot and he feels fidgety, adjusting his position in his seat multiple times and squirming at the crack of leather that follows every time he moves.

Five minutes after the time the both of you had agreed upon, the bell above the door chimes. His head turns so fast that a tendon pops, eyes landing upon you.

He wasn’t expecting you to look the same. Every time he sees you, no matter how long or short your time apart has been, there’s something different about you. A new color added to your hair or a complete change, a new style of outfits, another decorative piercing. A new tattoo if you were feeling extra adventurous in some foreign country.

Even knowing that, his breath catches at the sight of you. His blue eyes are wide when you finally look at him, your face brightening while he looks like a deer in headlights. He tries to match your smile, but it’s very obviously shaky.

When you get closer, he finally stands up, hand propped on the back of the booth as he greets you. “Hey, stranger.”

He can not find a single trace of anxiety on your features as you grin, reaching out to jab your finger into his chest. “Says you,” you tease. You slip into the opposite side of the booth, palms flattening on the table. “You’re the one who’s too busy to come home these days. It’s been, what, two years or so?”

Frank’s chest tightens again. He sits down to hide the tremble in his knees, exhaling so hard that a napkin flutters. “It’s been, uh, a busy two years,” he responds. “Would’ve come out if I could.”

You grab a menu, already feeling at home in this diner you’ve never been to. “With what? Saving lives? Or is Abby keeping you busy?”

There’s her name again, falling off her lips as if you get a dollar for every time that she’s mentioned. He grabs his own menu to try and hide the shaking of his hands, holding it up to hide his face.

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.

“Abby and I aren’t together anymore,” he admits. He lets the words drop off of his tongue rather than trying to say them gently. He had tried the gentle approach with everyone else he has told and it had only ended up one of two ways – they either pitied him until he couldn’t take it anymore or felt disgusted by the fact that he let himself cave into his addiction.

He spares a glance at you again once there’s enough quiet to suffocate him. You stare at him, your menu now laying flat on the table, and he decides to just keep going while you’re stunned already to rip off the bandaid. “We divorced after I went to rehab.”

You physically recoil in surprise, blinking your eyes as you try to put together all of the information. “Okay.” You draw out the word, trying to fill the space as if you were afraid he’d suddenly drop another bomb. “That’s not what I was expecting out of this catch-up. I thought you were just going to tell me fun stories about working in an emergency room.”

To his surprise, you thread your fingers together, resting both of your elbows on the table and holding his eyes. “Do you want to explain, or leave it at that?”

Frank’s shoulders lower more and more as he spills it all. Now that the harsh facts are out there, it’s easier for him to let everything else spill out. The back injury, the benzos addiction, the fallout at work, the rehab and the divorce. He tries not to let the emotions of them seep through, tries to stick to just the facts, but there’s a few things that slip through the cracks.

It’s easy to spill his guts to you. His own personal truth serum.

When he finishes, he clears his throat, suddenly bashful. “And there’s one more thing.”

He finally reaches into the bag he brought along, fingers closing around the journals inside and pulling them out. Before he can second guess it, he slides them across the table, watching as your hands move to keep them from falling off. 

“Diaries?” you guess lightheartedly.

“Kind of.” Frank chuckles, reaching up to scratch at the back of his neck. “I wrote a lot in rehab. My therapist recommended it. There’s a, uh, letter in there. For you. It’s where the tab is.” 

His fingers flick at the sticky note that’s just peeking out from the pages, glancing up at you through his eyelashes. “I trust that you won’t dig through the entire thing, but it’s okay if you do. Just know you’ll probably know more about me than you want to.”

You beam up at him before rifling quickly through the pages, taking brief glances at the scrawlings on the pages before letting it shut again. “Are you sure, Frank? This seems really personal.” 

He shrugs, leaning back in the booth and crossing his arms over his chest. “Well, you’re about to stay with me, aren’t you? You’ll see enough of my bad moments this week, so we might as well start now.”

His flaws are completely forgotten as you lean forward, somehow brightening more. The glow of the sunlight through the window is nothing compared to the way you look right now. “Really? You’ll let me stay with you.”

A laugh bubbles out of him before he can stop it, shaking his head. “You’ve bugged me for most of my life, we can’t ruin the tradition now.”

With a huff, you grab the wadded up piece of paper from his straw before tossing it at his forehead, grinning like a madwoman. “Jerk.”

For the rest of the day, Frank helps you move whatever you need into the spare bedroom of his apartment. The both of you pick up where you left off the last time he saw you, bickering over who gets to pick up the larger items and bigger boxes – you because of Frank’s bad back or Frank because he wants to be a gentleman.

After a shared dinner of takeout and him watching you coo over Petunia for half an hour, he finally admits to you that he needs to sleep for work the next day and retreats to his bedroom. With a pep in his step from finally spending a night socializing instead of staring at meaningless social media posts, he showers and gets ready for bed, forcing his dog to roll over onto her side of the bed before settling beneath the duvet.

He’s halfway asleep when there’s a couple knocks at his door. Fatherly instincts have him immediately shooting up, startling Petunia awake. “Yeah?” He calls out tiredly as he runs his fingers through the dog’s fur, soothing her back to sleep.

The door opens to reveal you, donned in soft pajamas and hair pulled up out of your face. The sight of his journal in your hands has him leaning over to click on his bedside lamp, illuminating his room and you in a warm glow. “What’s wrong?”

You hover in the doorway for a moment, lips parted when no words come out. Your mouth closes as you step closer, sitting down on the edge of his bed near his legs. He doesn’t move.

“You didn’t need to apologize,” you finally say. “For all of it.”

Frank runs a hand through his hair, the other still petting Petunia to try and calm the heavy beating of his heart. “I felt… feel like I needed to,” he admits sheepishly.

You prop one knee up on the mattress, somehow getting even closer to him. He tries not to squirm at the familiarity of it all. “None of what you’ve gone through the last couple of years has been your fault, Frank,” you murmur. “Addiction is a disease, not something someone willingly puts themselves through. You did the work through rehab and therapy, which is an apology enough for me.”

Your fingers brush against his duvet, tracing shapes next to his covered knee. “Your letter was sweet.” You continue, watching your fingers. “I’d forgotten about a couple of those things. It was nice to be reminded. I’m surprised you remembered.”

“I’ve been known to have a freakishly good memory,” he muses awkwardly.

That makes you finally look at him, giving him a soft grin. Your hand moves to curve over his knee, a shiver moving down his spine at the contact. “Imagine my surprise when I get to the end, my eyes hurting from squinting at your doctor handwriting, and I find out that –”

“ – that I wanted to kiss you.” He finishes the sentence before you can say the words. “The night of my going away party, when you told me that you were going to miss me again. I wanted to kiss you, because most people hadn’t even told me once and you had told me three times. I wanted to kiss you that night because I had wanted to kiss you many nights before that and never had.”

Frank sits up, hand finally leaving Petunia to grab yours and pull it away from his knee. His other hand moves to cup your cheek, giving a small smile when you lean into his palm. Your cheeks are warm beneath his touch, like only your hands are destined to be cold. Maybe it’s because they’re meant to be held by him, he thinks.

He leans forward until his nose brushes against your cheek. “No boyfriend?” He whispers against your skin. Just checking.

“No boyfriend,” you breathe out.

As soon as the last syllable leaves your tongue, he kisses you, seizing the opportunity of your lips still being parted. He kisses you like he’s trying to steal the air from your lungs, hand curling around the back of your neck to pull your lips closer.

He only pulls away when Petunia nudges at his elbow, jealous of the attention not being on her anymore, laughing breathlessly. He presses his forehead against yours. “You’re wrong to say that I didn’t need to apologize. I have to apologize for not kissing you sooner.”

You copy his breathless laugh, leaning back to breathe some of your own air. “I’ll take that apology,” you respond. You press your lips together to try and hide your giddy smile, staring at him for just a moment.

This is everything he’s ever wanted, he thinks. You’re beautiful like this, freshly kissed by him and euphoric, bathed in the aureate light of his lamp. Being here with you won’t fix any problem that he’s created, but it is the first thing that’s felt right in a very long time.

Then, in the blink of an eye, you stand, still clutching his journal in your hand. “Okay. I’m going to bed.”

Frank scrambles at your sudden pull away, sitting up further, much to the chagrin of the dog laying her head on his thigh. “You’re going to bed? Your bed?”

You stop at the doorway, turning to grin at him. “I’ve bugged you all of your life. We can’t ruin the tradition now,” you mock. 

With that, you give him a small wave, closing his bedroom door behind you.

He lets out an amused scoff at the click of his door, staring at it for a few moments to make sure you were serious and not just pulling his leg. When he faintly hears the sound of your bedroom door shutting, he groans, falling back onto his pillow and letting Petunia drape herself back over his torso. Then, he laughs, raising his hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose.

Jack had finally found some respite. 

An unbroken hour of solitude after being surrounded by a pile of dog shit strapped to patriotism, one bullet graze to the shoulder and a cyber threat on the health network of Pittsburgh as a whole. If anybody asked, he’d meet it with a shrug and a simple: ‘It was a bog standard shift. For the Fourth of July.’ 

(You should see the PTMC on a full moon on Halloween weekend. Now that’s an explosive spectacle.)

He had found that thought enough incentive to shut his eyes after setting an alarm for an hour—and five minutes—time to haul himself and the tender muscles in his shoulder back to the PTMC to go old school with fax machines and white-boards. 

It took all of the three minutes out of the spare five he had added to his alarm, for his phone to light up and buzz against his chest. Thumb against the button on the side to preemptively end the call before it even started. Jack almost chose himself over whomever decided that 4PM was the sweet spot to catch a conversation with the physician. 

And then, in one sweep of realisation that thrashed its way to the forefront of his mind, Jack remembered that it might’ve been a perfect time for you to call. 

Shit. 

Without much deliberation, he flipped his phone over, eyes halfway to being peeled open, when he saw your Caller ID spread across the top of the screen with a photo of you and Jack smooshed together on your fourth date as the chosen background image. 

(You hated the photo. Which made Jack love it even more.) 

His thumb swiped to answer, phone pressed to his ear. “Hello?” 

“Jack-y Jack-y. Break my back-y.”

Wow. That was a crude—but not unwelcome—way of introductions over the phone. Jack could practically smell the Fourth of July bottomless brunch through the phone, not to mention that the slur of your words may have given away the level of intoxication you were experiencing from a couple of patriotic cocktail mixes of red, white, and blue and two stolen Mimosa’s from another table. 

That was yours and the empty Table 12’s little secret though.  Jack let a chuckle slip, “Hey, baby. What can I do you for?” 

“Just calling—” You hiccuped, “—To ask how your Fourth of July has been? Uneventful? Boring?” You teased, knowing fine well, a SWAT shift was far from those two adjectives. 

“Oh, you don’t even know half of it.” Jack pandered to your drunken taunt, his eyes fully shut now. “How are the girls?” 

“Well…” You took in your surroundings of a litter ridden street and a tired sun dropping below the horizon and let out a puff of air in response.

Jack opened his eyes at that. 

Suddenly, dosing off to the dulcet tones of your voice on the other end of a phone call seemed like a far fetched idea. Who needed sleep anyway? Especially when their—unlabelled—significant other blew out hot air in response to a simple question of how her impenetrable fortress of her friendship group made up of women from all walks of life were. 

Oh, Jack couldn’t wait to hear this one. 

He zeroed in on your hesitance. “You still with me?” When you hummed lazily, Jack narrowed his eyes at the wall across from him, “Is that a hard question to answer all of a sudden?” 

“Sheesh, Abbot.” You drawled, “Let me just…think for a minute.” 

(Absolutely not.) 

“Where are you right now?” Jack asked with the phone sandwiched between his ear and shoulder. Already tugging at his prosthetic leg. 

You frowned, “Why?” 

“Why—?” Jack let out an impatient laugh. Not at you. Never at you. But, at the conclusion you would eventually come to during the phone call. He stood to full height and added, “Because, I’m coming to get you. That’s why.” 

“Uh, correction. You’re not invited.” You held your forefinger up in the air to draw emphasis on the correction you were making. You spoke again with one eye closed, “Don’t style my cramp. Or, however that saying goes.” 

Jack fished his keys from the bowl at his front door, “Oh yeah? Let me talk to one of them.” 

OK. Part of you took a mental note to be more consistent in recalling the fact that Jack Abbot was incredibly intuitive. Perceptive to a fault. Which meant, before you could even string a coherent excuse together from the jumble of words sloshing about in your brain, Jack had already been two steps ahead in deciphering the lack of female presence in the background of your phone call. 

Because, if it was a bottomless brunch that stretched far beyond the definition of ‘brunch’, that meant Jack would’ve been met with more than just one voice. How could he possibly know that? Perhaps, you had just stepped outside. Jack Abbot knew because of two things: 1) You never just called. It was always FaceTime, regardless of your location. And, 2) Your friends took every opportunity to interfere in your phone calls with Jack, because he had made a good, lasting impression on all of them. 

Put two and two together. The equation was…you had been ditched. 

Your fists clenched as you mouthed a profanity at Jack’s request. No, it hadn’t been entirely intentional that you were the last woman standing at the get together. The rest of the group—besides one who was married and left well before the lines got blurry on it being brunch drinks, and just, all day drinks—were single, and heavily active on all dating apps. Thus meaning, a holiday celebration statewide, and eight drinks thrown back; all your girlfriends were out for some metaphorical fireworks with someone they’d never cross paths with again. 

So, they all were picked off, one by one. Completely innocent. You’d never get in between a woman and her sexual prowess. 

With that, and a short-lived chastising from Jack after you held your phone further away from your mouth, your voice raised two octaves higher to imitate the bubblier friend; Jack had your location and was already on his way before the call had officially ended. 

He found you sat on the sidewalk of East Carson Street. Knees drawn up to your chest with your chin propped up on the palm of your hand, you were a vision of tranquil inebriation. (You know, considering you had been abandoned like a dog after the novelty of owning one wore off.) 

You visibly brightened when you saw Jack round his truck, shoulders squared as he scoped the surrounding areas.

You could take the man out of the military. 

“Hey, sweet cheeks.” You announced when he reached you, admiring the way that he did his best to crouch to meet your half-lidded eye level. You scratched lovingly at the stubble on his chin, “Fancy a drink? Some guy gave me, like, $150 for the night.” 

Jack mulled it over. “Tempting. I think I’ll pass.” His eyes dropped to your purse, because he couldn’t help himself, “You didn’t use the money I gave you?” 

You blinked, “Some guy gave me, like $150 and I have $20 of it left.”

That had Jack’s smile grow wider. Just as he had intended. 

“How about…we save it for later, and I’ll even throw in some Tylenol, if you get in the car.” Jack tilted his head. 

“You drive a hard bargain, Jack Abbot.” 

Without much resistance, you allowed Jack the triumphant win of getting you off of the sidewalk infested with gum and other substances, and into the passenger seat of his car. If you hadn’t had a hard time knowing which way was up, you would’ve noticed the small act of kindness in which Jack had ensured that the passenger side of his car was flush against the curb; so you weren’t reduced to playing with the traffic whilst trying to get inside the vehicle. 

That was his problem. And the zero sleep under his belt. 

He strapped you in with the seatbelt, and when the metal clicked inside the mechanism, Jack planted a kiss to your cheek, amused by the way you melted into the seat from his affection.

The drive to his house was comfortably silent. Jack had brought bottled water and two sachets of Liquid IV to ensure the electrolytes were pumped back into your body to ease the foreboding hangover you would experience in a day or so. His hand would occasionally come to rest on the meatiest part of your thigh, or lovingly rub against the nape of your neck and you would lap it all up under hazy vision. 

And then you sobered up a little when you pulled up to his apartment. 

“I’m staying here?” You asked, a little surprised. 

Jack pulled at the handbrake, his voice low, “Is that okay?” 

“Yeah.” You blinked and mustered up a smile that wasn’t the average expression for you, “That’s absolutely fine.” 

It was fine. Even if your face painfully didn’t translate that. 

The thing about it was…you had never officially stayed over at Jack’s apartment. The two of you had reached a consensus that whatever affectionate adjacent companionship that had blossomed through the cracks like pretty delicate flowers, there was no reason to hasten to the end result. Let the flowers grow at their own pace, without unintentionally yanking at their stems to forcefully encourage them out. 

This meaning, the whole staying over thing was a month ahead of schedule. 

You had been in Jack’s apartment before, because, he wasn’t a brick wall. The apartment itself was pretty clean, everything had a place and if it didn’t…it would be organised neatly for a later day. He had a little fern that he took care of, and then you bought him an another house plant under the guise of keeping the fern company.

(Really, you just enjoyed the limited times that you were able to spend money on Jack.)

“Don’t panic.” Jack mumbled, leaning in between the two front seats to grab a plastic bag of goodies from the backseat of his car. A place you both had come nakedly accustomed to. He gave you a lopsided smile when he pulled himself back to the drivers seat, “I can see those thoughts. I just want to make sure you’re taken care of.” 

“No thoughts here, Abbot.” You tapped a finger against your temple, “Just alcohol.” 

“Uh-huh.” Jack mocked before exiting the car, quick to shut the passenger door after you had cracked it open to get out yourself. You let out a laugh at his stern glare through the tempered glass of the window, and when he re-opened the door for you, he said, “We had a deal on who opens doors.” 

You slid down until your feet met the ground, “Put that patriarchal tone away.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

And then, you let Jack open the doors anyway. There were three doors to get through, and each time he’d gesture for you to step through the threshold, not missing an opportunity to let his hand come into swift contact with your backside. Jack wasn’t the type of guy to take advantage of your drunken state, however, he wasn’t opposed to letting you know—physically—that he liked the way your ass looked in that outfit you had chosen for your night out in Pittsburgh.

When you entered his apartment, Jack flicked the lights on and guided you with a hand on your hip, through the corridor and to the room on the left; his bedroom. 

But, you already knew that. 

Hands planted behind you, you sat on the edge of Jack’s bed and watched him bend at the waist in order to solve the mystical contraption that were your heels. The last time you had worn them, Jack had gotten thus far in his attempt to strip you naked in record breaking time, and then had forgone the idea of seductively taking your shoes off when he couldn’t figure out how they came off. 

Albeit, a good anchor for him to hold onto at the time, Jack Abbot would conquer the removal of the heel this time round. 

You nudged his chest gently with your foot, a smile growing on your face when he pressed a kiss to your inner ankle. He mumbled against your skin, “Why did the girls leave you at the bar?” 

“Alcohol induced libido.” You muttered nonchalantly, “They’re all single and well—”

Jack eyed you carefully as he gently wrangled your foot free of your heel, watching as your brow furrowed. You were truthfully stumped in the piloting of your own thoughts through the definition of whatever you and Jack were. Not that slapping the sticker of approval on the whole boyfriend thing would have Jack running in the opposite direction. But, it was the principle of it all. 

You were intransigent in not being the one to leap over that hurdle. 

Jack nodded slowly, “And you’re with me.” (Call a spade, a spade, you guess.) When the skin of your nose wrinkled in a scrunch, Jack lifted himself to press a chaste kiss to your lips. “We can talk about it later. For now, take a look in the bag. Got you some stuff for tonight.”

Grateful for the diversion, you peered into the plastic bag tossed onto the bed. The contents had your heart warm. A toothbrush—in your favourite colour—makeup wipes for sensitive skin, the pot of (rather) expensive moisturiser that Jack knew you worshipped the ground of, and a pyjama set that was made for the scorcher of a July you were already having. 

When you gave him an all-knowing glance matched with the smirk on your face, Jack deadpanned and smacked your backside for the fifth time that night, to get you and your smart mouth moving into the bathroom to de-shed the bottomless brunch attire off of you. 

He helped where he could, respected the part where you told him to turn around whilst you changed—despite seeing you naked several times—and even let you apply a dollop of moisturiser onto his face, because he wasn’t getting any younger. (That part earned a pinch to your hip.) 

You sauntered out of the bathroom, feeling less weighted down by the buzz of alcohol, and more lighter on the aspect of being loved correctly. Jack close by as if he were a dog on a lead.

Where you’d go, he’d follow.

It was just a bonus that he got to appreciate the view whilst doing so.

You flipped his duvet sheet back as you spoke, “I don’t know, Abbot. Seems like you’re going soft on me.”

Jack rounded the bed to approach you as you nestled into his bed, pillows propped up with all intentions of watching some re-run of Love Island. A show Jack swore against, but still somehow managed to catch up on it intermittently. One hand came to your hip as he leant down and kissed you like he meant it. And then two more times for good measure.

He spoke quietly against your lips, “Well, you make it pretty easy to fall in love.”

Oh.

You were really doing this.

Jack stood at full height, gratified by rendering you speechless.

“Alright, honey.” He continued with his voice laced with amusement, “I gotta go. The PTMC waits for no man.”

You slapped a palm to your forehead. “Oh my god. I completely forgot you had a shift at the Pitt today. Jack! I should’ve just gotten an Uber, holy shit.” 

“I am your Uber. Don’t forget it.” Jack reminded you on the agreement that was made that, it didn’t matter what time of day it was. If you needed help—no matter how small—you call him first. He was also feeling a bit playful as you reeled in guilt, “Plus, the SWAT shift wasn’t exciting enough. I only got shot at once.” 

“You got shot?!” 

“Shot at.” Jack corrected, “I’m fine. You should see my buddy. Not good.” 

“And you didn’t think to say anything.” You gawked, but deep down, you weren’t surprised. You let out a hefty sigh, “Did you even manage to sleep?” 

“Nope.” 

Looks like you owed him a couple of homemade dinners, and an abundance of leg massages. 

You dragged your hand down your face, “Why not?” 

Jack looked at you, amongst the sheets of his bed, now fresh-faced and sobering by the minute, and it left him confused as to how it wasn’t the most obvious thing in the world. Sleep, and everything in between, came second to you. 

You were like a goddamn Northern Star to someone like Jack Abbot. 

Yeah. You two were definitely having a conversation about labels and all that ooey-gooey relationship shit, when he got back from his shift in the morning. 

With his camo bag thrown over his good shoulder, the answer was readily available for you. 

He smiled softly, the flowers beginning to flourish between the cracks as he spoke the words that would come naturally for the rest of his life.

So you enlist one of your older neighbors next door to hold the ladder for you, hoping this would be enough to avoid any mishaps. But mishaps occur anyways when sweet 65 year old Lillian had stepped away to grab lemonade for the both of you, only gone for five minutes, giving you ample time to lose your footing and fall off the ladder.

While it might've resulted in a sprained or broken ankle at worst, your shitty luck had you pitching forward towards the edge of a piece of blunt furniture before falling onto your back and your head landing onto the hardwood floors. It clips your hairline and while the sudden burst of pain has you seeing stars, your vision evens out and the pain lessens to a dull throb. You wince and settle back onto your ass as you gently touch the source before whimpering.

"Mrs. Robinavitch—!"

Lillian gasps as she rushes into the study, kneeling by your side, and the title has you chuckling weakly. "Not yet, Lils. We haven't even picked a date yet— Ow."

"I'm calling the ambulance," the sweet old woman says and before you can protest, you look at your fingertips when you had touched something wet upon your forehead. Blood. Immediately, your vision blurs and your stomach turns. Then the spots in your vision bloom and the world goes dark.

—

You come and go as the paramedics arrive, your sweet neighbor rattling off what she knows as you try to deny and refuse any help. The paramedics ignore you, attaches leads onto your chest as they flash a penlight in your eyes.

"Do you know your name?"

You mumble, your tongue heavy in your mouth. "… Robby…"

The world spins above you and when you come to, you're in a hospital bed but fortunately still in your own clothes. The sounds of the emergency room comes to life around you but while it all feels familiar, it all feels off— like entering your bedroom and the curtains are the wrong color.

"Mrs. Robinavitch, how are you feeling?"

The curtains slide open and an unfamiliar face enters your room. Blue scrubs, kind face. Your head tilts slightly; you'd figured Lillian would've told the paramedics to send you to the pitt but if you aren't recognizing anyone, panic threatens to settle in at the damage done from falling.

"I— Um. I'm okay," you manage as your gaze flits around the room, searching for anything that could look familiar. But your heartrate is starting to skyrocket and you raise your hands to stop the approaching nurse. "Just—can you give me a minute, please?"

The older nurse stops and gives you a warm smile, understanding laced in her next words. "Of course. My name's Lydia." When you remember your name, you offer it next. Lydia nods and plucks your chart from the foot of your bed, tapping through the iPad before the curtains shift and a new doctor steps in.

Your mouth goes dry. Now you're absolutely positive you must've scrambled your brains on the way down the ladder because right in front of you is a man that's the spitting image of your fiancé— only… ten years younger.

"Looks like you took quite a nasty fall," the handsome doctor smiles as he taps through the screen. "Your sweet old neighbor was smart to call the ambulance as quick as she did, you were losing a lot of blood."

The severity of your injury takes your notice first and you startle. "But I didn't fall that high… there wasn't that much blood when I fell at first. Are you sure?"

The doctor nods, sets the screen down to give you his full attention. It's enough to bring forth a blush; he looks so much like Michael. Behind the doctor, Lydia rolls her eyes goodnaturedly. There he goes, she thinks, charming another patient.

"Head wounds usually look a lot worse than they are but you sustained a minor concussion when you landed. Lillian said you hit your head on the way down," he tells you kindly. With the pain ebbing away from whatever they've given you, it gives you the bandwidth to realize how embarrassing it is to get sent to the hospital for a concussion for just attempting to change a lightbulb.

Before you could respond like a proper adult woman, you blurt out the next thing that comes to mind. "Your name isn't Michael, is it?"

An incredulous chuckle escapes him, cards a hand through his soft brown hair. Your eyes track the movement. "No, my name's Carter. Dr. John Carter. You know what, can you sit up for me?"

Your lashes flutter as you nod. Slowly, you pull away from the hospital pillows to sit up. "Are you sure?"

Lydia sighs and exits the room; she's worked with the young doctor for a good amount of time now, she knows when Dr. Carter's upping the charm for a pretty patient. He approaches your side and settles onto the edge of the bed.

"Am I sure of my own name?" Carter repeats with a soft laugh as his hands gently cradle your jaw. His hands are warm, smelling vaguely of antiseptic, as the pads of his fingertips apply pressure from the back of your head. "Yes, I'm quite sure. So, what happened?"

Your cheeks burn. "I was trying to change the lightbulb. I lost my footing on the ladder."

"Oh, well—it's a good thing you came in. Might've had a bigger injury," Dr. Carter murmurs and warmth returns to your cheeks but it's coming from his palm where he's cradling your jaw, his penlight coming up to gently flash in your eyes.

"I know, I know." You sigh as you blink away the slight spotting, a part of you missing the warmth of his hand before guilt takes a stab into your gut. Fortunately, you chalk it all to the fact that this young doctor looks eerily like your fiancé. "I learned my lesson. Wait 'til my fiancé gets home to do it. God, this just sets back feminism," you mutter dryly.

Dr. Carter laughs again. "No, there isn't anything wrong with waiting for someone else to do something in the name of safety. Fiancé, though? When's the special day?"

A flustered smile curls upon your lips. Pretty, John thinks. "We haven't picked a date yet. He just proposed like last month."

"Congratulations." Dr. Carter murmurs as he begins to edge off the bed. As he does so, Lydia returns but with a new man in tow. You perk up immediately, a glimmer in your eyes and a smile that nearly knocks John off his feet. But that smile is directed over his shoulder and when he gets up to face the newcomer, his eyes widen.

Michael Robinavitch is a storm when he enters, barely managing a quick thank you to the nurse that had greeted him at the front before she recognized his name as the one listed as your emergency contact. Lydia had barely been able to keep pace with his long legs as she guided him through Presby Hospital towards your room in the emergency department.

"Michael," you say in such adoration that John feels a stab of jealousy of the man that looks like an older version of him. "I thought you were at work—?"

Your fiancé shakes his head as he circles the bed, bypassing Dr. Carter, to cradle the back of your head before he lowers down to press a gentle kiss to your lips. "Drove straight here when Dana got a call that you were admitted into Presby for a concussion of all things. Peaches, what the hell happened?"

Your embarrassment returns full force. "I— The bulb in the study," you mutter sheepishly before Robby blinks twice, a fond chuckle curling along his lips as he shakes his head and pulls you in for a kiss to your nose.

"Sweetheart, I was gonna take care of that tonight when I got home," he tuts lightly before he gently takes your chin and lifts your head up. His hand flies up to his scrub pocket for his pen light but another appears in the corner of his eye. He pauses and glances aside to see the doctor offer his. "Hooooly shit."

Dr. Carter chuckles and nods. Both men rub the back of their necks in unison. Between them, you sit and stare in slight awe. "That's what I was thinking. I'm Dr. John Carter." He offers his hand across the bed to Robby.

Robby takes it with a shake. "I'm Dr. Michael Robinavitch."

"This is really fucking weird," you cut in and when both men turn their attention to you, your heart flutters. "Are you two not related?"

Your fiancé shakes his head as both hands drop and fall away, his body shifting to settle beside you with a gentle arm around your shoulders. You melt immediately, leaning your cheek into his soft stomach.

"I had a brother," Carter says with a quiet smile. "He passed when I was a kid, though. But no. No one else."

"Could just be one of those odd coincidences," Robby shrugs as he gently rubs your shoulder. "Very odd, though."

"Very."

A quiet and not-so-awkward silence follows so you cut in with a quiet clearing of your throat. "Can I go home now? I was told I only had a minor concussion."

"Yes, that's right. Sorry about that, I'll go ahead and get started on those discharge papers. Sit tight." Dr. Carter gives you both a terse smile before he exits, leaving you with Robby. When he's gone, your fiancé gives you a little wry grin.

"Did he flirt with you or somethin'?"

You splutter, "what—? No, I don't think so…?"

"Sweetheart, he was doing a head exam with less than a foot of space between you two." Robby raises his brow as he stays standing, your head tilting up to maintain eye contact. "I don't think he had to stand that close, let alone sit beside you."

Your cheek nuzzles into his palm, kissing his calloused skin there before a mischievous grin blooms across your features. "You're jealous."

Now it's his turn to splutter. "I don't get jealous."

"Yes, you do!" You laugh as you latch onto his reaction, digging your metaphorical heels in. "Honey, you got jealous when Mateo complimented my outfit the last time I came to visit you at work."

"He was staring, Peaches."

"The time before that, you got fussy with Jack when he walked me to my car after I dropped you off for work."

"… He pissed me off before you dropped me off, sweetheart."

You pause and fix him with a deadened glare which he had enough sense to buckle down and nod. Happy wife, happy life, he chants to himself.

"Alright, alright. I get… a little jealous," he mutters before he leans in for a stolen kiss, mumbling against your lips. "Could you blame me? My wife's a knockout."

"Not your wife yet, Robinavitch," you giggle teasingly against his lips.

"Don't tell me you're getting cold feet, Peaches."

You pull away to huff at your fiancé. "Definitely not. But I'll start having second thoughts if you can't even admit to being jealous—"

"Okay, yes—I was jealous that the doctor that creepily looks like a younger version of me was hitting on my wife. Would that be such a hard concept to understand?" Robby grumbles as he traces your jawline with his fingertip. He waits for your correction but it doesn't come. You see where he's coming from; although you've been together long enough that the age gap is irrelevant to you, you'd also feel uncomfortable if an older woman that looks just like you had been flirting with Robby.

"No, I see what you mean," you murmur as you kiss his palm once more. "But I really don't think he was flirting."

Robby fixes you with an incredulous look but he had no time to argue because Lydia's returning with discharge papers and sheets on aftercare— although she sees no reason why since you've got a whole doctor in your life that seems as though he'd go above and beyond for you.

Once everything's in order, Robby's got an arm around your waist (you had to fight him on getting a wheelchair for you) and your papers in his other hand. Lydia and another nurse— Carol—waves you goodbye. Down the hall, Carter's conversing with another doctor. When he sees you and Robby, he gives you two a wave before Robby guides you out back to his car.

—

Back inside Presby, Carter and Carol lean against the nurse's station as they watch Robby help you inside the passenger's seat. Carol sighs sweetly when Robby leans down to kiss you before he shuts the door.

"That's sweet," she murmurs.

Carter startles slightly. "Yeah, I guess."

When the older woman notices the way the doctor couldn't seem to look anyone in the eye, something sparkles in the nurse's eye. "And that ring, did you see it? That rock on her finger's just as big as my nail, I swear."

"Mhm."

"Carter, please tell me you did not flirt with that woman even after you've seen that ring?"

He flips through another patient's chart, staunchly keeping quiet.

Carol releases a scandalized gasp. "John—!"

“Can you believe that?” Clark grumbles, his rough thrusts quickening as he pounds into you again and again, making you squirm each time his hips crash into yours. That's right. You were supposed to be attentive to his complaints throughout all of this.

“Bruce made me look like an idiot in front of the rest of the team,” he growls against your ear.

“Made everyone question my decisions, and—and how could they question me? I’m the leader of the Justice League, for Christ’s sake. I know what’s good for everyone.”

His head lolls forward for a moment. Falls into your neck while his heavy breaths fall against your heated skin. His thrusts pick up speed and pressure until your entire bed is shaking beneath his force. Clearly, he’s not worried about breaking you tonight.

“Whatever I say goes. That’s that. How hard is that to understand?”

His hands tighten on your hips, fingers curling around and digging into the soft flesh there. Squeezing them so roughly it almost hurts. Probably bruising the skin. That grip tightens every time he even thinks about that humiliating Justice League meeting he just crash-landed back from.

He was irate when he came home to you tonight. Jaw tense, eyes wild, chest heaving, face a bright red that was steadily bleeding down to his neck. That kind of roughness isn’t natural to Clark. He has to have a truly horrible day—or, more likely, a horrible set of days—to even consider fucking you like this. To storm into your room, tear through your panties, and fuck you with his suit still on. To fuck you like you’re an object to be used rather than his lovely, perfect girlfriend who deserves time and slowness and respect.

Just the thought of that has your cunt clenching around his cock and tears welling in your eyes.

Your head falls back onto your pillows while you squeal out a babbled mess of noises that were supposed to be words. Those tears start to flow down your hot, flushed cheeks. Your attempted whine doesn’t even come out; your throat is too raw from how much you’ve been screaming, from how good he’s been making you feel.

“Gosh, baby. You feel so good,” he murmurs, squeezing his eyes shut and groaning when you clench around him again.

“Lettin’ me use you like this,” he grunts between harsh thrusts, hands sliding up to your thighs so he can press them down harder. So he can get deeper. The tip of his cock nudges against your cervix with each rough thrust, the first of which makes you jolt and punch out a strangled moan. Makes you reach out and grab for him, but you can’t. He’s too far gone, and at a certain point, so are you.

He picks up his head and stares daggers at you. Misdirected anger. You're not upset about it, and neither is your pussy judging by the way it clamps around his cock.

“You understand, don’t you? You know that whatever I say goes. Such a good girl for me. Not askin’ any stupid questions. Just takin’ all of me like you’re supposed to. Like you’re made just for me.”

This isn’t your Clark. This is someone else—someone you could see yourself really getting used to.

Your arms and fingers stretch down toward your own hips, a pathetic attempt at trying to get your hands on him. They find a soft, silky fabric to curl around, to clutch and hold on to for dear life. When you finally lift your head back up to look at what you’ve got, you almost black out.

It’s his cape.

Bright red and flowy, softly billowing with each of his harsh, borderline hateful thrusts into you. He didn’t even bother taking it off. He didn’t bother taking any of his suit off; all he did was free himself from those iconic trunks and get to work, and he’s controlling just how much of him you get to touch.

Him, on the other hand? He gets to touch whatever he wants. You only get his cape, and he gets your entire body. All of you, none of you, as much of you as he wants, whenever he wants. He’s in control.

God, is it good for him to be in control.

There wasn’t even a hint of foreplay tonight, and yet you’re soaked. All you can hear in this room is a combination of his brutal thrusts, your creaking bed frame, your moaning mixed with his grunts, and the lewd squelch that comes with every shift of his skilled hips. You’ve finished twice from the way his cock keeps bullying that soft, sensitive spot deep inside of you; the one he keeps hitting without hesitation even though he knows it'll overwhelm you. The one that makes you squirm so much that he has to pin you down on the bed to keep you from skittering away.

You’re already on the verge of coming—again—and it’s from his brutality alone. You felt it deep down in your belly, a burn that you’re so familiar with after being with Clark for so many years, and all you need is a final push.

And Clark gives it to you when he picks up his speed and force once more, leans over you with both hands pressed into the mattress aside your head, and growls, “Maybe I’ll take you to our next meeting. Do this in front of everyone and show ‘em whose in charge.”

You whine and nod your head; couldn’t control the way your pussy spasmed and constricted around him at the mention of this Clark fucking you in front of the entire Justice League. Your Clark wouldn’t even think of it.

“Goodness, she’s squeezin’ me like a vice. You like the sound of that, honey? Me using you in front of everyone?”

“Yes! God, yes!” you shout while you come all over him, body convulsing and falling apart like only he can get it to do. First time you’ve been able to find your words all night.

Clark just laughs at you. Keeps hammering into you over and over with a playful glint in his eye. Watches your tears fall down your cheeks without wiping them away because he’s too busy with his rough, now-sloppy thrusts.

“I like the sound of that, too.”

You had no ill intentions when you sought Jack out on the beach. Truly. None whatsoever.

Your conscience was pristine. Clean enough to eat off of, if a person were inclined toward that sort of thing. And Jack would more than likely be inclined toward that sort of thing.

Which is neither here nor there and definitely not the point.

The point is that he happened to be the first available person you spotted who wasn’t elbow-deep in the cooler, manning the grill, hauling folding chairs closer to the water or otherwise occupied in some way that would’ve made your request an imposition.

He happened to be seated in the shade, sand-dusted calves stretched out and both hands conveniently free. You happened to wander over with your sunscreen and your very normal, very defensible need for help reaching the center of your back. 

Never mind that your eyes tend to find him first everywhere.

Your first choice, always. In the hospital, in crowded rooms, in Friday-night bars, and now here, on a stretch of beach sand full of towels, melting ice cubes and boozy coworkers.

If Jack is there the geometry of the universe settles. 

Noise levels drop. Potential catastrophe politely steps back in line. Statistically, things improve by, what, twenty percent when he’s within arms reach?

The only time Jack’s presence ever seems to tip from reassurance into danger is when Robby is nearby.

Your brother, his best friend, currently planted beside the grill with a pair of tongs in one hand and a beer sweating in the other, wholly unaware of just how intimately you know the man sitting a few yards away from you reading a book. 

No idea that you even know Jack beyond hospital stories and holiday small talk. No idea that you’ve counted the freckles on Jack’s torso the way other people count blessings. No idea you know the small mole just above Jack’s hip because you’ve watched it disappear beneath the push of his own thigh when he’s folded you open beneath him. No idea you know how his forearm looks when it flexes beside your head, that raised vein appearing when your heels hook into his back and he grunts your name into his mouth. No fucking idea you know the pale scar on his ribs that becomes your personal tactical obsession whenever he cages you against a doorframe and breathes against your ear, quiet, sweetheart, unless you want your brother to ask questions. 

You slip into the little wedge of shade cast by Jack’s umbrella, hip brushing the arm of his chair. 

It takes half a second for Jack’s gaze to lift. First to your face, because he is decent, or because he has spent forty-nine years perfecting the performance of decency and can probably do it under sedation.

Then his eyes dip lower, catching on your chest and the heroic and doomed labor of your bikini top, the poor thing doing its absolute best with limited resources and no meaningful administrative support, and for one brief, gorgeous second, Jack Abbot’s whole face goes blank. 

You unscrew the sunscreen cap with the patience of a saint and the moral character of someone much worse, pretending you don’t see a thing. It’s easy. You’ve been playing dumb your whole life, and Jack happens to make it especially rewarding. 

“Hi, Jack.”

He blinks as though dragged out of a dream he has no intention of describing in mixed company. 

The paperback folds around one finger; he swallows civility into a single neutral “Hey,” though his ears are flaming traitors. 

You bounce once on your toes just to watch his eyes track the up-and-down movement. “Mind helping me with my back?”

A phantom movement ripples down his arm, the muscle memory that usually ends with his thumb sliding up the tender inside of your knee.

Half-second later he remembers the clause you made him swear to the night before you left, the one you recited while sitting on the edge of his bed in nothing but your earrings and a very serious expression: no contact during this trip. Not in front of Robby. Not in private. Not even the little absent-minded touches Jack was so fond of giving and so terrible at pretending were accidental. 

He had listened with the patient, faintly amused face — oh, of course, let’s discuss boundaries — all while his hands were already easing your thighs apart, palm spanning half your quads. “That’s smart, sweetheart,” he had murmured, barely out of his mouth before he fucked you so hard you spent the first two days of this trip remembering him every time you sat down, crossed your legs, climbed stairs, breathed wrong, existed.

Day one started with Robby squinting at the careful, not-at-all-in-pain way you eased into the passenger seat. 

“Pull something?” he asked, suspicion crinkling the corners of his eyes. 

Jack, loading your suitcase into the trunk, had only said, “She’s fine — just overdid the beach volleyball warm-up.”

Now, beneath the umbrella, he eyes the bottle in your hand.

“You’re asking me to put sunscreen on you while I’m currently under express orders not to touch you,” he clarifies, mouth twitching. “Little contradictory, don’t you think?”

“It’s medicinal, Jack. Doctor-ordered sun safety. That puts it squarely under the ‘acts of basic care’ exemption we definitely agreed on.” 

There is, of course, no exemption. But you say it with such polished confidence, such gorgeous little liar convocation, and Jack’s eyes keep distractedly slipping to your cleavage, you figure you might be able to gaslight him into believing otherwise.

Jack tilts in, voice dropping to bedside-manner dark. “Preventive exams are also acts of basic care, sweetheart. I offered to give you one last night. Head to toe. Very thorough. You didn’t seem to keen on the idea. Funny how selective you are with these exemptions.”

He knows perfectly well keenness was never the issue.

Keenness had been present and accounted for, actually, sitting upright in bed with a racing pulse while Jack spent nearly forty minutes vibrating your phone off the nightstand at one in the morning, apparently deciding the no-contact was less a boundary and more a diagnostic puzzle he could brute-force with persistence, semantics, and an irresponsible number of filthy hypotheticals. 

How firm is the rule?

You had answered, Very.

Define very.

Jack.

I’m serious. Are we talking legally blinding or more of a strong suggestion? 

I can’t sleep knowing you’re down the hall.

I keep thinking about your ass in that tiny fucking bikini.

And your mouth.

And the noise you make when I’m tasting your pretty pussy.

So if "very" has any flexibility, now would be an excellent time to disclose it.

You had flushed at that, instinct dragging your hand south, fingertips tucking beneath the elastic of your pajama shorts, privately checking how much trouble you were in.

Spoiler: a lot. Still, you forced your breathing steady and tapped out the grown-up response you promised yourself you’d give him.

Too risky. Robby’s awake. 

Riskier to ignore symptoms.

You seemed flushed at dinner, baby. Could be heat exhaustion.

Standard protocol is immediate evaluation. Full tactical assessment of any sensitive areas.

Better I handle it now than you collapse tomorrow, right? 

“The walls here are paper thin. I just didn’t want everyone to hear you,” you murmur, eyes flicking toward the grill where Robby still holds court. 

Jack’s gaze drags over your face, patience fraying.

His head cants. “Me?”

An accusation rather than a question.

You bite the inside of your cheek to keep from grinning too hard.

It’s bullshit.

Jack makes sounds in bed, sure, these low rough little things he tries to swallow down into silence, but you are, historically, the problem. You are the one who forgets walls even exist, who gets whiny and breathless, saying his name too sweet and loud.

Still, riling him up is half the fun.

“Mhm. All those grunts you do? Very compromising. You really should work on that. I was just protecting your reputation.” 

His mouth tugs into that bare-bones smile, parched and cutting, like a fence post bleached under Georgia sun. 

“That’s interesting, doll, because I seem to remember you nearly getting us thrown out of that hotel in Atlanta.” He pauses, eyes steady on yours. “Had to clamp a palm over your mouth halfway through just so the folks next door would quit pounding on the wall.” 

You make a thoughtful, entirely disingenuous sound. “I don’t recall.”

Liar, you think, but only to yourself, because the scene is seared onto the backs of your eyelids: big palm, slick with sweat; your own pulse popping under his thumb.

“Convenient,” he says. “Concerning, too. Memory loss at your age.”

The urge to fire back — your age, grandpa — sparks under your tongue, but you swallow it, knowing you’ve already won.

He’s picturing that night, too. You can see it in the way his jaw resets, in the way his fingers flex like they’re aching to reprise the role of impromptu gag. 

“Memory loss and melanoma.” Your fingers skim your collarbone, then your shoulder, making a tiny show of your poor exposed skin. “That’ll be on your conscience, and you have so many sins already, Jack.” 

Jack’s glare fractures, concern muscling past amusement. 

“Turn around,” he orders.

His palm resignedly lands on your back and the first sweep of cool lotion is an instant balm, a hush in every raw, sun-tight cell that’s been screaming since day one of this self-inflicted separation.

Water to a dying flower. Oxygen after a held breath.

The peppermint chill kisses the nape of your neck, then fans outward in broad strokes, each pass ironing the ache right out of your skin. 

Three whole days without his hands, seventy-two hours of pretending you didn’t need this, and now his thumbs slip beneath your bikini straps like they own the territory, tracing the warmed skin that’s been begging for him with every salty breeze. 

“Missed you,” you murmur under your breath, words a little wobbly and petulant.

He huffs a soft laugh and bends to brush his mouth against your shoulder blade. “Yeah, missed you, too, angel.”

He smooths another cool ribbon down your spine.

You angle yourself towards the grill to allow him better access only to see Robby nudging the spatula at Mateo like a relay baton. Take over, man.

Mateo blinks, grabs the grill tools, and Robby wipes his palms on a dish towel as he starts striding across the sand.

Panic sparks hot in your belly. Abort, abort —

Jack’s fingers press reassuringly at the base of your neck. “Easy.”

Robby arrives, squinting against the glare. 

Jack doesn’t miss a beat, straightening just enough to greet him over your head, palms still settling the lotion. “Need a second set of tongs, man? You were talking about that pineapple glaze.” 

“Yeah, figured you could baste while I flip,” Robby says, oblivious.

“Sure thing.” Jack rubs the last of the lotion on your shoulder before flicking the cap back on the bottle. 

Robby tips his chin at you, hooks an arm around Jack’s neck like a big brother claiming turf. “And watch it, man. Give her an inch and she’ll have you painting her toes next.”

Jack shoots you a wink. “Wouldn’t put it past her, bit on the spoiled side, isn’t she?”

You don’t get to be alone with Jack again until later that evening.

After a twelve-hour gauntlet of being herded from one little duty to the next, karmic punishment apparently being less fire-and-brimstone and more Robby glued to your elbow, Samira asking about plates, Dana hunting for towels.

The house had stayed swollen with noise, doors opening, voices carrying, bodies constantly moving through every room, leaving nowhere private enough to breathe, let alone get a second with your secret boyfriend. 

And you would find some sort of humor in it all if it didn’t feel like torture, spending the whole day brushing past Jack close enough to catch bits and pieces of him but never close enough to keep it, catching his stare across the deck and breaking first because if you hold it too long, even for one more second, your face will say everything your mouth has forbidden to.

By the time you get into the shower, you’re wound so tight you feel one wrong move might split you straight down the middle. Steam flattens the bathroom, fogging the mirror in milky layers while condensation beads along the floor beneath your heels. 

The water comes down nearly scalding over skin still balmy from the sun, rinsing the day off you in slow, glittering streams. Salt, sunscreen, sweat, sexual frustration, little crescents of sand, all of it spiraling together toward the drain. 

You brace both palms against the wall and hiss when the spray finds the tender knot tucked between your shoulder blade and spine.

You don’t have time to decide whether the sting is pleasure or pain because suddenly the door latch is clicking.

You spin, palms crossing over your breasts, ready to apologize for… something (what, exactly? You’re not sure, because last time you checked you weren’t the person barging into an occupied bathroom.) 

But then the silhouette resolves into Jack and the apology dies on your tongue.

He shuts and locks the door with a soft snick, arching a brow through the haze.

You hiss under your breath, “What — Jack, what are you doing?”

He doesn’t answer right away. He just looks. His gaze drags leisurely, like a hand down your body, over your breasts, the water-glossed dip of your waist, the slick shimmer on your thighs, then hovering at your bare pussy before climbing back to your face. 

He looks utterly unhurried. A man content to feast with his eyes first and speak when the hunger becomes unbearable. 

Fire pools low in your belly and you shift, thighs pressing together in a useless bid for modesty. “Seriously, what if someone saw you come in?”

He closes the distance until your breath clouds a small circle on the glass pane between you.

“Just grabbing my razor,” he says, offhand, like you’re the one overreacting as he tips his head toward the shelf behind you. “Promise I’ll be two seconds. In, out.”

You give him a long, squinting once-over, as though you can spot the lie on his skin. He just wiggles his fingers — see? Harmless — so you huff a tiny laugh and shift aside. 

“Fine. Two seconds,” you mutter, watching him carefully.

You pull the slider door open.

The instant rush of cooler air leaves gooseflesh in its wake, and Jack’s shoulders seem suddenly much broader than you remember as he steps through. 

“Appreciate it, honey.”

He ducks under the spray, and the stall feels two sizes too small.

Jack plants himself in front of you, torso filling your peripheral vision, trunks plastered to powerful thighs.

He doesn’t touch you, but the warmth radiating from his body seems to crowd every spare inch of space.

When his chest rises you feel the ripple in each breath through yours.

“You okay?” His tone drips false innocence as he reaches around you for the razor, the damp fabric of his trunks gliding over the sensitive swell of nerves between your legs in a feather-light pass.

You suck in a harsh breath.

He straightens as if nothing happened, twirling the razor between his fingers, eyes glinting with pleased mischief.

Dick-Face.

Your vision goes momentarily starry, the lost friction leaving you empty.

You rally with a shaky grin. “‘M fine.”

“Mind if I shave in here, then? Better water pressure and keeps the sink hair-free. Know you hate that.”

You squint up at him, water streaking your lashes. 

“Jack…” One elongated syllable loaded with I know exactly what you’re doing. 

“Relax, angel. Two seconds,” he reminds, though the slight tilt of his hips say otherwise. 

He angles the razor at his jaw, drawing the first careful stroke. You watch the silver path he leaves on skin, the way tiny beads of water race after the blade. His face, stripped of stubble in increments, is almost too handsome. Straight nose, freckles you could count, lips made for kissing yours. 

He catches you gawking and smirks. “Gonna nick myself if you keep staring like that.”

You tilt your chin, droplets collecting at the curve of your collarbone, mustering your usual sparkle, “Then focus, doctor. I won’t be held responsible for self-inflicted injuries.”

He lets the razor dangle forgotten at his side as he studies you a beat longer. His hand slides forward, knuckles skimming the silky bloom of your hip, then dipping inward to follow the hollow where muscle meets bone.

A shiver flutters through you. He feels it and grins, this slow, predatory spread of lips.

“Focus is a tall order,” he says, thumb brushing a streak of water off your stomach. “Pretty as you are.”

Your breath stutters as his thumb skims lower, and you grab his wrist. “Uh-uh. Hands to yourself, remember?”

“Don’t make me beg, sweetheart.” The husk in his voice slips through you from head to toe. “Because I will, if that’s what you want — say please a thousand times, just to prove how badly I need you.”

Before you can answer, he sinks to his knees.

Once again he doesn’t touch, free hand splayed on the grout, but his mouth hovers near the crease of your hip, close enough that every exhale fans liquid fire over your pussy. 

His eyes flick to yours, desperate, waiting for the single syllable that will break every rule you set.

“I can keep my hands to myself, if that’s the rule. Just let me use my mouth, please. Need to taste you, angel.”

“I — Jack, we said —” 

Your grip on his wrist feels fragile, ceremonial.

“That a yes, baby? Gotta hear the word.”

Steam curls between your bodies and it’s almost suffocating now, filling up your throat and nose and ears until you start to feel a little dizzy.

Rules clang in your skull — not here, not now — but the week-long ache in your belly chants louder: need, need, need.

You bite your lip hard enough to taste copper, eyes slipping shut.

When they open again, the answer is already there, shining in resignation. “Yes. Please — yes.”

He doesn’t waste another second.

He dives in like a man reprieved from drought. Three days and three nights and water turned to wine in his tongue. He presses it flat, dragging through your folds until your knees threaten to buckle.

The first targeted flick to your clit punches a helpless cry out of your throat and the second has you clawing for purchase on the handlebar to your left.

Jack mumbles something that feels like so sweet against you, vibration sparkling up your spine, then seals his lips and sucks hard, alternating pressure in prodding intervals.

You don’t think you’ve ever gotten to that blissful edge so fast before, seconds away from splintering, vision tunneling as pink and blue stars flare behind your lids.

It all comes crashing down when a brisk tap-tap-tap cuts through your near-climax.

Jack freezes, mouth still full of you and hot on your cunt but now motionless, eyes snapping up to meets yours. Beautiful eyes with pupils blown.

Santos’s voice filters through: “Whoever’s in there, hurry up!” 

The pulse that was about to break erupts into silent, aching stasis instead. You bite your fist, whole body trembling on the cliff-edge he’s left you hanging from. 

You choke back a whimper and call, “Be out in a sec!” 

And like you said, you would find some sort of humor in it all if it didn’t feel like pure fucking torture.

Jack tries to remind himself that he has, by every measurable standard, survived worse things than this.

War, for one. Heat that cooked straight through the soles of his boots, nights sawn open by rotor blades and gunfire. The terror of deciding who needed his hands first when everyone needed them at once.

He lost a leg and learned how to walk again, then somehow went back to medicine because apparently nearly dying had not cured him of the instinct to run toward other people’s emergencies. He has cracked chests, led resuscitations, talked shaking interns through their first patient death, spent his free time embedded with SWAT because golf had always seemed both dull and something he wouldn’t thrive at. 

He knows pressure. He understands discipline. He has built an entire life around refusing to be governed by fear, pain, adrenaline, or lesser impulses. 

None of those facts seem to feel reassuring right now as he watches you from across the bar.

You’re burrowed into the center of a brand-new constellation of people you just met, telling one of your well-worn stories with the same sparkling conviction you gave it the first time, chin tipped up, bracelets chiming as your hands sketch the scene into the air.

Jack knows every beat.

Knows when your eyes will widen, when your mouth will pull into that scandalized little O, when you will pause just long enough to make everyone lean closer before delivering the line that sends the table into laughter.

And they do lean closer. Even the bartender’s polishing rag pauses mid-swipe.

That is the thing about you. You make strangers feel chosen. Make a whole room feel handpicked, lit from within, as if you opened the door just for them and meant it. Then you’ll drift away, leaving them there in the aftershocks, still facing the space you occupied like worshippers after the god has already one.

Jack knows exactly how dangerous that is because he has made that mistake himself.

More than once.

Sat across from you and read too much into every smile, every soft little lock of your focus, every gooey, honey-thick stretch of your attention. Mistook being seen by you for being chosen.

And then life, perverse as ever, let him be chosen after all. Let him earn the real thing. 

Which only makes watching other men bask in the counterfeit version feel worse.

The feeling metastasizes when one of the men catches the opening after your final line and moves into it, all expensive veneer-looking teeth and effortless posture, bending toward you as though the room has naturally made space for him there.

He says something Jack cannot hear over the bass, punctuates it with a small, self-satisfied shrug, and wears the expression of a person who thinks being near you is already a kind of accomplishment.

Jack studies him. 

Young. Smooth. Unscarred, at least where the world can see. A body that has probably never needed to be negotiated with before something as simple as walking barefoot across a beach. No prosthetic to strap on before dawn, no phantom pain flaring where flesh ends, no inventory of what still works and what must be accommodated. 

He looks right beside you. No one would glance twice, no one would do the math. Robby could clap him on the shoulder, laugh at his jokes, maybe even approve.

Certainly wouldn’t have to excavate a grave under the rental deck. 

Jack counts that as strike three.

“Jack.” Robby’s voice breaks across the table, dragging him back by the collar. “Tell ‘em I’m not making this up.”

Jack blinks, wrestles his gaze off you, and pretends he’s been part of the conversation all along. Dana and Baran blink back at him.

“You’re usually making something up,” he says and it earns Victoria’s laugh, though he hasn’t the faintest idea what improbable tale he’s just failed to corroborate.

It seems to be enough of an answer for Robby though, because he laughs too, his hand thumping Jack’s shoulder hard enough to slosh the liquor.

Jack drinks anyway, holds the bourbon like a tongue depressor to his worst instincts. Swallows. The burn chars every jittery nerve that wants to turn around and see if Mr. Linen Shirt is still siphoning oxygen out of your orbit.

But he wants to know. Wants to know whether the man has moved closer, whether you’re still smiling, whether Jack is about to make a decision that leaves the bastard sipping his own drink through a wired jaw. 

He shouldn’t go that far. Healing hands and all. But he can make exceptions.

He lets boredom rasp across his tongue as he clears his throat. “Your sister know those guys?”

Robby looks over on reflex. Jack doesn’t move. Doesn’t need to. Robby’s face will tell him everything. “What guys?”

“Dunno. Thought one of ‘em looked familiar.”

Robby squints past the crowd.

“Nope. Don’t think I recognize any of them.” Robby decides, pushing a tired breath through his teeth, knuckles rasping over two-day stubble. “She does this everywhere she goes. Draws attention like wildfire. I swear, half my blood pressure medication is because of her.”

Jack’s arteries would corroborate that, but he lets the confession smolder unheard behind the rim of his glass. 

“Well, can you blame ‘em? She looks like that.”

And Dana’s comment is the invitation he’s been waiting for. Lets him gorge on the sight without raising suspicion.

The little dress, the glossed-up lips, the endless stretch of your legs under the bar light. Your hair falling loose around your shoulders, your face animated as you talk, every feature sharpened by laughter into something almost indecently alive.

A cherry-red straw clacks against your teeth when you sip your rum punch, each drag leaving a perfect lipstick crescent on the plastic rim.

You are beautiful in every standard category and several highly specific ones Jack suspects may exist solely to inconvenience him. 

“Don’t mean she needs a swarm,” Robby grumbles, waving his bottle at the cluster around you. “She treats everybody like they’ve known her ten years, then acts shocked when half the room starts trailing after her. And somehow I’m the prick when I tell ’em to give her some space.”

“I don’t mind being the asshole,” Jack pipes up. Across the table, Dana’s attention narrows, and Jack realizes, half a beat too late, that he may have sounded a little too willing. So he adds, “If you’re tired of the job, I mean.”

Robby snorts. “You’d scare the hell of ‘em.”

“That’s generally the point.”

He lifts his bourbon before the thought can show on his face, lets the rim conceal the faint tightening at the corner of his mouth.

Robby, thankfully, is already smiling, visibly seduced by the prospect of outsourcing his least charming brotherly obligation. 

“Be my guest,” he says. “Tell her I sent you.” 

Jack tips his glass, drains what remains, then taps the rim against the tabletop.

Signal received. Assignment accepted. He doesn’t need to be told twice.

By the time he is halfway across the room, you’ve already noticed him.

Your eyes flare with a brightness he can feel from here, and whatever polished little nothing Mr. Smooth is feeding you dies unattended between one word and the next. 

He keeps talking anyway, poor guy, unaware that you’ve left the conversation without moving an inch. By the time Jack reaches the bar rail, your attention has funneled to one point, him, and nothing else.

It stirs something dormant in him, the same dark pull he felt in the shower, his pants suddenly tighter, less cooperative. He sees exactly what he would do without the table of coworkers and one eagle-eyed best friend behind him. 

He would hook a hand around the back of your neck, pull you flush to his chest, and kiss every little thought clean out of your head. Kiss you until the gloss smeared, until your lipstick feathered over his mouth, until your lips went swollen and every polished stranger nearby understood, without needing it explained, who had put that dazed look in your eyes. 

Instead, he leans one forearm against the bar and says, pleasantly, “You drinking enough water, sweetheart?”

“I could be persuaded to drink more.” Your lips curl around the straw again, eyes fixed on Jack with a private little shine.

The younger man follows your attention to Jack and gives him an affable nod. “Man, your dad’s on top of it. Mine would’ve let me dehydrate out of spite.”

Jack nearly coughs up his previously swallowed drink.

He can feel every one of his years arrange themselves in descending order between you. The gray at his temples. The scars. The apparently paternal concern over your fluid intake. 

Fuck’s sake.

He parts his lips to correct the record, a dry little execution already waiting on his tongue, but you beat him to the trigger. 

“Oh, he’s the best,” you gush, peering at him sideways. “Always checking on me. Sunscreen, hydration, curfew. Super over-protective.”

Jack gives you a long, level look, one that says he knows exactly what you’re doing and plans to deal with it later.

“She keeps me busy. Full time job, most days,” he finally says, playing along.

And it is a full-time job.

Just not remotely in the way this poor kid is imagining. You are a twenty-four-hour on-call position with no protected sleep and an astonishingly generous benefits package.

You need to be kissed before he leaves the room, touched whenever he passes within arm’s reach, listened to with grave concentration while you explain some internet drama involving some show he’s never watched and a man named Sincere he will never meet.

Then there is the other hunger, the one that wakes beside him already stretching toward his body, that has you squirming into his lap after dinner or whispering again against his mouth when any reasonable person would be asleep.

Jack is always on his toes with you, anticipating needs you have not articulated yet, figuring out whether a pout means hungry, horny, tired, or all three braided together.

It is exhausting in the way a life worth living is exhausting.

He has never minded work when the work matters, and taking care of you has become the most selfish labor he has ever loved.

The younger guy clears his throat, trying to recapture the momentum. “Anyway, like I was saying about the jet-ski tomorrow —”

“Actually,” Jack interrupts, “we’ve got to get back. Curfew, you know.” He aims a polite nod at the man, who now looks decidedly dejected, then drapes a guiding hand along the back of your stool in perfect over-protective-father form. “Appreciate you keeping her company.”

Your mouth twitches around the straw. Jack can already tell you’re going to make him suffer for this. The prospect improves his mood considerably. 

He starts to walk you back to the table, when he spots Robby, who’s laughing much too loudly at something the new intern just whispered in his ear.

The girl is angled toward him, smiling with that shy, pleased little tilt people get when they think they’ve successfully surprised him, and Robby, miracle of miracles, looks genuinely interested. 

That is information worth preserving. Worth interrogating later, too.

But for now he takes that opportunity for what it is and herds you into a corner out of view.

As soon as you’re tucked between a stack of surfboards and the dim EXIT sign, his fingers close over the curve of your backside, giving a quick pinch.

A startled “hey!” pops out, alcohol-loose and breathy, and you bat at his knuckles.

He catches your wrist, holding it against his chest as amusement darkens his gaze. “You’re testing me, angel. Missed me so much you had to start getting other men’s attention just to see if I’d come take you back?”

“Missed who? The pervert or the overprotective dad?”

Jack clicks his tongue and leans in until the tips of your noses nearly touch, crowding the joke right back into your mouth. 

“Hated every damn second of that. Couldn’t lay a finger on you while that kid flirted his ass off. And you knew exactly what you were doing. Wanted to see how fast you could make your old man lose his cool?”

“Thought you liked being challenged?” You tilt your chin, lashes dipping. “Besides, you’d been ignoring me all night. What was I supposed to do, sit there looking pretty for no one?”

“You know that isn’t how it is. I’ve been following the rules you set, angel. Your rules.”

“Yeah, well, last night kind of blew those up, don’t you think?” You lean closer. “The line’s already smudged. Seems silly to keep pretending we can still see it.”

“Trust me, sweetheart, I’ve got no attachment to that line. I’ve wanted my hands on you from the second I saw that dress.” He leans closer, voice dropping into something meant only for you. “But you’d better mean it. You don’t get to rile me up all night and then act surprised when I collect.”

Your eyes flick toward the neon Restrooms sign, then back to him, lashes heavy. “Meet me by the bathroom in sixty seconds. If you’re late, I’m starting without you.”

One quick sweep confirms the coast is clear.

“Bought and paid for, angel. Be there in fifty-nine.”

You giggle, turning on your heel with a bounce that sets your dress fluttering. He tracks every inch as you stroll off, head cocked like you know he’s staring; the last thing he sees is the curve of your ass rounding the corner.

He waits just long enough not to make it obvious, then starts toward the hall, pulse already ticking off the seconds.

Fifty-eight. Fifty-seven.

“Jack.”

Shit.

Dana catches him mid-stride. When he turns, she is watching him over one lifted brow, empty glass raised loosely in her hand. “You getting another round?”

His gaze flicks toward the corridor before he can stop it. Mistake. Dana follows it, then looks back at him.

“Wasn’t planning on it,” he says.

“Could’ve fooled me. You look like you’re on a mission.”

And what can he say to that?

Yeah, Dana, good eye. I am on a mission to follow my girlfriend into a seedy beach-bar bathroom and fuck the living daylights out of her before Robby notices either of us are gone. By the way, she is his little sister and young enough that, from a distance, strangers apparently assume I helped raise her.

So Jack does what any sensible man would do under pressure.

He lies. 

“Just gotta take a leak.”

Dana lets out a low hum, the kind that says she believes exactly none of him. “Sure.” And Jack thinks that’s it, but suddenly she shakes her head. “Just do yourself a favor and be careful.”

“Careful about what, exactly?” Irritation flicks hot across his scalp, mostly because it coats the thin, unfamiliar ache of fear. 

She tips her chin, eyes dull with shift-long exhaustion, offering him nothing but that tired little smile that says You already know. 

“Don’t make me say it out loud.” Her gaze dips toward the restroom sign, subtle enough that anyone else would miss it. Jack doesn’t. “I don’t care about the sordid details. But secrets like this don’t stay contained forever. People get hurt when they come out.” Her expression softens by a fraction. “And she has more to lose than you do.”

He doesn’t get the chance to answer before Dana slips past him, already lifting two fingers toward the bartender and calling for another round. 

She has more to lose than you do.

Jack knows that. Or at least, he should’ve.

He is established. Difficult to shame in any lasting way. People already know who he is, have decided what sort of man he is, and most days he can live with that. 

You, meanwhile, are still being decided. Every room you enter is another jury, every mistake fresh evidence for peers and others alike. 

And men tend to survive a scandal differently.

Jack might lose Robby, take a hit to his reputation, become the subject of a few whispered conversations at work. Then the weeks would pass, another crisis would arrive, and people would remember he was useful. 

The world permits men to outlive their mistakes.

It does not extend women the same courtesy.

You would be remembered through it, reduced to it. People would search backward through every bright smile and short skirt as if the proof had always been there, call you foolish where they called him weak, promiscuous where they called him lonely.

Even the people defending you would talk as though you needed defending from your own decision.

Jack suddenly feels sick because Dana is right, and because somewhere along the way he let himself pretend the risk belonged equally to both of you.

Half his, half yours. Fair.

It never had.

Jack lets the sixty seconds expire and stays exactly where he is, rooted with his hands by his sides and the first honest understanding of what protecting you might actually require.

Tonight, when you go looking for Jack, your intentions are not merely ill.

They are terminal. Premeditated. Your conscience is nowhere to be found, certainly not sparkling, certainly not clean enough to eat off.

Whatever small moral voice usually lives in you has been smothered beneath a white-hot blend of anger and a bruised ego, two things currently holding hands and skipping merrily through your bloodstream. 

The house has only just begun to settle after several hours of drunk postmortems, everyone still riding the bar’s momentum and apparently determined to delay sleep through sheer noise pollution alone. Somebody had thrown up in the upstairs toilet, although nobody was admitting to it and Whitaker had somehow staggered into Jack’s room and passed out starfished across his bed, fully clothed, one shoe still on, leaving Jack exiled to the downstairs couch.

It’s almost completely dark when you creep down the stairs.

A small lamp glows beside the sofa, casting a little island over Jack and the book open in his hands.

The rest of the room dissolves into shadow, cluttered with the aftermath of everyone else’s good time: cups lined along the coffee table, half-empty glasses, plates abandoned with crusts and smears of dip.

You ghost past him without a glance, feet soundless on the hardwood.

Only when he murmurs, “Can we talk?” do you pause, but only long enough to throw a breezy, “Later — busy,” over your shoulder.

Jack pushes off the sofa, trailing you a step. “Busy with what, exactly?”

Busy making your life a living hell, you think, scrubbing dried food from a plate. Busy returning the favor. Busy ensuring he experiences even a fraction of the private humiliation you swallowed in that bar bathroom, standing beneath a flickering light panel while sixty seconds stretched into two minutes, then five, your invitation curdled into foolishness.

And when you had finally emerged, Jack was back at the table with the others, but every stiff line of him betrayed where his attention really was. Fresh drink in hand, barely touched. Shoulders set. Gaze locked on the corridor.

He had chosen not to come, but he had not stopped watching.

Jack would sooner lose his other leg than abandon you tipsy in a strange bar, and even furious, you knew that. He had been keeping vigil over the door, tracking who went in, who came out, waiting for your face to appear. But that garnered no brownie points from you.

When you approached, confused and annoyed and still stupidly hopeful, he had only leaned close enough to breathe, “Later,” against your ear.

As if it were of no significance. You were of no significance.

You snatch up another abandoned cup and tip its watery remains into the sink.

“This,” you say. “Some of us respect shared spaces.”

“Mm. At two in the morning?” Jack leans one hip against the counter, arms folding over his chest. When you dont stop, he adds, “All right. Scoot over. I’ll help.”

Jack has never encountered a mess, emotional or otherwise, that he did not believe could be improved by putting his hands on it. A wound, a crisis, a woman mad enough to scrub ceramic like she means to erase the glaze. Same instinct. Reach. Steady. Fix.

You turn before he can.

Dishwater slips from your fingers in clear little tracks, the oversized sleep shirt grazing high over your thighs as you square yourself toward him. 

“No, thank you.” Your gaze stays fixed on his. “I’ve learned I can manage without help.” 

He comes closer, and closer still, until your damp fingers have nowhere sensible to go except flat against the edge of the sink. 

“That’s very independent of you, honey,” he says. “Always loved that about you.” His hand lands beside your hip, bracketing you in. His gaze searches your face, lightening at the edges. “But I don’t think we’re talking about dishes anymore, are we?”

You tip your chin up, refusing to let the gentling in his eyes sand down your irritation. “No, we’re not. We’re talking about you saying one thing and doing another. Apparently promises are more of a loose suggestion when they’re coming from you.” 

“Give me a chance to explain, sweetheart.” The words slip out on a breath, softer than the rattle of the faucet.  “You can be mad after. Hell, you probably still will be. Just hear me out first.” 

You do not want to hear him out.

Explanations are unpredictable things, doors that open both ways, and you already have the sickening suspicion that whatever is waiting on the other side will hurt worse than not knowing. 

Because yes, objectively, Jack failing to follow you into a bathroom means very little.

No fidelity breached, no grand betrayal, no concrete proof of anything beyond bad timing and worse communication.

But the small flutter in your stomach does not care about what your mind tries to litigate away. 

It knows this feeling. Knows this small retreat before someone leaves, the subtle cooling, the moment affection starts becoming obligation. 

Maybe he has simply had his fill of you. Maybe the novelty wore off and now you are no longer the bright, entertaining little thing he wanted to sneak around with, only a woman who talks too much and needs too much and has begun expecting permanence from something built in shadows.

And maybe now he has seen enough of the real thing to know he cannot imagine building a life around it. 

So you do not give him the chance. 

“Nothing to explain,” you say, seizing the sponge and escaping the cage of his arms for the opposite counter.

You start cleaning with theatrical diligence, collecting bottles, stacking plates, wiping crumbs into your palm as though the fate of the rental deposit rests entirely on you. 

But you did not come downstairs to rescue countertops. You came because you need proof that Jack still wants you.

Any kind of proof. Emotional, physical, desperate, selfish. You would take whatever he gives you.

And if you cannot bring yourself to ask whether he still sees a future with you, then you can at least find out whether he still wants to put his hands on you.

So when you bend to retrieve a fallen fork from the ground, you let the hem of your sleep shirt climb unchecked over the backs of your legs until it bares you completely, exposes that you are wearing no underwear, your thighs parted just enough for Jack to see every soft, private inch you left uncovered for him. 

Cool air brushes your pussy.

His stare burns hotter.

“Jesus Christ, honey.” The words leave him rough and disbelieving, dragged up from the well below his throat. Behind you, the counter creaks faintly beneath the sudden weight of his hands. “What the hell are you doing?” 

You count to one before straightening. 

You turn with the fork still balanced between two fingers, arranging your face into its sweetest approximation of confusion.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

“Right,” he murmurs. “Must’ve imagined the whole thing.” 

You drop the fork into the sink with an accusing clatter. “Probably. Memory goes with age, remember?”

He steps in behind you before you can turn away, chest brushing your back, one palm flattening over your stomach while the other slides beneath your shirt.

His knuckles skim the soft inside of your thigh, then settle exactly where you’re naked. 

“Yeah,” he growls against your ear. “Didn’t imagine a damn thing.”

A whimper threatens and you bite it back so hard your jaw aches. In that stilled heartbeat the fight drains out of your muscles and your body answers him first, arching back, begging in the only language it trusts. 

But the panic bubbles back up in fiery waves.

“Please don’t,” you say, and the plea is not the one he expects.

Jack’s hand freezes.

You close your eyes. 

“If you’ve changed your mind about me, just say it.” Every word hurts your throat. You turn your face just enough for him to see what the anger has been hiding all night. Fear. “If you don’t want me anymore, then don’t touch me like you do. Don’t make it harder than it already is.” 

Jack’s hand vanishes so abruptly from beneath your shirt, your knees dip with the loss.

Then he’s turning you, big palms framing your cheeks, thumbs parked just under your cheekbones. Your own slick glosses his knuckles. He tips your chin up so you can’t look anywhere but straight into the brown storm of his.

“What the fuck are you talkin’ about, baby?”

Your mouth opens, but what escapes first is a wet, hitching breath.

The tears rise fast, flood-waters breaching the levee before you can blink them back, Jack’s outline smearing into watercolor.

“I don’t know,” you hiccup, which is not true at all. You know too much. “You left me there. And then you acted like I was being dramatic for expecting you to show up when you said you would.” Your fingers curl around his wrists, not pushing him away, just holding on. “And maybe it’s not about that. Maybe it’s about how easy it would be for you to wake up and realize I’m not… serious-person material. I’m fun, I know that. I’m pretty and I make you laugh and I’m good in bed, but that’s not the same as being someone you actually want a life with.” Your lips tremble. “People always like me better at first.” 

Immediately his face caves, all the structure in it imploding: brows hitching, mouth parting, a stricken slackness that makes him look ten years younger and infinitely more breakable.

“Don’t say that,” he says, too sharp at first, then immediately dampens. “No, sweetheart. I’m sorry. Say whatever you need to say. I’m just…” He shakes his head, jaw tight, eyes shining with something close to a fear that matches yours. “I hate that I made you feel like that.” 

His hands slide from your face to your shoulders, holding you there as if he needs you to understand this with your whole body. 

“You are serious to me. More serious than anything I’ve let myself have in a long time.” He exhales shakily. “You think I don’t picture a life with you? I picture it constantly.” 

You just stare, lungs cinched tight, tears marooned mid-cheek as though gravity’s on pause. The room narrows to the pulse thudding in your ears. 

“You’re… you’re serious about me?”

Jack makes a quiet, wounded sound. His hands come back to your face, thumbs stroking the wet tracks beneath your eyes. 

“Christ, baby. Yes. Of course I am.” He bends closer, as though proximity might help drive the truth into you. “I don’t know how I let you believe otherwise… I didn’t follow after you tonight because I got scared for you, not of you. I should have told you. I should have found you, explained, apologized. Instead I left you alone with your worst thoughts. That was cruel, even if I didn’t mean it to be. Please let me fix it.”

Another hiccup rattles through you as you try to process the words at face-value. “Scared for me how?” 

“Because if this blew up, I didn’t want you caught in it.” He says it simply, like there is no question which of you matters more. “I don’t give a damn what people think of me, baby. I care what it does to you.” 

You shake your head inside the cradle of his hands.

“I don’t care what people think either. I don’t care about any of it.” Your voice snags, but you push through. “I love you, Jack. That matters more.” 

His eyes close for half a second, like the words are almost too much to take standing up.

When they open again, he kisses you senselessly soft, both hands still holding your face as though you might vanish.

He kisses you once, twice, a third time, each one a little messier than the last.

“Love you too, baby,” he whispers, lips brushing yours. “Love you so much it scares the hell out of me.”

The brine of your tears slick the seam of your mouth. Jack doesn’t flinch, drinks it in like proof of living.

You surface for one ragged sip of air, barely enough, your lips still grazing his, fists knotted in his shirt like ballast against weightlessness. 

“You mean it? You’re really serious about me?” you whisper again, softer this time, almost shy with it. 

Jack lets out a low, guttural sound and grazes the corner of your mouth. 

“So serious, honey.” Another kiss, deeper now, his hands sliding from your face to your waist, pulling you flush. “Want to put a ring on that pretty little hand. Want a house with your clothes everywhere and your shoes in places I’m gonna trip over.” His mouth finds yours again, swallowing your gasp before he adds, rougher, “Want a kid, if you want one. You want a baby with me, angel?” 

“Yes, please, Jack.”

The words are still warm in the air when he fits his mouth to yours, a groan vibrating through both of you.

His palms squeeze your waist, then lift, your stomach swooping as he sets you on the cleared stretch of counter. Cool laminate kisses the backs of your thighs, shocking against the furnace heat of him stepping between your legs.

Your sleep-shirt scrunches between his hands, creeping, creeping, until the hem gathers at your hips and you’re bared to him again.

“Yeah?” he murmurs against your lips. “You’d give me that?”

You nod so eagerly the room tilts, fists in his collar, yanking him closer. “Anything.”

“My perfect girl,” he breathes, kissing you again, softer now, as if the tenderness makes what follows any less filthy. 

His hand slips beneath the gathered cotton at your waist, fingers gliding south until one settles between your folds. He drags the wetness up in a lazy sweep, humming appreciation that burns brighter than the touch itself.

“And what’s all this, hm?” he asks, studying your face while his finger toys idly with your clit. His eyes darken, attention dropping to where his hand disappears between your legs. “You sittin’ here imagining me filling you up with a baby, sweetheart?” 

Your hips lift helplessly into his hand, chasing pressure he has no intention of giving you yet. 

“No teasing,” you whimper, breath breaking around the words. “Please, Jack. I need you inside me.” 

Jack swears under his breath, hand leaving your clit only long enough to undo his pants. The zipper drops. Fabric loosens. Then he is back between your thighs, dragging the thick head of his cock through your folds once, twice, gathering the wetness you have made for him.

The sight of him nearly makes you stupid.

It has only been a few days, which is nothing, really, barely enough time for a normal person to miss anything, but your body has become accustomed to him, used to the heavy stretch of his cock at least once a day, sometimes twice when neither of you has somewhere to be. 

You’re practically drooling, inner muscles fluttering around emptiness while he takes his sweet, sweet time wetting himself in what you’ve made for him. 

You shift on the counter, thighs widening of their own accord, a needy sound slipping free when the head catches against your entrance and pulls away again. 

“I know, honey. I know.” His voice roughens as he traces the head up your inner thigh. “Should’ve given you what you needed hours ago.” 

Then he finally does. 

He braces one hand at your hip and pushes forward in one long, steady stroke, the thick head breaching you first, then every heavy inch following.

Your cunt flutters, welcoming, molding around him until there’s no space left unexplored. 

The counter shudders with the low sound that tears out of both of you. 

The inexorable pressure sutures the empty ache that’s haunted you, stuffing it full until there’s no room for jealousy, no space for worst-case scenarios.

There is only Jack.

Your thighs cinch hard around his waist, heels gouging into the backs of his legs like spurs demanding more.

He doesn’t stop until pelvis meets pelvis, forehead thunking against yours while both of you gasp as if you’ve sprinted a mile in the sand. 

He retreats a heartbeat’s width and your walls seize around him, possessive. He curses under his breath.

“This tight little cunt missed me, didn’t it?” he asks, already driving back in.

He starts pumping into you at a saint’s tempo, each drag of his cock thick and thorough, his hips grinding flush against you at the end of every thrust.

Your arms lock around his shoulders as your body rocks with him, bare thighs trembling against his sides. 

Pleasure gathers everywhere at once, starting at your pussy and climbing until your whole body feels tuned to the rhythm of his hips.

You try to tell him that. Try to say yes, missed you, feels so good, but what comes out is a breathless spill of syllables, half his name and half a sound you would be embarrassed by if your brain were still capable of embarrassment. 

His hand slips between your bodies, two fingers finding your clit. 

“You’re mine, aren’t you? All mine,” he growls, cock still working inside you. “And I’m yours. Never gonna be anybody else’s, you hear me?”

Your answer is a helpless chain of nods and breathy mewls, but he isn’t satisfied with that.

He catches your jaw, thumb pressing your cheek until your eyes snap to his. 

“Look at me. Hear me.” 

“Y-yes, Jack… yours — love you, love you s’much,” you babble.

“Love you, angel.” He presses a kiss to your trembling lips. “Want me to fill this pretty pussy up? Want me to leave every drop inside where it belongs?” 

“Yes, please. Need it — need you — m’so close.”

The first warning licks up your spine. A trembling in your calves, nipples pebbling hard against your shirt.

Pleasure stacks in breath-stealing layers, so heavy it feels like quicksand pulling you under. 

Jack’s tells flare with yours. His hips snapping hard, hands tightening on your waist until his knuckles blanch.

Sweat beads at his hairline, drops down to your skin, and your walls clamp down in greedy pulses, each flex beginning for the flood he’s a second away from letting go.

“Keep looking at me,” Jack pants, curling a hand from your waist to the back of your neck. “Need to watch you fall apart.”

“Can’t — can’t hold it,” you whimper, thighs shaking.

“Don’t hold a damn thing,” he growls. “Give it to me, come on, baby.”

The quicksand finally liquefies and the world folds to white noise.

Jack breaks with you, a strangled — fuck — on your lips, thrusts turning short as he empties himself in thick bursts.

You cling to one another, quake for heartbeat after heartbeat, until the tremors fade into breathless, boneless warmth. 

When Jack’s breathing finally steadies, his mouth roams in slow increments. First your collarbones, up the column of your throat, over the quiver of your lips. 

He eases back only to reach for a paper towel, thumb already swiping at the mess seeping down your thighs. 

“Don’t,” you plead, catching his wrist. “Wanna keep it.”

Jack huffs a low laugh before moving to kiss away your protest. “Sweetheart, you’re not making it five steps up those stairs with that sliding down your legs.” 

Even as he says it, he dabs gently between them.

The light friction has your hips ticking forward, little whimpers breaking free. 

“Sensitive, huh?” he tuts. 

“Thought you wanted to put a baby in me?” you argue.

Jack’s thumb circles your thigh. “Oh, I plan on it — but not until there’s some extra hardware shining on your hand. One thing at a time, yeah?”

Old-fashioned as he is, you probably should’ve expected that.

Jack Abbot is the kind of man who still opens doors, calls restaurants instead of booking online, and apparently requires jewelry before intentional procreation. There is probably a proper sequence filed away in that stubborn head of his: ring, vows, house, baby. 

You find, to your own surprise, that you do not mind the order at all. 

You tap his chest with a teasing finger and dopey smile. “I can live with that. I do love shiny things, after all.”

What he does not tell you is that the shiny thing already exists, hidden in his sock drawer, waiting for the right moment. 

You won’t find that out for another two months, until after the two of you finally sit Robby down and tell him everything, until after Jack takes one clean punch to the face without even trying to dodge it, because fair is fair, and until after Robby’s anger burns itself down into something survivable. 

By the time Jack slips the ring onto your finger, his lip is healed, your brother is calling him Jack instead of Dick-Face (you can’t be sure where he learned that insult from), and the future no longer feels like something borrowed.

It is yours. 

MARIA NOTE this lowkey was supposed to be like 1k words and the ideas just kept flowing and it turned into a full psychological case study on why making ur brother's best friend jealous is both a terrible idea and, unfortunately, very effective. also jack saying ring first, baby later made me briefly black out. hope u enjoyed!! <3

It started as an ordinary crush. Everyone had a crush on Superman, right? That was what you kept telling yourself every time your mind wandered back to his smile, the dimples that came with it, his voice, the little curl that always seemed to fall perfectly against his forehead. It was harmless... normal. Practically expected, in a sense.

That explanation became less convincing when you thought about the way the suit fit him, how it showed the shape of everything. And you did mean everything. Your eyes were particularly drawn to certain pieces. Pieces you kept to yourself when people asked what you were thinking about, because what were you supposed to say? That his arms looked obscene in that blue? That his thighs looked even worse? That those red briefs fit too damn well for something everyone was just expected to casually ignore?

Right.

So when people asked, you stuck to the basics. Kept it simple. When Lois mentioned Superman and yet another rescue, you gave something polite, something normal, something that made you sound like a decent citizen and not a woman quietly losing a fight against her own imagination. When Jimmy talked him up, you dulled everything down and smiled, nodding along like you hadn’t already looked at the photo he was describing three separate times. Cat tried her luck more than anyone, of course, always watching your face a little too closely when she mentioned how good Superman looked on camera, how the lens loved him, how some men were just built to be looked at.

But you didn’t fold. You just shrugged, kept your expression clean, and said, “Yeah, the camera works for him." Some watered-down version of what you were actually thinking.

Clark noticed too. 

Not like the others. No, his revelation was far more accurate. You two weren’t exactly friends or anything, but you had worked on a few pieces together, which meant late nights, long drafts, shared coffee runs, and him becoming well acquainted with you whether he meant to or not. He knew your crush on Superman went far past what you let people see. Knew that your body had its own reaction reserved specifically for him. Well, not him. The other him. And at a certain point, that distinction was starting to drive him crazy.

Like today.

The bullpen had gathered around for the latest clip of Superman, everyone’s attention fixed on the screen while yours looked almost too controlled. Soft interest. Casual smile. The right amount of impressed, muted just enough to pass as normal. But Clark’s attention was nowhere near the screen. It was on you. While your mouth said something kind and sweet whenever Superman was mentioned, he heard how fast your heart was beating under it. Heard the slight change in your breathing when Cat said the suit looked good from a specific angle. Caught the small shift of your legs when Superman looked into the camera and answered the reporter directly, voice calm, steady, painfully familiar.

That one stirred something in him. Something he covered with a quick clearing of his throat, eyes dropping to the papers in his hand like they suddenly required all of his focus.

But then Superman laughed in the clip. Just a low, easy laugh at something the reporter said, nothing dramatic, nothing meant to be anything at all, and Clark heard you let out something that almost wasn’t a sound. Half sigh, half something else, something that would have been far more dangerous if it had come out any harder.

That little slip of breath hit him harder than he expected. 

Right below the belt. 

Not that you hadn’t already been working your way into his system, because you had. Slowly. Quietly. In little ways he could pretend not to notice until pretending stopped working. But this was getting harder to ignore. You were there now, wedged somewhere between Clark’s curiosity and Superman’s pride, reacting to a version of him you didn’t know was sitting three desks away, listening to every sound you tried to hide.

All of it dragged something up in him he had no business letting loose. Something possessive. Something too pleased. Something he was fighting like hell to keep quiet.

It took everything in him not to look at you for the rest of the day. 

And every day after that.

It had been no more than a week since you had nearly moaned in front of the entire bullpen. Superman came on the screen and you nearly did too.

What were you thinking?

It had been an involuntary response, something you usually only let happen in the quiet of your apartment where no one was around to witness it. No reporters, or editors, or Cat watching your face like she was waiting for it to tell on you. It was just something about his laugh, the tenor of it, the way it rolled out deep and warm, paired with that slight tilt of his head. Oh, and the hung smile. That too. The one that sat on his mouth a second too long and landed right between your legs before it reached anywhere else.

Jesus, you were down bad.

You knew that. Denial wasn’t even worth the effort at this point. Superman was part of your job as much as he was part of your thoughts, no matter how incoherent those thoughts became when they showed up. You had sworn to yourself that you would at least try to tone it down. That he didn’t need to consume every corner of your mind. That you were a grown woman with responsibilities, deadlines, and at least some self-respect left.

Unfortunately, only the logical part of your brain got the memo.

He had already broken your focus twice just this morning. Once while you were getting ready for work, toothbrush in hand, staring at your reflection while your mind wandered straight back to him for absolutely no productive reason. The brushing session went on far longer than necessary, your eyes unfocused, toothpaste nearly sliding down your wrist before you finally snapped out of it.

And again in the Daily Planet elevator, purse tucked under your arm, trying to look normal while your brain decided that 8:42 in the morning was the perfect time to replay the exact sound of Superman’s laugh. You nearly missed your floor completely, only snapping back when Clark Kent, of all people, glanced over from beside you and said, soft and polite, “This is you.” You blinked, looked at the glowing floor number, and stepped out too fast with a quick, “Right. Thanks.”

Yeah, embarrassing enough, but it didn’t stop there. 

Not long after you settled in at your desk, breaking news echoed throughout the bullpen, grabbing everyone’s attention. Especially yours. There he was, flying through dust and debris, catching pieces of towering buildings like they weighed nothing. You figured the montage would be over soon, that you could will your way through it for just a few more seconds, keep your face neutral, keep your breathing normal, keep your eyes from lingering anywhere they had no business lingering in a room full of people.

But then you heard his voice.

He was talking after saving a burning building while simultaneously fighting another alien invasion in the city, because apparently one crisis wasn’t enough. All smoke and wreckage around him, the streets torn up behind him, the sky still half-lit with whatever had just been trying to kill everyone. He had a few smudges across his skin, dark streaks near his cheek and jaw, his hair curly but messy in that way where you could tell this hadn’t necessarily been an easy feat for him. Still, he got it done. Of course he did. And unfortunately for you, he looked damn good after doing it.

That image of him stuck with you all day, well into lunch. Normally you’d sit with Lois and Cat, let Cat bait you, let Lois talk through the latest lead, pretend you were functioning like a normal person. But today you had “so much work” and you were just “too busy.” The first half was a lie, but the second half was relatively true. You were too busy.

With Superman.

You sat at your desk, pen and notebook suddenly becoming less like paper mates and more like partners in crime as you started writing. Ignoring Superman’s presence as it radiated through your body wasn’t doing you any good. If anything, it only made it worse. The more you tried not to think about him, the more your mind supplied the details anyway. The smudges on his skin. The mess of his hair. The way his voice had sounded after the fight, steady but rougher, like the city had pulled something out of him and he still had more to give. 

So your best solution? Write it out. Maybe if you gave the thoughts somewhere to go, he’d go with them. Maybe felt like a high-risk, low-reward situation, but you were desperate enough to try.

Clark, on the other hand, had been working through revisions for your most recent piece together. Nothing too crazy, just a few additions that would support the notes you’d give him later. Easy work. The kind of work he could usually get through without much trouble. 

And perhaps that had been the problem.

It didn’t take much for Clark’s focus to drift away to its new favorite spot—you. His back was to you, your desk set behind his, and from what he could hear, you were having a pretty productive day. Your pen moved across the page in smooth, steady strokes, pausing here and there before starting again. He assumed they were revision notes at first, something detailed enough to help the piece, something that almost pushed his attention back to his own screen.

Almost.

Just when his mind started to drift away, he heard the telltale signs. Your heartbeat picking up, your breath cutting in shorter intervals, quiet enough that no one else would notice but clear enough to him that ignoring it became its own kind of effort. He heard the shift of your legs, crossing and uncrossing twice beneath your desk like you couldn’t quite get comfortable. But more than that, your writing had changed.

The pressure. The shift from a smooth glide to the sharper scratch of pen against paper. The stroke of each letter becoming so specific, so weighted, that he could make out most, if not all, of what was being written.

—that’s the part I can’t seem to get out of my head. Always so big, like it’s too much until it isn’t—

Clark’s fingers slowed over his keyboard.

He had picked up on the rhythm some time ago, from the hours you’d spent working side by side. And no, it wasn’t intentional. It had happened gradually, built through marked-up pages, half-finished articles, and too many notes passed back and forth. He knew the way you wrote when you were focused. Knew the difference between a quick note, a revised sentence, a thought you crossed out before it could finish.

This wasn’t any of that.

I keep thinking about how it would feel to let him spread me open with those hands.

Clark went still.

The sentence formed clearly enough that his breath caught before he could stop it. For one second, he told himself to stop. That this was wrong. That he shouldn’t be listening just because he could. He was raised better than that. 

That one tugged at that Boy Scout conscience of his, just enough to have him start pulling his attention back.

Then your pen moved again.

S-u-p-e-r-m-a-n.

He couldn’t have ignored that even if he tried. His attention snapped right back to where it had no business being, caught on the scratch of your pen, the weight behind each word, the small breaks in your breathing as the page filled. Every piece of it gave you away, telling him exactly what state you were working yourself into.

You wrote about wanting him all the time. About wanting Superman’s body over you, in you, around you. About how badly you wanted to know if he’d fuck like you imagined he would. About how you didn’t think once would be enough.

The more your thoughts sharpened, the more your body reacted. Your heartbeat had gone fast enough now that it wasn’t even subtle to him anymore. Your breathing kept catching, then evening out, then catching again, like every line was pulling another reaction out of you. He was tuned into all of it, too tuned in, and by the time he realized how bad it had gotten, it was already too late.

He was hard.

Not gradually. Not with any warning he could pretend he missed. One second he was fine, or close enough to pass for it, and the next he wasn’t. It hit all at once, a sharp drop into want that had his whole body going tense around it, leaving him straining beneath the desk, trying not to shift, trying not to make it worse.

His jaw tightened. 

And you just kept writing.

You started with his mouth, then his hands, then yours, your thoughts slipping straight to what it would feel like to take Superman between your lips. About how good it would feel to get on your knees for him first, to feel him against your tongue, to see if he was as big as you’d been imagining every time the camera caught the front of that suit from the right angle.

That was bad enough.

Then Clark’s brain supplied the rest.

Your mouth wrapped around him. Warm and wet, lips stretching around the tip before taking more. Your tongue gliding over him slowly, tasting, teasing, making him feel every inch of it before you let him deeper. The thought of you doing that little sigh he’d heard before—the one that caught low in your throat and turned into something closer to a moan once it slipped free—sent another pulse of heat straight through him.

Behind him, your chair creaked.

The sound was small, but to him it might as well have been a confession. You shifted in your seat, trying to move the pressure somewhere else, trying to get comfortable while your pen kept scratching across the page, and Clark heard the next thought almost as clearly as if you’d said it out loud.

You wrote about riding him. About how you’d feel him everywhere. How you’d have to take him slow at first, because he’d be too much to just drop onto, even if all you’d want to do was bounce on him the second he let you. About how your body would work have to work around his size, how you’d sit on him inch by inch and then lose your mind once you finally had all of him.

That image hit harder.

He saw it immediately. You on top of him, thighs spread over his lap, riding him slow, just like you wrote, trying to adjust before the need won out. Then faster. Harder. Your body lifting and dropping, bouncing on his cock as your hands gripped his shoulders or maybe braced against his chest. Your tits moving with the rhythm. The way your face would change once it started feeling too good to hide—

How tight and warm you’d feel taking him.

That was the one.

Clark’s whole body locked around it, a soft, involuntary grunt catching in his throat as he came.

His fingers curled against the edge of his desk, the force of his release hitting hard enough to leave him tense beneath it, but quiet enough for him to bury the sound under the scrape of his chair as he shifted in his seat. His other hand moved a second later, reaching for nothing in particular, just something to make it look like he was adjusting, like he hadn’t just lost himself at his desk over the sound of you wanting Superman.

The movement caught your attention, pulling you out of your thoughts. Your pen paused mid-thought as the reality of where you were settled back in far too late. Work. The bullpen. Deadlines. Actual responsibilities, unfortunately. You blinked down at the notebook, shut it a little too fast, then reached for the folder sitting beside your keyboard like that had been your plan all along.

Clark heard you stand. Heard you coming toward him too, of course, which only made him sit a little straighter. Too straight, probably, but he couldn’t help it. His hand lifted to his mouth, fingers resting there in a passable attempt at concentration.

Every sense he had was still tuned to you, tracking the distance as it closed, the faint shift in your breathing, the soft rustle of the folder in your hand. He forced his eyes to stay on the screen, even though not a single word made it through.

“Hey,” you said when you reached his desk, holding it out to him. “I meant to give this to you earlier. It’s just the notes for the revision.”

Clark turned enough to take it, but not enough to really look at you. He couldn’t trust himself with that yet.

His fingers brushed the edge of the folder as he took it from you.

“Thanks,” he said.

You gave him a small, apologetic look. “Sorry. I’ve been a little distracted today.”

Clark heard your heart jump at the word distracted. Just a quick, telling little stutter beneath everything else. Unfortunately, his body had a similar reaction, sharp enough to make his grip tighten around the folder as he kept his eyes on his screen.

You didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe you were too caught in your own embarrassment to look too closely.

He kept his face steady. Well, at least tried to. Then you made it worse.

“I wish I could focus like you,” you added.

Clark let out something close to a laugh, but it barely made it there. A strained huff, half-hearted at best, paired with a nod that probably looked more convincing than it felt. 

“Yeah,” he said, because it was the safest thing he had.

You smiled, still oblivious, and turned to walk away.

Focused.

That was one word for it.

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