#barantos hcs

they meet when trinity has an injury during a game. probably like re-aggravating an old injury (maybe from her gymnastics days) and she has to go to the hospital which she is notttt happy about. hospitals probably make her uneasy, maybe cuz of her gymnastics history, maybe also because she has sh scars and such. combined with the insane amount of adrenaline from the game, she is soooo uncomfortable and thus difficult to work with, esp before any teammates or coaches make it out. i think just very 1) unwilling/unable to articulate her boundaries (like don’t handle me a certain way or to tell her with details whats gonna happen) and 2) when those boundaries get crossed (not maliciously, hopefully) it’s immediately to 100% with the defensiveness.

baran is the only one who is able to work with her (i think being a queer woc would be prt of it (esp if she was originally treated by someone like langdon) but also just cuz she has a good bedside manner). and yk trinity being trinity theres lots of teasing lots of banter etc etc. “are you aware you’re flirting with me barely 10 minutes after i saw you kick dr langdon out while the whole floor heard you screaming and sobbing?”/“its part of my charm, doc. you can’t say its not working.” (trinity would wink and baran would blush like hell and on it goes)

baran would know who trinity is already because i think her son would be into the hockey + pwhl (btw in my head they r in toronto cuz for some reason toronto feels the most pittsburgh adjacent. to me.). maybeeeee she’d ask for an autograph totallyyyyy just for her son and maybeeeee trinity would slip in her phone number

cue like way too much texting following this

[trinity would have the most gen z texting style, just lots of acronyms and very little grammar or capitalization, while baran texts Exactly how she talks with perfect grammar and punctuation. ]

like wayyy too early into the “relationship” trinity offers baran and her son tickets. “my roommates are away for the weekend and no one else is gonna take them, i know ur son likes hockey”, they do show up with the cutest homemade signs, which probably cues some teasing from teammates (“since when did you get a wife and kid santos?” “since when did you get a HOT wife?” “a doctor puts up with ur ass?”)

following this scheduling makes their budding relationship a little bit go to shit. pro athlete schedule vs er doc schedule, yeah they aren’t gonna have much time together.

baran isnt eager/willing to start a relationship with someone who’s schedule is so chaotic, constantly traveling constantly across the country, also just practicing so much and working out and whatever whatever. especially with her kid, she wants stability yk.

i think trinity gets this, but due to some entirely-not-fleshed-out backstory drama (prob w yolanda), she is soooo not going to want to commit here. so shes unwilling to say like “i will make time for you i will be here for you i can make it work” like in the beginning she just isnt gonna do that. and shes also definitely not gonna do a casual relationship when they just see each other when shes available and dont talk in between.

cue pining! of course!

what brings them back together, you ask? cuz ofc this is fanfiction and it like, never ends with the couple not together lol. well 1) could be a fun “right person wrong time” thing but 2) why, another injury of course! this is athletics x medicine baby the main overlap is Injuries. + they’re great for angst obv

but! not trinity again, just cuz its more interesting imo.

i think instead it would be victoria, who is on trinity’s team. victoria is younger than trinity, and while she was still smth of a prodigy, she’s not like above her age bracket since everyone whos a pro athlete was smth of a prodigy. sorta. so trinity has taken victoria under her wing. they’re close, both each other’s closest friend on the team, and yk extra plot with victoria’s mom not approving of her doing pro sports + them maybe not financially supporting her + trinity helping her out, roommate style, etc etc trinity feels SO responsible for vic. and victoria is like, mostly fine, but trinity is still freaking tf out. baran sees trinity freaking out at the hospital, and i mean cmon, as if she’s not gonna help?

and yeah sure totallyyy a one time thing, letting ur ex-situationship cry into ur arms about the steas of all of it, its just one night, its just polite at that point. and i mean, she is a doctor. it would be practically rude not to offer advice in the coming days about managing concussion recovery, answering questions about screen time limits or whether reading recipes was okay, maybe if trinity printed them out? those arent relationship-things. any acquaintance would do the same.

cue the questions getting less and less excusable.

“would chocolate be a good “get well soon” care package item? how abt fruit? if you were stressed baran, what would you like?” (baran ignores whatever she answers arriving at her door in a few days)

“what r good low stimulation movies to watch that wouldnt trigger a migraine? have u seen the new [insert movie idk]? no? maybe we should watch it together, to test it for vic, yk?”

etc etc

and yeah. i think through wanting to be available to vic (who is out for the season) + kinda wanting to make it work w baran (more than kinda) + just trinity’s general need to work through the mental health stuff related to solely putting in 110% effort into her sport at the immediate cost of her bodily health, she learns how to better balance the hockey stuff + the non hockey stuff. esp once off season hits, her and baran r able to figure out a system that works.

and eventually happily ever after <33