#mowalsh

“Samira!” Trinity flags her down in the middle of the ER with such an urgency that she almost thinks something catastrophic is happening. The only thing that separates it from being a cry for help is the excitement in her voice. 

Normally Samira would ignore her, but it’s a quiet day and Trinity is her friend so she allows herself to stop. “What?” she asks, still shuffling papers because she is Samira Mohan in the ED. 

Trinity’s spinning around in her chair, likely procrastinating charts. “We should do a double date.” she states, only vaguely looking in Samira’s direction. “‘Cause Baran and Yolanda and I have Wednesday off, and I’m pretty sure you do too. Does Walsh have Wednesday night off?”

Samira freezes and allows herself a moment to think about her fiancé’s schedule. “Yeah, I think she does.” 

“So?” Trinity’s actually looking at her now.

Samira takes a moment to think. Emery really needs to get out more and she’s friends with Yolanda. She might even be a fan of this idea. “Yeah….” Her voice trails off. “That should be good.”

Trinity grins, already pulling out her phone. “Perfect.”

—

Samira shoves a note at Lena. “Do me a favor and pass the message to Em?” she asks. Would it have been easier to text her the information? Yes, absolutely. But Emery liked being cute and old-fashioned sometimes, so she figured the note might make the date even more special. 

Lena simply takes the note, eying it suspiciously. “Yeah, sure.” she replies offhandedly. 

—

“Hey Perlah, will you tell Walsh to go to the hill at the park on her day off. From Samira.”

—

“Tell Walsh there’s a romantic picnic on her day off she has to go to.”

—

“Walsh, you need to go to the hill in the park a few blocks away with a picnic for a date on your night off.”

“What? I’m doing things.”

“Night off. Picnic. Samira.”

“So Tuesday?”

“Yeah, probably.”

“Whatever.”

—

The sandwiches are made. The flowers are ordered. Trinity’s girlfriend’s are ready. An intern had confirmed that Em knew what was going on. 

Samira bounces on her toes. What could she say, they could all use the break. It was really shocking that they all had the same day off, really.

She turns away from her prep to finally relax. She has a research paper she’s really excited to get reading!

Her phone dings and Samira lets her hand fly to it. She grins when she realizes it’s from Emery.

em <3: Hey, where are you guys

em <3: On the hill and brought a picnic like you asked but it’s looking kinda empty

em <3: And it’s my night off just like you said. 

It’s four years after The Incident that she makes her return to the singles. Not entirely her own choice, Trinity had said she wanted to focus on her game more because on god she was going to beat Garcia one of these days, so that meant Samira would need a different doubles partner.

Samira hadn’t wanted a different doubles partner.

She worked well with Trinity, they’d had a good partnership. They’d been friends since they’d been assigned as training partners in tennis camp when they were fifteen and had continued to play together every now and again as they’d grown up. Samira liked playing with her.

She didn’t want to play with anybody else.

But needs must, when you want to keep making a living.

Finding a new coach had been easier than she’d expected it to be. After Robby’s rather dramatic exit, Samira had imagined her name would’ve been blacklisted amongst most other prospective investors, but Baran had reached out to her before she had even thought to ask.

She guessed she had Trinity to thank for that.

Baran was a good teacher. Not much older than herself but a hell of a lot more accomplished, with seven Grand Slam titles under her belt by the time she’d stepped back from the court.

Samira had never faced her herself but she’d seen Baran play. Calm, confident, disciplined, even in a loss.

She liked her style off of the court too. Endlessly graceful, charming, cool and kind when it came down to her teaching. She actually made Samira think instead of just hitting the ball over the net, made her into an athlete rather than just a girl with a racket in a white sport-dress.

That being said, Samira still cries after her losing her first appearance back on the circuit.

It’s a humiliating score. 6-2. 6-0.

Granted, she’s made some progress with her temper by saving her racket smash for the privacy of her own changing room, but the humiliation still burns enough tears that she ruins Baran’s Lululemon-sponsored jacket the minute her coach pulls her into a hug.

Maybe she just isn’t meant for tennis. Maybe it’s just not her.

Baran puts her on a different tactic.

Before, when she had Robby, it was exercise drills. Practising serves and pushing weights until she dropped, running until she couldn’t cry anymore, getting her head down and focusing on the work.

With Baran, it’s the media that gets her to open up again, gets her to clear her head. Nudging her in front of some kid interviewer with a microphone and asking her what her favourite movie is.

It’s different, silly even, but Samira comes to like it a lot more than she did before. Before, it was post-match press conferences and being asked why she was so crap, why she was always losing, why she couldn’t keep a racket intact or a ball over the net. Always harsh, always judging.

Now, she gets to laugh and forget about the tennis, forget about the judgement and the humiliation, just gets to have fun and feel a little brighter.

She learns she’s actually got fans.

Her game improves all the way to the Indian Wells open where Baran pulls some strings to get her on the wild card.

She gets through round one.

Then round two.

By sheer luck she faces Trinity in round three and beats her in straight sets, something her friend doesn’t seem to be altogether too mad about, thank god.

But it’s round four where it all drops away.

Round four, she faces Emery Walsh.

She’s heard of Walsh. A dynamic player, raised on tennis, two-time Grand Slam champion, once at Roland-Garros four years ago, the other at the American Open the year before that. She’s one of those players that makes everything look so fucking easy that it’s frustrating. A natural star.

Nobody ever sees Walsh practice. She just turns up, wins, waves and leaves. Whatever’s going on in her head stays purely there, never on her face, never in her serve, just plain and simple in her head. There’s no overthinking and no bad playing. Consistency at its finest.

Samira loses to her in straight sets. 6-3. 6-4.

Usually, that would have her running to Baran, throwing a racket and dumping her bag on some poor physio until she could calm down again. But not this time.

Most players would be happy about getting to the quarterfinal at Indian Wells. Ecstatic, even.

Not Emery Walsh.

Emery Walsh, when she approaches Samira at the net after her win, has a look on her face so peculiar that Samira worries they’re not going to shake hands.

When they do, the shorter player leans in and says:

“Make it harder next time.”

What’s even stranger is that Samira can see it’s not meant to provoke or mock her, it sounds almost disappointed.

Emery gives her a tight look and walks off before Samira can reply, shaking the umpire’s hand and giving the crowd a brief wave before disappearing down the tunnel.

She doesn’t even stick around for her post-match interview.

If it’s a tactic to get into Samira’s head, it works.

She spends the rest of tournament watching Walsh like a hawk. She’s not a total recluse it seems, Samira catches her walking around with her coach Shamsi and her training partner Abbot, signing autographs and posing for the occasional photo with a young fan but she doesn’t watch any matches though they would surely benefit her.

Walsh doesn’t seem at all fazed either that she’s playing some of the biggest names in tennis, day in and day out. If it does bother her, she doesn’t show it.

Even when she loses to Parker Ellis in the semi-final, she doesn’t look all that put off. In fact, Samira’s pretty sure she sees Emery shrug when Parker grins and shakes her hand over the net.

She can’t get the player out of her head.

The next time they face each other is Miami, a month later.

Emery beats her 6-4. 7-5.

This time, when they meet over the net, Emery grins like she’s won something.

“Much better, Mohan. Still, make it harder.”

Again, she’s off and down the tunnel before Samira can get a word in, left standing at the net with her mouth open and her racket unbroken in her hand.

Not only do the commentators pick up on it, so do the fans. Everyone’s wondering why Slo-Mo is gazing after Emery Walsh after losing to her in such spectacular fashion.

It becomes a rivalry.

A rivalry that Samira keeps losing at, and a rivalry that keeps Emery Walsh smirking at her from over the net.

“You’re sick.”

Samira squints from where she’s standing in the hallway. Garcia had grabbed her wrist after a trauma and dragged her to the quietest place she could find in the ED. (Which really wasn’t very quiet at all.)

She wasn’t friends with Garcia, so she had been expecting something professional. (Or maybe Emery related.) Not this.

“What?” (Eloquent. She knows.)

Garcia rolls her eyes and crosses her arms like she thinks Samira is the dumbest person alive. “You look like you’re about to fall over. Tell Dana you’re going home. Don’t make me call Em.”

And the worst thing about it is that she isn’t wrong. Samira is cold and clammy and the only thing she wants to do right now is go home and cuddle with her fiance. But the had a shift, so the pounding headache and the misery can wait until she gets off. 

And so, like an adult, she spits out, “You’re not the boss of me.” and storms away, ignoring the fatigue that pulls down on her bones and begs her to sink into the floor.

(She is so caught up in it that she doesn’t notice Garcia already pulling out her phone.)

—

“What the fuck.”

“Good morning to you too.” Yolanda’s voice is crackly and mildly condescending through the phone. 

Emery’s just about to go off on her about how she got off at eight a.m. and it is currently eleven a.m. and therefore it is her bedtime, but Yolanda speaks first.

“Your fiance is almost certainly sick. She looks like she’s going fall over in the middle of the ED. I’ve collaborated with Dana and talked to her but she won’t go home.”

Emery takes a deep breath and feels her anger turn to worry. 

“I’ll be there in twenty.”

—

 “Sam.”

Samira freezes because she would recognize that voice and that pet name anywhere. And sure enough, when she finally rotates her body from where she’s grabbing gloves Emery is there. Her arms are crossed and it looks like she’s thrown on the first clothes that struck her as “maybe work appropriate”. Plus her hair is still down in a way that she never wears to work. So, in short, Samira definitely woke up her fiancé.

The headache and the heat must be taking more out of her than she thought because she can feel tears pricking in the corners of her eyes. She couldn’t do one thing right, could she?

Emery must sense she’s on the verge of tears because she speaks again. “Let’s go home.” Her voice is collected and laid back, but Samira can see a tinge of worry in her eyes. 

But she also has eight hours left of her shift. “Can’t. Shift.” She gestures to the busy Emergency Department with her head and instantly regrets it when it sends more pain through her skull.

Emery shrugs and steps closer. “Sucks.” She drops her voice so only Samira can hear it. “I already talked to Dana. You’re good to go. Come on, I know you want to go home.”

Samira sniffs and tries her best to hold back her tears. It must not work well enough because Emery’s thumb reaches up at her face to wipe one away from the corner of her eye. “You’re supposed to be asleep.” is what she manages to get out.

Emery nods. “Yep. Sooner we get out of here, sooner we can nap.”

Samira can’t really think of anything to say to that. Because it does sound nice, especially right now, to curl up against Emery and sleep. But on the other hand, she can’t let people down. Work is her life. She goes to work, rain or shine, because she loves it and it’s her purpose. “No.” she whispers, but her voice has lost bite.

Emery sighs, stepping closer. She spots a nurse that is looking at her weird and shoots them a death glare. But then, all her attention is on Samira. 

“Listen,” she begins, grabbing Samira’s hands. “Just from the looks of you I can tell that you are burning up. I can tell that you are miserable. I can tell that you want to home. I am offering to take you home. We can cuddle in my bed and both sleep, and you can have some Tylenol and water and it’ll be great.” She stops and begins again, letting her gaze dart for a minute. “I know you care about the people here, but you’re really no help if you’ve got the flu.” She reaches up and pressed a hand to Samira’s forehead with a wince. “And I really think you do.”

Samira lets her body lean towards Emery, like a magnet for her fiancé. “No one will be mad?” she whispers.

Emery shakes her head. “God, no.”

“They’ll be okay here?”

“They’ll be fine.”

“You promise we can cuddle?”

“Absolutely.”

Samira takes a deep breath, which is half a good idea and half a bad one because now she can really feel just how bad she feels. There is genuinely nothing she wants more in the world right now than to be cuddled on Emery’s lap.

“Yeah.” she whispers.

Emery smiles. “Yeah? Ready to go home baby?” And it’s soft in a way she never lets into the emergency room and Samira is weak so she just nods. 

Emery slings an arm around her shoulders before guiding her to the locker room.