You hurry into the emergency department as fast as possible, juggling four trays of baked goods stacked as high as your head. The scent of cinnamon and sugar fills the air, hitting the nurse’s station before your coworkers even spot you struggling to maneuver in the busy space. 

Princess rushes over, and you can see her grin even through the stack of dessert. “I could marry you,” she says, grabbing two of the trays and falling into step beside you. 

You hear Dana sigh with exaggerated resignation, and it’s not long before she’s at your side. “What did you do now?”

You bite your bottom lip, hiding a smile. “I might have made cinnamon rolls, and the recipe might have gotten a little bit out of hand.” 

Whitaker’s head lifts the second he hears the words cinnamon rolls fall from your lips, and you don’t miss the way he and Victoria both stand up from their charting immediately. They hurry over, and the man looks like he’s in awe as he asks, “Are they for us?”

“Who else would they be for?” You question, heading toward the staff lounge to display the treats. “I can’t eat forty-eight cinnamon rolls by myself.”

“You made forty-eight cinnamon rolls?” Emma gasps, her hand squeezing your shoulder gently. You’d fallen into an easy friendship with the girl in the past three weeks of working at Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center. The first day you’d spent in the unit was full of anxiety, and you’d been grateful to see someone like Emma, so close in age to you, fitting in the emergency room seamlessly, despite her chipper nature. It had made you relax, particularly when she’d complimented the pink ribbon you’d tied in a bow around your ponytail before work. 

“Yeah…” you breathe, “I probably went overboard, but I wanted everyone to be able to have some. I had a lot of extra ingredients for the cream cheese frosting anyway, so I thought I might as well go big.”

You stop in front of the table in the center of the lounge and gently place the trays of cinnamon rolls down, careful not to jostle them. Dana stacks the extra boxes off to the side and chuckles when she finds the tiny sheet of ingredients, running her thumb along one of the little sketches of vines you’d decorated the edges with. “You made labels?”

Nodding, you reply, “I don’t want people to eat it if they’re allergic. Or not eat it because they’re scared they might be.”

She clicks her tongue, but her smile is fond when she murmurs, “Never change, kid.”

The emergency department is busy. Busy enough that you’ve had to readjust the ponytails securing your braids three times by eleven. Busy enough that you barely have time to use the restroom. Busy enough that you don’t notice Mel King walking up to you, holding a cinnamon roll in her hand, a beaming smile on her face as she says, “They’re shaped like flowers!”

You giggle, watching as she takes her first bite. 

You’d brought baked goods to work a few times, and it warmed your heart to watch your coworkers find joy in them. Sure, you enjoyed baking and would do it either way, but it was nice to know that the things you were making could at least have a tiny impact on the people around you, especially when work could be overwhelming and exhausting.

The rest of the morning passes by in a whirlwind: triage, trauma, and charting biting at your heels when you dare pause for a break. You haven’t found time to check in on the cinnamon rolls in the staff lounge, but you can’t help but feel satisfied each time one of your coworkers passes you and mutters something about the dessert.

By five, the mood in the department shifts, as if you’ve entered the silent but deadly eye of a hurricane. Perlah appears at your elbow as you stock a supply cart while talking to Earl about sandwiches, her face stern. She doesn’t bother with a greeting, instead opting to pull you towards bay eleven. 

“We need an extra set of hands in here,” she mutters under her breath, her stride fast and focused. “Robby’s in there with ortho. You need to stay on top of this one. Keep sharp. Listen to what the surgeon is asking for, take notes on the chart, yeah?”

You don’t have time to look at the chart on the tablet she thrusts into your hands before she pushes the door open, tugging you gently into the heavy atmosphere of the medical bay.

You stare at the man in front of you, circling the hospital room like a predator watching its prey. He’s huge, surely several inches over six feet, and you don’t miss the strength in his arms as he crosses them over his chest, the dark blue fabric of his scrubs stretching to accommodate the muscle. 

Everyone is silent, and you join them in the quiet, instead deciding to ponder the reason Perlah had pulled you into the room when you hadn’t had anything to do with this case. 

Truthfully, it didn’t seem like a second nurse was needed, but it was only your third week on the job, and you weren’t going to make any waves by questioning the nurses who had been working at the hospital for nearly as long as you’d been alive.

The man, Dr. Park, as Perlah had muttered quietly to you when the surgeon had turned his back on the two of you, spoke confidently to Robby, your attending nodding in agreement. You only caught pieces of his words: surgery tomorrow, not urgent, something that sounds like “send her upstairs.”

The room seems to breathe when he exits, a soft chatter picking up again, but your eyes stay trained on him. You hesitate, looking towards the hallway that leads upstairs, to the staff lounge, then back to the man walking down the corridor. 

Dr. Park is nearly out of your sight as he begins to round the corner, but you seem to surprise him when you murmur, “Hi!”

He turns on his heels, looks at you, eyes trained on your face in a way that is entirely too intimidating to keep your voice steady while you say, “I’m sorry to interrupt you in the middle of the workday.” 

He’s so still. Eerily still and serious, as if he doesn’t move unless there is a purpose. You shift your weight, uncomfortably aware of the stark contrast between the two of you. 

You’re in your hospital-issued dark-grey scrubs, but your undershirt is a lavender that matches the shade of your stethoscope. Your hair is pulled into braids, the bottoms secured with a tiny white ribbon, and despite your enjoyment of the outfit, you can’t help but feel a bit childish when the gaze of the orthopedic surgeon falls upon you.

Still, you give a soft smile. “I just wanted to let you know that there are cinnamon rolls in the staff lounge if you want any!” He is silent, and it does nothing to help your nerves. He’s so close, so large, so handsome. 

It makes you feel sick. 

“I made them yesterday night, and...and there is an ingredient sheet too, in case you’re allergic to anything and want to check. I don’t want anyone to get sick, of course. Though I realize that we’re in a hospital and if you’re going to have anaphylaxis you might as well have it here, and-”

It takes Park interrupting you for the rambling to stop. “I don’t really eat dessert.”

He’s not loud. He isn’t cruel; he’s just…flat in tone. He speaks so matter-of-factly that it sounds like he’s telling you the sky is blue. “I’ll have to pass.”

“Oh, okay,” you nod, swallowing. Your smile falters when you murmur, “No worries.”

He gives you a tiny nod, and you scramble to add, “You can take some for your team, if you’d like?”

God, you feel like a bumbling idiot. What the fuck is wrong with you?

His eyes flick briefly toward the staff break room before falling back on you. “Have a good evening, nurse…” he looks down at your ID badge and adds your name with a tentative twitch of his lips

“You too, Dr. Park.” 

He doesn’t look back when he leaves. The doors to the stairs close behind him, and you feel like your tennis shoes are stuck to the ground. 

“Oof,” Whitaker mutters, appearing next to you out of thin air. 

“What?” You breathe, looking up at him. He looks exhausted, though you can’t blame him. It has been a long day, and with only two hours left in the shift, everyone seems to be dragging their feet, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the night shift.

He nudges your shoulder, and you frown, chewing on your bottom lip. “You okay? You look sad.”

“Do I actually?” You mumble, walking back to central with the resident doctor at your side. Your hands fiddle absentmindedly with the ends of your stethoscope. 

“You absolutely look sad.” Dennis shrugs, pressing his lips together in a familiar expression that brings the corners of your lips up just a hair.

“I just thought he’d like a cinnamon roll.” You scratch the back of your neck at how ridiculous you feel. “I wasn't trying to be weird or anything.”

“You weren’t.” He assures.

Dana walks over, throwing her arm around your shoulder and tugging you into her side. It feels motherly, and you thank the universe for her, for her being the one to lead you through this stage of your life. The job, the department, all of it. “What happened to my girl?”

Whitaker points towards the doors of bay eleven, the patient being tended to by Frank and Perlah as they prep her to be transported to the orthopedic rooms. “Park.”

The charge nurse groans, giving your arm a tight squeeze that calms your dejectedness more than it should. “What did he do now?”

“He doesn’t eat dessert apparently,” you grumble, rolling your eyes at the thought of it. Who doesn’t eat sweets? Surely one can live a balanced life and still indulge.

“That’s it?”

“He said it kind of…” Dennis searches, his hands waving around like you noticed he so often did. “Shark-ish.”

“Nobody warned you, did they, sugar?” Dana sighs, reaching over the desk to grab her water.

“About what?” It seems like every day in the emergency department comes with new information to be learned. You expected it, sure; starting your first nursing job was bound to bring new experiences, but not to this extent.

“Dr. Brendon Park. Park the Shark.” Whitaker answers, “Known to be terrifying.”

“He wasn’t terrifying,” you chuckle. Eerily composed, yes, but terrifying wouldn’t be the word that would come to your mind. “He was really serious, though.”

“He denies the existence of joy in the hospital,” Dennis responds. Dana laughs into her water, and you let their teasing be a balm to the disappointment of meeting the surgeon.

Lying back in bed, you sigh, finally feeling relaxed after your twelve-hour shift. You were off tomorrow, with plans to sleep in and maybe go shopping for a new book as a treat – if you successfully manage to clean your apartment first, that is – and you felt giddy at the idea of being free.

You’re musing over that potentially being the ultimate experience of adulthood when your phone buzzes, notifying you of a text message. You click on it, eyes furrowing as you read the words. How the hell did Park the Shark manage to get your phone number, and why was he messaging you at nine-thirty at night?