WhimsicalBeans

“ok.. i lied.”

“about what?”

“this is about a boy.. but uhm.. it’s also not..”

“okay?”

“i don’t know how to kiss.. i was wonderin’ if you could teach me?”

robby can’t believe his fucking luck. all those times he’s spent laying on his couch after you’ve gone back home, his hand fisting his cock as he mutters out your name. many, many times he’s pictured you bouncing on his cock, your hands on his stomach as you giggle on top of him. and now here you are, sat on his couch, asking him to teach you how to kiss—and he’d be a stupid ma to say no.

“oh, sweet girl.. of course i can..”

you squealed in delight, swinging your legs off the couch before settling down on his thigh, your hands grasping at his shoulders. his hands come up to cup your face, pulling you gently towards him, before he gently whispers close your eyes, honey and just follow my lead—which you nod in response, your eyes slowly fluttering closed. his lips were soon pressed against yours, his tongue parting your lips to slide in your mouth. you squeak out a gasp, opening your eyes wide before being lulled back into a daze as his hands move to settle on your hips, dragging you fully onto his lap. your eyes roll to the back of your head as your eyelids flutter closed, lazily kissing robby as he controls every movement. you absentmindedly grind your hips and feel the bulge in his pants twitch between your legs, so you pull off him for a second, saliva hanging between yours and his lips.

“a-are you hard, mister robby? from kissing me?”

“yeah, sweetheart.. i am, feels that good..” he breathes out, watching as you swallow thickly, eyes focused on the twitching in his pants as you grind over him. whining slightly, you look back into his eyes and speak quietly, nervousness overwhelming you for a second.

“can i.. can i touch it, mister robby?”

“of course, could never deny my sweet girl when she wants something, hmm?”

“am i your sweet girl?”

“mmhm, ‘course you are..”

it’s then and there that robby decides to confess everything to you.

“been thinkin’ about you a lot, angel.. been thinkin’ about how good of a kisser you’d be, how soft your little hands would be as you stroked my cock, how your mouth would feel with your lips wrapped ‘round my cock.. and especially how that tight little pussy would feel all stuffed up with my cock..”

“you.. y-you have?”

“mmhm..”

“am i.. uhm.. am i a good kisser?”

“the best.”

taglist !

You hated how long everything took now. Something as simple as sitting upright in bed became a carefully planned event involving medication timing, strategically placed pillows, and enough determination to make your physical therapist visibly concerned. Showering exhausted you. Walking exhausted you. Sometimes even holding a conversation for too long left you needing a nap afterward because the concussion still lingered stubbornly in the background, stealing pieces of your energy whenever you weren't paying attention.

You hated needing help more than anything else.

More than the pain. More than the restrictions. More than the endless parade of specialists, surgeons, therapists, and follow-up appointments that seemed determined to remind you how badly injured you had been.

You hated reaching for a glass of water and realizing your shoulder couldn't manage the movement. Hated waking up in the middle of the night and having to ask for assistance instead of simply getting up yourself. Hated the way people watched you now, always a little too carefully, as if they expected you to break apart in front of them.

For the first week after surgery, getting out of bed required someone nearby.

The realization humiliated you more than it should have.

You were used to being the person helping. The person lifting stretchers and running trauma activations and staying three hours past the end of a shift because somebody else's emergency mattered more than your own exhaustion. You were the person people called when things got difficult, the one who always figured out a solution, always kept moving, always managed to carry a little more than everyone thought possible.

Now people looked at you the way you usually looked at patients.

With concern.

With patience.

With that careful gentleness reserved for people who were hurt badly enough that nobody wanted to make things worse.

It made your skin crawl.

The bruising around your throat lingered for weeks afterward.

Dark fingerprints faded slowly enough that every accidental glance in a mirror felt like being punched directly in the chest. Sometimes you would catch sight of them while brushing your teeth or washing your face and suddenly find yourself back inside Trauma Two again. Back beneath fluorescent lights. Back on the floor.

Hands around your throat.

Air disappearing.

The cabinet slamming into the back of your skull.

The overwhelming certainty that your body was beginning to fail you.

You never stayed in front of mirrors very long anymore.

Mostly, though, you hated being a patient.

You spent nearly three weeks in the hospital altogether, long enough to memorize the overnight ICU staff by voice alone. Long enough for nurses to start sneaking you extra pudding cups because apparently near-strangulation combined with jaw fractures meant surviving almost entirely on soft foods for a while. Long enough to become familiar with the strange rhythm of hospitalization.

The four a.m. lab draws.

The endless vital sign checks.

The quiet conversations nurses thought patients couldn't hear from the hallway.

The way sunlight crawled slowly across the floor every afternoon before disappearing again.

Long enough to watch Pittsburgh weather change endlessly through narrow hospital windows while your own department continued functioning without you somewhere several floors below.

That part bothered you more than expected.

The emergency department was still open. Traumas still arrived. Residents still complained. Patients still needed help. Life continued moving forward whether you were there or not, and for the first time in years you were stuck watching from the outside.

Rationally, you knew the department would survive without you.

Emotionally, it felt different.

You had spent so much of your life inside those walls that part of you had started believing your place there was permanent. Necessary. The thought of everyone continuing without you left a strange hollow feeling in your chest that you couldn't quite explain.

Sometimes you found yourself staring at the tracking board app on your phone just to feel connected to something familiar.

Sometimes you missed it so badly your chest physically hurt.

Jack practically moved into your hospital room by the third day.

Not officially, but everyone knew.

His hoodie stayed permanently draped across the back of the chair beside your bed. Empty coffee cups accumulated along the windowsill no matter how many times nurses threw them away. Half the overnight staff stopped questioning why Dr. Abbot somehow appeared in your room at two in the morning every single night.

Sometimes you woke up to find him asleep beside your bed, neck bent at an angle guaranteed to cause problems later, one hand still wrapped loosely around yours like he needed physical proof you were breathing. Other nights he didn't sleep at all.

You would wake sometime around three in the morning and find him sitting quietly in the darkness, laptop forgotten beside him, staring out the window with an expression that always made something uncomfortable twist inside your chest.

Whenever he noticed you awake, he smiled immediately.

Every single time.

The smile never quite reached his eyes.

That scared you more than you wanted to admit.

Because Jack had always been good at hiding things. Better than most people. Years of emergency medicine had taught him how to compartmentalize fear and grief and exhaustion until nobody could tell what was happening beneath the surface.

The fact that he wasn't hiding this meant it was bigger than either of you wanted to acknowledge.

You tried returning to work conversations by day six.

Jack shut that down immediately.

"I'm serious," you argued from the hospital bed while attempting to maneuver yourself upright one-handed. "I can do consults at least."

Jack looked up from the chair beside your bed with an expression so deeply unimpressed it almost offended you.

"You got strangled, fractured your jaw, dislocated your shoulder, cracked two ribs, and had a concussion severe enough to put you in the ICU for three days."

You frowned.

"When you say it like that, it sounds dramatic."

"It was dramatic."

"I’m just saying that it sounds worse when you list everything."

"Because the list is bad."

You opened your mouth to argue and immediately regretted it when pain shot sharply through your jaw.

Jack noticed, of course he noticed. He always noticed.

Without another word, he stood and crossed the room. By the time you managed to formulate a protest, he was already adjusting the pillows behind your back, carefully supporting your injured shoulder before helping you settle into a more comfortable position.

The movement was practiced now, almost natural.

Weeks ago you would have hated needing the help. Now you hated how grateful it made you feel.

"You are not stepping foot back into the ER until you're fully cleared," he said firmly. "And before you argue with me, Robby agrees."

"That's because Robby enjoys ruining my life."

"No," Jack answered flatly. "That's because Robby watched you almost die."

The words landed heavily between both of you.

"I did too, by the way."

Silence settled over the room immediately.

Jack's hands slowed against the blanket before becoming still altogether.

You felt your chest tighten.

Because there it was again. The thing neither of you had figured out how to talk about yet.

The attack wasn't over. Not really.

Neither of you talked about the nightmares much either, even though they started almost immediately after the ICU. Yours usually involved hands around your throat and the horrible realization that Leon did not recognize you anymore. Jack’s were quieter. You noticed them mostly because he stopped sleeping deeply afterward. Some nights you woke up and found him sitting awake at the edge of the bed staring at absolutely nothing while his prosthetic rested beside him on the floor.

Neither of you knew how to fix the other.

So instead you stayed close.

After discharge, recovery became its own strange routine. Orthopedic follow-ups. Neurology appointments. Speech therapy for the lingering jaw pain and throat damage. Physical therapy twice a week where a woman named Denise slowly taught your shoulder how to function properly again while you swore creatively enough to make her laugh almost every session.

And therapy.

Real therapy.

Therapy turned out to be harder than physical therapy.

At least with physical therapy there was a clear objective. Denise bent your shoulder until it hurt, assigned exercises you hated, and measured progress in degrees of motion and strength. There was a finish line somewhere. A point where the joint would function again, where the muscles would remember what they were supposed to do, where the pain would eventually become manageable.

Therapy with Dr. Feldman didn't work like that.

There were no measurements. No imaging results. No charts proving you were improving. Just a quiet office with soft lighting, a bookshelf full of psychology texts, and a woman who somehow managed to see directly through every defense mechanism you had spent years perfecting.

You hated her almost immediately.

Not because she was unkind. The problem was that she was patient.

The first appointment consisted mostly of you sitting rigidly in your chair with your arms crossed while answering questions with as few words as possible. You approached the entire thing the same way you approached difficult conversations with patients' family members in the emergency department: polite, cooperative, and emotionally unavailable.

Dr. Feldman noticed within fifteen minutes.

"How have you been sleeping?" she asked.

"Fine."

She looked down at her notes briefly before looking back up.

"You were hospitalized for nearly three weeks after a violent assault. Most people aren't sleeping fine."

You shrugged.

"I've had worse schedules during residency."

A small smile tugged at her mouth.

"That's not what I asked."

You hated that answer.

The second session wasn't much better. Every time she asked about your emotions, you redirected toward medicine. Every time she asked how something felt, you explained the physiology behind it instead. You could discuss post-traumatic stress responses, hypervigilance, sleep disruption, conditioned fear responses, and trauma recovery pathways in meticulous detail. You could explain exactly what was happening inside your brain.

What you couldn't do was admit how any of it actually affected you.

Halfway through the appointment, Dr. Feldman finally set her notebook aside.

"You keep describing trauma," she said.

"Because we're discussing trauma."

"No," she replied gently. "You're describing symptoms. You're explaining mechanisms. You're talking about yourself the same way you'd talk about a patient."

The observation irritated you immediately because it was true.

"I'm a doctor."

"I know."

"It's how I think."

Dr. Feldman smiled slightly. "I know that too."

For a moment, neither of you spoke. The room settled into a comfortable silence that immediately made you uncomfortable. Years in emergency medicine had trained you to fill silence quickly. Silence usually meant somebody was waiting for an answer, waiting for bad news, waiting for a conversation to become more painful than either person wanted it to be. Dr. Feldman, however, seemed perfectly content to sit inside it.

Eventually she leaned forward slightly in her chair.

"But you're not my doctor."

The words landed harder than they should have. You looked away immediately.

"You don't have to explain this to me clinically," she continued gently. "You don't have to convince me that you understand trauma. I already know you do."

A humorless laugh escaped you.

"That's easier."

Of course it was easier. Explaining symptoms was safer than feeling them. Discussing hypervigilance was safer than admitting you were afraid. Turning yourself into a case study allowed you to keep a comfortable distance between yourself and what had actually happened. If you could reduce the attack to diagnoses and recovery statistics and neurological responses, then maybe it felt less personal.

Dr. Feldman's expression softened.

"Of course it is."

Something about the kindness in her voice made your chest ache unexpectedly.

The sessions continued after that. Week after week, you showed up and slowly learned that recovery was a lot harder when someone refused to let you hide behind medical terminology. Sometimes you left feeling angry. Sometimes exhausted. Occasionally embarrassed by how much energy it took simply to sit in that office and answer questions honestly. There were appointments where you spent nearly the entire session arguing with her, and others where you spent the drive home replaying a single observation because it had landed uncomfortably close to something you weren't ready to examine.

The breakthrough happened during your fourth appointment, though neither of you recognized it immediately.

The conversation had shifted toward work, which should have felt safe. Work was familiar. Work was predictable. Work was the one area of your life where you still understood exactly who you were.

"Have you thought about going back?" Dr. Feldman asked.

"Obviously."

"You miss it."

The answer came instantly.

"Every day."

She nodded thoughtfully.

"What do you miss?"

You didn't even have to think about it.

"The pace. The people. The chaos. Being useful."

As soon as the words left your mouth, you realized how much truth was hiding inside them. You missed the noise of trauma activations. You missed residents interrupting each other during presentations. You missed arguing with consultants and complaining about impossible patient loads. You missed the organized insanity of the emergency department. You even missed things you used to hate.

Most of all, you missed feeling like yourself.

Dr. Feldman watched you quietly for a moment before asking, "And what worries you about going back?"

The question should have been simple.

Instead, something tightened immediately in your chest.

You looked down at your hands.

"I don't know."

Dr. Feldman didn't respond.

The silence stretched.

You hated that she knew exactly how effective silence was.

Eventually you sighed heavily and rubbed a hand across your face.

"I know what you're trying to ask."

"Then answer it."

The response almost made you laugh.

Almost.

Instead, you stared at the floor and tried not to think too hard about why your pulse had suddenly picked up. Images surfaced anyway. Hospital curtains closing. Empty treatment rooms. The sharp beep of a monitor. A patient moving unexpectedly. A hand reaching toward you.

Your stomach twisted.

And suddenly you understood exactly why you had spent weeks avoiding this conversation.

"Sometimes I think about being alone with a patient," you admitted quietly. "Sometimes I think about walking into an exam room and closing the curtain behind me, and immediately I start planning exits. I start calculating how quickly I could get out if something happened."

The confession felt awful. Humiliating, even.

You couldn't bring yourself to look at her.

Because suddenly this wasn't about trauma responses or coping mechanisms or anything clinical at all. It was about fear. Real fear. The kind you had spent years helping other people survive.

Your fingers tightened together in your lap.

"I'm afraid of being alone with patients."

The words hung heavily between you.

For years, you had been the person other people relied on when they were afraid. You were the doctor walking into emergencies, not the person avoiding them. The calm one. The capable one. The person who always seemed to know what to do when everyone else was panicking. Building a career in emergency medicine had required a certain level of confidence in your ability to function under pressure, and somewhere along the way that confidence had quietly become part of your identity.

Now the thought of being alone with a patient made your heart race.

The contradiction sat heavily inside your chest. It wasn't just fear that bothered you. It was what the fear seemed to say about you. Every time your pulse spiked walking into an exam room, every time you found yourself unconsciously identifying exits, some stubborn part of your brain interpreted it as weakness. You knew that wasn't fair. You would never judge a patient that harshly. You would never expect someone who had survived what you survived to simply get over it.

For some reason, you expected it from yourself anyway.

Dr. Feldman seemed to recognize that immediately.

"Why does that feel embarrassing?" she asked.

The question caught you off guard. You frowned slightly, searching for an answer that made sense.

"Because I know better."

"Know better than what?"

You gestured vaguely, frustration already building.

"Than this. Than being afraid all the time. Than having panic responses I can literally explain from a neurological perspective."

Dr. Feldman remained quiet for a moment before responding.

"You were strangled. You suffered a traumatic brain injury. You genuinely believed you might die."

The words settled heavily between you.

Hearing the facts presented that plainly made something uncomfortable twist inside your chest. You spent so much time viewing the attack through a clinical lens that it was easy to forget how terrifying it had actually been. In your own mind, the event had gradually become a collection of injuries and recovery milestones. Fractured jaw. Concussion. Shoulder dislocation. ICU admission. Physical therapy. Follow-up appointments.

Medical facts.

Medical facts were easier to live with than memories.

"And now you're judging yourself for being afraid," Dr. Feldman continued gently.

You looked away.

The worst part was that she was right.

When she phrased it that way, the cruelty of it became obvious. Not cruelty from anyone else. Not from your coworkers or Jack or your friends. Nobody in your life expected you to recover faster than you already were.

The pressure was entirely your own.

"I know the psychology behind trauma," you said quietly.

"I know."

"I know why my brain is reacting this way."

"I know."

The frustration finally surfaced.

"Then why does it still feel like this?" You rubbed a hand across your face, suddenly exhausted. "Why do I understand exactly what's happening and still feel like I'm losing my mind sometimes?"

For the first time since sitting down in her office, your voice wavered.

Not dramatically.

Just enough.

Enough that you heard it. Enough that she heard it.

Dr. Feldman didn't answer immediately. She let the question exist for a moment before speaking.

"Because understanding pain isn't the same thing as healing from it."

You stared down at your hands.

The answer should have been obvious, instead it felt devastating.

For months you had approached recovery the same way you approached every problem in medicine. Gather information. Understand the mechanism. Create a treatment plan. Follow the evidence. Somewhere deep down, part of you had believed that if you understood trauma well enough, you could control it.

As if knowledge could somehow exempt you from being human.

"You've spent years helping other people survive terrible things," Dr. Feldman said softly. "You've sat with grieving families. You've treated victims of violence. You've helped patients through experiences most people can't even imagine. But throughout all of those situations, you were standing beside the trauma."

Your throat tightened.

"This time, you were the one living through it."

The words landed harder than anything else she had said.

Suddenly you weren't sitting in a quiet office anymore.

You were back in Trauma Two, staring up at fluorescent lights while your lungs desperately searched for air. You remembered the growing certainty that something was terribly wrong. The helplessness. The fear. The horrifying realization that all of your training, all of your experience, and all of your medical knowledge couldn't change what was happening.

For the first time, you remembered the attack not as a physician but as the person who had survived it.

The memory hit hard enough that tears blurred your vision before you could stop them.

At first you felt embarrassed. Then tired. Then overwhelmingly sad.

Not only because of the attack itself, but because of everything that followed. The surgeries. The nightmares. The panic attacks. The months spent measuring your recovery against impossible expectations. The constant belief that you should somehow be handling all of this better because you were a doctor and doctors were supposed to understand these things.

Dr. Feldman didn't interrupt. She didn't hand you a tissue or rush to make you feel better. She simply sat there with you while the reality finally settled into place.

For months, you had been describing the attack the same way you described everything else in medicine—clinically, objectively, through symptoms and recovery timelines. You had translated the most frightening experience of your life into a language that felt safer, convincing yourself that understanding it might somehow make it easier to carry.

But trauma wasn't a chart.

It wasn't a diagnosis.

And it wasn't something you could analyze until it stopped hurting.

For the first time since waking up in the ICU, you stopped trying to explain it away. You stopped trying to justify your reactions or convince yourself that understanding the psychology behind trauma should somehow make you immune to it.

The truth was much simpler than that.

It hurt.

Doctors made terrible patients because knowing the science behind something did not magically stop it from hurting. Understanding trauma responses did not prevent nightmares. Being able to explain hypervigilance did not stop your pulse from spiking whenever somebody approached too quickly from behind. Knowing exactly which parts of your brain were responsible for fear and survival instincts did absolutely nothing when those same instincts decided a harmless moment was dangerous.

Some days were easier than others after that. Some mornings almost felt normal until a mirror, a monitor alarm, or an unexpected reminder dragged the memory back to the surface. The bad nights were harder, especially when nightmares left you gasping awake before reality had a chance to catch up.

On those nights, Jack would reach for you almost immediately, often before either of you fully opened your eyes. Somewhere along the way, he had learned the difference between you shifting in your sleep and you waking from a nightmare. He would pull you closer without a word, one hand settling against your back while both of you waited for your breathing to slow again.

Slowly, though almost painfully slowly, life began stitching itself back together around the damage. The nightmares became less frequent. The panic lasted minutes instead of hours. Physical therapy hurt a little less each week. Recovery never arrived all at once; it came in tiny pieces that were easy to miss until you looked back and realized how far you had come.

By the time nearly three months had passed, most of the visible evidence of the attack had finally faded. The bruising around your throat disappeared first, though sometimes you still caught yourself staring too long at your reflection, expecting to see fingerprints there anyway. Your jaw had mostly healed, leaving behind only occasional pain when you talked too much or forgot yourself and laughed too hard. Physical therapy slowly returned strength to your shoulder until Denise finally cleared you to stop glaring at resistance bands like they had personally offended you.

Physically, you were doing well.

Emotionally was harder to measure.

Because no amount of therapy fully prepared you for walking back into the emergency department for the first time.

The second the automatic hospital doors opened that morning, your body betrayed you instantly.

Your heartbeat spiked so suddenly it almost made you stop walking. Your chest tightened. Every sound felt too loud all at once. Ambulance radios crackled overhead somewhere down the hallway. Stretchers rattled across tile floors. Somebody laughed in the distance. A monitor alarm sounded briefly before being silenced.

The familiar chaos of the emergency department wrapped around you immediately.

For years, these sounds had meant comfort. Work. Purpose. Routine. The constant noise of ambulance radios, ringing phones, overhead pages, and monitor alarms had become so familiar that your brain barely registered them anymore. They were part of the rhythm of the place. Part of home.

Now, your body reacted differently.

Before your brain could catch up, every muscle had already tightened. Your chest felt too small. It was as though some deeply buried part of you had mistaken familiarity for danger.

You slowed without meaning to.

Jack noticed immediately.

His hand tightened around yours before you had even fully stopped walking.

"Hey."

The word was quiet and gentle. When you looked up, you found him watching you carefully. Not because he thought you were about to fall apart, and not because he was panicking. He was simply paying attention. Somewhere over the past few months, Jack had become remarkably good at noticing the things you tried not to show anyone else.

"You okay?"

The question wasn't casual.

You could hear the concern beneath it immediately. The concern had softened over the months, but it had never fully disappeared. Even now, Jack seemed capable of noticing the things you tried not to show anyone else long before you admitted them yourself.

You took a slow breath.

"Yeah."

Jack's eyebrow lifted immediately.

The look alone told you he didn't believe that answer for a second.

Despite yourself, a small laugh escaped.

"Okay," you admitted, exhaling heavily. "Maybe not completely."

"That's a more believable answer."

The corner of his mouth twitched slightly.

What struck you wasn't the teasing so much as the absence of everything else. There was no judgment in his voice, no frustration, and no expectation that you should somehow be over this by now. Months had passed since the attack, but Jack had never once acted as though recovery came with a deadline.

His fingers tightened around yours.

"You don't have to be okay immediately."

The words settled somewhere deep inside your chest because they felt less like reassurance and more like permission.

For months, you had been quietly frustrated with yourself for not recovering faster.

Jack never seemed to share that frustration.

Not once.

You looked at him for a moment before nodding.

This time, when you took a breath, it came a little easier.

And when the two of you started walking again, you realized you weren't quite as afraid as you had been thirty seconds earlier.

Jack stood beside you in black scrubs, one hand still wrapped around yours while the other adjusted the strap of his bag. He looked calmer than he had in weeks, but not entirely relaxed. Some part of him still carried the memory of what happened here, even if neither of you talked about it very often.

Without saying anything else, he squeezed your hand once more before guiding you further inside.

The emergency department looked exactly the same.

Monitors still beeped overhead. Residents still rushed through presentations too quickly. Dana was already arguing with somebody in radiology over the phone near the nurses' station. Santos appeared to be stealing crackers from somewhere while simultaneously talking over three different people.

Life had continued here without you.

Standing there again, that realization hit harder than you expected. After everything that had happened, some irrational part of you had expected the place to feel different. Instead, the department had done what it always did.

It kept going.

Then somebody noticed you.

The shift moved through the department almost immediately. Conversations slowed. Heads turned. Even Santos stopped talking for a full second, which honestly felt medically concerning on its own.

"There she is."

Dana's voice carried across the nurses' station before you could fully prepare yourself. Something about hearing it made your stomach tighten unexpectedly.

You smiled awkwardly.

"Hi."

The word came out far more nervous than you intended.

God.

You had handled mass casualty incidents with steadier composure than this.

Santos recovered first.

Before you could react, she was already crossing the department toward you. A second later, she wrapped you in a careful hug, avoiding your shoulder with surprising precision while somehow still managing to squeeze hard enough to make your eyes sting unexpectedly.

"You look significantly less dead."

A surprised laugh escaped you.

"Thank you."

"No, seriously."

She stepped back and looked you over carefully, her eyes moving across your face as if she were unconsciously searching for evidence that you were actually okay.

"I'm glad you're back," she said quietly. "It sucked here without you."

The words landed harder than you expected.

Because you knew Santos.

You knew how much effort it took for her to say something sincere without immediately burying it beneath sarcasm.

The department seemed quieter after that.

Not because anyone felt awkward.

Because everyone remembered.

Nobody talked about it anymore, but the memory still existed beneath the surface of the room. They remembered the safe word over the intercom. They remembered Jack sprinting toward Trauma Two. They remembered the shouting, the blood, the uncertainty afterward.

Standing there surrounded by familiar faces, you suddenly realized that while you had been recovering, they had been carrying pieces of that experience too.

Whitaker approached next looking deeply uncomfortable.

"We missed you."

The words came out almost too quickly.

Your throat tightened immediately.

Not because the statement was dramatic.

Because it was honest.

The emergency department had always been dysfunctional and chaotic and emotionally repressed in exactly the way trauma departments usually were. Nobody openly talked about how much they cared about each other. Instead, they brought extra coffee. Covered shifts. Saved each other the last decent muffin in the break room and made fun of one another relentlessly.

That was how affection worked here.

But they had missed you.

And standing there looking at people you had worked beside for years, a realization settled heavily into your chest.

For weeks after the attack, these people hadn't known whether you were going to survive.

While you were unconscious in the ICU, they had still shown up for work. They had still walked past Trauma Two. They had still waited.

Somehow, understanding that hurt more than you expected.

Your eyes burned suddenly.

Immediately, Jack's hand settled against the small of your back.

Grounding.

Steady.

A reminder that you weren't standing here alone.

"You okay?" he asked quietly.

Only you could hear him.

You nodded a little too quickly.

Jack's expression made it abundantly clear he wasn't fooled for a second.

Before he could say anything else, Robby appeared.

"Alright. Enough vulnerability before somebody bursts into flames."

A few people laughed immediately.

The tension eased.

Robby pointed directly at you.

"Half shifts for the next two weeks. No trauma rooms alone. No heroics. No staying late. No pretending you're invincible."

You blinked.

"Robby—"

"That wasn't a suggestion."

"It sounded vaguely suggestive."

"It wasn't."

You crossed your arms as much as your shoulder currently allowed.

"I'm sensing hostility."

"I'm sensing paperwork if you reinjure yourself."

Several nurses immediately nodded in agreement.

Traitors.

"And if I catch you overworking yourself, I'm personally calling your physical therapist."

You gasped dramatically.

"That feels threatening."

"It is threatening."

Despite yourself, you laughed.

A real laugh this time.

The sound felt rusty after months away, but hearing it surprised you almost as much as feeling it. For a second, the knot that had been sitting in your chest all morning loosened.

And when you glanced toward Jack, you caught the expression that crossed his face before he could hide it.

Relief.

The realization hit you then with surprising force.

This morning hadn't only terrified you.

It had terrified him too.

Because returning to the emergency department meant more than walking back into work. For you, it meant facing the place where your life had nearly ended. For Jack, it meant returning to the place where he had found you bleeding on the floor and thought, for one horrifying moment, that he was already too late.

Your eyes drifted instinctively down the hallway toward Trauma Two before you could stop yourself.

The curtain was open now. The room sat empty beneath fluorescent lights, looking exactly like every other trauma bay in the department.

But your body remembered anyway.

The back of your neck tightened. Your breathing faltered.

Jack noticed immediately.

Without saying anything, his hand found yours again. His fingers threaded through your own with quiet certainty, grounding you before the panic had a chance to grow into something larger.

This time when he squeezed your hand, you squeezed back.

Life slowly started feeling like yours again after that.

Not all at once. Healing never happened dramatically the way movies liked pretending it did. There was no singular moment where everything stopped hurting and the fear disappeared. Recovery arrived quietly instead, through ordinary moments that barely seemed important at the time.

The first time you walked through the hospital parking garage alone without your pulse skyrocketing. The first night you slept six uninterrupted hours. The first time Jack touched your throat absentmindedly while kissing you and your body didn't flinch before your brain caught up.

Those moments mattered more than any clean CT scan ever could.

The victories that mattered most were often the ones you barely noticed at first. One day you realized an ordinary hallway no longer made your shoulders tense. Another day you found yourself laughing without pain or hesitation. Eventually, you stopped thinking about every breath, every movement, every reminder of what had happened and simply existed again.

Your body slowly began feeling like home.

The bruises faded completely after a while. Physical therapy eventually became frustrating instead of humiliating, which Denise informed you was actually progress.

A few weeks later, she watched you complete an exercise without compensating for pain for the first time since surgery.

"There she is," Denise said immediately.

For the first time in a very long time, you believed her.

The nightmares faded too.

Not entirely at first.

Some nights still dragged you backward into Trauma Two with terrifying clarity. You would wake with your heart hammering against your ribs while panic clawed briefly through your chest before reality slowly settled back into place around you.

Those moments used to feel endless.

Eventually they became manageable.

Partly because Jack was always there.

Sometimes he woke before you did, reaching for you automatically the second your breathing changed beside him. Other nights he simply pulled you closer without either of you speaking, one hand moving slowly along your spine while your heartbeat gradually returned to normal.

Neither of you talked much during those moments because you didn't need to. There was something strangely intimate about surviving trauma beside somebody who understood exactly what silence meant.

No explanations.

No reassurances.

Just the quiet certainty that neither of you had to carry it alone.

The attack had changed both of you.

There was no pretending otherwise.

Then one afternoon, almost five months after the attack, Leon reached out.

You had been sitting on the couch answering work emails when the notification appeared. At first, you barely paid attention to it. Over the past few months your inbox had filled with department updates, physical therapy reminders, scheduling changes, and occasional messages from coworkers checking in on you. It looked no different than any of the others until your eyes landed on the sender's name.

Leon Carter.

The reaction was immediate.

Your stomach dropped hard enough that you physically sat back against the couch, staring at the screen while your brain struggled to process what you were seeing. The name itself looked strangely ordinary sitting there in your inbox, which somehow made it worse. Nothing about it suggested surgeries or ICU stays or months of recovery. Nothing about it suggested panic attacks or nightmares or the long process of learning how to feel safe again.

It was just a name.

But it was attached to one of the worst days of your life.

You didn't open the email right away. Instead, you found yourself staring at it while memories surfaced faster than you could organize them. You remembered the rain and the interstate. You remembered climbing into the ambulance and finding a frightened man who talked about his daughter and thanked you for helping him. You remembered the trust he had placed in you simply because you were a doctor and doctors were supposed to know what to do.

Then the memories shifted.

You remembered Trauma Two. The confusion in his eyes. The moment recognition disappeared and something went terribly wrong. You remembered fear. You remembered pain. You remembered waking up in the ICU days later with only fragments of the attack and everybody else's horror to fill in the gaps.

The problem was that none of those memories existed separately anymore.

When you thought about Leon, you thought about all of it at once.

The patient.

The victim.

The man who nearly died in a car accident.

The man who nearly killed you afterward.

For several long seconds, you simply sat there looking at the email while your pulse climbed higher and higher.

Across the apartment, Jack looked up from where he was working on his laptop at the dining table. He noticed the change in your expression immediately.

Five months later, he still seemed capable of reading your mood before you spoke a single word.

"What happened?"

The question sounded casual, but you could already hear the concern underneath it.

You swallowed, glanced back at the screen, and slowly turned the laptop toward him.

Jack's eyes moved across the screen, and the change in him was immediate.

His entire body stiffened before he'd even finished reading.

"No."

The answer came so quickly it startled you.

"Jack—"

"No."

His voice wasn't loud. If anything, that made it worse. Every muscle in his jaw tightened, and something flashed across his face so quickly it was difficult to identify. Anger, certainly. But fear too. Fear disguised as anger. The kind that had become familiar over the past few months whenever conversations drifted too close to what happened in Trauma Two.

"You do not owe him anything."

The words settled heavily between you.

You knew that.

Nobody expected you to answer. Nobody expected forgiveness. Nobody expected anything from you at all. The problem wasn't obligation. The problem was that part of you already wanted to know what Leon had said.

That night, long after dinner and after the apartment had settled into its usual quiet rhythm, you finally opened the email. Jack didn't try to stop you. He simply sat beside you on the couch while you read.

The message wasn't long.

What struck you first was what it didn't contain. There were no excuses. No attempts to justify what happened. No requests for forgiveness. Leon explained that pieces of the attack had only recently been explained to him fully after months of neurology appointments and psychological rehabilitation. He remembered the accident. He remembered the rain and the ambulance ride. He remembered talking to you and trusting you to help him.

After that, there was nothing.

The seizure had fractured his memory completely.

The next thing he remembered was waking up days later and learning that he had violently assaulted the doctor who stopped on the interstate to save his life.

You felt your throat tighten as you continued reading.

Leon wrote that he was horrified by what happened. He wrote that he understood if you never wanted to hear from him again. He wrote that he thought about you every day and hoped you were healing. He explained that he was finally receiving treatment for both the neurological aftermath of the seizure and the psychological trauma surrounding the accident itself.

At the very end, there was a simple apology.

And somehow that made it harder.

By the time you reached the last line, several minutes had passed. The apartment felt unusually quiet around you. When you finally looked up, Jack was watching carefully from the other end of the couch. He wasn't pushing for an answer or trying to influence your reaction. He was simply waiting.

"What are you thinking?"

You looked back down at the screen.

For a moment, you weren't entirely sure yourself.

"I think he's telling the truth."

Jack's gaze dropped immediately. You could practically see the conflict moving across his face.

"He almost killed you."

The words came out rougher than he intended.

You shifted closer until your knee brushed his.

"I know."

Jack looked toward the apartment windows instead. The city lights reflected faintly against the glass while silence settled between both of you.

Eventually, Jack let out a quiet laugh and rubbed a hand across his face. There wasn't any humor in the sound. If anything, he looked exhausted. The kind of exhausted that had nothing to do with sleep and everything to do with carrying something for too long.

"You know what the worst part is?"

Your chest tightened immediately.

"What?"

For a moment, he didn't answer. He just stared out toward the apartment windows.

"I know it wasn't his fault," he said finally. "I know what postictal aggression is. I know what brain injuries do to people. I know he wasn't himself."

His jaw tightened as he spoke, and you could see the conflict written all over his face. Jack understood the medicine. He understood the neurology. He understood all the reasons why what happened wasn't really Leon's fault.

But understanding something and making peace with it were two very different things.

"I know all of that," he continued quietly. "But every time I hear his name, I still see you on that floor."

The honesty of it hit harder than you expected because there was no anger behind it. No blame. No attempt to argue with the facts. It was simply the truth.

You reached for his hand immediately.

His fingers closed around yours before you had fully touched him, as though some part of him still needed the reassurance. As though, despite the months that had passed, there were moments when his body still remembered the terror of almost losing you.

"He didn't remember hurting me," you said softly.

Jack nodded.

"I know."

"He wasn't trying to hurt me."

"I know."

His thumb moved slowly across your knuckles before his gaze dropped toward your joined hands.

"That doesn't make it hurt less."

Your eyes burned unexpectedly.

"No," you admitted. "It doesn't."

Silence settled between the two of you after that, not uncomfortable but heavy with the kind of truth neither of you could argue with. Leon had been a victim. You had been a victim too. One reality didn't erase the other, and accepting that was probably the hardest part of all.

Eventually, you answered the email.

Not because you were completely healed, and not because you had somehow stopped being afraid. There were still days when memories surfaced unexpectedly and moments when certain sounds made your pulse spike before your brain could catch up. There were still shifts where you caught yourself avoiding Trauma Two without consciously realizing it. Healing had never been linear, no matter how badly you wanted it to be.

But you also understood neurological trauma. You understood how quickly a person could stop being themselves inside catastrophic moments. More importantly, you understood what it felt like to wake up after trauma wishing desperately that something terrible had never happened.

So you accepted his apology.

Much to Jack's absolute dismay.

"You're too forgiving," he complained several days later while the two of you carried groceries up three flights of stairs.

You snorted.

"Says the emergency physician."

"That's different."

"It literally isn't."

"It is when it's you."

The answer arrived so quickly that it stole the rest of your argument.

Jack stopped halfway up the stairs, grocery bags hanging forgotten at his sides. For a moment he simply looked at you, and suddenly you could see all of it again: the fear, the exhaustion, the months he had spent pretending he was coping better than he actually was.

"You almost died."

His voice wasn't loud. It didn't need to be.

The quiet certainty in it somehow made the words hit even harder.

"I don't think you understand what that did to me."

Emotion caught painfully in your throat before you could answer.

Because maybe, for the first time, you finally did understand.

Five months ago, you probably wouldn't have. A year ago, you might have called his fear irrational. Doctors saw trauma every day. People got hurt. People healed. Life moved on. That was the unspoken agreement everyone in emergency medicine made with themselves in order to keep functioning. If you stopped to consider how fragile everything really was, if you allowed yourself to think too hard about all the ways an ordinary day could become a catastrophe, you would never be able to walk back into work.

So you learned to accept uncertainty without dwelling on it. You learned to tell yourself that terrible things happened to other people.

Then it happened to you.

The attack forced you to confront something years of emergency medicine had never fully taught you. None of it was guaranteed. Not the next shift. Not next year. Not even the next ordinary Tuesday that began like every other day and ended with your entire life divided into a before and after.

Standing there on the staircase, looking at Jack, you finally understood what he had been carrying all those months. It wasn't just the memory of the attack. It was the memory of almost losing you. The memory of walking into Trauma Two and finding the person he loved lying on the floor. The memory of not knowing whether you were going to survive.

You stepped closer until the grocery bags bumped awkwardly against both of your legs and wrapped your arms around him.

Jack held on immediately.

Not desperately. Just instinctively.

Like he always did now. Like some small part of him still needed the reassurance that you were really there, standing in front of him, alive and breathing and stubborn enough to argue with him about everything.

For the first time since the attack, you didn't just recognize that instinct.

You understood it.

And somehow that realization hurt almost as much as it healed.

After a while, life settled again anyway.

Not because everything was suddenly fixed. Not because the memories disappeared or because the attack stopped being part of your story. Life simply did what it always did. It kept moving forward. Shifts accumulated. Seasons changed. New patients arrived. New crises demanded attention. The world refused to remain frozen around a single terrible day, no matter how much that day had changed the people who survived it.

Eventually, you returned to full shifts.

The first one felt impossible.

You remembered standing in the locker room beforehand staring at your reflection for longer than necessary, scrubs folded over one arm while anxiety twisted quietly beneath your ribs. Part of you had been convinced something would go wrong the moment you stepped back into the rhythm of a normal day. That you would panic. Freeze. Forget how to be yourself.

Instead, the shift began.

Then another patient arrived.

Then another.

Hours passed.

You assessed injuries. Ordered imaging. Argued with consultants. Drank coffee that had been sitting out too long. Somewhere around the middle of the afternoon, you realized you had gone nearly three hours without thinking about the attack at all.

The realization almost made you stop walking.

Because for the first time, the emergency department felt like work again instead of a place haunted by memory.

It wasn't immediate after that. There were still difficult moments. Days where entering certain rooms made your stomach tighten unexpectedly. Cases that lingered a little too long beneath your skin. But gradually, almost invisibly, the fear loosened its grip.

You stopped hesitating before entering trauma bays. Your hands stopped shaking after violent cases. The emergency department slowly became home again instead of the place where something terrible happened to you.

And through all of it, Jack remained exactly where he had always been.

Beside you.

Some nights after difficult shifts, the two of you still sat together in the parking garage for a few extra minutes before driving home. Neither of you usually spoke much during those moments. You simply sat in comfortable silence while the adrenaline of the shift slowly drained away.

Sometimes Jack still reached for your hand automatically in crowded hallways. Sometimes you caught him scanning rooms without realizing he was doing it. Occasionally you would glance across a trauma bay and find him already looking at you.

The expression never changed.

It wasn't worry anymore.

Not entirely.

It was something softer.

Something that looked suspiciously like gratitude.

Like some part of him remained quietly amazed every single day that you were still alive to look back at him at all.

One night, after an especially exhausting shift, the two of you found yourselves briefly alone at the nurses' station while the rest of the department dealt with varying levels of chaos farther down the hallway.

Jack was finishing a chart.

You were pretending to finish one.

Neither of you had enough remaining brain cells to be particularly successful.

Without looking up from the computer screen, Jack reached over and laced his fingers through yours beneath the desk. The movement was so absentminded that he probably didn't even realize he'd done it. You looked down at your joined hands and felt something settle quietly in your chest.

There was nothing remarkable about the gesture anymore. That was what made it matter.

Over the past year, that hand had reached for yours so many times that you had stopped noticing most of them. It had found yours in hospital rooms when you woke up disoriented and hurting. It had found yours in therapy office parking lots when neither of you really wanted to talk about what had been discussed inside. It had found yours in the middle of nightmares, in crowded hallways, during difficult shifts, and in countless ordinary moments that would never make it into any dramatic retelling of your recovery.

When you thought back to everything that had happened—the surgeries, the panic attacks, the nightmares, the endless appointments, and the exhausting process of slowly rebuilding yourself from the inside out—one truth remained painfully clear.

You would not have survived any of it without Jack.

Not because he fixed it. Nobody could have done that. He hadn't magically erased the pain or made the recovery easier than it was. The nightmares still happened. The fear still existed. The damage had still been real.

What Jack had done was stay.

Every time recovery became ugly or frustrating or unbearably difficult, he stayed. Every time you pushed people away, convinced yourself you were fine, or became angry at your own limitations, he stayed. He sat beside hospital beds and physical therapy offices and bad days without ever demanding that you become easier to love.

Sometimes, during the quietest parts of overnight shifts, you still found yourself thinking about the version of yourself that had existed before all of this happened. The woman standing beside a wrecked car on an interstate in the pouring rain. The woman who ran toward emergencies without hesitation. The woman who believed understanding trauma and surviving trauma were basically the same thing.

You missed her sometimes.

More than you usually admitted.

There were days when you missed how uncomplicated she had been. How certain. How convinced of her own resilience.

But not as much as you expected to.

Because surviving had changed you. Not dramatically. The changes had happened quietly instead, carving themselves into habits and instincts before you ever noticed them. They lived in the way your body still stiffened slightly at raised voices, in the way Jack checked your breathing in his sleep without realizing he was doing it, and in the way both of you had learned that silence could mean comfort instead of distance.

There were still difficult moments. Violent patients occasionally made your pulse spike before your brain could remind you that you were safe. Cold Pittsburgh mornings sometimes left your shoulder aching where scar tissue still lingered. There were nights when Jack woke from dreams he never fully explained and reached for you before he was even awake enough to realize what he was doing.

But there were good days now too.

Real ones.

Days where laughter came easily again and the emergency department felt like home instead of a crime scene. Days where you caught yourself standing inside Trauma Two without remembering to be afraid first. Days where entire hours passed without thinking about the attack at all.

Healing had happened quietly. Not through dramatic breakthroughs or grand victories, but through ordinary moments accumulating so gradually that one day you looked back and realized your life belonged to you again.

And maybe that was why you loved Jack so much in the end.

It wasn't because he had saved you, although in a lot of ways he probably had. It wasn't even because he stayed when things became painful and complicated, though that mattered too. You loved him because he never once asked you to heal faster for his comfort. He never treated your recovery like an inconvenience or your fear like something that needed to be fixed. He simply sat beside you through every ugly part of it with the same stubborn steadiness, loving you exactly as you were while you figured out how to become yourself again.

One night near the end of your shift, long after life had started feeling normal again, the two of you found yourselves standing outside the hospital watching snow drift softly across the parking lot.

Jack stood close enough that his shoulder brushed yours through both of your jackets.

For a while, neither of you said anything.

The air smelled like snow and cold pavement, and you simply stood together watching flakes drift through the glow of the parking lot lights. It was an ordinary moment. So ordinary, in fact, that a year ago you probably wouldn't have remembered it.

Now it felt important.

Without looking away from the snowfall, Jack reached for your hand automatically. The gesture was so familiar that neither of you really thought about it anymore. You simply threaded your fingers through his and felt his grip tighten instinctively around yours.

Somewhere along the way, that had become home.

Standing there beneath fluorescent lights with your hand wrapped safely inside his, you found yourself thinking about everything that had happened over the past year. The attack had changed your life. It had left scars, taken things from you, and forced both of you to rebuild parts of yourselves you never expected to lose.

But it hadn't taken everything.

Because when the fear finally stopped feeling so sharp and the dust settled enough for you to see clearly again, one truth remained.

The worst thing that had ever happened to you had also shown you exactly who would stay when everything else fell apart.

And somehow, standing beside Jack in the falling snow, that knowledge felt stronger than the fear ever had.

Thinking many thoughts about this little clip and just how rabbot coded it is.

Maybe even, and walk with me here, boyfriends dads rabbot.

Maybe you’re staying with your boyfriend for a little while over summer break. Maybe some of those days said boyfriend still has tennis or perhaps soccer training meaning he's out for the majority of the morning/early afternoon.

And on those days, the only people still home just so happens to be his two hot, older dads.

You get along, always have since you first met the pair, but that doesn't quell the fuzzy feeling in your gut whenever they interact with you.

The pair find it endearing really, the way you'll slip sometimes, calling them Mr Abbot and Mr Robinavitch instead of Jack and Robby (or Micheal if you'd prefer it). You struggle to keep eye contact with them too, even more so when you trip your words up when responding to questions about yourself. Your degree, your hobbies, what you enjoy to eat, hell, they'll even how your relationship is going with their boy- they're just interested thats all!

But the thing that gets both Jack and Robby chubbing up in their pants like perverted old bastards the most?

How you've spent your time bouncing around the Robinavitch-Abbot household in what must be the skimpest of summer clothes. That bikini that barely covers your tits as you soak up the sun in their garden, or the denim shorts that hardly hides the line of your panties as you sit on the couch reading.

Theres guilt, of course there is, the pair of them perving over their sons girlfriend. But not nearly enough to make them stop thinking about you in ways they shouldn't be. Like how wet you get when worked up or how beautiful your body must be truly bare.

Robby always thinks your lips would look stretched around the girth of them, while Jack ponders the perfect whines you'd let free as you cum.

Its after a long day of sunbathing does everything finally come to a head though

Your skin glistens with a mix of sunscreen and sweat, heart thudding in your chest from the heat. You're boyfriends gone again, has been all day, leaving you, Jack and Robby at home soaking in the summer sun in the backyard.

At lunch you learnt Jack knows a thing or two about making cocktails, by almost dinner you're pretty confident he's got a mean pour.

The world floats by as you lounge on a chair, watching Robby stood by the grill cooking steaks with his own sweating beer. The glass on the table next to you half full, your.. Fourth? Maybe third? Fruity Margarita abandoned as you giggle about something that feels funnier than it is.

Thats the last thing you properly remember- the gruff laughter, the sundrunk haze, Jack and Robby drinking, grilling and hosting like regular older men.

When your eyes blink open again (did you shut them on purpose or did they flutter without you knowing?) the scene is vastly different.

Grey curls sit messily between your plush thighs, hazel eyes peering up lustblown and dark. It hits you then, the intense pleasure of a skilled mouth lapping and lavishing your pussy.

Its hot, wet, perfect and utterly wrong all in one, legs desperate to close around the older mans ears to little avail. Jacks big hands hold you open though, palms flat on your inner thighs, panties of your bathing suit crooked to the side and held steady by two thick fingers.

Your back arches from the lounger, a ragged, breathless gasp ripping from your heaving chest. "O-oh my god!"

The tongue flicks playfully against your clit, before plump lips suckle lewdly, a voice you recognize as Robbys chucking as he sits crouched beside you. "Mm, not quite sweetheart. You wanna that try again?"

The moan breaks with your voice, a hand flying down to those mused salt and pepper curls, tangling tight. "J-jack oh f-fuckk"

"Yeahhh, There you go" he grins wolfish, "s' he makin you feel good kid?"

The nod is jerky, the response even more so. Your hips bump up despite Jack's grip, brain unsure if to run or relish in the overwhelming feeling between your legs; at how fuckig wrong it is to let it continue. "M-mphm y-yeah"

Jack offers some reprive just a moment, unlatching his mouth for just a moment to gravel out "Got you squirmin like no ones done this before, s' our boy holdin out on you honey?"

The question only serves as a reminder these men are your boyfriends fathers, men decades older than you and him. Its wrong, sick, absolutely fucking vile to do to the man you love.. But fuck, his dads devouring you like your sloppy, slick pussy is the only thing left on earth to sustain him. Hes licking you with experience that only comes from enjoyment, suckling like every gasp and whine gives him air.

But in this moment, your hot. Hazy. Utterly drunk of bliss. So you mewl out the truth, jerking your hips to hump at Jack's face like the pleasures the only thing that will keep you alive. "M-mhm.. Says he.. He doesnt like it- fucking shit- that s' not enjoyable-"

"Doesn't like eatin this pretty pussy up, Christ, where'd we go wrong mi- mphmn" Jack murmers incredulous again your folds, stubble rubbing a heavenly kind of pain on your most intimate of areas, fumed point cut off by Robby reaching over a hand that pushes his partner back into your pussy so tight its a wonder he's able to breathe.

"Shhh jack, jus' keep goin. Shes gettin close huh honey?" Robby grins, hand sliding beneath the cups of your bikini top. Your nipples pert and tight as his calloused thumb offers a delightful friction. "Sides, we've gotta correct that bullshit ourselves hm, apologize to that sweet little pussy for everything she's been missin"

Your head is thrown back, hair mused against the chair, your body quivering as the bliss only draws tighter in your gut. Your eyes struggle to stay open between the now setting sun and the onslaught of pleasure. Those plush, still glistening thighs tremble against Jack's touch, one of his hands sliping down to press one, then two, thick digits inside.

You can feel the cool edge of his wedding band bump your hole with each slickened drive, every curl managing to rub at your g spot in a way that only pushes you closer to crumbling.

Then, as quick as Jack's mouth had appeared at your pussy, another sensation has your spine arching almost painfully. Robbys somehow pushed the cup of your top to the side, mouth hot on your skin, his own tongue flicking and teasing at your nipple. His peppered beard making you shake as it rubs your skin with every move he makes.

Its that combo that sends you over the edge with a wail of their names so perfect their chubbed up cocks throb and leak inside the confines of shorts now way too tight. It takes your breath away near violently, the orgasm hitting you so hard you're almost convinced you'll never come back down.

They both keep it up until tears slip down your cheeks, until you're pushing them off and your body is overwhelmingly sensitive. Blood thunders in your ears, hazing over the praise the pair murmer to you.

Jack rises with a groan, shuffling himself forward to meet your mouth in a messy, filthy kiss. You can taste yourself on his tongue, feel the dampness on his stubble, letting yourself drown in the dopamine a moment longer before you know you'll have to address everything that's just happened..

That is, until hot breath fans over your twitching clit the same but different, you're eyes wide as you dart between Robby who you didn't even realise had moved and Jack.

Robby grins wolfish again, shuffled between your shaking thighs, a large hand pressing on your still heaving belly. Your eyes must look like saucers, lips pouty and bitten raw, peering down with the most doe- like expression.

"Nawh whats that look for?" he coos, pitiful and mocking, inhaling the sweet, musky scent of you in a way that makes your insided lurch. "S'it too much t' take sweetheart? Two old men wantin to lick your sweet pussy?"

"mhm.." you mewl, hand reaching blindly for the loungers edge- for Jack and some semblance of safety. "R-robby please..cant.."

The chuckle is mean, a rumble you feel in the deepest parts of you, hips shifting preemptively to little avail. Robbys gaze drops, as does his wiry haired jaw, his sentiment cut between a broken moan and the envelopement of your puffy clit into the cavern of his mouth.

At first you assumed construction or flooding because of the weather, but then smoke curled upward through the rain and your stomach dropped immediately.

Cars sat mangled across three lanes of traffic at impossible angles. One SUV had spun into the median while another sedan looked almost folded around the back of a delivery truck, its front end crushed so badly it barely resembled a vehicle anymore. Hazard lights blinked weakly through the storm while people stumbled across the interstate in shock.

Your body moved before your brain fully caught up.

“Oh my God.”

You were already unbuckling your seatbelt before the car completely stopped.

Adrenaline sliced straight through your exhaustion hard enough to make your hands shake as you reached for the trauma bag in the passenger seat. Rain hit you instantly the second you shoved the door open, cold water soaking through your clothes within seconds while distant screaming echoed somewhere through the storm.

Someone yelled that a driver was trapped.

Another voice screamed for a medic.

A woman near the shoulder sobbed hard enough she could barely breathe, blood running down the side of her forehead while a man beside her stood completely frozen, staring blankly at the wreckage like his brain had stopped processing reality altogether.

You were already running.

“I’m a doctor,” you shouted over the rain. “Move back and give me some room.”

People listened immediately.

The trapped driver looked somewhere in his forties, pinned awkwardly behind the wheel of the crushed sedan. Blood streamed from a scalp laceration down the side of his face while the airbags hung deflated around him. His breathing came too fast beneath the sound of rain hammering against twisted metal, panic beginning to sharpen around the edges of every inhale.

You crouched carefully beside the shattered driver’s side window, ignoring the glass biting through your scrub pants into your knees.

“Hey,” you said, forcing calmness into your voice despite the adrenaline roaring through your chest. “Can you hear me?”

The man blinked slowly toward you, dazed. “Think so.”

“Good. That’s good.” You adjusted the flashlight between your fingers while quickly checking his pupils. “What’s your name?”

“Leon.”

“Okay, Leon. I’m Dr. Y/L/N.” Your voice stayed steady automatically, years of emergency medicine taking over before panic had a chance to settle in. “Don’t move your neck for me, alright?”

A shaky breath of laughter escaped him. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

Despite everything, you smiled a little.

“You’re doing great,” you assured him quietly. “Stay with me.”

And he did.

His eyes kept finding yours every few seconds like you were the only stable thing left in the middle of the chaos.

Your hands moved automatically after that.

Pressure against the head wound. Monitoring responsiveness. Keeping him conscious and talking while you assessed what you could from outside the vehicle. Rainwater mixed with blood beneath your fingers while traffic backed up for what looked like miles behind you, headlights glowing dimly through the storm.

Leon kept looking at you every few seconds like you were the only stable thing left in the middle of the chaos.

“You work at the PTMC?” he asked weakly after spotting the hospital logo embroidered onto your soaked jacket.

“Unfortunately.”

That got a real laugh out of him, brief and pained but enough that relief loosened slightly in your chest.

“You always this calm when you see a car crash?”

You let out a tired breath through your nose. “No. I’m panicking beautifully internally.”

That made him laugh again.

Patients relaxed faster once they laughed. It was something you learned early in residency, fear loosened the second people felt human again instead of helpless.

So you stayed with him.

Even after the paramedics arrived.

Even after they started finishing the extrication, peeling back what remained of the driver’s side door while rain poured endlessly over the wreckage.

You stayed crouched beside him talking him through every step because shock was already creeping in around the edges of his expression, and every time panic threatened to overwhelm him again, his eyes found yours immediately.

“You’re okay,” you kept saying quietly. “Stay with me. You’re okay.”

The interstate blurred around you in streaks of red brake lights and flashing hazards. Rain soaked through your jacket and scrubs completely now, damp fabric clinging uncomfortably to your skin while your hair stuck to the back of your neck. The adrenaline that had carried you through the crash scene was already fading, leaving behind an exhaustion so heavy it felt physical.

An EMT looked up from the stretcher and did a double take.

“Dr. Y/L/N?”

You snapped back into focus automatically.

“Male, approximately forty-two. Restrained driver. Brief LOC reported by witnesses. GCS fifteen currently. Complaining of left-sided rib pain. Possible concussion. Neuro status intact for now, but keep an eye on him.”

The EMT nodded once while adjusting the cervical collar. “Got it.”

They moved quickly after that, securing straps, checking vitals, loading equipment through the rain while Leon tracked every movement with the wide-eyed focus of someone trying very hard not to think too much about what had almost happened.

Your knees ached from kneeling on broken glass. Your hands had started trembling slightly now that nobody urgently needed anything from you anymore.

But you stayed beside him anyway.

Leon caught your wrist weakly just before the paramedics closed the ambulance doors.

“Hey.”

You looked up immediately.

His face looked pale beneath the blood and rainwater, eyes glassy with pain and adrenaline, but there was something steadier there too.

Gratitude maybe.

“Thank you for taking care of me.”

The words landed somewhere deeper than they should have.

You swallowed hard before giving his hand one quick squeeze.

“Yeah,” you said softly. “Of course.”

For a second, you just stood there breathing.

The interstate still smelled like gasoline and smoke. Somewhere farther down the road another paramedic shouted instructions while tow trucks crawled through the rain toward the wreckage. Traffic in the opposite lanes slowed almost to a stop as people stared through fogged windows at what was left of the crash.

“You riding in with us?” one of the EMTs asked.

You glanced once toward your abandoned car still trapped in unmoving traffic nearly half a mile behind the accident scene. The thought of trying to get back to it right now felt impossible.

“Yeah,” you answered tiredly.

The ambulance doors shut behind you a second later, sealing you inside with the sharp smell of antiseptic, wet clothing, and adrenaline.

Leon talked for almost the entire ride to the hospital.

Nervous talking.

The kind trauma patients did when they were scared enough to fill every silence because silence meant thinking too hard about how close they came to dying. You’d seen it hundreds of times before. Some people cried. Some got angry. Some went terrifyingly quiet.

Leon talked.

So you let him.

He rambled about his job, about his daughter’s soccer game this weekend, about how his wife was going to kill him for wrecking the car because they still hadn’t finished paying it off. Every few sentences his voice shook slightly before he forced another joke out anyway.

You stayed beside him the whole ride, monitoring pupils and vitals while keeping him talking just enough to assess mental status without making it obvious you were doing it.

“You always pick up patients on the highway on your day off?” he asked weakly at one point.

You let out a tired breath of laughter. “Only the lucky ones.”

That earned another shaky smile from him.

The ambulance doors burst open, paramedics already rolling the stretcher down the bay entrance while rainwater dripped steadily from the wheels onto the floor.

By the time the ambulance rolled through the bay doors at The Pitt, you were freezing hard enough your teeth almost hurt. Your scrubs were soaked completely through, your shoes squelching against the floor while trauma staff moved around you in organized chaos.

“Look what the cat dragged in,” Santos called across the ER the second she spotted you climbing out of the ambulance bay. “Always a pleasure seeing you this early, Iron Woman.”

You groaned immediately.

You earned the nickname after accidentally mistaking a patient for Robert Downey Jr. during a twenty-hour shift.

To be fair, the goatee had been identical.

“Dana,” you called immediately, falling into step beside the stretcher. “What’s open?”

Dana barely looked up from the nurses’ station. “Trauma Two’s clear.”

“Perfect.” You pushed damp hair back from your face before glancing toward the department. “Whitaker, Javadi, you’re with me. Perlah, can you help set up Two?”

Perlah nodded immediately and disappeared ahead of the group while Whitaker grabbed gloves from the wall dispenser on his way past.

“You look cold,” Whitaker informed you conversationally.

“Thank you,” you replied flatly.

Javadi appeared beside the stretcher while all of you pushed through the trauma bay doors together. “What happened?”

“Restrained driver, approximately forty-two,” you answered automatically. “High-speed MVA during the storm. Brief LOC reported by witnesses. GCS fifteen on arrival, complaining of left-sided rib pain and worsening headache. Possible concussion.”

“Vitals stable en route,” one of the paramedics added while helping transfer Leon onto the trauma bed.

Whitaker immediately started attaching monitors while Javadi pulled supplies from cabinets with the frantic efficiency of someone still trying very hard to look calmer than she actually felt.

Then Jack looked up from the computer station.

And somehow, in the middle of the packed emergency department, everything softened slightly around the edges.

You caught the exact moment recognition crossed his face. The exhaustion behind his eyes shifted immediately into concern as his gaze moved slowly over you. Soaked scrubs, blood smeared across your gloves, rainwater dripping steadily from your hair onto the floor beneath you.

Jack crossed the trauma bay almost immediately.

“You okay?” he asked quietly. “What happened? I thought you went home.”

His voice grounded you in a way almost nothing else could anymore.

Maybe it was because he always sounded calm even during chaos. Maybe it was because after years together your body recognized him before your brain consciously caught up. Or maybe it was simply that exhaustion hit harder the second somebody else arrived to help carry it.

“I’m fine,” you answered automatically while stripping off your soaked gloves and replacing them with clean ones. “Probably need a head CT.”

Jack’s expression tightened instantly.

“For you?”

You blinked at him before realizing what you’d said. “What? No. For the patient.”

Behind you, Perlah had already started cutting away Leon’s soaked shirt while Whitaker attached cardiac leads to his chest.

“BP’s holding,” Whitaker called.

“Sinus tach at one-ten,” Javadi added while checking another monitor. “Probably pain and adrenaline.”

“Good,” you answered automatically before stepping back beside the bed.

“Where’s Robby?”

“Overdose in Four,” Dana answered from the doorway.

You nodded once and reached for your penlight again, checking Leon’s pupils carefully while rain continued tapping faintly against the ambulance bay doors behind you.

Santos wandered into Trauma Two looking personally offended. “Why does huckleberry and crash get invited? I can help.”

“You can stand there and look pretty while actual doctors save lives,” you shot back immediately.

Santos gasped dramatically. “Dr. Abbot, your girlfriend is bullying me again.”

“She bullies everybody,” Jack muttered.

But there was no heat behind it.

His eyes lingered on you a second too long.

You knew that look by now.

Jack had spent years in emergency medicine learning how to bury concern beneath sarcasm and exhaustion, but you still caught it every time. He noticed the dark circles under your eyes. The slight tremor beginning in your hands now that the adrenaline was wearing off. The way your shoulders sagged whenever you thought nobody was looking.

“You’re freezing,” he said quietly.

“You are correct. I am freezing.”

Without another word, Jack pulled his hoodie off the back of the nurses’ station chair and draped it carefully around your shoulders before you could protest. It was still warm from him, smelling faintly like coffee, antiseptic, and the cologne he only remembered to wear maybe twice a month.

Something in your chest tightened stupidly at the gesture.

Behind him, Santos gagged theatrically. “Oh my God. Romance in the trauma bay. I’m going to throw up.”

“Go chart something,” Jack said flatly.

Whitaker looked up from the monitor leads. “Actually, I think it's very sweet."

“You’re all miserable,” you informed them while pulling the hoodie tighter around yourself.

“No,” Javadi corrected while checking Leon’s blood pressure. “You two are just aggressively in love in public.”

Jack looked genuinely offended. “Aggressively? I don't get it."

Despite yourself, you laughed softly while stepping back toward Leon’s bedside.

Leon noticed the interaction immediately.

“That your boyfriend?” he asked weakly from the trauma bed.

“Husband to the emergency department,” you corrected while snapping fresh gloves on. “Boyfriend in real life.”

Jack rolled his eyes while typing orders into the computer. “Don’t encourage her, Leon.”

Leon grinned despite the pain. “You guys are disgustingly cute.”

Under the brighter trauma lights, bruising had already started blooming dark purple across his ribs beneath the rain-soaked skin.

“Headache worse?” you asked while checking his pupils again.

“A little.”

“You nauseous?”

“Not yet.”

“Good,” you answered. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Javadi palpated carefully along his left side while Whitaker adjusted the blood pressure cuff.

“There’s something strangely comforting about you people,” Leon admitted weakly after a moment.

“You say that now,” Javadi muttered.

That earned another tired laugh from him before he winced sharply afterward.

“There it is,” you said softly. “Still joking. Good sign, buddy.”

There was something oddly comforting about patients who stayed conversational. After years in emergency medicine, you learned to appreciate moments where humanity still existed between procedures and bloodwork and trauma assessments.

Sometimes those tiny conversations mattered almost as much as the medicine itself.

Jack stepped beside you while reviewing Leon’s vitals, his shoulder brushing yours briefly in the cramped trauma bay. The room smelled faintly of antiseptic, damp fabric, and rainwater now that Leon’s soaked clothing had finally been cut away.

“You should change,” Jack murmured quietly while adjusting one of the monitor leads. “I got this, baby.”

You barely glanced at him, still focused on the chart. “Don’t worry. I’ll survive.”

A tired look crossed his face immediately.

“That’s usually what people say right before passing out.”

You shot him a look over your shoulder, though exhaustion dulled most of the energy behind it. “You’re dramatic.”

“You’ve been awake how long now?”

“Eighteen hours.”

Jack stared at you flatly. “That’s not comforting.”

“You stopped at a major accident scene after an eighteen-hour shift?” Javadi asked incredulously.

You shrugged slightly.

And that alone made Jack’s jaw tighten, because that was exactly the kind of thing you always did.

The adrenaline carrying you through the crash scene had almost completely faded now, leaving behind exhaustion so heavy it felt physical. Your wet clothes clung coldly to your skin beneath Jack’s hoodie while every muscle in your body ached now that the immediate crisis had passed.

Jack exhaled softly through his nose before lowering his voice.

“You don’t always have to run yourself into the ground trying to save everybody.”

The words landed harder than they should have.

You focused instead on adjusting Leon’s blanket over his chest, smoothing the fabric carefully just to give your hands something else to do.

Jack knew you too well by now to push after saying something like that.

That was part of what made loving him dangerous sometimes. He noticed things you worked very hard to hide from everybody else.

He noticed the way your hands trembled after bad trauma calls once the adrenaline wore off. How you skipped meals without realizing it during difficult shifts. How every patient death stayed with you longer than you ever admitted aloud.

Jack had spent years in emergency medicine learning how to compartmentalize just enough to survive it, which somehow only made him better at recognizing when you weren’t doing the same.

His hand brushed briefly against the small of your back as he moved toward the monitors again.

“Don’t worry, Leon,” Jack said easily while checking the cardiac tracing. “You’re in good hands.”

Leon looked toward him before his gaze drifted back to you.

“I figured that out already,” he said softly. “She stopped on the interstate for me.”

You glanced up from the chart, slightly surprised by how steady his voice sounded now despite everything.

“You didn’t have to do all that,” Leon continued quietly.

You shrugged lightly, pushing damp hair away from your face. “Part of the job.”

“Maybe,” he answered softly, still watching you carefully. “But most people would’ve kept driving.”

Something warm and uncomfortable settled low in your chest at that.

Most patients never saw the moments in between all of this. They saw calm voices and steady hands. They saw competence because that was what they needed from you in moments like these.

They never saw the aftermath.

The exhaustion. The panic doctors swallowed in real time just to keep functioning. The way people occasionally locked themselves in supply closets for thirty seconds after bad cases just to breathe before walking back out like nothing happened.

But Leon had seen you kneeling beside twisted metal in freezing rain with blood on your hands while traffic screamed past only feet away.

He’d seen the human part too.

And somehow that felt far more exposing than expected.

Before you could answer, something shifted.

Subtle.

Small enough most people in the room probably would have missed it entirely.

But after years in emergency medicine, your body noticed changes before your brain consciously caught up.

Leon’s breathing changed.

One second it was slow and uneven with postictal exhaustion.

The next it caught strangely in his chest.

His eyes lost focus somewhere over your shoulder while every muscle in his body tightened beneath the blankets all at once.

Your stomach dropped instantly.

“Leon?”

Jack looked up from the monitor station at the exact same moment Leon’s entire body stiffened violently against the mattress.

“He’s seizing!”

Everything exploded into motion.

The seizure hit hard and fast, violent enough that the entire trauma bed rattled beneath him. His back arched sharply while his arms convulsed uncontrollably, knocking equipment sideways as monitors erupted into sharp screaming alarms throughout the room.

“Clock started,” Perlah called immediately.

“Two minutes on the seizure pads,” Whitaker added while grabbing suction.

“Turn him,” you ordered.

You and Javadi moved together automatically, carefully rolling Leon onto his side while his body continued jerking violently beneath your hands. Blood appeared at the corner of his mouth where he’d bitten through his tongue while every breath came in horrible choking gasps between convulsions.

“Airway’s clear,” Javadi said quickly, though her voice still sounded tight with adrenaline.

Across the room Jack was already pulling medication from the crash cart while Dana called CT from the doorway ahead of transport.

Then finally, slowly, the seizure broke.

Leon’s body slumped heavily back against the mattress drenched in sweat while ragged breaths tore unevenly from his chest. The room fell briefly into that strange silence that always followed emergencies, where everybody still moved quickly even though the worst part had passed.

For now.

“Let’s get a CT stat,” Jack said immediately.

You nodded once, trying to ignore the tremor beginning in your hands now that the adrenaline spike was crashing again.

“I’ll stay with him until transport.”

Jack hesitated.

Only briefly, but long enough for you to notice.

Something unreadable crossed his expression while his eyes flicked from Leon back toward you.

Concern maybe.

The same quiet tension he always carried after particularly violent trauma cases.

“You sure?” he asked softly.

You frowned slightly. “Yeah.”

Whitaker glanced briefly between both of you like he noticed something too, but before he could say anything Dana appeared in the doorway again.

“Trauma Three needs help now.”

Jack’s jaw tightened.

His fingers brushed briefly against your wrist before he stepped away toward the hallway, disappearing almost immediately back into the noise and chaos outside the trauma bay.

The room quieted afterward.

Machines beeped steadily while rain tapped faintly against distant ER windows somewhere down the hall. Whitaker and Javadi had already been pulled into another room, leaving you alone beside Leon while he lay motionless in exhausted postictal confusion.

You dimmed the overhead light slightly before adjusting the blanket higher over his chest.

“Hey,” you said gently when you noticed him beginning to stir. “You’re okay. You had a seizure.”

No response.

His eyes stayed fixed upward, unfocused and confused.

Postictal.

You had seen it hundreds of times before. Disorientation. Confusion. Agitation sometimes. Patients waking terrified because their brains had not fully caught up to reality yet.

Your shoulder ached dully now that exhaustion was settling deeper into your body again. You reached absentmindedly for the chart at the foot of the bed, mentally running through differentials and imaging priorities while waiting for CT to call back.

You missed the shift in him by less than a second.

One moment Leon lay motionless against the mattress, the next his eyes sharpened violently.

Not recognition.

Fear.

Pure terrified instinct.

Your stomach dropped.

“Leon—”

He surged upright before you could finish the sentence.

His hand closed around your throat with terrifying force, slamming you backward into the cabinet hard enough to knock the air violently from your lungs. Pain exploded across the back of your skull as your head cracked sharply against metal.

“Leon!”

The sound came out broken and strangled.

But he wasn’t seeing you.

That was the horrifying part.

His eyes looked completely wild now—unfocused, terrified, empty all at once. Pure neurological panic stripped entirely of recognition.

For one terrible second, training overrode fear.

“Leon,” you gasped desperately, grabbing his wrists instinctively instead of striking him. “Listen to me. You’re in the hospital. You’re safe.”

Nothing reached him.

His grip tightened harder around your throat.

Air stopped.

Panic slammed through you instantly now, sharp and animal and overwhelming in a way you almost never allowed yourself to feel. Your vision flickered violently while you clawed uselessly at his hands, trying desperately to drag in even one full breath.

You needed help.

Safe word.

Your mouth opened automatically.

“H—”

Nothing came out except a rasp.

Leon shoved you backward harder, your skull slamming against the cabinet again hard enough that white exploded across your vision.

The hospital safe word.

You just needed to say it.

“Hula—”

The sound collapsed into another strangled gasp as his fingers crushed tighter against your airway.

Your lungs burned.

Tears blurred your vision from pain and lack of oxygen while movement echoed faintly somewhere outside the trauma bay. People were still moving through the ER completely unaware of what was happening behind the curtain.

Your body was weakening fast.

You forced one shredded breath into your lungs and screamed:

“HULA HOOP!”

The entire department reacted instantly.

The trauma bay doors burst open hard enough to slam against the wall while voices shouted over each other.

Hands grabbed Leon, trying to drag him backward while he fought wildly in blind confusion and terror.

But before anyone could fully pull him away, he shoved you violently across the room.

Your shoulder struck the edge of the cabinetry with a horrible crack before the rest of your body collapsed hard onto the tile floor.

Pain tore through your arm instantly, sharp and wrong enough it barely felt real.

You couldn’t breathe.

Couldn’t think.

The room blurred violently while alarms screamed overhead and people shouted your name somewhere nearby.

And through all of it, through the pain and chaos splitting apart around you, your brain found one thing instinctively.

Jack.

You thought about the way he always found you in crowded trauma bays without even trying. The way his hoodie still smelled faintly like coffee and antiseptic around your shoulders. The quiet brush of his hand against your back only minutes earlier.

You wondered irrationally if he was going to blame himself for leaving the room.

That thought hurt almost as badly as the pain itself.

Your eyes slipped closed just as the world dissolved completely into noise.

Jack was halfway through finishing a chart when he realized he had not seen you in several minutes.

He looked up automatically, scanning the department for you out of habit more than anything else. Usually he could spot you immediately no matter how crowded the ER became. You moved quickly when you worked, sharp and focused and impossible to miss once he knew what to look for.

But you were nowhere.

“Hey, Javadi,” he called while signing off medication orders. “Have you seen Dr. Y/L/N?”

Javadi looked up so quickly, like she was a deer caught in headlights. “Uh… no,” she answered quickly. Too quickly. “I haven’t seen her since I left Leon. Sorry.”

Then she disappeared almost immediately toward another patient before he could ask anything else.

He pushed himself upright from the workstation, the familiar ache radiating faintly through his prosthetic. Long shifts always made it worse. The socket rubbed raw after enough hours on his feet, especially during busy trauma nights when he barely sat down.

Normally he ignored it.

Right now he barely felt it at all.

“Dana,” he called, already moving toward the nurses’ station. “Have you seen Y/N?”

Dana barely looked up from the chart she was reviewing. “Pretty sure she’s still with Leon. Why?”

Jack turned the iPad slightly toward her. “They haven’t gone to CT.”

That got her attention.

Her eyes flicked quickly toward the tracking board before settling back on him. “They’re probably backed up upstairs.”

“Maybe.”

But something still felt wrong.

Dana sighed softly. “Jack, she’s a big girl. She can handle herself.”

He knew that.

God, he knew that better than anybody.

You were one of the strongest people he had ever met. Smarter than most attendings twice your age. Calm during trauma activations that made residents freeze completely. You handled combative patients, pediatric codes, catastrophic MVCs, and grieving families with a steadiness that still amazed him after all these years.

But that feeling in his chest would not go away.

Dana pointed down the hallway. “I actually need you in Central Fourteen. Chest pain rule-out and Dr. Garcia wants another set of eyes before she calls cards.”

Jack exhaled through his nose, still staring at the tracking board.

“Right,” he muttered distractedly. “Yeah. Okay.”

He turned reluctantly toward the direction of Central Fourteen, adjusting his pace automatically as the prosthetic clicked softly against tile beneath his scrub pants. Fatigue had settled deep into the joint hours ago, making his gait slightly uneven now that the adrenaline from earlier trauma activations had worn off.

Then he heard it.

“HULA HOOP!”

Everything in his body stopped instantly.

The voice was barely recognizable.

Raw. Ragged. Strangled around obvious pain and panic in a way that made every hair on the back of his neck stand upright immediately. For one horrible second his brain refused to process it properly because it did not make sense. Not your voice. Not like that.

And then recognition hit him all at once.

The hospital safe word.

Trauma Two.

Jack’s heart dropped so violently it almost hurt.

No.

The thought hit him before anything else.

No no no.

Adrenaline detonated through his bloodstream hard enough to make him dizzy.

Then instinct took over completely.

“No,” he breathed aloud, already moving before the word fully left his mouth.

He pivoted so sharply pain shot violently through his prosthetic, the sudden turn grinding pressure through the socket hard enough that under normal circumstances it would have staggered him. But right now he barely felt it beneath the sheer overwhelming panic flooding his system.

Fear swallowed everything else whole.

Not the controlled fear he knew from trauma medicine. Not the clinical kind that sharpened your focus during codes and mass casualty calls.

This was different.

This was personal.

Jack shoved past a stretcher hard enough that the wheels screeched across tile while people all around him started reacting at the exact same time. Nurses turned toward Trauma Two instantly at the sound of the safe word. Dana’s head snapped upward from the nurses’ station. Santos was already running before half the department fully understood what was happening.

But Jack got there first.

The curtain outside Trauma Two jerked violently as shouting erupted from inside the room. Monitors screamed overhead loud enough to echo through the entire department while equipment crashed hard against the floor somewhere beyond the drapes.

“Get him off her!”

The words barely registered through the roaring in Jack’s ears.

His pulse was so loud now it drowned everything else out.

He hit the doorway hard enough that the curtain ripped halfway off the track as he shoved inside.

And then he saw you.

Lying on the floor.

Motionless.

For one horrifying second his brain simply stopped functioning.

You were crumpled unnaturally against the tile beside the cabinets, one arm twisted wrong beneath you while blood streaked across the side of your face from where your head had struck something hard enough to split skin open. Jack noticed everything all at once in the brutal hyperclarity trauma doctors developed after years in emergency medicine.

The bruising already forming around your throat.

The abnormal angle of your shoulder.

The way your chest barely moved.

And somehow that was the part that terrified him most.

You were not moving enough.

Leon was still screaming somewhere nearby while Ahmed and two nurses fought to restrain him against the opposite wall, his face wild with postictal confusion and terror. Somebody was yelling for sedation meds. The entire trauma bay had dissolved into complete chaos.

But Jack barely registered any of it.

Because you were on the floor.

And you were not getting up.

Something inside his chest seemed to cave inward violently.

“Oh, honey.”

Then he said your name, and the sound that came out barely resembled the steady, composed voice Jack used during traumas and codes and every impossible shift the hospital threw at him.

This was different.

There was no clinical calm left in him now.

Only fear.

Pure terrified fear.

He dropped beside you so fast pain tore sharply through his prosthetic as his knee hit tile, but he ignored it instantly. His hands shook hard enough he almost missed your carotid pulse the first time he checked.

Then finally.

There. Weak, but there.

Relief hit so hard it almost made him nauseous.

“Oh my God,” he whispered shakily, one bloodstained hand cradling the side of your face carefully while the other pressed against your neck searching for injuries. “Hey. Hey, stay with me. Come on.”

You did not respond.

Jack’s stomach turned violently.

Training forced itself back online in fragmented pieces despite the panic threatening to choke him alive. Airway. Breathing. Circulation. Neuro. He assessed automatically even while his brain screamed at him that this was you beneath his hands.

Not a patient.

You.

Blood pressure crash from trauma? Concussion? Cervical injury? Shoulder dislocation? Fracture? Internal bleed?

His eyes flicked instantly toward your throat again and rage flooded him so suddenly it nearly stole his breath.

Finger-shaped bruises were already darkening against your skin.

He hurt you.

The realization nearly made Jack physically sick.

“Jack,” Dana’s voice cut sharply through the chaos as she dropped beside him. “We need to move.”

But Jack could barely hear her.

Your eyelashes fluttered faintly for half a second before falling closed again and something inside him broke completely at the sight.

“No no no,” he whispered frantically, brushing damp hair away from your face with shaking fingers. “Stay awake. Baby, stay awake for me.”

His voice cracked hard on the last word.

That terrified him almost as much as the sight of you bleeding on the floor.

Because Jack Abbot did not lose composure.

Not during traumas, not during mass casualties, not while pronouncing deaths.

But right now panic was tearing straight through him so violently he could barely breathe around it.

And for the first time in years, he had absolutely no idea how to separate being a doctor from being the man who loved you.

“What the hell happened?”

Robby’s voice cut sharply through the chaos as he pushed into Trauma Two with Mohan directly behind him, but for half a second, both of them stopped cold.

The room looked catastrophic. Leon was still fighting violently against security near the far wall, his movements frantic and disorganized while Santos shouted for more sedation. Equipment littered the floor around the trauma bay, overturned trays and scattered supplies crunching beneath people’s shoes as alarms screamed overhead loudly enough to make the entire room feel claustrophobic.

And in the middle of all of it, you were lying motionless on the floor with Jack kneeling beside you.

Blood streaked down the side of your face and disappeared beneath the collar of his hoodie still hanging around your shoulders. Bruising had already started darkening visibly around your throat, ugly fingerprints blooming beneath the fluorescent trauma lights, while your left arm rested at an angle that made Mohan’s stomach immediately drop.

“Jesus Christ,” Mohan breathed.

“Security’s got the patient,” Dana snapped, already dropping beside you with Santos. “Probably postictal aggression after the seizure. He went after her.”

Robby moved instantly after that, years of trauma medicine overriding shock the second he reached your side. “Get her on a gurney now. C-spine precautions. Santos, I need vitals. Dana, page CT and tell them we’re coming immediately. Mohan, get me neuro and ortho on standby.”

Everybody moved except Jack.

He stayed frozen beside you on the tile floor, one hand still cradling the side of your face like he physically could not force himself to let go.

“Jack,” Robby said.

No response.

Jack was staring at you with an expression Robby had never seen on him before. Not panic exactly. Worse than panic. Helplessness, maybe, like his brain had short-circuited somewhere between doctor and boyfriend and now could not figure out how to function as either.

“Jack,” Robby repeated more firmly.

That finally seemed to pull him back enough to blink.

“She isn’t breathing right,” he said hoarsely, voice rough enough it barely sounded like him anymore. “He had her by the throat. Her head hit the cabinet, probably. Possible LOC. Shoulder’s definitely dislocated, maybe fractured too.”

The words came out clipped and automatic, pure trauma assessment forced through panic, but his hands were still shaking.

Dana and Santos carefully slid a backboard beneath you while Mohan cut away the remains of the hoodie around your shoulder to assess the injury better. The second the fabric moved, Jack saw the full extent of the bruising spreading across your throat, dark purple already beneath your skin.

“He squeezed hard enough to leave petechiae,” Santos muttered quietly while examining your neck. “Shit.”

Robby’s jaw tightened immediately. “We need airway monitoring. Neck trauma protocol.”

You stirred weakly then, letting out a broken sound somewhere between a gasp and a whimper as Dana stabilized your shoulder. Jack moved instantly at the sound.

“Hey,” he said, voice softening so fast it almost hurt to hear. “Hey, don’t move. You’re okay.”

Your eyes fluttered halfway open for barely a second before unfocusing again.

“She’s awake,” Jack breathed.

“For now,” Robby answered grimly while checking your pupils with a penlight. “Possible concussion. We’re not ruling anything out yet.”

Jack knew that tone. It was the same one they all used when things might be much worse than they looked initially.

Around them, the room was finally beginning to settle into controlled chaos instead of outright panic. Security had Leon restrained now while Santos pushed sedatives through an IV line with tight, controlled movements. Leon’s terrified shouting dissolved into confused, exhausted mumbling as the medication began taking effect.

“He didn’t know what he was doing,” Mohan said quietly, mostly to fill the horrible silence hanging over the room.

Jack did not answer. Rationally, he already knew that. Postictal aggression, neurological confusion, severe agitation after seizure activity. They had all seen it before. But none of it mattered right now, because every time Jack blinked, he saw your body hitting the floor again.

“On my count,” Santos said firmly while positioning herself near your head. “One, two, three.”

They lifted you carefully onto the gurney, and the second they moved your shoulder, a sharp cry tore from your throat despite your barely conscious state.

Jack physically flinched.

Robby looked at him immediately. “Jack, I need you with me here.”

But Jack still looked frozen. His prosthetic locked slightly as he stood too quickly, pain shooting sharply through the joint while exhaustion and adrenaline crashed violently together inside his body. Normally, he compensated automatically for it. Years of physical therapy had taught him exactly how to move through pain without thinking.

Right now, he barely noticed it. All he could see was you strapped to a trauma gurney instead of standing beside one, and somehow that felt profoundly wrong in a way his brain could not fully process yet.

Dana squeezed his arm briefly as she passed him. “She’s alive,” she said quietly, firmly enough that it sounded almost like an order. “So stay with us.”

Jack swallowed hard, then finally nodded once.

The second the gurney locked into place beside the trauma bed, the room shifted fully into trauma mode. Controlled chaos. Fast hands. Sharply clipped orders. Monitor alarms blending into the constant noise of the ER outside while everybody moved around you with the kind of practiced coordination that only came from years of emergency medicine.

“BP dropping,” Santos called from the monitor station. “Ninety-two over fifty-six. Heart rate one-forty. Pulse ox ninety-four.”

Robby swore quietly under his breath before stepping beside the gurney. “Dana, I need another large bore IV. CBC, CMP, coags, type and screen, lactate. Full trauma panel.”

Dana was already moving before he finished speaking.

Mohan carefully stabilized your cervical spine while Perlah adjusted the collar more securely around your neck. Blood stained the side of your face now, dark against pale skin beneath the fluorescent trauma lights, while bruising continued spreading visibly across your throat.

“She’s tachycardic from pain and adrenaline,” Mohan said quickly while palpating carefully along your ribs and clavicle. “Left shoulder deformity obvious. Could be anterior dislocation, maybe proximal humerus fracture too.”

“She hit hard,” Dana added grimly while cutting away the sleeve of your scrub top completely. “Look at the swelling already, poor baby.”

Jack forced himself closer finally, though every instinct in his body screamed at him to stop looking entirely.

Your shoulder looked wrong. Not subtly wrong, catastrophically wrong. The joint sat visibly displaced beneath skin already darkening with bruising while your arm rested protectively against your torso in unconscious guarding. Even barely responsive, your body was trying to protect the injury.

“Y/N?” Robby called firmly while shining the penlight into your eyes again. “Hey, stay with me.”

Your eyelids fluttered weakly, and your lips parted slightly before a small broken sound escaped you, more pain than words.

“There you go,” Dana said softly. “That’s good, hey sweetie.”

“She’s responsive,” Mohan confirmed. “Pupils reactive bilaterally.”

“Any obvious neuro deficits?”

“Hard to assess until she’s more alert.”

Jack swallowed hard. Normally those words would have sounded clinical. Routine. Hearing them about you made him feel sick.

Robby’s fingers moved carefully along your scalp before stopping near the back of your head. “She’s got a laceration here. Probably where she hit the cabinet.”

“How bad?” Jack asked immediately.

Robby looked up briefly. “Needs staples. I’m more concerned about intracranial bleed.”

Jack felt the room narrow sharply around him as his brain supplied every possibility instantly. Subdural. Epidural. Contusion. Diffuse axonal injury. Years of trauma medicine suddenly felt less like a skill and more like torture because now he knew exactly how bad this could become.

“BP’s still dropping,” Santos called sharply.

“Hang another liter.”

Dana connected fluids immediately while Mohan checked your abdomen carefully for rigidity and tenderness.

“She guarding?”

“Little bit.”

“Could just be pain response.”

“Or internal injury,” Robby answered grimly.

Jack closed his eyes briefly. Only twenty minutes ago, he had been teasing you for refusing to change out of wet scrubs. Twenty minutes ago, you had been standing beside him alive and exhausted and rolling your eyes at him. Now you were strapped to a trauma gurney while your coworkers discussed possible brain bleeds.

The trauma bay doors pushed open again.

“What do we have?”

Garcia entered already pulling gloves on, clearly expecting another routine consult before her eyes landed on the gurney. Then she froze.

“Is that...?”

Nobody answered immediately because suddenly saying it aloud made everything feel horrifyingly real.

Garcia moved closer automatically, surgical instincts taking over even while shock still flickered visibly across her face. Her eyes swept quickly across your injuries, taking in the bruising around your throat, the unstable shoulder, and the blood matted into your hair.

“Oh my God.”

Jack looked away sharply at the sound in her voice. He could handle panic, trauma, blood, failed resuscitations, and catastrophic injuries. But he could not handle hearing pity directed at you.

“What happened?” Garcia asked quietly.

“Postictal assault,” Robby answered while reviewing your vitals. “Patient seized after MVC. Became combative during recovery.”

Garcia’s jaw tightened immediately. Her eyes flicked briefly toward Jack, and somehow that made everything worse. Everybody in the hospital knew about the two of you. Not because either of you talked about it much, but because some things became obvious after enough years working together. The way Jack unconsciously searched for you in crowded rooms. The way your voice softened around him even during impossible shifts. The way both of you somehow always ended up side by side during difficult traumas without discussing it first.

And now everybody was watching him try not to fall apart while you lay bleeding in front of him.

“Y/N,” Garcia said gently while stepping closer to assess your airway. “Can you hear me?”

Your brow twitched faintly at the sound of your name.

“Good,” she murmured softly. “Stay with us.”

Jack finally moved closer again until he stood directly beside the gurney. For a second, he just stared at you. Really stared. At the bruises darkening beneath your jaw, at the trembling rise and fall of your breathing, at the blood drying against your temple.

Then very carefully, he reached down and took your hand.

Your fingers twitched weakly against his palm almost immediately.

Tiny movement. Huge relief.

“Okay,” Robby said firmly, forcing the room back into focus. “Let’s move. I want CT angio head and neck immediately. We’re ruling out intracranial bleed and carotid injury.”

Garcia nodded once beside him, already assessing your airway with practiced hands. “Neck swelling’s getting worse.”

Jack saw it too now that she said it aloud. The bruising around your throat had spread darker beneath the fluorescent lights while swelling gathered visibly beneath your jawline. Every breath you took sounded wrong now. Wet. Shallow. Strained enough to make every survival instinct in his body start screaming.

“Pulse ox is dipping,” Santos called sharply. “Ninety-one.”

“Jaw thrust,” Garcia ordered immediately.

Dana repositioned carefully at your head while Garcia leaned closer, studying the bruising around your airway with growing concern. “She may need to be intubated before CT if the swelling progresses.”

The word hit Jack like a physical blow. Intubated. His brain immediately supplied images he did not want. Ventilator settings. Sedation drips. ICU monitors. Neurological checks every hour.

“No,” he said automatically before he could stop himself.

Everybody looked at him.

Jack swallowed hard immediately, realizing too late he had said it aloud.

Robby’s expression softened slightly. “Jack.”

He hated the way Robby said his name right now. Carefully. Like he was one bad second away from falling apart completely.

“I know,” Jack muttered quickly, dragging a shaky hand down his face. “I know.”

But he didn’t. Not really. Because his brain kept splitting violently between two impossible realities. One side of him catalogued injuries automatically. Airway trauma after strangulation. Possible cervical instability. Hypoxia. Concussion. Internal bleeding. Shoulder fracture-dislocation. The other side could barely process the fact that you were lying here at all.

Your breathing suddenly hitched sharply.

Jack’s head snapped toward you instantly.

Your eyes fluttered weakly before opening. Confusion crossed your face immediately while you tried weakly to move, but pain flashed across your expression so fast it made Jack physically tense.

“Don’t,” he said immediately, stepping closer. “Baby, don’t move.”

Your gaze drifted slowly around the trauma bay like you were trying to understand where you were. The bright lights. The people surrounding you. The monitors beeping overhead. Then finally, your eyes landed on Jack.

Relief flickered there instantly. Small. Barely there. Enough to nearly destroy him.

“Hey,” he said softly, gripping your hand tighter without realizing it. “Hey, I’m right here.”

Your lips parted slightly, but nothing came out at first except a weak breath.

Jack leaned closer immediately. “What?”

Your brow pinched faintly in confusion.

“...Leon?”

The room went quiet for half a second.

Even now, barely conscious and injured and terrified, your first instinct was still the patient. Something inside Jack cracked painfully at that.

“He’s restrained,” Robby answered gently before Jack could. “You’re safe.”

Your eyes shifted again, slower this time.

“Hurts,” you whispered faintly.

Jack looked immediately toward your shoulder. “I know,” he said quietly, voice finally cracking despite how hard he tried to control it. “I know, sweetheart.”

Garcia’s eyes flicked sharply toward him at the sound. Jack almost never lost composure at work. Not like this.

You tried to swallow and immediately winced.

Garcia noticed too. “Throat pain?”

A tiny nod.

“Difficulty breathing?”

Another weak nod.

Garcia looked immediately toward Robby. “Airway’s worsening.”

Robby swore quietly under his breath. “We tube here or risk losing it in CT.”

The room shifted instantly again. More movement. More urgency. Dana reached for airway equipment while Santos prepared sedation meds with visibly tighter movements now. Mohan adjusted oxygen flow quickly while Garcia moved toward the head of the bed.

Jack felt suddenly frozen all over again.

Your eyes moved back toward him weakly, panic beginning to flicker beneath the pain now that you were awake enough to understand pieces of the conversation around you.

“Jack,” you whispered hoarsely.

His chest tightened violently. “I’m here.”

Your fingers curled weakly against his hand.

“Don’t...” Your breathing hitched painfully. “Don’t leave.”

That finally broke him.

Because you sounded scared. You, the person who stayed calm during pediatric arrests and mass casualty incidents and catastrophic traumas that made residents physically sick afterward.

Jack leaned down immediately, pressing his forehead briefly against yours despite the blood and chaos surrounding both of you. “I’m not going anywhere,” he whispered shakily. “Okay? I’m right here.”

Then your heart rate spiked sharply.

“One-fifty,” Santos warned.

Your oxygen dipped again.

“Eighty-eight.”

Garcia looked up instantly. “That’s it. We’re securing the airway.”

Panic flashed visibly across your face, and Jack felt your hand tighten weakly around his.

“Hey,” he said immediately, brushing damp hair carefully away from your forehead. “Look at me, sweetheart.”

Your unfocused eyes found his again.

“You’re okay,” he whispered, even though his own heart was pounding hard enough to make him nauseous. “Just keep breathing for me.”

Garcia stepped beside him carefully. “Jack,” she said quietly. “I need room.”

And suddenly he realized there was nothing else he could do. No medication to order. No procedure capable of fixing this himself. No trauma protocol separating him from the overwhelming terror flooding his chest.

All he could do was let go of your hand and watch other people try to save you, and somehow that felt worse than anything he had seen in his entire career.

And somehow that felt infinitely worse than any injury he had seen in his entire career.

The intubation blurred together afterward in fragments Jack knew would probably stay with him for the rest of his life.

Garcia’s voice turned sharp and clinical the second she stepped fully into procedure mode. “Etomidate ready?”

“Ready.”

“Succinylcholine?”

“Ready.”

“Pulse ox?”

“Eighty-seven and dropping.”

The room moved quickly around you after that. Packaging tore open, monitors screamed softly overhead, and Santos pushed medications through your IV with controlled precision while Dana stabilized your cervical spine at the head of the bed.

Jack stood rooted beside the wall, feeling completely fucking useless.

He had watched hundreds of intubations in his career. He had performed them himself during impossible traumas, with blood filling airways and families screaming outside the room. Usually, the procedure grounded him. Medicine always grounded him because medicine made sense. Algorithms. Protocols. Airway, breathing, circulation. Find the problem and fix it.

But this was you, and suddenly none of it felt clinical anymore.

Your eyes found his one last time before the sedatives fully took effect. Fear still flickered there beneath the exhaustion and pain, but so did trust. Complete trust. The kind that made his chest ache violently because you were still looking at him like he could somehow fix this.

Then your body relaxed beneath the medication.

Garcia moved immediately. “Going in.”

The room fell quieter for a second except for the ventilator alarms and the sound of Jack’s own pulse hammering violently in his ears. He watched Garcia guide the laryngoscope carefully while Robby monitored your vitals from beside the bed.

“Visualized.”

“Tube.”

“Advancing.”

Jack swallowed hard enough that it hurt.

You looked so small suddenly. That was the thought that kept repeating in his head while he stared at your motionless body beneath trauma lights that suddenly felt much too bright. You had always seemed larger than life somehow. Loud when you wanted to be. Brilliant. Sharp-edged. Impossible to intimidate. The kind of doctor residents followed instinctively because even during disasters, you carried yourself like you could handle anything thrown at you.

Now you were lying completely still while somebody else breathed for you.

“Tube’s in,” Garcia confirmed.

Relief swept through the room instantly, subtle but collective.

“End tidal color change confirmed.”

“Breath sounds bilateral.”

“Secure it.”

Dana taped the ET tube carefully into place while the ventilator connected with a soft mechanical hiss. Your chest finally began rising in slow, controlled breaths afterward, steady and artificial and horrifyingly impersonal.

Jack hated the sound immediately.

The ventilator transformed you from injured into critical in a way his brain could no longer avoid.

Robby was already moving again. “Okay, we transport now. I want CTA head and neck, cervical spine imaging, chest CT, trauma series. Somebody call ortho and tell them she’s likely got a fracture-dislocation.”

“She’s still hypotensive,” Santos warned while adjusting fluids.

“Pressure?”

“Ninety systolic.”

“Hang another liter.”

Everything continued moving around him after that, but Jack could barely process any of it fully anymore. The room had narrowed into snapshots burned violently into his memory. Blood staining the collar of your scrub top. Finger-shaped bruises spreading darker around your throat. Your hand slipping weakly from his when they rolled the gurney toward the doors.

He followed automatically beside the bed while they rushed you toward imaging. His prosthetic protested immediately beneath the sudden pace, sharp pain radiating through the socket with every uneven step, but he barely registered it now. His entire body had narrowed itself into one singular instinct.

Stay close. Do not lose sight of her.

Hallway lights blurred overhead while the gurney rattled violently across tile. Nurses moved aside instantly when they recognized who was lying on the stretcher, and somehow that silence hurt worse than panic would have.

People stopped talking when they saw you.

A respiratory therapist physically froze near the elevators before whispering, “Oh my God.”

Jack looked away immediately. He could not handle watching other people realize how bad this was.

Then suddenly, he was left standing alone in the hallway.

The silence hit him all at once.

He stared numbly at the closed doors for several long seconds before finally turning back toward Trauma Two because he genuinely did not know what else to do with himself.

By the time he returned, the room was mostly empty again. The chaos was over. Only the aftermath remained.

One overturned tray still sat abandoned near the wall where it had been kicked over during the struggle. Wrappers and syringes littered the floor beside shattered plastic packaging while a monitor continued beeping pointlessly beside an empty bed.

And blood.

Your blood was still everywhere.

Jack stopped walking.

For a second he just stood there staring at it. Tiny streaks across the tile floor. Smears against the cabinets where your head had hit. Dark fingerprints dried against the bedrail.

His stomach twisted so violently he thought he might actually throw up.

Because the only thing left of you in this room now was blood.

Not your laugh echoing across the nurses’ station during overnight shifts. Not your sarcasm when Santos annoyed you on purpose. Not the warmth of your body curled against his after impossible shifts when both of you were too exhausted to even speak properly anymore.

Just blood.

Jack looked down slowly at his own hands. There was still dried blood caught beneath his fingernails from where he had held your face trying to keep you conscious. More stained the sleeves of his scrub top in dark rust-colored smears that made his chest tighten painfully every time he looked at them.

You were intubated upstairs while trauma surgeons searched your brain for bleeding.

The thought cracked something open inside him.

If he had stayed. If he had trusted his instincts. If he had checked sooner.

“Jack.”

Dana’s voice came softly from the doorway behind him.

He did not turn around immediately. For a second, neither of them spoke while she took in the scene around him. Dana had worked in emergency medicine long enough to understand what trauma aftermath looked like, not just physically, but emotionally too.

Jack looked wrecked. Not outwardly hysterical. That almost would have been easier. Instead, he looked hollowed out from the inside.

“You should sit down,” she said gently.

“I’m fine.”

The answer came automatically, immediate and empty.

Dana almost sighed because they both knew it was complete bullshit. She stepped further into the room slowly, careful with him now in the same way people approached trauma patients who had not realized how badly they were injured yet.

“You’re shaking.”

His hands were trembling badly now that the adrenaline had started wearing off, small uncontrollable tremors moving through his fingers no matter how tightly he clenched them into fists.

“I left her,” he said quietly.

Dana’s expression softened immediately. “Jack.”

“I left her alone with him.”

The guilt in his voice nearly hurt to hear.

Dana moved closer. “You could not have predicted postictal aggression escalating like that.”

“But I should’ve checked sooner.”

Jack laughed once under his breath, but there was absolutely no humor in it. Just panic and exhaustion and guilt twisting together so tightly he could barely breathe around it anymore.

“She sounded scared,” he whispered roughly. “Do you know how bad it has to be for her to sound scared?”

Dana’s chest tightened painfully because she did know. Everybody in that hospital knew how terrifyingly calm you usually were under pressure. You were the person comforting other people during disasters. The doctor residents looked for during bad traumas because your voice never shook.

But tonight it had.

Dana stepped directly in front of him then and reached up without hesitation, gripping the back of his neck firmly enough to ground him.

“Listen to me,” she said softly but seriously. “She is alive.”

Jack swallowed hard. “She squeezed my hand before CT.”

“Then hold onto that.”

His eyes burned immediately at the words.

For a second, he looked terrifyingly close to falling apart completely.

“She was looking at me like she thought she was dying.”

Dana’s face crumpled slightly at the crack in his voice because Jack Abbot almost never sounded fragile. Not after everything life had already put him through.

But this was different.

This was you.

“You know her,” Dana said quietly. “You know how hard she fights.”

Jack closed his eyes briefly because somehow that made this hurt even worse. He did know. He knew the exact stubborn determination living inside you, the way you worked through exhaustion and grief and pain because your body physically did not know how to stop caring about people.

And suddenly, the idea of losing you felt so catastrophic he genuinely could not imagine surviving it.

When you woke up, the first thing you felt was pain.

Not sharp at first. Not localized enough to understand. Just heavy.

A crushing ache spread through your entire body like every bone had shattered somewhere deep beneath your skin. Awareness dragged itself slowly upward through layers of medication and exhaustion while fluorescent hospital light glowed faintly red through your eyelids. For one blissfully empty second, your brain stayed blank enough that you did not remember anything at all.

Then your chest tightened violently around the ventilator tube lodged in your throat.

Panic hit instantly.

Your eyes snapped open as your body reacted on pure instinct, trying desperately to fight the foreign object forcing air into your lungs. The movement sent agony ripping through your throat and jaw so violently it nearly knocked you unconscious again. A horrible choking sound escaped around the tube while pain exploded across the side of your head hard enough to blur your vision immediately.

The monitors beside your bed erupted into sharp alarms.

Then suddenly Jack was there.

He moved so quickly the chair beside your ICU bed nearly tipped backward onto the floor. One second the room felt empty and terrifying and unfamiliar, and the next his hands were hovering carefully near your face like he wanted to touch you everywhere at once but was terrified of hurting you more.

“Hey, hey, don’t fight it,” he said immediately, voice low and urgent. “You’re okay. Breathe with it.”

You could see his mouth moving. Could see panic written all over his face.

But you could not hear him properly.

Everything sounded distorted beneath the ringing in your ears, voices muffled and warped together like you were trapped underwater. The ventilator hissed rhythmically beside you while your chest rose mechanically against your will, and the sensation was horrifying enough to send another wave of panic crashing violently through your body.

Jack kept talking anyway.

You recognized the cadence of his voice more than the words themselves. Calm. Steady. But underneath it there was something rawer now, something desperate he usually hid much better than this.

Your entire body hurt.

Your throat burned every time the ventilator pushed another breath into your lungs. Your jaw ached violently from the intubation while your left shoulder throbbed with deep nauseating pain that radiated all the way down your arm. Even breathing hurt despite the machine doing most of the work for you.

Then memory came back all at once.

The trauma bay. Leon seizing. Hands crushing around your throat. Your head slamming violently against the cabinet. The floor.

You started crying before you even realized it was happening.

Tears slipped silently sideways into your hair while panic clawed straight up your chest hard enough to blur your vision again. You could not stop shaking. Every instinct in your body still screamed danger even though logically you knew you were safe now.

Jack’s entire expression broke the second he realized you were crying.

“Oh, baby,” he whispered hoarsely.

At least you thought that was what he said.

He sat carefully on the edge of the chair beside your bed before reaching for your hand, avoiding IV lines and bruises with practiced gentleness. The second his fingers touched yours, you grabbed onto him desperately enough that pain shot violently through your injured shoulder again.

You did not care.

Jack was here.

And somehow that meant alive. Safe.

Your grip tightened harder around his hand while your breathing turned ragged around the tube again. Jack immediately leaned closer, his thumb brushing shakily across your knuckles while he tried to calm you before you exhausted yourself further.

“It’s okay,” he murmured softly. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

Only then did you really look at him.

And God.

He looked awful.

Dark bruising sat beneath his eyes like he had not slept once since this happened. His hair looked messy in a way that suggested he had spent hours dragging anxious hands through it, and there was something hollowed out in his expression now that made your chest tighten painfully.

You mouthed the question anyway despite the ventilator.

What happened to you?

Jack watched your lips carefully before understanding finally crossed his face. His throat worked once visibly while emotion flashed so openly across his expression it almost scared you more than the pain itself.

He still looked terrified.

Even now.

Instead of speaking, he carefully turned your hand over in his and began tracing slow letters against your palm with his thumb.

Patient attacked you.

The memory crashed back completely after that.

The pressure around your throat. Leon’s empty unfocused eyes. Your body hitting the wall. The terrifying realization that he genuinely did not recognize you anymore.

You jerked violently on instinct before you could stop yourself, panic surging through your bloodstream so fast your vision blurred instantly while the cardiac monitor erupted into another wave of alarms beside the bed.

Jack reacted immediately.

“Hey, hey, look at me.”

You could not fully hear the words, but you knew his voice. Knew the shape of it. The desperation underneath it.

Your breathing turned frantic around the ventilator while terror clawed violently through your chest again. You remembered thinking you were going to die. Not abstractly. Not distantly.

Really die.

And for one horrifying second, lying in this ICU bed unable to speak or breathe on your own, that feeling came rushing back all over again.

Jack kept one hand wrapped tightly around yours while the other hovered uncertainly near your face. He looked like he wanted to pull you against him and protect you from everything all at once but knew touching you too much would only hurt you further.

“You’re safe now,” he kept saying quietly. “He can’t hurt you. You’re safe.”

Safe.

Your eyes darted weakly around the ICU room instead. Machines. IV poles. Bandages. Your leg elevated and immobilized beneath blankets. Soft restraints loosely secured around your wrists so you would not accidentally pull the ventilator tube out while disoriented.

You felt trapped inside your own body.

The panic became unbearable.

Then your eyes landed on the PCA pump beside the bed.

Jack noticed immediately.

His entire face fell.

“Baby…”

You reached weakly toward the button anyway with trembling fingers.

Jack looked absolutely shattered watching you press it. Not angry. Not disappointed.

Heartbroken.

Because he understood immediately what you were doing.

You could not stop the fear. Could not stop the pain.

So you were choosing unconsciousness instead.

Medication flooded slowly through your bloodstream almost immediately afterward. Warmth spread outward in gradual waves, softening the sharp edges of panic first before the pain finally began loosening its grip around your body. The terror still lingered somewhere deep beneath everything else, but it no longer felt sharp enough to suffocate you alive.

Your grip weakened slightly around Jack’s hand as exhaustion dragged heavily at your eyelids again.

Jack stayed exactly where he was.

You could barely keep your eyes open anymore, but you still saw the way he looked at you while the medication slowly pulled you back under.

Completely devastated.

Like watching you choose sedation over consciousness hurt him almost as much as the attack itself.

Your fingers twitched weakly against his palm before your eyes finally slipped closed again.

The last thing you felt before unconsciousness dragged you under completely was Jack lifting your hand carefully toward his mouth and pressing one shaking kiss against your bruised knuckles.

The second time you woke up was somehow worse because this time you stayed conscious long enough to understand what had happened to you.

Pain existed everywhere now.

Not sharp anymore. Not even severe enough in one specific place to focus on. It had settled deeper than that, heavy and constant, wrapping itself around your entire body until even breathing felt exhausting. Every inhale pulled painfully against bruised ribs while your jaw throbbed in slow aching pulses that spread all the way into your skull. The medication dulled the edges enough to keep panic from swallowing you whole again, but not enough to make you forget.

Nothing let you forget for very long.

Garcia stood beside your ICU bed when your eyes finally opened again, flashlight moving carefully across your pupils while monitors hummed steadily around the room. The overhead lights had been dimmed sometime while you slept, leaving everything washed in pale blue-gray shadows that made the hospital feel strangely unreal.

“Hey,” Garcia said softly the second she noticed you were awake. “Welcome back.”

Your hearing still came and went in fractured bursts after the concussion. Some sounds arrived painfully sharp while others disappeared completely beneath the relentless ringing inside your ears. Voices felt warped and distant, like everybody speaking stood underwater somewhere far away from you.

You blinked slowly toward the doorway and spotted Santos hovering there awkwardly holding a bouquet of flowers that looked aggressively stolen from the hospital gift shop. Half the stems bent sideways beneath crinkled plastic wrap while one of the price tags still dangled visibly from the bouquet.

You stared at them for a second before a weak breath of laughter escaped you despite the pain immediately punishing the movement.

Santos looked so relieved at the sound she nearly seemed close to crying herself.

“You scared the absolute shit out of us,” she said quickly, like humor was the only thing keeping her from saying something genuinely emotional instead.

The ghost of a smile tugged weakly at your mouth.

Garcia stepped back after finishing the neuro assessment while Santos moved a little closer to the bed, still clutching the flowers awkwardly against her chest.

“Abbott threatened like six people,” she muttered after clearing her throat.

Your eyes shifted toward her slowly.

“He almost went through security trying to get back to Leon.”

Your stomach twisted instantly.

Leon.

For one horrible second you saw him again exactly as he looked before the attack happened. Pale and exhausted beneath ambulance lights while rain hammered against the windows around both of you. Laughing weakly through pain. Asking if you were always that calm. Looking at you like you were safe.

You swallowed hard against the sudden nausea crawling into your throat.

“What happened to him?” you asked quietly, each word dragging painfully through the ache in your fractured jaw.

Santos’ expression changed immediately. The sarcasm disappeared first. Then the humor.

“He’s okay,” she answered after a moment, voice softer now. “Physically, I mean.”

You closed your eyes briefly.

Santos hesitated before continuing more carefully. “He doesn’t remember anything after the seizure started. Robby thinks it’s the postictal state mixed with the head trauma.”

The room fell quiet after that.

Not awkward quiet.

Heavy quiet.

The kind that settled directly into your ribs and stayed there.

Because the worst part was that you believed her completely.

You knew exactly what postictal violence looked like. You understood the neurological confusion, the blind panic, the total loss of recognition that sometimes followed severe seizures. Rationally and medically, every part of your brain understood exactly what had happened inside Trauma Two.

But emotionally, it still hurt in ways you did not know how to untangle yet.

A strange grief wrapped itself around the fear sitting inside your chest because less than an hour before the attack, Leon had been sitting beside you in the back of an ambulance talking about his daughter and his wife and soccer games and stupid jokes while rain pounded against the windows. You remembered thinking he seemed kind, the sort of patient who apologized too much for being in pain.

You had liked him.

And then suddenly he became the person who nearly killed you.

Emergency medicine was cruel like that sometimes. One second somebody was human to you. The next they became trauma.

Santos stepped closer quietly before squeezing your foot gently through the blanket. “We’ll come back later, okay?”

You nodded weakly.

After they left, the ICU room felt unbearably quiet again. Machines hummed softly around you while rain tapped faintly against distant windows somewhere beyond the hallway. Pittsburgh looked gray outside the narrow ICU window, the city blurred beneath another storm rolling slowly across the skyline.

You drifted in and out for hours after that.

Sometimes nurses came in to check vitals and neuro responses. Sometimes transport arrived to wheel you toward imaging. Sometimes you only woke long enough to register pain before medication dragged you under again.

Then sometime deep into the night, consciousness returned slowly enough that you realized somebody was sitting beside your bed.

Jack.

At first you thought he was asleep.

His head rested bowed carefully against your hand where it lay on top of the blanket, broad shoulders slumped forward like exhaustion had physically crushed him downward into the chair. The dim ICU lighting softened the edges of him enough that for one brief second he looked strangely fragile.

Then you noticed he was shaking.

Your heart cracked instantly.

Jack was crying.

Quietly. Almost silently. But hard enough that his shoulders trembled every few seconds beneath the dim blue ICU lights.

The sight hurt worse than any fracture in your body.

You had seen Jack exhausted before. Angry. Burned out after impossible shifts and mass casualty nights and pediatric codes that left entire departments emotionally gutted afterward.

But you had never seen him like this.

Very slowly, ignoring the pain shooting through your ribs and shoulder, you lifted your fingers weakly toward his hair.

The movement alone was enough.

Jack lifted his head immediately.

His eyes were bloodshot and red-rimmed beneath exhaustion so deep it looked painful. There was stubble shadowing his jaw now like he had not even thought about himself since this happened, and the healing cut near his cheekbone stood out harshly beneath fluorescent light.

Destroyed.

That was the only word your exhausted brain could find for the way he looked.

Jack Abbott was always the steady one. The person everybody else leaned on during disasters because he never seemed to break no matter how catastrophic things became around him.

Until now.

“I should’ve stayed.”

The words came out rough enough they barely sounded like him at all. Raw. Torn open somewhere deep inside.

You frowned weakly despite the pain. “No.”

“I knew something was wrong.”

“You couldn’t know.”

“I did.”

Jack stood abruptly then, pacing once across the small ICU room before turning back toward you like he physically could not force himself to stay still anymore. His prosthetic clicked sharply against the tile beneath his scrub pants while one trembling hand dragged hard through his hair again.

“I left you alone in there.”

“Jack.”

His face crumpled so suddenly it stole what little breath your bruised ribs could manage.

“When they pulled him off you...” His voice broke completely for one horrible second before he forced himself to continue anyway. “You weren’t moving.”

Your own eyes filled instantly.

Jack pressed shaking fingers hard against his mouth, trying desperately to regain control of himself and failing anyway.

“There was so much blood,” he whispered finally.

The confession hollowed the entire room out around both of you.

You reached toward him carefully despite the pain.

Jack moved back to your bedside immediately this time, like he physically could not tolerate distance from you anymore, and leaned down slowly until his forehead rested carefully against yours.

For a long time neither of you spoke.

Machines hummed softly around the room while rain tapped gently against the windows again. Jack’s breathing still shook every few seconds no matter how hard he tried controlling it, and you realized with sudden aching clarity that he had been holding himself together by force ever since the attack happened.

Probably for everyone else.

For the department.

For you.

Until now.

Finally, through the ache in your jaw and throat, you whispered softly, “You saved me.”

Jack closed his eyes immediately like the words hurt almost as much as the memory itself.

For a long moment he did not say anything at all. His forehead stayed pressed carefully against yours while his breathing shook unevenly every few seconds, and you realized suddenly that he was trying very hard not to completely fall apart in front of you. The effort of it sat visibly in every tense line of his body, in the way his fingers curled tightly around yours like letting go might physically destroy him, in the way his shoulders remained rigid even now like some part of him still expected another disaster to happen the second he stopped bracing for it.

“You almost died.”

The words came out so quietly you nearly missed them beneath the hum of machines surrounding both of you.

Jack pulled back just enough to look at you again, and the expression on his face made something ache deep inside your chest because he looked terrified still.

Not panicked anymore. Not frantic.

Just deeply, genuinely terrified in a way you had never seen before.

“I couldn’t get to you fast enough,” he admitted roughly, eyes fixed on your face like he needed constant proof you were still here. “I heard the safe word and I ran, but by the time I got there...” His throat tightened visibly. “You were on the floor.”

You swallowed painfully.

Bits and pieces still came back in flashes more than complete memories. Leon’s hands around your throat. The cabinet slamming against the back of your skull. The overwhelming certainty that your body was beginning to give out beneath you.

Then Jack.

Your eyes drifted slowly across his face now, taking him in properly for the first time since waking up. The exhaustion. The fear. The sleepless hollowing beneath his eyes. He looked like somebody who had been surviving on adrenaline alone for far too long.

“You did get to me,” you whispered carefully.

Jack laughed once under his breath, but the sound cracked painfully in the middle. “Barely.”

“That’s not true.”

His jaw tightened immediately.

You knew that look. The same one he got after bad outcomes. After losses he carried around long after everybody else moved on. Jack had always been harder on himself than anyone else could ever be, especially when the people he loved were involved.

And God, he loved deeply.

Even when he pretended not to.

You shifted your hand weakly against his, ignoring the ache radiating through your shoulder and ribs.

“Jack.”

His eyes lifted back to yours instantly.

“I’m here.”

Something inside him seemed to break completely at those words.

Jack lowered his head again, pressing one trembling kiss carefully against your bruised knuckles before holding your hand against his chest. His heartbeat pounded hard and uneven beneath your fingers, fast enough that you could still feel the leftover adrenaline vibrating through him.

For a while neither of you spoke again.

The ICU remained dim and quiet around you while rain continued tapping softly against the windows outside. Nurses’ footsteps echoed faintly somewhere down the hallway, distant enough that it almost felt like the rest of the world existed somewhere very far away from this room.

Your eyelids had started growing heavy again by the time Jack finally spoke.

“You scared me,” he admitted quietly.

The confession sounded small somehow. Honest in a way that made your chest ache more than the injuries did.

You looked at him for a second before squeezing his hand as tightly as your exhausted body would allow.

“I know,” you whispered.

Jack nodded once, eyes never leaving your face.

Then very carefully, like he was handling something impossibly fragile, he leaned closer and pressed a kiss against your forehead while exhaustion slowly began pulling you back under again.

This time, when sleep finally took you, Jack’s hand never left yours.

with one hand firmly planted on your ass he takes one finger and runs it along your slit, gathering your slick as he goes. he lifts his finger to take a closer look, a string of your arousal still connecting him to you, jack can’t help but bring his finger to his mouth to get a taste of you.

“fuck, taste so sweet doll” he groans, his eyes rolling back from how good you taste.

he goes back in, running his finger through your folds a few times before circling over your clit. your back arches and you let out the softest gasp, robby would spank you for that, but not jack.

“that’s it, sweetheart, let it out, feels good, huh?” he coos, rubbing your ass with his free hand while he circles your clit with the other with feather light pressure that makes your head dizzy.

“mhmm…feels s’good, uncle jackie” you mewl, lifting your ass to meet his hand, wanting more pressure, more friction.

he gives it you, uncle jack always gives you what you want. he takes his hand from your ass and runs two fingers through your folds a couple of times before pressing them against your tight entrance. you let out another gasp, his fingers are so thick that even two of them feel like much more than you can manage.

“s’okay doll, you’re okay, just relax f’me, uncle jackie’s gonna take real good care of you” his voice is so soft and calming so you let yourself relax, just as you take a deep breath in jack slowly sinks his fingers inside of you.

“mm, shit—m’sorry, didn’t mean to swear jackie” you cry out, feeling so full already with two of his fingers stretching out your tight little hole.

“s’okay baby, you can swear if you need to. i know it’s a lot for a little one like you, don’t worry i won’t tell dad” jack smiles, endeared by even in your fucked out state you’re still trying your best to be a good girl.

“bein’ so good f’me, sweetheart, takin’ me so well. such a sweet little girl” jack’s cock strains against the tight fabric of his pants, he wants so badly to take it out and have you sit on him, really stretch you out but he know’s robby will kill him, you’re his sweet little girl after all.

your walls clench and flutter around jack’s fingers, he can tell that you’re close so he quickens his pace on both your clit and his thick fingers working inside of you. before long you’re writhing in his lap, crying out soft little noises, begging him to let you cum—obviously something you have to do with robby, jack on the other hand would never not let you.

“okay baby, you can let go. want to feel you cum for me, sweetheart—yea. that’s it, just like that–aw, look so pretty coming for me, doll. what a good girl, my good girl” jack coaxes your orgasm out of you and talks you through it, singing sweet praises as you gush all over his fingers, your body shaking as he rides you through your high.

when you’ve finally come down he pulls your pajamas back over your legs, giving a light tap to your ass before you shakily get up off of his lap.

“come on, let’s get you to bed, i’ve already let you stay up way past your bed time” jack smiles as you kiss his cheek, your face all pink and flushed from your orgasm.

he helps you get cleaned up in the bathroom before taking you to your room, perching on the side of your bed as he tucks you in. he presses a soft kiss to your forehead before turning out the light and heading back to the living room thinking about how robby must be the luckiest guy in the world to be able have this everyday—to have you.

finally did a pussy inspection blurb after being asked probably 100 times—forgive me but i made it uncle!jack, saw a video on x that reminded me of him doing this and went crazyyyyyy!! i hope u enjoyed even if it’s super icky!! <33

want to be added to my fauxcest taglist .ᐣ reply to this post ᝰ.ᐟ

Even when they’d joined the army and found themselves constantly fighting for their country, he’d still somehow kept in contact. Jack had left eventually, after he’d met his wife, and settled down to be a trauma attending. Your father however hadn’t. He’d been the type that found a woman in the military, and had a family with her. 

He was always moving base-to-base, country-to-country, continent-to-new continent. And being his daughter had you a part of that, an army brat being the informal term. You’d grown up in that constant  adapting highly transient lifestyle. Never having any constant in your life, except for the weekends in Nebraska, That once a year weekend your parents pulled you along for. 

Your parents, Abbot and his wife, and Robby with whatever girl he was seeing that week. The ones where you’d spend your time in your room, or by the fire reading books you probably shouldn’t have been so young. But that had changed around fourteen when you’d gone to boarding school, not caring to leave the comfort of your school for a random weekend with your parents' friends. 

Then you’d joined again last year, having left that high school boarding school and spending your nineteenth year of life travelling, a gap year. It hadn’t been planned, you’d just happened to be in Nebraska on your tour of the country you’d been born in but never felt connected to. It had worked out well because Robby was seeing Janey and they had brought Jake along. 

The two of you had immediately hit it off even with the two-year age gap between the two of you, and he’d become a constant in your life. Your best friend who you’d told everything to. Except maybe what you’d really thought of Robby. 

Those thoughts stemming from that weekend, specifically that night. Robby hadn’t talked to you much, not really beyond the normal polite questions. But then you’d somehow ended up alone, around the bonfire, after everyone had gone inside or to sleep. Neither of you being quite ready to leave the warmth of the fire. 

It had started polite enough, talking about you going to university the next year, thinking of seeing if Pittsburgh University was a good fit for your degree. And the more you talked, the less awkward it became. You’d spoken about the PTMC and somehow that had turned into the existence of god and people who didn’t practise what they preached. You would probably chalk it up to the story he’d told you about a pastor and his wife, and how he’d given her a disease he’d picked up from his mistress. 

And before you knew it, it was 2 am and you were laughing about university stories he shared and the dangerous and stupid shit your father, jack and himself had gotten up too. You’d shared your own, having been what could only be described as the resident trouble maker at your boarding school. 

You had connected with him in a natural way. The maturity he pulled out of you and the childishness you’d pulled out of him had been a mix of feelings that you’d never felt before. You’d surprised him with the lessons you’d learnt and the way you spoke had been like the dying fire beside the two of you, warm and safe. 

But it had been a single night and then you hadn’t spoken to him or seen him again past that weekend. Until your parents had decided to settle down and move to Pittsburgh. You’d been in the city a year by then, your first year of university over and done with. 

But with Robbys whole friend group in the same city again, monthly barbeques became a staple, the type your parents never let you skip. You hadn’t minded it too much. The boys always around the grill with drinks in their hands, the girls talking about whatever book they were all reading, while you sat by the pool talking. Your plus one always being Jake, that was until Robby and his mom had broken up and he had felt weird still being there.

It was around the same time you’d brought home your first real boyfriend. Danie lDean, a guy a couple years older than you, who looked like the cover of a magazine, with one of those faces Robby couldn’t help but want to punch. He didn’t like how Daniel had treated you, always dismissive, always bossing you around, never talking to anyone and worst of all,  making rude comments about you under the guise of joking.

Robby never found it funny, he’d mentioned it to Jack once, and they both agreed they weren’t sure how you’d ended up with a guy like that. The typical good for nothing rich boy who thought money brought him respect, when in reality it was the only reason anyone put up with him. 

Your father often confided in him and Jack about it. About how when you’d had your friday night pizza night pool parties with yours and Jake's friend group, he’d never attend and when he did he’d spent the entire time making rude comments about your body, to the point you always ended up pulling a t-shirt on and staying far away from the pool. 

Robby had never met someone with a stick so far up their ass in their lives and he’d met a few. It sort of came with the territory of working in an Emergency Room. And Robby had disliked him terribly after he’d ended up in the ER after a drunk driving incident, and had made inappropriate comments to Santos. She’d put him in his place obviously, always did, but Robby’s view had been changed after that. Especially when Daniel's attitude had changed upon realizing Robby was your dads friend.  

He’d mentioned that incident to you once at one of those lunches a month or two later, how Daniel had been in the ER, and you’d known nothing about it. Having been told his car needed repairs because someone skipped a traffic light. 

It had been about two months since then, since the last time he’d seen you, when your dad had phoned him asking him if he’d help him change a part in your car on a Saturday morning, when you’d come past to visit your mom, and with nothing better to do on his day off he had told him sure and they had set a time. 

They’d been out in the driveway for about an hour, having discovered it was a bigger problem than they had originally anticipated. Robby had pulled his jacket off and was forearms deep in the engine bay, when he’d heard the door in the garage open, and your voice filled his ears. 

“I brought you guys something to drink.” You said as you moved behind him in the garage obviously placing whatever you’d brought down. “Do you think it’ll be much longer?” You ask your dad moving to stand next to him. 

Your dad moves away from the engine bay and wraps an arm around your shoulders. “It was worse than I thought, it should be done this evening. I don’t think you’re going to be able to drive her today” Your dad told you. “I’m sure Robby wouldn’t mind dropping you at your apartment on his way home” Your father had told you and Robby had smiled to himself, at the way your father knew he’d do anything for him. 

You let out a sad sigh and Robby finally untwists the part they were trying to get out. He moves back and hands it to your dad, “I don’t mind at all.” He says the words dying on his tongue when his eyes land on you. His breath faltered for a second at the exposed skin. You were wearing a black bikini set with faded denim micro-shorts. “Sorry, kid” He tells you and you shrug. 

“It’s okay. Thanks though Robby. I was planning on going to the lake with my friends today. I’ll see if Jake can pick me up and drop me off.” You tell him, and he watches as your eyes study him. “Can I just spend the night here afterwards, go home in the morning?” You ask your dad, turning your head towards him.

Your dad starts saying something but your eyes don’t leave him, an indescribable look in your eyes, and a funny feeling he hadn’t felt in months starts sticking to his skin. 

The one that caused a hum under his skin, redness creeping up his neck. Your dad finishes telling you whatever he had been ending with how they needed to replace a part. Your eyes finally leave him as you say your thanks and turn to go back inside. 

He can’t help but look back at you when you do, your dad with his back turned taking a drink of the beers you’d brought out for them. He watches the way your hair moves against your open back, aside from that little string tied in a bow to keep it snug on your body. But then the door closes behind you he snaps his head back to the engine, his mind screaming at him. 

What the fuck was he thinking? You were his best friend's daughter. You were more than half his age. And he was checking you out as if you were just another girl. But why had you been studying him? And what was that look in your eye when you did? 

He shook his head and grabbed one of the beers and took a sip, before getting back to the engine. Your dad had joined him immediately after. 

It wasn't long after that, maybe fifteen minutes later, that a sleek blue BMW was pulling up to the curb beside your house. He knew the car, had seen it a couple times when your boyfriend had graced their barbeques with his presence. He hooted, and through the dark tint he saw Daniel pull out his phone. 

Your dad let out a deep sigh beside him. “Not even decent enough to come knock on the door” He added and Robby huffed. 

“Different time, I suppose” Robby replied, trying to turn his attention back to the mission at hand, but when you come running out the house, sunglasses on, hair in a messy pony, and a shirt over your bikini, it becomes a lost cause. 

“I’ll see you later, dad” You called to your dad. “Thanks again, Robby” You added, as you passed them, your totebag hitting against your hips each step you ran. 

You climb into the car and the ignition starts, and Daniel revs a couple times before driving out the parking and down the road. “She might be an adult but that doesn’t mean she knows how to make good decisions” Your father told Robby, that tone of disappointment in his voice. 

Robby just huffed, turning back to the engine bay, because he had agreed. He didn’t know you well enough to judge but from what your father had told him and Jack, you ignored all his red flags, one after the other. Daniel treated you like someone temporary, that’s how your father had described it. 

And Robby hadn’t understood it, because how could anyone look at you and not immediately think about keeping you safe, fed, loved, looked after. He shook his head again, pushing his thoughts away because they weren’t welcomed. They had that slippery slope flutter to them, the type that could be dangerous if he wasn’t careful. 

They eventually fixed what needed to be done on your car and by the time they got inside the sun was setting and your mom was making dinner. She had invited Robby to stay for food, the very least they could do after helping fix your car. 

And it had just been served when you walked into the house, a lightness to you that you hadn’t carried this morning. The kind that said the sun had worn you out in the best way. “Oh my god, that smells amazing!” You groaned walking into the kitchen, “Please tell me, there’s enough for us” you ask, turning fast to the dining table where Robby and your parents sat. 

“Yea, there should be enough left over” Your mom says and greets Daniel who is beside you on his phone. 

“Huh?” He says looking up, “Oh yeah, hey” he says towards the table before looking back down at his phone. The movement makes Robby's jaw tick because the lack of manners was offensive. You ask Daniel if he’d like some of the pasta and he scoffs.

“We already shared a pizza at lunch, do you really need more carbs?” he says to you, looking up from his phone for the first time unprovoked.

“I had a single piece, you ate the rest. I’m starving” You laughed, as though it was a joke. As though it wasn’t a rude comment he’d made. And Robby's hand tightened around the fork in his hand, anger finding itself in his veins. He watched you dish up a plate for yourself before coming to sit beside him, Daniel sinking into the seat at the head of the table. 

“Did you guys get my car sorted?” You ask, looking at Robby and your dad. You dad says yes, and tells you about it, and Robby can’t help but look just past you at Jackson. 

He didn’t even look up from his phone as you spoke, the conversation shifting to how you spent the day. You spoke about how you met this girl who had a boat and you were tubing on the lake with the boat. You were animated as you spoke, and he didn’t even look up, he didn’t even look the least bit interested in what you were saying. 

Robby, smiled while you recounted how there was a dog that stole a girls top while she was tanning and how her girlfriend and brother ran after it trying to get it back. He took the now empty plates to the sink and grabbed himself a new drink, casually, like he was a part of the furniture. In that way no one batted an eye at. He offers to grab you and Daniel something to drink and you accept and are about to tell him what you want, when he lifts up the can of your favourite drink without you having to say it. 

You thank him and nudge Jackson, who looks at you confused, confirming what Robby already knew. He wasn’t listening. You repeat the question to him and he shakes his head. “Nah, I’m gonna head out” he tells you standing. 

You follow him out to the front door, as Robby sits back down. And when you come back inside, that light feeling that had followed you the first time was gone, instead you sat back down and gave them all a sad smile. “Thank you” you said, picking up the can of cold drink and opening it. 

He winks back at you while he turns the conversation back to your parents who are talking about the next barbeque. But his head is elsewhere, on you. He thinks about what Daniel had said to you when you got food. About how he ignored everyone. He thinks about how you had gone quiet after you came back. He wondered why you put up with it. Why did you let it happen? 

And then a thought crossed his mind that had him immediately freeze. He thought how he would treat you if he was in Jackson's shoes. He shook his head, because why the hell had he thought that? Why had he been paying so much attention to him? He looks at you then as you add something to the conversation, something about the weather being good to swim. 

And his eyes trace you, from your bright eyes, to the dimples by your lips when you smile. He follows the curve of your neck to where it meets your shoulder, imagining water droplets racing down that skin, pooling by your collarbone. He thinks about what it would feel like to kiss the same spot that those water droplets pool. 

He stands immediately at it, almost as if it had scared him. Everyone looks at him confused. “Shit, sorry, I just, I forgot I’m supposed to feed my neighbours cat” He lied. 

Your dad laughed it off but he felt your eyes on him. The ones he feared would see right through him. So he makes quick, thanking your mother for dinner, promising to bring something to the next BBQ, making a joke with your dad as he gathers his stuff and gets ready to leave. 

You and your parents move with him outside, and he hugs each of them goodbye, and then he gets to you. He pulls you into that casual hug that anyone wouldn’t second guess, a normal goodbye. But the second you are pressed against him, he notices how perfectly you fit against him. 

He takes a breath as he pulls back in hopes to ground himself, instead the smell of you hits his head like a drug. It was slightly salty and fruity like sunscreen and icepops, but also warm like vanilla and cinnamon. 

He gives everyone a forced smile before grabbing his helmet and putting it on, starting his bike to warm up the engine. He moves the end of the driveway with it and looks at your family, puts up his hand to wave but he sees that look in your eye again, the one he hadn’t been able to describe earlier, and still couldn’t.

It’s a look that haunts him. The one that you’d given him before he woke up in a cold sweat because his dreams were inappropriate. The same look that would pop up in his head while at work. And worst of all the one that popped up when he’d taken a girl home, right when she’d scream his name as she came. 

He hadn’t stayed long at the most recent BBQ after that, the one they discussed that night, because when he’d walked into the back yard, you were at the edge of the garden on a lawn chair, sun kissing your skin in a way that made you sparkle. He hadn’t even stayed for food, making up some excuse that he had double booked himself. 

Yet when he had walked to his bike after finally saying goodbye to everyone, hoping you were still in the bathroom, as not to have to say goodbye, His heart had jumped to his throat when he saw you outside. You were bent over your driver's seat, one leg in the air as you tried to reach something you didn’t want to walk around the car to get.  It had filled his mind with things he would never say outloud, things he would rather take to his grave. 

Then you had straightened up and caught him watching you. Your face immediately reddened, a blush finding home on your cheeks. You’d made a joke about enjoying the view and he’d kissed that lie he kept telling himself goodbye. The lie that he was just lonely, and you were a pretty girl, that it was nothing more than a shallow physical attraction. 

Because no matter how many girls he fucked, each younger than the other, your face replaced them each time. He’d hated himself for it, because it was wrong. So wrong. He was so old and you were so young. He was thinking about retirement and you were still doing internships. You were one of his best friends' daughters. Someone you’d met when you were a kid, yet he’d only ever really known you as an adult. 

He had stayed as far away from you as he could after that, over working himself in hopes it would drive the want and need away. Yet it never did. He skipped group meet ups, not being able to look your dad in his eyes knowing the dreams he’d had about his daughter. Until his phone rang in the middle of the night, your contact number in bright bold letters.

It’s the early morning, and for once, Jack isn’t coming from his night shift to immediately get himself shot with SWAT. You hear the front door close, then the soft thump of his shoes being placed in the cupboard. Only half asleep, you can picture his after-work routine: a full glass of water downed in one sip, a quick shower, and then a fresh pair of pajamas. Except for the change of clothes and the removal of his prosthetic, none of those things happen before he slips into bed. 

His hands are cold when they find your waist, pulling you close to his chest. You wait for the kiss on your cheek that he usually bestows upon you to greet you, but it never comes. 

“Hi,” you mumble, sleep sticking to your voice. 

He hums a half-answer, not a single word actually discernible. 

You’d blame it on a bad shift if the upcoming Friday wasn’t that date. 

Jack moves a little, and his hands wander up from your side to cross in front of your chest. It’s harder to breathe like this, but you missed him so much you won’t complain. 

Your nipples harden when his fingers brush over your breasts, and heat collects in your lower tummy, along with the slightest bit of discomfort. You would never say it out loud, but you’re terrified he’s imagining her right now. 

He palms you through your camisole, his cool hands gentle but demanding. 

It was one of the first things you noticed about him—how cold his hands always were. He had laughed when you told him and said he was a doctor, that that was just part of the job. And it stayed true to this day; whether he was holding your hand, passing you something, or burying his fingers deep inside you, his skin was always icy enough to make you shiver a little. 

You want to speak up, say something to him, ask him about his day, but the only thing that makes it out of your mouth is a soft moan when he cups your breast and kneads it. 

“Such a pretty sound, baby,” he whispers. His lips brush the outer shell of your ear, chasing goosebumps up and down your arms. His breath ghosts over your face, and your lashes flutter, fighting to stay open as Jack spins his webs of sweet comfort around you. 

He spends so much time working you open and pliant for him—tugging and twisting your nipples until you are writhing right in his arms, desperation turning you into a whining mess. Only then does he move his fingers lower. They drift between the valley of your breasts, then over your belly button, until he meets the edge of your panties. 

“Jack,” you gasp, his name more prayer than anything else. 

He shushes you sweetly, then slips underneath your waistband. You’re warm and wet and gooey, like honey on the stove. His fingers drag through your folds, collecting your arousal that already drenches your underwear. 

“Fuck,” he whispers, “So goddamn wet for me. Missed me that much, hm?”

He has no idea. How much you still miss him even now, while his pointer and middle finger circle your clit, the pressure just gentle enough to keep you eager.

“Jack—yeah, I-I did,” you manage to answer.

With his free hand, he finds your mouth. His thumb swipes across your bottom lip before he tugs it down a little. Your tongue darts out almost instinctively, and he uses that opportunity to press the pad of his finger against the wet muscle. When your lips close around his digit, he moans out loud. 

The pressure in your mouth almost makes you gag, but with his fingers teasing your entrance, all you can think about is how badly you want him. You keep letting your tongue swirl around his finger, sucking him deeper into the hollow of your throat, while his middle and ring finger slip inside of you. 

At first, the fullness is what you’ve been waiting for. Your warm walls stretch for him, accommodating the size of his digits that work their way in and out of you. But when he thrusts his fingers deeper into you, there’s a new coldness introduced, one you wish wouldn’t belong to him.  As he curls his fingers to meet your G-spot, you feel the hard metal of his wedding ring bite against your skin. It’s a sensation you’ve gotten used to, but today, it feels different—just another reminder that there was someone before you, someone Jack would give anything to have again. 

Your jaw grows slack with his thumb still inside your mouth, and part of you wants to tap out, but the heat at the base of your spine grows tighter. The knot unravels as his fingers piston in and out of you, and you cum on his hand with a muffled cry. 

Jack works you through your release until you are shaking from overstimulation and pushing his hands away. 

“That was a good one, huh?” he mutters, and pulls his respective hand from your mouth and cunt.  You are still catching your breath as you nod, tears that won’t spill collecting on your waterline. 

“Yeah,” you whisper. 

Jack hugs you from behind, wrapping his big arms around your middle. You stare at the wall in front of you, waiting for that inherent feeling of sadness to pass. 

“How was work?” you ask.

“Fine,” he answers, then presses a kiss to the back of your neck. “Less busy than usual.”

He clears his throat and tightens his arms around you.  “I’m really tired,” he declares softly.

You swallow hard, the spit in your mouth bitter. 

“You should get some sleep then, my love,” you whisper, “I gotta get up soon anyway.”

--

You’ve learned to only ever cry in the shower when Jack gets like this. It wouldn’t be fair to him to unload your burdens and insecurities on him while he is grieving the life he could have lived. 

As the warm water cascades down your back, and the suds of soap collect at your feet, you let the tears flow until you no longer feel like you are going to choke on them.  The lump in the back of your throat doesn’t exactly go away, but it eases. You breathe a little better, and the tightness in your chest feels more like a memory than an active threat. 

Wrapped in a towel, you stand in front of the mirror and look at yourself. You might look worse than him—dark circles under your eyes, your lips dry and flaky. You pull on the dead skin with your teeth until you bleed, then put on moisturizer and get dressed. 

Jack is asleep, or pretends to be, when you walk into the bedroom. His eyes are shut, his chest rises and falls softly. Your wet hair drips down the back of your neck and drenches your fresh blouse. 

For a moment, you watch your boyfriend. He always looks younger in his sleep, but it is so obvious that this time of the year is tough on him. It’s not that you expect him to just be okay; you’re not that selfish. You simply wish that he would talk to you instead of acting like things were fine. But then again, one might say you are doing the same thing. 

So you keep getting ready for the day and make yourself lunch while this large cloud of things left unsaid hangs over you. 

Work passes by in a blur and drags on simultaneously. It’s a little after 5 pm when you come home, and Jack is up by then. You put your shoes in the cupboard and walk into the kitchen. 

“Hi,” you greet him. 

Jack turns to face you, a tender smile on his lips. He crosses the room slowly, then kisses you briefly.

“Hey,” he answers when he pulls away.  He smells freshly showered, and the tips of his hair are still a little wet. 

As you lean against the counter, he fills up a glass of water and passes it to you. 

“Drink up,” he says. 

The gesture is sweet, but your skin crawls during the entire interaction. Everything feels so utterly performative and unreal that you almost wish he would leave for work early. The word ‘disassociation’ bounces around in your mind, just jumping out of reach every time you try to get a hold of it. 

When you look at Jack, his face doesn’t mirror yours at all. He seems unaware of your emotional turmoil, as if he doesn’t take issue with the situation at all. His face might as well be blank.

Every day, you miss his smug smile, his cheeky remarks, and the way he loves to tease you. All those habits die down every time the date gets closer, and then it takes a few days afterwards until he builds up the courage to slip back into that persona.

Sometimes, you feel like you are being gaslit. Like you’re imagining all these issues, because he just won’t say or show that there is something wrong. 

So you pour a little oil into the fire. 

“Any plans for the weekend?” you ask. “I saw that you’re not working.”

His work schedule hangs on the fridge, this weekend being the only one blank for the entire month.  You watch as Jack freezes in his step, just for a moment, before he fills his mug with tea. 

“Nope, not really,” he answers then. Lie.

“Yeah?” you go on, knowing that you’re treading the line, and leaning dangerously to one side. 

“Yes,” he says, a little sharper than before. His fingers tap against the counter once, twice, before he looks out the window.  “Actually,” he continues, “Maybe I’ll visit the garage with Robby. Check out some bikes with him.” Lie. 

“Oh,” you reply dumbly. 

You watch as the tension builds in his shoulders, and you think you might have him now, but when he turns to face you, Jack is smiling. 

“Yeah, don’t worry, sweetheart, I won’t start riding, too,” he vows quietly.  He holds your chin between his thumb and pointer finger, then kisses you again. There is not an ounce of feeling to it. 

You smile weakly, and he accepts that. 

The hour between your arrival from work and his parting for his shift, you spend in shared discomfort. You start cooking dinner and pack some of it for his ‘break’ that he won’t get, while he hovers in the kitchen like he is scared to leave you alone for too long, but not willing to talk to you either. 

You’re incredibly thankful for the invention of music because you would have fled the house if Jack hadn’t turned on some jazzy playlist to cover the fact that neither one of you had anything to say to the other. 

The second the clock strikes half past six, you pass Jack a Tupperware with his food, then kiss him goodbye.  “Have a good shift,” you mumble when you pull away.  His smile doesn’t reach his eyes as he answers, “Will try.”

The front door falls shut, and dinner tastes like ash. 

--

On Thursday morning, things come to a boil. 

Jack comes home from his shift, the look of death written all over his face. He barely even greets you before he walks straight to the bathroom and locks himself in there for thirty minutes.  You call in sick to work when you hear the water running but never catch him stepping into the bathtub.  Pure fear settles in your stomach, so you pace up and down in front of the bathroom. You know you should tell him you’re there for him and that he can talk to you, but you are too scared to spook him. Your nervous wandering turns into a slow trot before you slide down the bathroom door and sit there in silence. 

It’s almost 10 am when you dare to call out his name.  “Jack?”

You hear a gasp and a soft thump, then his voice follows. “Sweetheart? What- what are you doing here? Why aren’t you at work?”

The thick wood of the door makes him sound muffled, but you don’t miss his tone. Jack usually compartmentalizes well, even after a terrible shift, but right now, he sounds like rock bottom is close, and he is holding a shovel. 

“I took the day off,” you reply. 

He stays quiet for a moment. You picture him in the room, sitting on the edge of the bathtub or leaning over the sink with horror etched into his face, memories he’ll never shake replaying in his mind. 

“Wish I had done that,” he murmurs then. The words are so quiet that you barely catch them, but you do. 

You chew on your lip, trying to think of something to say, anything that might soothe his aching soul, but you can’t come up with anything. So you try the next best thing.

“Can you let me in?”

Your choice of words almost makes you laugh—after all, that is all you’ve wanted for the last few days. 

The other side of the door stays quiet for a long while, and you almost give up hope. Until the lock clicks. You scramble to your feet just in time to meet Jack’s eyes. It breaks your heart to see him like this. Faint tear tracks glisten on his cheeks, wiped away hastily until his skin had reddened.

“My love…,” you mumble, and he looks away instantly. 

“Just a bad shift,” he mutters, his eyes trained on the floor. 

You shake your head and take his hand.  “It’s not just that, is it?” 

You know the answer; you knew it before you even asked the question. Jack’s eyes find yours for a second, and your heart drops as you see his expression: there’s anger in his gaze. Just for a moment. Just a millisecond. It fades into sadness, the one you’d do anything to carry for him. But it was there long enough for you to see it. To read it. To file it away and have it gnawing at your already dwindling confidence until the end of your days. 

But now is not the time for your worries and hurt feelings. 

You pull yourself together and lead Jack out of the bathroom. After situating him on the bed, you bring him a fresh pair of sweatpants and a simple black shirt. You watch him change, watch how his skin is exposed and then covered again by cloth. The faint scars, from training and his time overseas, the ones you know by heart, are a little more noticeable today. 

“Let’s get you into bed,” you whisper to Jack as you push back the blanket. He follows your request on autopilot, slipping underneath the covers. Seeing the blank stare, you almost wish he’d go back to being angry at you. 

“Do you want to eat something, my love?” you ask. 

He shakes his head. 

“Can I keep you company?” you continue. 

You hold your breath as you wait for his answer, and he takes his time. The vacant look in his eyes threatens to trigger tears in your own. His lips part once, twice, before he turns his head and looks away.

“I’d like that,” he mutters then. 

His skin is cold beneath your fingers when you find your place next to him on the bed. Your palm comes to rest on his chest, feeling the sturdy beat below. 

You take a deep breath and try to think of the best thing to say. 

“I know tomorrow will be hard for you,” you begin.  Jack’s entire body tenses up, and his head whips to you, the first sign of life flashing across his face. 

“Don’t,” he pleads. “Don’t talk about it.”

Your lips part, uncertainty making it impossible to think properly. His eyebrows draw together as you struggle for the right answer, and you can almost hear his thoughts. 

“Alright,” you whisper against your better judgment. “Just… just get some rest, honey.”

--

Friday morning, you wake up to an empty bed—not the way you’re used to. In the entirety of your relationship, you can practically count the days you woke up in Jack’s arms on both hands, but today, it’s a new loneliness that greets you as the sunlight filters in through the curtains. 

His side on the mattress isn’t even warm anymore, and you wonder just how much time he had even spent asleep. 

As you climb out of bed, you let your eyes drag through the room and find your favorite photo of all time. Your face is half hidden in it, mushed into Jack’s neck, your nose tickled by his slightly unkempt beard, but it is the happiest you’ve ever looked. You still remember the day as clear as if it had been yesterday. 

It had been taken on your six-month anniversary, just you, Jack, and a small boat he barely knew how to commandeer.  As the salty sea water had sprayed your face with its cold droplets, you grinned at Jack, all smiles and teeth and pure unfiltered happiness. 

He had wrapped his arms around you and whispered, “I love it when it’s just us.” With his chest pressed against your back, you had stared out onto the sea, his warm lips pressing against your cheek.  “Me, too,” you had mumbled fondly. 

Now, you wonder how much of that was still true today.  Back then, you had known that he was a widower but hadn’t known the date of his wife’s passing yet.  

You know it’s wrong to be so jealous of a dead woman—and Jack would probably hate you if you knew just how much you despised her on some days.  But as your fingers drift over the cold, empty space in bed next to you, you allow yourself to wallow in your melancholy a little longer. 

Selfishly, you think you wouldn’t want Jack to move on if you were to die. Of course, no part of you wished to see him sink into depression and utter loneliness as he’d mourn you, but your heart constricts at the idea of him finding love after your passing. You wonder if his wife had thought the same thing, or if she had been a much better person than you and hoped for his happiness—or if the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind at all. 

The sound of the front door closing rips you out of your head. You run to the window overlooking your front yard just in time to catch Jack slamming his car door shut and driving off. 

“Fuck,” you whisper to yourself. 

You think of the past years, of all the anniversaries of her death during which you watched from the sidelines, breath bated. 

On the first, you didn’t even know what was happening. Jack had hidden from you all day, keeping his head buried as he worked a double shift. When he came home, all 24 hours of her death day having already passed, he confessed to you what the date meant to him. 

A year later, you thought you were prepared—you were wrong. You bought flowers and made soup and lasagna, the most comforting food you could think of. When Jack came home that morning (—this time around, you had convinced him not to work all day—), he ate a spoonful before he excused himself and cried in the bathroom. His sobs still echo through your head every now and then when the darkest, deepest part of your insecurities comes to life. 

Eleven months after that, you made the biggest mistake to date. You tried to get Jack out of the city for that week. A booked hotel room, couple’s massages, and room service all went down the drain when you tried to surprise Jack with it. He hadn’t screamed at you—it might’ve hurt less if he had. Instead, he had only muttered that he couldn’t believe you’d think he’d want to do something like that on a day like this.

Which is why you didn’t come up with any plans this year. 

But not doing anything at all feels worse than giving yourself to him as an outlet for his pain. 

The day passes like chewing gum stretches. It expands and grows and keeps giving until you think it might snap, but it doesn’t. Solitude clings to you, burying itself in your bones—it practically settles in your lungs to the point where you’re not sure anymore whether you’re still breathing.

You wander around, fulfilling chores and taking care of things that need to be done, but you don’t remember any of it by the time the clock strikes seven pm. 

Jack isn’t home. 

You are. 

He is chasing a ghost you’ll never be able to replace. 

As you get into your car and drive, it’s an obvious guess where he is. 

--

Wind chases goosebumps down your spine when you open the squeaky gate. Its metal looks old, the rust on its surface rough against your palm. The lush greenery all around surprises you—it’s too early in the year for the shrubs to have that color, but you understand the intention. No one wants to grieve their loved ones in a field of grey. 

The graveyard looks well-kept, some of the graves more than others. Shame fills your chest as you catch yourself wondering how much money Jack might spend on the upkeep of his wife’s one per month.  It could be more than your rent, and she’d deserve every penny. 

He is easy to spot. The silver hairs stand out, illuminated by the gentle evening sun just beginning to settle in for the night. He stands awkwardly, most of his weight shifted onto his left leg, and you feel your heart clench. It’s obvious that he is in pain. You don’t know for sure whether he has been here all day, but you assume so as you walk up to him. 

The bouquet you’re holding trembles in your hands. You take a deep breath before you come to a stop just a few meters shy of him. You try to think of something to say, something clever or loving or maybe even funny. 

“Hi,” is all you can manage. 

Jack flinches—and you wish you hadn’t come. You almost wish he had never even met you. 

Seconds that feel like hours pass where neither one of you speaks or moves. One of the petals of the chrysanthemum in your bouquet falls to the ground. 

Jack’s mouth opens and closes twice, but not a single sound comes out. 

“I…”  You stand there in front of him, feeling like a little kid caught up past their bedtime.  “I hope it’s okay that I came,” you mumble then. 

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he glances at the flowers in your hands and clenches his jaw. 

“I’ll come home soon,” he murmurs. His voice is rough from disuse, thick with tears unshed, or maybe they have been shed already, and he has run out. 

Your heart sinks. 

“You don’t have to,” you reply. “You- you can stay here. I can stay here with you.”

“No.”  His answer is final. It’s not cold or disapproving, just desperate—but so are you. 

“Jack, please,” you beg. “Let me stay. Just… let me help you.”

He flinches as if you shot him. One hand raised uncomfortably, like he’s trying to keep you at bay, he stands there as still as a deer in headlights. You’re the car going ninety. 

“My love, please,” you repeat, taking a step towards him. “I… Just talk to me. Tell me- tell me how you feel, or about her—”

“No,” he interrupts. “Jesus Christ, do you really think—”  He stops himself and shakes his head.  Your worst fears unhinge their jaws as they get ready to feast on you.

“Do I really think what?” you prompt bitterly. “Do I really think that I… that I deserve to know her? That I’m the one who could maybe help you a bit through this grief? I don’t know, Jack, you obviously don’t.”

His mouth falls open. 

“What?” he croaks. 

You shrug helplessly.  “You don’t want me here,” you reply.

“No, I don’t,” he replies. “But not… not because I think you don’t deserve to know her, but because… because you don’t deserve this weight on your shoulders. My grief—my fucking… never-ending grief…”

As his words drizzle out into uncertainty, you’re left to stare at him. 

“I… I just don’t want you to see me like this and think… think that I…”  He shakes his head. 

“That you want her instead of me,” you finish for him. 

“That’s not the case,” he says sharply. 

“Isn’t it?” you counter. 

“No,” he hisses. “She’s gone, and there’s nothing I can do to bring her back. You’re here.”

“Yeah, but if you could—”

“But I can’t!”  His shoulders tremble as he fights to keep his voice down.  “She’ll never come back. Never.”

“But you’ll never stop loving her,” you whisper.

“How can I?” he snaps. “I… I vowed to love her until death do us part, and now—now she is dead, and we’re apart, but I’m still here. And I fell for you.”

He takes a deep breath. “Every day, I’m fucking terrified that I make you feel like… like you have to compete for my love with someone who is not here anymore, and obviously, I’ve fucking done that. And you look at me like… like I’m wounded. You treat me like I’m someone to take care of, so I behave like it.”

“But you don’t let me take care of you,” you reply. “You don’t let me in. You don’t let me help.”

“Because if I do, I’ll have to start talking about her to you. I’ll have to tell you how much I love her and that—I can’t fucking do that to you!” he answers.

“But I’m asking you to do that,” you spit out. “I’d rather hear how much love her than live with her fucking ghost looming over us unmentioned. Like that, I don’t even get to feel second best next to her.”

The world grows quiet at your admission. The wind that was blowing before dies down, much like your bravery. You want to take it back. You wish you could rewind time. 

“Fuck, Jack,” you whisper. “I’m sorry.”

His eyes are glassy as he looks at you. 

“You’re not second best,” he mutters. “You matter as deeply to me as she does. I just don’t know how to show you that.”

“Maybe start letting me in,” you whisper. “Treat me like I’m worth your time. Don’t lie to me about how terrible you feel. Help me help you.” You awkwardly shake the flowers in your hands.  “Let me be part of your grief.”

His eyes follow your hands, and he swallows hard. 

“Did you buy them for her?” he asks quietly. 

“Yeah,” you mumble.  As you walk towards him, it feels like crossing a bridge into unknown territory. Maybe you’re overstepping. Maybe you’re being cruel. Maybe you should be more understanding. 

“They’re… I don’t know what kind of flowers she liked, or… if she liked them at all, but they’re chrysanthemums and Peruvian lilies,” you explain. 

“She would’ve liked them,” he answers quickly. “She liked all flowers.”

He reaches out but stops himself.  “Do you… do you want to…”  He motions to the grave and steps aside. Your path is clear. 

Her grave stone is made from smooth limestone, her name engraved in simple, strong letters.  Beloved wife.

You crouch down and lean the flowers against the stone, then stay there for a second. As you glance over your shoulder, you see Jack looking at you. At both of you. 

“I didn’t get her any,” he mumbles. 

You straighten up and return to his side. 

“Why not?” you ask. 

He stays quiet for a moment before he turns to look at you. “It felt disrespectful to you.”

For a second, it’s like he has stolen all the air from you. The pit in your stomach deepens. And then it eases. 

“Jack,” you whisper, “I don’t care if you get her a million flowers—I’ll deliver them here myself. I just want to know that you look at me and see me. Not her, or her… her successor.”

“I do,” he vows, “I do see you.”

in floriography (the language of flowers), chrysanthemums and peruvian lilies stand for honor, respect, and loyalty

jack brushes his teeth at the sink in your en suite, the door wide open. “what?” he calls out, spitting into the sink.

you moan, your hands clawing at robby’s chest, fingernails digging into his skin as his digits push deeper, curling, dragging against that spongy spot inside you. your hips buck, trying to fuck his hand, but he pins you down with his other palm flat on your belly.

“fuck, i’m gonna—” you cut yourself off with a high, desperate whine as he curls his fingers just right, the pads of his middle and ring fingers rubbing against your g-spot in tight, focused circles.

“there you go, there you go,” robby murmurs, watching your face twist — your mouth open, breath hitching, eyes fluttering. he looks over at jack. “i asked you what your record was. five?”

“for her?” jack hums as he steps out, just a towel on, hair still wet after his shower, watching you on the bed, naked and needy.

robby nods, looking to jack as if they’re just having a regular conversation, as if you’re not really there.

“six,” jack says. “in... fuck, honey, what was it?”

you can barely think straight, babbling incoherently as robby pushes you toward another peak. his digits pump in and out of your dripping cunt, driving you wild.

“he asked you something,” robby says sternly, tapping your cheek lightly. “speak. now.”

your brain is barely able to form words as you mutter, “three hours. it-it was three hours — fuck me, i’m gonna—”

“yeah? you’re gonna what?” robby wonders, helping you get to that high.

you hesitate with your answer, only focused on how he pushes you closer to the edge, until he raises his brows at you with a nod, tapping your chin.

“gonna-gonna cum. please. fuck—” you whine.

“you’re being a dick,” jack murmurs as he goes back into the bathroom, finishing brushing his teeth.

“she loves it,” robby sighs. “i think i can break that.”

“break what? my record?” jack scoffs from the bathroom.

“yeah. six in three? she’s about to do three in one. that’s another one per hour. i could bring it to two, make it eight. go ahead, honey. make it three for me,” robby hums, not looking away from you now as you come undone under his fingers, whining low and pitchy all at once as you scratch at robby’s chest, hair digging under your fingernails slightly as you peak. “good girl. good girl, yeah, feels nice, doesn’t it?” he hums as he watches you soak his fingers again.

jack spits into the sink again. “if you make it eight, then i have to make it ten. it’s an honour thing. my girlfriend — i have to hold the record.”

“if you make it ten, i have to make it twelve,” robby remarks as you pant beneath him, his fingers dragging out of you. a light slap over your folds makes you whine as you drag your hands over his cock. “less an honour thing, more pride.”

“are you seriously making this — what? some sort of competition?” jack scoffs as he walks out of the bathroom. he leans down toward you and kisses you sweetly. “hey, baby.”

you moan into his lips before jack moves away.

“me? competitive? not at all,” robby groans as your hands wrap around him. “fuckin’ — give me a second, will you? needy tonight,” robby murmurs, kissing at your tits sweetly as you slow your movement before pulling back and looking to jack, who’s headed to his dresser to get dressed. “but you? you love competition.”

“bullshit,” jack sighs as he drops his towel, pulling on his boxers before sitting down in an armchair.

“yeah? what was that situation last—” robby groans when your fingers find their way over his tip. “oh, sweetheart, fucking...” he hums, hanging his head into the crook of your neck.

jack watches with a hum as robby manhandles you beneath him, switching positions as robby sits at the head of the bed, moving your hips over his, lining his cock up with your core before guiding you down over him, feeling you ride him, fingers digging into his shoulders.

“what was that... situation you had with shen, then? last month? most patients in twenty minutes?” robby recalls, groaning as he watches you bottom out on him, pussy warm and tight around him.

“that’s different. we were helping people,” jack sighs.

“we’re helpin’ someone,” robby shrugs, a hand over the back of your head, gripping at your scalp. “isn’t that right, sweetheart? we’re helping you.”

you moan, clenching tighter around him. robby hums, groaning softly.

“think you’re just afraid i’m gonna win.”

jack scoffs, rolling his eyes as he moves to sit next to the two of you on the bed, beside robby, as if this is the most casual conversation they could possibly have while you ride him.

“oh, brother, you aren’t gonna win. i know her body. know what she responds to,” jack sighs as he watches you.

“think i do too.”

robby’s fingers work magic on your clit, rubbing gentle circles as he moves your hips to a new angle. your back arches, a low moan escaping your lips as the pleasure builds.

“goddamn it, right there, honey, right there,” robby groans, hitting his head against the headboard as he loses himself in your tight heat. his cock throbs inside you, coated in your slick arousal.

“fine, fine. we’re doing this,” jack sighs, leaning against the headboard as he watches you take robby’s cock. “what should we cap it off at? what are the rules?”

“i don’t know. fucking hell,” robby groans, fingers rubbing firm circles on your clit. your hips buck against his hand, desperate for more.

“now you’re pussy-drunk?” jack says with a smirk. “see what you did to the mean one now, baby? made him an idiot.”

robby slaps jack lightly on the chest, telling him to shut up. jack grabs his wrist and moves robby’s hand to his own cock, making him stroke him.

“you wanna talk rules?” robby scoffs as he moves his hand up and down jack’s shaft. jack inhales sharply at the contact, letting go of robby’s hand as he leans back, watching you intently.

“well, we aren’t animals... gotta make her feel good first and foremost,” jack says, eyes glued to your bouncing tits and pretty moans.

“she’ll be fine.” robby speeds up his hand over jack’s cock before giving up, too focused on you. jack sighs and takes over stroking himself, fisting his thick shaft as he watches you take robby’s cock like a pro.

robby’s hips thrust up into your wet heat, fucking you harder, deeper. his fingers rub firm circles on your clit, pushing you closer and closer to the edge.

“m’sorry, uncle robby” you pout, pushing the door open and stepping inside, your hands behind your back and head turned to the floor—embarrassed that you’d been caught.

“s’okay, i don’t mind” he’s turned to face you now, still stroking his cock at a languid pace, “you can watch if you want to, sweetheart, nothing wrong with that”

“y-yeah?” tentatively you look up, robby bites back a groan as your eyes land on his fist pumping his cock.

“course, take a seat” he nods his head to the counter space by the sink and you shuffle over to it, pulling yourself up onto it, swinging your legs as they don’t quite reach the ground while you’re watching him, heat building in your tummy.

“it’s okay, you can touch yourself too if you want, sweetheart” he smirks, his bottom lip pulled between his teeth.

it takes you a beat but slowly you slip your hands under the waistband of your pants again and resume your motions from before, your fingers lightly brushing over your clit, sliding through your soaked folds beneath the fabric.

“feel good?” he asks, his eyes glued to your hand between your legs.

“mhmm” you nod slowly, still watching him as he pumps his cock faster.

“think you could take your pants off for me? want to see you touching that pretty little pussy of yours, would that be okay? want to show uncle robby how you touch yourself?”

slowly you nod and pull down your pants, your hands shaking slightly as he watches you hungrily, your underwear goes down with them, discarding them in a pile on the floor.

you lean back on the counter, both feet up on it as you spread your legs wider, giving him an unobstructed view of your pussy glistening under the harsh light of the bathroom.

“fuck, such a good girl touching yourself for me, so so pretty, sweetheart” robby groans as he watches the way your fingers dance over your clit, trying to match his pace.

it doesn’t take long for you both to end up cumming at the same time in a chorus of deep grunts and soft moans, your body shakes against the cool metal of the mirror you’re leaning against.

and afterwards you go back down to join your family for dinner like nothing ever happened—but you know you’re going to get it when you go back up to your shared bedroom for the night.

uncle!robby seems to be flopping recently so i changed the title to dbf to see if that helps…even tho it’s literally the same thing dbf just seems to do better???

bruhhhhhh about came in my fucking pants writing ‘want to show uncle robby how you touch yourself’ yum yum yum yum yum 😵‍💫😵‍💫

pseudo taglist ⋆˚꩜｡ @cod-guys-slvt @puppyboy-khali @gaultiano @robinavitchgf @popecodysgirl @cameronsbbg @mrs-depp @diilfluvrr @strangemar @quicksilver21 @di1fluvr @cerealov3r @strawberryemiry @robinaabb0t @scootlerdoodler @unicvnthlle @allthegoooooodfics @alphabetically-deranged @aerangi @glitter-abbot @httpfatherhowo @maystyles @vaelyrians @girljusttrying28 @wylde-goblin-girl @kissalready @rufles2 @everythingabby101 @miniswritinblog @mira-xx @batcat46 @girljusttrying28 @kitkatrina @joelmillerswifey @mitchielee @gramelda @notthatmultifandomwhore @prettyflowerlily @generation-zero @whimsyweepingwillow @bikinibottomspeach @oxythoughtin @lovergirlellie @eternalabbot @brasspistol

want to be added to my pseudocest taglist? reply to this post x

“Robby,” you repeated for the millionth time, staring at the way his focused eyes stayed glued to the computer screen. “Robby, are you even listening to what I’m saying?” Your words went in one ear and straight out the other. His attention was completely locked on the patient charts, as if the world had temporarily ceased to exist. 

You let out a quiet sigh, then reached over the nurse station counter, fished a latex glove out of the open cardboard box, and with a quick movement, snapped it right against his back.

“Ouch!” Robby exclaimed, finally jerking his gaze away from the screen. He rubbed the spot where the glove had stung him, looking equal parts surprised and betrayed. “Why the hell did you do that?”

“Because I’ve been trying to talk to you!” You fought to keep your voice from snapping, though the frustration was definitely leaking through. “Did you call the bouncy castle people already?”

He nodded, leaning back in his chair with a groan. “Yeah, already did. They’re charging me two hundred extra for switching from the unicorn castle to the capybara one with less than a week’s notice, by the way.” He tried to sound annoyed, but it didn’t quite land. Michael loved his daughter far too much for that. If he had to build a goddamn capybara bouncy castle with his own two hands so she could have whatever she wanted in the entire world, he would do it without hesitation. Instead of irritation, his expression softened into something almost endearing, the corners of his mouth twitching like he was fighting back a smile at her latest demand.

“And you’re paying for it without complaining because you’re a great father,” you said matter-of-factly, unable to hide the fond smile tugging at your own lips. “Remember, the party’s at three. You still good for setup?”

Robby exhaled through his nose, the sound almost a laugh but not quite. "They're delivering the capybara monstrosity at one-thirty. Said they'd set it up in the backyard." He rubbed a hand over his jaw as if he was remembering what other arrangements he’d made. "Also confirmed the balloon guy with a helium tank, should be there by two."

You nodded, feeling the relief you always felt whenever Robby managed to take care of everything. Co-parenting with Robby has always been like this, efficient, practical, and competent. No missed pickups, no forgotten appointments. He'd never once let your daughter down, even when work tried to swallow him whole.

"And the cake?" you asked because you can't help it, even though you knew the answer.

He gave you a side-eye, the one that said do you even have to ask? "Chocolate with vanilla buttercream, extra sprinkles. Pickup at two-fifteen, I'll swing by after my shift ends, already talked to Shen and he’ll cover for me.”

Five years ago, you were a fourth-year med student rotating in this very department, terrified of screwing up in front of the mighty Dr. Robinavitch. Then Dr. Robinavitch slowly became Dr. Robby to you… and eventually he was just Michael when you were moaning his name under the weight of his body in his bed.

What you and Robby once had was simple, and you both liked it that way. It was the comfort of each other’s company after a brutal shift when neither of you wanted to be alone. No strings, no labels, no complications of being a real couple. No whispered rumors in the hospital about Robby seeing a med student outside of work. No pressure on Robby’s well-known inability to commit to anything more than passionate sex at night and coffee in the morning.

But simple things didn’t always stay simple, especially not when two adults knew exactly how risky it was to keep skipping protection, and neither of you ever felt much enthusiasm about pulling out. “Fuck, this is the last time, Michael,” you’d said more than once, breathless and frustrated. “Why are you nagging me?” he’d reply with a half-smirk, still catching his breath. “I had every intention of pulling out before you wrapped your legs around me like that.”

And that’s exactly how, six months after the first night you slept in Robby’s bed, you found yourself staring at the most terrifying sight you’d ever witnessed in your life: two pink lines on a plastic stick.

The conversation that followed was painfully awkward. You told Robby you were pregnant, and Robby, being who he was, decided it was time to put on his big boy pants and play his cards right. Life had handed him something he never thought he’d get, a baby, a real chance at a family. So he did what any traditional man would do in his position: he settled with you.

You’d moved into his house, and Robby and you had settled into a routine, not as two people who casually slept together on lonely nights, but as partners, and soon-to-be parents.

Robby took you to every single appointment. He insisted on every test to ensure his child’s safety, blended you the best prenatal smoothies, disgusting carrot-and-spinach concoctions that made you gag but that he swore were just what you needed, and even pushed hard for you to take early maternity leave. But of course, you refused, determined to finish your last year of med school before the baby arrived.

The day your daughter was born was the happiest day of Robby’s life. Even now, it still brought him to tears whenever he thought about it, the moment his entire life changed forever, the day he met his greatest love, his reason to keep going, to keep living, to try harder every single day.

But even as Robby put in his best effort to be a boyfriend, it didn’t take long for the fantasy to crumble.  It wasn’t all sunrays and paradise, and after endless long shifts in the ED, endless diapers, and all-night cries that never seemed to stop, you were both running on fumes. It became painfully clear, day after day, that the only reason Robby had decided to settle down with you was because he’d gotten you pregnant.

You could see how unhappy he was. He barely spoke a word to you when he got home from work. He’d just sit on the couch with distant, lost eyes staring at the wall like he was the most miserable person alive. The only times he laughed or smiled were in the presence of his daughter. You couldn’t help but feel crushing guilt for trapping him in a relationship he never truly wanted. Robby had longed for a family and for company, but once he had it, he didn’t know what to do with it.

That’s why, after five months of fights and desperate trying, you decided it was time to do the most noble thing you could: let him go. Set him free instead of keeping him trapped beside you in a pretend marriage he’d only started because he was too considerate to let you raise his daughter alone.

Hannah Robinavitch had never once envied her friends whose parents were still married. She never got sad or asked why the three of you couldn’t just be a normal family. Because she already knew you were one, a little different from the others, maybe, but still a family nonetheless. And having separate parents actually had its perks. It meant two houses, twice as many birthday presents, and two different vacation destinations every single year.

Sunlight slanted through the tall maple trees lining the backyard fence, painting patterns across the grass. Your yard was huge, the short green grass always perfectly maintained, and the swimming pool sparkled with crystal-clear water that seemed to catch every ray of light. It was the kind of house you could never have afforded on a resident’s salary in a million years. But Robby had made sure you and Hannah had it anyway the moment the two of you decided to part ways and break up. He’d never blinked at the money when it came to his daughter. If giving her (and you) the nicest possible place to live during your half of the week with her, in a safe, beautiful neighborhood full of every comfort meant making his baby girl happy, then he would do it without hesitation.

Because fuck, Robby was such a good father. The kind who puts his little girl first and everything else second. He finally had a real reason to take days off work and actually go on vacations. He finally had something to look forward to, a future worth living for: taking care of his daughter, watching her grow up, teaching her things, just being needed by this helpless little angel who still demanded he check under the bed for monsters every single night.

You’d read once that when it came to having children, women should look for a man who would make a good father, not necessarily a good husband. Because love could run out. People broke up. They got divorced. But a child was a lifelong commitment. And you’d won the lottery with Michael, even if sometimes you still wished he could have been as good a partner as he was a father.

The enormous capybara-themed bouncy castle Hannah insisted on dominated the grass as screams of delight and the rhythmic thump-thump of small feet echoed from inside it. All her kindergarten friends chased each other in circles as their parents clustered near the patio tables, drinking iced tea and making polite small talk about preschool and summer camps.

You were on snack duty, refilling the chip bowls, and right on cue, the side gate swung open. Robby stepped through, wearing dark jeans and a button-down shirt rolled to the elbows, the sleeves catching on the muscles of his forearms, revealing Hannah’s name tattooed on his wrist.

He was carrying a large gift box wrapped in shiny silver paper with a bright red ribbon tied around it. The second Hannah’d spotted him, the entire backyard might as well have disappeared.

“Daddy!” She launched herself down the slide so fast the inflatable nearly tipped. She was sprinting with her bare feet on the grass before she even landed properly.

Robby dropped to one knee just in time to catch her as she collided into his chest like a missile. He laughed and wrapped his arms around her, lifting her clean off the ground for a second, even though she was getting too big for it. She squealed and buried her face in his neck.

“You came! You came!”

“Wouldn’t miss it, babygirl.” He set her down but kept one hand on her shoulder. “Happy birthday.”

She was s already eyeing the box. “Is that for me?”

“Depends.” He raised an eyebrow. “You been good?”

“Super duper good! Ask Mommy! I only ate two cupcakes and I shared my shovel in the sandbox with the other kids!”

You caught his eye over her head, and Robby gave you the tiniest smirk, yeah, he knew “two cupcakes” was probably an undercount.

“Guess it’s yours then.” Robby set the box on the grass, and Hannah attacked the paper. A brand-new bike glints in the sunlight, purple with whitewall tires, training wheels already attached, and even a little bell shaped like a flower.

Hannah froze for half a second, then let out a shriek that made half the parents jump. “A BIKE! Daddy, a BIKE!”

She flung herself at him again, hugging him so hard he had to brace himself. He laughed again, softer this time, and rubbed a hand over her back. “Figured it was time for you to have some riding lessons.”

“I can ride it now? Right now?”

He glanced at you for a quick check-in, the way he always does when big decisions happen, and you nod once.

“Yeah, angel,” you said, walking over. “But helmet stays on, and daddy’ll hold your seat until you’re steady.”

Hannah was already trying to climb on, so Robby steadied the bike with one hand, using the other to guide her foot to the pedal. She wobbled the second her weight hit the seat, but she was grinning so wide it looked almost painful.

Robby shot you another look and then crouched beside Hannah again. “Ready?”

She nodded furiously, and Robby started walking her forward, keeping one hand on the seat, the other hovering near her shoulder to steady her in case she fell. She pedaled hard, poking her tongue out in concentration. The bike lurched, straightened, and lurched again. Robby kept pace easily as you watched from the patio steps. The man who once told you, half-asleep after a fifteen-hour shift, that he wasn’t sure he knew how to be anyone’s dad, was now the same man who walked backward in front of a wobbling five-year-old, talking her through every turn.

“Push harder with your right foot… there you go. Look where you want to go, not at the ground. Yeah, just like that.”

Hannah laughed when the bike finally held a straight line for more than three seconds, and Robby let go of the seat, just for a heartbeat, and then grabbed it again when she tipped.

“I did it! I almost did it!”

“You’re doing it,” he corrected her, encouraging like he’d read in so many parenting books. “Keep going.”

They made a loop around the bouncy castle. Parents pulled out phones to snap pictures of her, and someone even started clapping, making Hannah beam like she was crossing a finish line. You felt eyes on you, Robby’s, briefly. He didn’t say anything, but the look told enough: we made this kid. Look at her.

After another lap, he slowed her to a stop near the bouncy castle. She was flushed and sweaty, but utterly triumphant. “Can we take the training wheels off?” she asked immediately.

Robby exhaled a laugh. “Tomorrow, maybe. Today we celebrate the fact you didn’t eat pavement.”

He ruffled her hair, then stood, brushing grass off his jeans. Robby walked over to you, watching Hannah show off her new ride to anyone who’ll listen.

“You good?” He asked you. “You’ve been running this circus solo all afternoon.”

“I’m fine. Exhausted, but fine.” You paused, then added softly, “She’s having the best day. Because you’re here.”

He looked at you then, and something about his eyes reminded you of the way he used to look at you when you were falling asleep on his couch with a newborn between you. “Yeah,” he said. “Me too.”

Hannah zoomed past again, ringing the little flower bell. “Five,” he muttered, almost to himself. “How the hell did that happen?”

You didn’t have an answer, you just stood there beside him, your shoulder almost brushing his, watching your daughter ride circles around the backyard.

Two hours later, you were cutting slices out of the chocolate cake while Robby stood right next to you, handing them out to the sugar-desperate kids swarming the table.

You passed another slice to Robby. He took it from your hands, brushing his fingers against yours for a brief second.

“You know, I didn’t see Vet Guy over here,” he said, pulling on a dramatically disappointed face. “Bummer. I was really hoping to finally meet the guy.” You decided to ignore the sarcastic, obviously ill-intended comment. Robby, never one to let silence win, kept going. “I suppose he was busy. Did he have a labradoodle to give a haircut?” He let out a loud, self-satisfied chuckle that rumbled into a deep “Ha!”

“That’s a pet esthetician, you know?” You mumbled, aggressively slicing the knife through the cake. “Vets don’t do haircuts.”

“Oh, you’re right,” he mock-apologized, not even pretending to drop the subject, not when he had weeks’ worth of jokes lined up. “Then I guess he had some high-risk procedure. Open-heart surgery on a hamster, maybe?”

“You’re hilarious, Michael,” you said with your biggest deadpan face. “How long did it take you to come up with that one?”

“Oh, I have plenty more where that came from,” he replied, grinning. “Do you even call him Doctor? I mean, vets aren’t even real doctors.”

“Of course they are!” you shot back with sudden, exaggerated respect for the veterinary profession, purely to piss him off.

Vet guy was nice. You’d met him at the hospital after he came in with a nasty dog bite on his leg. You’d tended to the wound while he respectfully flirted with you, not too hard, not desperate or aggressive, but just enough to make you feel seen. He asked genuine questions about you, shared funny stories from his own job, and somehow managed to pull real smiles out of you even after a brutal shift.

When he asked for your number, intending to take you to what he swore was the best Thai restaurant in Pittsburgh, you’d hesitated. You didn’t need more distractions from residency and motherhood. But Dana had insisted you accept. She said you needed to spend time with adults outside the hospital, to do something just for yourself, and to let yourself be treated nicely for one night. Secretly, you knew she was cracking up at the way Robby’s jealousy flared every time Vet guy flirted with you, the way he clenched his jaw, cleared his throat, and rolled his eyes like a petulant child.

You’d gone out with him a couple of times. It was fun. He was a gentleman, smart, funny, handsome, the type of man most women would be thrilled to stumble upon. But then your stupid, stupid brain did that awful thing it always did whenever you started seeing someone new: it compared him to Robby. Robby would’ve ordered that. Robby would’ve said that. Robby would’ve done that. As if your brain had never gotten the memo that you and Robby had broken up. That it hadn’t worked. That you were supposed to be looking for a guy who wasn’t like him at all.

“Oh, please. WE are doctors. They’re frauds.” Robby scoffed. “What’s that guy’s biggest life achievement? Getting vomited on by a dog?”

“You’ve clearly thought a lot about a guy I’ve only gone out with like two times,” you offered him your fakest smile. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were the one dating him, not me.”

Robby’s expression, which up until that moment had been mocking and sleazy, changed completely. His smile flattened into a thin, straight line, and his eyes turned serious. “Funny,” he mumbled as he handed another slice of cake to a waiting kid.

“And to answer your question, no, I wasn’t gonna bring some random guy I had dinner with a couple of times to my daughter’s birthday. You know me better than that.”

He didn’t say anything else. Robby knew you were right, you weren’t the type of person who introduced someone new into Hannah’s life unless it was truly serious. But behind all the mockery and cheap jokes, there was something dangerously close to jealousy. The thought of you deciding another man was better than him, more worthy of your time and interest, the idea of Hannah ever having a stepdad, of him no longer being the only male figure in both your lives… it infuriated him.

Was he an asshole for wanting to keep you all to himself when he had no right to demand to be the only man in your life? Maybe. Was he stupid to pretend that a gorgeous, smart, and amazing woman like you would stay single forever, living on the memory of what you two once were, waiting for him to finally grow a pair of balls and give you what you deserved? The same thing he’d had every chance to give you years ago, but had been too scared to reach for, letting it slip away Definitely.

As the party came to an end, kids hugged, and parents collected backpacks and stray shoes, mumbling thank yous to you and Robby.

You stood by the gate, waving and promising playdates. Robby was on Hannah duty now, helping her say goodbye to each friend, crouching so he was eye-level, reminding her to say “thank you for coming.”

Most of the crowd thinned out quickly, a few stragglers lingered, one of them was Ethan, father of Mia, one of Hanna’s closest friends from the four-year-old room. Divorced last year, or so the gossip went. Nice enough guy. Tall, with an easy smile. He was hanging back near the patio table, helping stack chairs while his daughter ran one last lap around the bouncy castle.

You walked over to grab the last of the empty cups. “Great party,” he said, straightening up. “Hanna’s in heaven. That bike was a killer gift.”

“Thanks. Robby picked it out.” You smiled, tossing cups into the trash bag. “She’s been begging for one since she saw the big kids riding at the park.”

Ethan nodded, lingering his eyes on your face for a second. “Smart move.” He paused, then added, softer, “You pulled this off like a pro. Solo hosting a kindergarten party? Respect.”

You laughed lightly. “Not entirely solo. Robby’s been here all afternoon.”

“Yeah, I saw.” His tone was casual, but there was a flicker of curiosity there, maybe appraisal. “You two seem… good. Co-parenting goals and all that.”

“We manage,” you said neutrally.

He stepped a little closer, dropping his voice like he was sharing a secret. “Listen, if you ever want a break from… all of this. I just… figured it might be nice to talk to someone who gets the single-parent thing.” He smiled warmly. “Mia talks about Hannah nonstop. Be good for them to have more playdates. And for us to… catch up. Maybe you could give me some tips for this whole co-parenting lifestyle.”

It wasn’t subtle at all. The way he held eye contact a beat too long, the slight lean, the casual brush of his hand against yours when he handed you a stray napkin. You felt heat creepong up your neck. It wasn’t interest, exactly, just the awkward awareness of being seen that way. 

You opened your mouth to deflect politely. But before you could, behind you, a voice cut in.

“Ethan, right?” Robby was there suddenly, casual as anything, holding Hannah’s new helmet in one hand. “Mia’s dad.”

Ethan straightened, his smile faltering only a fraction like he’d been caught red-handed. “Yeah. Hey, man. Good to see you.”

Robby nodded once. “You too.” He flicked his gaze to you, then back to Ethan. “We’re starting to clean up over here. You need help finding her shoes? Think they’re by the slide.”

Ethan blinked, then laughed it off. “Nah, we’re good. Just saying goodbye.” He looked at you again. “Think about what I said, okay? No rush.” He waved, called for Mia, and headed toward the gate.

You exhaled slowly, but Robby didn’t move. He was quiet for a long minute, then: “Sooo. Ethan.”

You snorted as you started gathering stray plates from the patio table. “Yeah?”

Robby followed, picking up cups without being asked. “Seemed chatty.”

“He’s friendly.”

“Very friendly.” Robby stacked the cups. “Animated, even.”

You glanced at him. His face was neutral, almost too neutral, a sign of how secretly annoyed he was. “Robby.”

“What?” Innocent. It sounded too innocent.

“You’re being nosy. First with vet guy, and now again.”

“I’m making conversation.” He set the stack down. “Guy was all secretive talking in your ear. What’d he want?”

You laughed despite yourself. “None of your business.”

He raised an eyebrow. “That bad?”

“Not bad. Just… standard divorced-dad. He wanted to organize some playdates. The usual.”

Robby nodded slowly, like he was filing that away. “Huh.”

You waited, but he didn't elaborate. Instead, he picked up a stray balloon string, winding it around his fingers. “Guy’s got some nerve. Hitting on you in the middle of our kid’s birthday party.”

Our kid. He didn’t say it possessively, just as a fact. You turned to face him fully. “Jealous, Robinavitch?”

He met your eyes without flinching. “Curious,” he corrected. “Big difference.”

“Sure.”

He didn’t deny it. “Anyway,” he said, his voice back to normal without the edge of jealousy in it. “I’ll help deflate that monstrosity in the yard before it blows away. Then I’ll get out of your hair.”

After Robby had helped the bouncy castle guys, he hauled the last of the folding chairs back to the garage and carried out three trash bags without being asked. He stepped back into the kitchen through the sliding door. “Hannah's out cold,” he said, keeping his voice low so he didn’t wake her. “Tried to get her to brush her teeth, but she rolled over and kept sleeping.”

You laughed under your breath. “She’ll be up at six tomorrow demanding to ride the bike again.”

“Good luck trying to talk her out of it.” You felt the weight of his gaze as he pushed off the counter. “Anyway, I should head out. Early shift tomorrow.”

You turned the faucet off, drying your hands on a dish towel. “Thanks for everything today. Seriously. She had a great time thanks to you.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “Thanks to both of us. We’re a good team.”

You walked him toward the front door. At the door, he stopped, with one hand on the knob as he turned back to you. For a second, he just looked, not at your face, but at all of you.

His eyes started at your bare shoulders where the thin straps of your sundress sat, tracing the line of your collarbone, then they dropped deliberately down the front of the dress. You felt suddenly aware of every inch it covered, and of every inch it didn’t. Robby lingered his gaze on your waist, the flare of your hips, and the hem brushing just above your knees. Then lower, to your legs, and back up again, slower this time, until he met your eyes.

There was heat in the way he looked at you, nothing subtle about the way his eyes roamed your body. It was the look of a man who was remembering exactly what you feel like under his hands, what you tasted like, what sounds you used to make when he was inside you. The kind of look that said he wanted to back you against the nearest wall, hike that dress up around your waist, and fuck you until the only thing either of you could hear was your own breathing and the wet sound of skin against skin.

He didn’t say anything, there was no need for words. Your mouth went dry as the heat coiled in your lower belly, the same way it had many nights before. Five years since you stopped sleeping together. Five years of boundaries, separate beds, separate lives. And still one look was enough to make your body remember. 

He exhaled through his nose, almost an incredulous laugh, “Happy birthday to her,” he said quietly, nodding toward the living room. “We made something good.”

“Yeah,” you managed to say, your voice coming out softer than you meant it to. “We did.”

The weeks slid by in the same rhythm you’d grown accustomed to: long shifts at the hospital, trying to be a present mom whenever you weren’t buried in charts, and the handoffs with Robby at your house.

It was a Saturday afternoon, the day of Hannah’s ballet recital. You arrived a little early because she had been buzzing about it for weeks, her first real performance after long months of practice. Plus, you appreciated every rare opportunity life gave you to wear something that wasn’t scrubs. You’d gotten your hair done, put on soft makeup, slipped into a nice dress and high heels, and for once you felt like a whole different person. Someone confident. Someone who could take on the world.

You loved Hannah. You loved being a mom. But sometimes you missed the person you used to be before all of this. You missed being seen as more than just “Mom.” You missed conversations with adults that didn’t revolve around kindergarten, tantrums, or pediatric appointments. You were still young, and even though you’d always been mature for your age, you’d had to grow up fast the moment you became a mother. You had never imagined yourself with a child before you even became a doctor. You certainly hadn’t pictured managing residency at the same time you were raising a tiny human being.

But even if life hadn’t turned out the way you’d once planned, you didn’t regret any of the decisions that had brought you here in this auditorium, about to watch your daughter’s ballet recital.

You spotted Robby near the front row, saving seats for the two of you. When he saw you, he stood, waving you over with a half-smile.  “Hey,” he said as you slid into the seat beside him. “She’s backstage, losing her mind. Kept asking if both of us were coming.”

You laughed softly, settling your purse on the floor. “Wouldn’t miss it. Was she nervous?”

“Not one bit. She made me practice clapping in the car.” He glanced at you, his eyes lingering a second longer than necessary. “You look nice.”

You couldn’t avoid feeling the heat creeping up your neck, but you brushed it off. “Thanks. You cleaned up nice, too.”

Before he could reply, the lights dimmed, and the ballet instructor, a woman in her sixties, welcomed everyone, and then the curtain slowly parted.

There she was. Hannah stood front and center in her pink leotard and tutu, her hair,the same brown shade as Robby’s, pulled into a slightly lopsided bun secured with a sparkly clip. She immediately scanned the audience, spotted the two of you sitting side by side, and her whole face lit up like sunrise. Forgetting every rule about staying still, she waved at you both with both hands.

The routine was equal parts adorable and chaotic, little arms waving with enthusiasm, a few spins that turned into giggles, and tiny dancers bumping into one another. But when it came time for her part in the middle, Hannah nailed it,  twirling with maximum concentration, poking out her tongue slightly the way it always did when she was trying her hardest.

You were grinning so hard your cheeks ached as you recorded the whole thing on your phone, careful not to miss a single moment. Beside you, Robby was doing the same, leaning forward in his seat like he was afraid to miss even one second of his little girl shining under the stage lights.

When it ended, the room erupted in applause. You and Robby were on your feet first, clapping loud enough to drown out half the parents. Hannah beamed, blowing kisses at the audience, then bolting offstage the second she was allowed.

Backstage, Hannah launched herself at you both at once, her arms around your legs and Robby’s in a group hug.

“Did you see me twirl, Mommy? Daddy, did you see?”

“We saw everything,” Robby said, scooping her up in his arms. “You were the best one up there, angel. Hands down.”

“You were perfect,” you whispered, leaning to place a big and loud kiss into her hair. “So proud of you, baby.”

Hannah tugged at your hand. “Can we get ice cream? To celebrate?”

Robby raised an eyebrow at you as if awaiting to see what your answer would be, and silently hoping it’d be a yes.

You smiled. “Ice cream sounds perfect.”

He set Hannah down on the floor, then crouched so she could climb onto his back. She wrapped her little arms and legs around him tightly, her favorite perch. With a soft grunt and an easy smile, Robby straightened up, carrying her like she weighed nothing.

The three of you headed for the exit together. You walked beside Robby, close enough that your shoulder brushed against his every few steps, but neither of you pulled away. There was something about the way the three of you looked, almost like a picture-perfect family to anyone glancing from the outside. It made your mind loosen the reins on old fantasies: how different life would have been if the three of you had managed to make it work. If being together had been a choice made out of love instead of obligation, the only option he felt he had at the time.

God, how much you still wished things had worked with Robby. What wouldn’t you give to see him truly happy to be with you, instead of miserable the way he looked every time the two of you came home from a long shift.

The ice cream shop had a neon sign flickering “OPEN” in red letters, sticky vinyl booths, and the widest variety of ice cream flavors you’d ever seen. Hannah insisted on extra sprinkles and chocolate sauce on her cone. She was perched between you and Robby on the bench seat, swinging her legs and recounting her ballet routine for the third time.

“I did the spin and everyone clapped SO loud! Did you hear it, Daddy?”

“Loudest ovation in the room,” Robby said, wiping a streak of chocolate from her cheek with his thumb. “You owned that stage, babygirl.”

You watched them as you ate your strawberry ice cream cone drizzled with hot fudge. It was uncanny how much Hannah looked like Robby,  like he had been cloned into a tiny, feminine version of himself. The same soft brown hair, the same big, puppy-brown eyes that were easily the warmest you’d ever seen in your life. Eyes you could never say no to, because one single look from them melted your heart every time.

She was already slowing down, the adrenaline from the recital and the sugar rush from the ice cream finally catching up with her. Her head rested heavily against Robby’s shoulder as she munched the last bites of her ice-cream, her little eyelids starting to flutter.

The walk home was only ten minutes, but Hannah's steps turned sluggish halfway there. Robby scooped her up without a word, and she curled against his shoulder as she’d always belonged there, tucking her head under his chin as she fisted her little hand on his shirt.

At your front door, Hannah was completely out, her rosy cheek smooshed against Robby’s collarbone, with her mouth slightly open. You unlocked the door quietly and stepped inside. 

Robby carried her upstairs like she weighed nothing. You followed, watching the careful way he lowered her to the bed, tugged off her ballet slippers and pink tutu, and pulled the covers up. 

Downstairs again, you were suddenly aware of how quiet the house was without her chatter filling it. He stopped a few feet away. “She’s wiped..”

“Yeah.” You smiled. “She had a big day today.”

He exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck. “And you… in that dress. You’re punishing me. You have no idea what you do to me.”

“Robby.”

He didn’t back off. Just looked at you in the same way he did the night of the birthday party. Tracing his eyes over the neckline of the dress, the way it hugs your waist, the bare skin of your breasts. 

“Stop looking at me like that,” you said, but your voice came out quieter than you intended. As if part of you didn’t really want him to stop. You longed for the validation, for knowing you were still the woman who drove him insane, the one who made him feel things no one else could, his soft spot, his weakness. 

And for Robby, you still were. Until this day, you were the only one who could bring out the most vulnerable side of him. It wasn’t just the physical part, though God, your body drove him insane. He could still feel the ghost of your skin against his every night when he closed his eyes. It wasn’t the sex either, though in fifty-four years of life he’d never found anyone who felt quite like you did, anyone who made him feel so many things, who woke up the most primitive, most virile part of him.

It was simply you. Your strength when you carried a pregnancy and still worked your ass off for your career. Your quick mind and the way you could deliver a witty comeback that put him in his place when he deserved it. Your competence, something he found extremely attractive, both at work and as a mom. And watching you raise his daughter with a patience and love only you could give, loving her so fiercely with every bone in your body… it made him feel things he’d never felt before.

“Like what?”

“Like you want to eat me alive.”

He huffed a half-laugh as he stepped closer. “Can’t blame a guy for looking.”

You swallowed, using all the self-restraint you had in your body to stop yourself from jumping into his arms. “Every time we’re close like this, I have to remind myself why this is a bad idea.”

He tilted his head. He knew you too well, he could see how much you were trying to be strong and how much you wanted it too. “And why’s that, exactly?”

“Because we tried. We crashed. We hurt each other. We’ve got a kid now, it’s not just us we gotta think of, but her. And we’ve got a good thing going on, we’re good at this.” You gestured between you. “At being her parents. At not screwing it up. Adding… whatever this is… risks that.”

He’s quiet for a beat. Then: “Don’t think. Just do what you want.”

You stared at him. “Is that your new motto? ‘Don’t think, just do it?’”

He took another half-step, close enough you could smell the mint from his ice-cream on his breath. “One night,” he said. “Doesn’t have to mean more. Doesn’t have to change anything tomorrow. We used to be so good together. You remember that? Because I do, I remember it every single night.”

Your pulse hammered in your throat, a rhythm that matched the sudden heat blooming in your belly. You remembered it too, every vivid and overwhelming detail.

The kind of chemistry you and Robby had in bed had been like nothing you’d ever experienced before. The way your bodies responded to each other was like they were made for it, instinctive, almost frightening in its intensity. Every single touch felt magnetic and electrifying, sending sparks racing across your skin even from the lightest brush of his fingers. The way he knew exactly how to unravel you, and how you could do the same to him. You had both cried out in pleasure every single time, sounds that echoed in the dark of his bedroom, your bodies slick and trembling, chasing that peak until the world narrowed down to nothing but the two of you.

It was the kind of fire you only find once in a lifetime. But you couldn’t do it.

You couldn’t risk setting that fire loose again and burning down the delicate, carefully manufactured system you had built together. For Hannah’s sake, you needed to keep Robby exactly where he was: your co-parent, your reliable partner in raising your daughter, not your lover anymore. One wrong move, one night of giving in to the pull that still crackled between you, and everything could crumble,  the peaceful handoffs, the shared birthdays, the stability Hannah thrived on. You refused to gamble with her sense of security just because your body still remembered how perfectly he once fit against you, how his voice sounded when he fell apart because of you.

 “Of course you’re horny. You just want a quick fuck. I should’ve known.”

His expression flickered, showing a little of something that looked like hurt in his eyes. “Come on. It’s not like that.”

“Then what is it like?”

“Okay, fine. Maybe I do want sex,” Robby admitted, “but come on, don’t pretend you don’t want it too. You remember how much fun we used to have.”

He found your waist, pulling you gently against him. You gasped softly as he slid his palms lower, cupping your ass through the fabric, possessive squeezes that send sparks straight through you. He massaged your flesh deliberately, pressing his thumbs in just the right spots, drawing you closer until you were flush against his chest.

“God, I want you,” he murmured against your ear. “So fucking much. Always have. Always will, probably.”

He dug his fingers a little harder into the curve of your ass, kneading the soft flesh with confidence. You were so close that you could already feel the hard outline of his cock pressing insistently against your lower stomach. He was hard for you, just from being this close, just from a few lingering touches. It took every ounce of willpower you had not to give in, not to reach down and palm him over his pants until he groaned into your mouth the way he used to.

“Keep your hands where I can see them, Robinavitch,” you warned, trying to sound threatening. It came out breathy and weak instead. You couldn’t fool anyone, least of all him. You wanted this, maybe even more than he did.

“You don’t want my hands where you can see them,” he replied with that stupid, cocky tone he always slipped into when he knew he had you right where he wanted you. “You want them in places you can’t see. You haven’t forgotten how good I am with them, have you? Nah… some things these hands did to you are impossible to forget.”

You bit your lip hard to stop yourself from smiling. Cocky motherfucker.

Finally, with the last scrap of self-control you could muster, you pushed him away. “You had your fun. Time for you to leave.”

“I was barely starting to have fun,” he said with a wicked smile as he took a step back, rubbing one hand over his face. “You, cruel, cruel woman.”

“You’ll live,” you muttered. “Go chase some nurses. They love you. Well… the ones who don’t actually work with you do.”

“You hurt me,” he exclaimed dramatically, pressing a hand over his heart in mock offense. “I don’t have any nurse to chase. And even if I did, nobody could compare to us. You know that.”

“You broke things off with the last one?” you asked in mock surprise, playing dumb. “What was her name? Nora? N… Natalie?”

You knew Robby had had his fair share of affairs throughout the years, nothing too serious, nothing that ever deserved a real conversation, and definitely nothing meaningful enough to introduce to Hannah. Still, it stung. You couldn’t exactly throw it in his face, you’d gone out with people too. But you wished the asshole would keep his flings away from the hospital, away from the place where you had to watch him flash those stupid little smiles and do his little shoe-lace trick for whatever nurse had caught his eye this month. The same way he’d once done it for you.

“I won’t answer to those accusations against me,” he said, shaking his head with a low chuckle. Robby stepped closer again and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to the top of your head. “Have a good night. I’ll see myself out.”

You couldn’t stop the smile from tugging at your lips as you watched him walk toward the door and finally leave the house. Five years later, and your body still caught fire whenever his hands were on you. Five years later, and you still loved your silly arguments and the way he could make you laugh even when you were pretending to be mad at him. Five years later… and you were still deeply enamored with Michael Robinavitch.

The clock on your nightstand glowed 2:17 a.m. when the first cry cut through the dark.

It wasn’t not the usual sleepy whimper or the “I had a bad dream” whine. It was a sharp sound, followed immediately by the unmistakable sound of vomit hitting the floor.

You were out of bed before your brain fully registered it, rushing down the hall. Hannah’s room light was already on, and she was sitting up in bed, with the bedsheets twisted around her legs, her face shiny with sweat, and her eyes glassy because of the tears. There was a small puddle of bile on the rug beside her, and another streak down the front of her pajama top.

“Mommy—”

“I’m here, baby.” You dropped to your knees beside the bed, lifting your hand to her forehead. She was burning, her skin hot enough to make your palm sting. “Oh, sweetheart.”

She leaned heavily into you, her body trembling as another wave hit her. This time it was dry heaves because there was nothing left in her stomach to bring up. You lunged for the small trash can under her desk just in time, holding it steady beneath her chin while your other hand gathered her soft brown hair back from her face. With gentleness, you rubbed slow, soothing circles on her back, murmuring the same comforting nonsense you always did in moments like this.

“It’s okay, baby… you’re okay. Mommy’s got you. Just breathe, sweetheart.”

Your voice stayed calm and steady for her sake, but inside, your mind had flipped into full doctor mode, racing through the mental checklist at lightning speed. Fever. Persistent vomiting. She had been fine at bedtime, tired from her long ballet practice, a little sniffly maybe, but nothing that had raised any red flags. 

“Mommy… tummy aches,” Hannah mumbled weakly.

Your heart clenched so hard it hurt. You scooped her up immediately, blanket and all, and carried her to the bathroom. You ran a washcloth under cold water, wrung it out, and pressed it gently to the back of her neck, hoping the chill would bring some relief. Then you offered her a small sip of water from the cup on the sink. She took it obediently, but almost instantly spat it back out, coughing and whimpering.

Reaching out for the thermometer from the medicine cabinet, you grabbed it and slipped it under her tongue, holding her close while you waited for the beep. 103.8. You managed to get a dose of Tylenol into her, but she could barely keep it down, her whole body shuddered as she fought the nausea, and her teeth chattered from the fever chills as she curled into you even tighter, shaking hard.

Helpless, that’s how you felt, completely helpless. And as a mother, feeling helpless was the worst torture imaginable. You were a doctor, and yet here in your own house, with your own child, there was only so much you could do. The cold washcloths weren’t bringing her temperature down fast enough. The medicine wasn’t staying in her long enough to work. Nothing seemed to help.

You couldn’t stand seeing your baby like this: so pale, so tired, her usual bright energy drained away, her little body trembling in your arms.. In this moment, more than anything, you wished Robby were here. Robby would know exactly what to do. He always did. He’d take one look at her, assess the situation and figure out what was wrong with Hannah right away. He’d fix it the same way he fixed dozens of people every single day in the pitt.

You sat on the edge of the tub with her in your lap, rocking her slowly, trying to keep her calm while you dialed Robby.

He picked up on the second ring. His voice was rough with sleep, but instantly alert when he realized you wouldn’t be calling this late at night if there wasn’t something really urgent going on. “Hey. What’s wrong?”

“Hannah’s sick. Fever’s 103.8, she’s been vomiting for the last twenty minutes. Won’t keep anything down. She’s shaking.”

There was the rustle of sheets and the immediate creak of a bedframe on Robby’s end. He was already moving, even half-asleep. You could practically see him sitting up in the dark.

“Okay,” his voice came through the phone. “Did you give her Tylenol?”

“Yes.”

“Motrin too? You should alternate if the fever’s that high.”

“I only have children’s Tylenol here,” you answered. “Motrin’s at your place.”

There was a brief pause, then a quiet “Okay… okay. Alright.” You heard him exhale slowly, the sound of fabric shifting as he moved. “Cool clothes? Cold washcloth on her neck or forehead?”

“I’m trying the cloth right now, but I’m not seeing any changes. The fever won’t come down at all.”

“Are you hydrating her? Give her small sips of water, tiny amounts so she doesn’t throw it right back up.”

“I am,” you said, glancing at the half-empty cup on the bathroom counter. “She’s spitting most of it back up. She can’t keep anything down.”

Another pause stretched between you. Even for a man who could keep ice-cold composure during the most chaotic live-or-die codes in the ED, something in Robby’s voice betrayed how uneasy he really was. You heard the rustle of clothes being pulled on quickly, then the unmistakable jingle of keys.

“So, fever’s still not budging?” he asked.

“Not yet. She’s miserable, Robby. Keeps saying her tummy hurts, and the dry heaves are getting worse. She’s shaking so hard her teeth are chattering.”

You heard loud, hurried footsteps crossing his floorboards, followed by the sound of a door opening and closing with a firm sound. 

“Take her to the ER. Now.” There was no hesitation left in his words. “I’ll meet you there.”

Your stomach dropped. “You think it’s that bad?”

“I think 103.8 in a five-year-old who can’t keep meds or fluids down is worth getting checked. Could be viral, could be something else. Better be safe.”

You nodded even though he couldn’t see it. “Okay. I’ll get her dressed. We’re leaving in five.”

“I’m already in the car. Text me when you’re on the road.”

He hung up, and you moved fast, changing Hannah into fresh pajamas, wiping her face, and wrapping her in the softest blanket she owned. She was listless now, her soft head lolling against your shoulder as small whimpers left her lips every time the nausea rolled through her again. You grabbed her insurance card, your wallet, a spare change of clothes for her, and the little stuffed unicorn she’d been sleeping with every night.

You placed Hannah in her car seat, with her blanket tucked around her. You buckled her in carefully, kissing her hot forehead. “We’re going to see the doctors, okay? Daddy’s meeting us there. You’re gonna feel better soon.”

She just nodded with her eyes half-closed. The drive to the hospital was only fifteen minutes at this hour through the dark and empty streets. You kept one hand on the wheel, and the other reaching back to hold hers. She was quiet except for the occasional gags into the bowl you’d wedged beside her seat.

You pulled into the ambulance bay lot, killed the engine and unbuckled Hannah. She was burning up, her usually light body now felt heavy and limp because of the fever. You wrapped the blanket tighter around her and lifted her carefully into your arms as you hurried toward the sliding glass doors.

They whooshed open, and Lena, the night-shift charge nurse, looked up from the desk. Her face immediately softened with concern the moment she recognized you.

“Hey… oh, honey.” Her voice dropped gently. “Is that Hannah?”

“Fever hit 103.8 at home,” you rattled off, shifting your daughter’s weight higher on your hip, trying to keep your voice steady, as if you were presenting a case, not describing your daughter’s symptoms. “Persistent vomiting, abdominal pain. I gave her Tylenol twenty minutes ago, but no improvement at all.”

Lena nodded briskly, already waving you over. “Bay six. We’ll get vitals right away.”

“Who’s on tonight?” you asked, walking fast down the familiar hallway. “Shen?”

“Dr. Abbot. I’ll send him your way as soon as he’s free.”

“Oh, thank God,” you exhaled, the relief hitting you so hard it made your shoulders sag for a moment. If there was anyone in this entire hospital you’d trust with Hannah besides Robby, it was Jack, Hannah’s godfather. You still remembered the day Robby had asked him to be his daughter’s godfather. The way Jack’s eyes had filled with tears, the two men pulling each other into a tight hug like brothers, like two men who were the only ones who truly understood the weight of this life, the long shifts, the losses, and the rare moments of hope like that one. Abbot had promised right then that he’d always have her back, no matter what.

You were halfway down the hall when Robby rounded the corner. The second his eyes landed on Hannah in your arms, his entire expression shifted to fatherly fear.

“Hey, angel,” he said softly, stepping close. He brushed a gentle hand over her back. “Mom said you’re not feeling good, huh?”

Hannah managed a weak, cracked little “Daddy…” before turning her face back into your neck, hiding from the bright lights and the unfamiliar sounds.

Robby flicked his gaze up to yours, doing that assessing scan he always did, checking not just Hannah, but how you were holding up. “You okay?”

“Fine,” you whispered, though your voice trembled as the tears pricked at the corners of your eyes. “Just… scared. I hate seeing her like this. She’s never been this sick.”

He nodded once. “I’ve got her.”

You handed her over without hesitation. Hannah clung to him immediately, wrapping her small arms around his neck and burying her face against his shoulder like he was her safe place. Robby carried her the rest of the way into the bay. He laid her down gently on the hospital bed, keeping one hand resting protectively on her stomach while the other smoothed damp strands of hair off her forehead with tenderness.

One of the night-shift nurses stepped in right away and rechecked her temperature. “It’s up to 104.1 now.” Her oxygen saturation was still holding steady, but she was clearly dehydrated, her lips cracked and dry, her eyes a little sunken, her usually rosy cheeks pale.

A couple of seconds later, Abbot strode into the bay, sweeping his eyes over the scene: little Hannah lying on the bed, Robby standing guard on one side, you on the other.

“Hey,” Abbot said, pulling Robby into a quick, one-armed brotherly hug, clapping his back once, and giving you a nod. “Heard our girl was here. Sorry, I was tied up with a gunshot wound, perforated lung. It’s chaos tonight.”

“She’s been throwing up everything, couldn’t even keep the Tylenol down,” Robby reported, giving the facts the way two attendings would, except this time his voice carried an edge of helplessness he rarely showed. He wasn’t the doctor tonight. He was the father. “Fever’s up to 104.1. We should get an IV going, more Tylenol, Zofr—”

“I’ve got this,” Abbot interrupted gently but firmly, keeping his tone calm and reassuring as he stepped closer to the bed. He looked down at Hannah with the softest smile, dropping his voice into that sweet, playful tone he saved only for kids. “Hey, Hannah Banana… we’re gonna get you feeling brand new before you even realize, okay?” He offered her a warm smile and the gentlest pinch on her cheek.

“Uncle Jack…” she mumbled, her voice cracking pitifully as another wave of nausea rolled through her.

The nurse started the IV in her tiny hand. Hannah cried out at the poke, a heartbreaking whimper that twisted something deep in your chest. Robby was right there, holding her other hand tightly, talking her through it in that calm voice he used with every scared kid who came through these doors. “Just a little pinch, angel. You’re being so brave. Almost done… that’s my good girl. Daddy’s right here.”

You stood on the opposite side of the bed, holding her foot gently in both hands and rubbing soothing circles over her ankle with your thumb, as if your touch alone could somehow absorb her pain and make it yours instead.

“We’ll keep her under observation for a while, wait for the fever to come down,” Abbot told you both. “I’ll come back in fifteen to check on her again, but she’s in the best hands tonight with the two of you right here.”

“Thank you, Jack,” you said quietly with gratitude. He gave your shoulder a gentle, reassuring squeeze before stepping back.

“Thanks, brother,” Robby added right after you, his hand never leaving Hannah’s hair.

Robby didn’t leave her side for even a second. He didn’t glance at his phone, didn’t step out to grab coffee, didn’t let himself get distracted by anything else. He stayed right there, anchored to the bed, resting one large hand gently on Hannah’s forehead, occasionally stroking her damp hair back from her skin. Every few minutes he’d lean in and murmur soft, ridiculous nonsense to her sleeping body, telling her she was tougher than any superhero, that the doctors here were the absolute best because they all knew her dad, and that meant she was getting the royal treatment, the best care in the house. You watched him from the corner of your eye. Even after everything, this was still who he was when it mattered most: steady, devoted, completely focused on the tiny human you’d made together.

The hours dragged, and eventually, after the second round of meds, Hannah’s fever finally started trending down. It had dropped to 100.7, and for the first time all night, some color began creeping back into her pale cheeks as her chest rose and fell more peacefully under the blanket.

You and Robby were slumped in the two chairs pulled up beside her bed. Robby broke the silence first. “I know what you’re thinking. You did everything right.”

You let out a shaky breath, staring at Hannah’s sleeping face. “Maybe I should’ve brought her sooner. She would’ve gotten better faster.”

He shook his head slowly. “You waited until it was warranted. You’re a doctor. You know the signs.” He reached over without hesitation, covering your hand with his on the shared armrest. His palm was warm and grounding in a way that made your throat tighten. “It’s just viral. She’s gonna be okay.”

Without thinking, you turned your hand over beneath his and laced your fingers through his, holding on tightly. For a moment, you didn’t care what it meant, or what anyone walking past the bay might think if they glanced in and saw the two of you like this, exes, co-parents, sitting together holding hands. The exhaustion of the night had stripped everything down, and right now, all that mattered was that Hannah was improving and Robby was here.

“Thanks for coming,” you whispered, even though you knew the words weren’t really necessary. Robby would drop everything and be anywhere either of you needed him, that had never been in question.

“Always.” He brushed his thumb slowly over your knuckles, a gentle motion. “Wouldn’t be anywhere else.”

By the 6 a.m. check, Hannah’s fever had already dropped to 99.8. The IV fluids had done their job, and she hadn’t vomited anymore, even managed a few sips of apple juice without it coming right back up.

She shifted under the blanket, blinking up at you both. “Mommy? Daddy?”

“Hey, sweetheart,” you whispered, leaning forward to brush her hair back. “How’s your tummy?”

“Better,” she mumbled. “Did uncle Jack cure me?”

“He did.” You smiled, feeling a wave of relief flood through you. “You’re doing great now.”

Robby reached over, stroking his thumb over her cheek. “Morning, angel. You scared us.”

She managed a tiny smile, then winced. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” He kissed her temple, lingering there for an extra second. “Just glad you’re feeling better.”

Jack came back a moment later for a quick exam and a review of vitals and labs, thankfully nothing alarming. Viral gastroenteritis, most likely, with a febrile response. 

“Thanks for curing me, Uncle Jack,” Hannah said softly with that radiant smile that could melt absolutely anyone in seconds. “You’re the best doctor ever.”

Abbot grinned widely, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he looked down at her. “Well, thank you, Hannah Banana. That’s the nicest thing anyone’s said to me all week.”

Robby cleared his throat dramatically from the other side of the bay, crossing his arms. “Second best,” he corrected, raising an eyebrow at his daughter.

“Second best,” Hannah agreed immediately, turning that same sweet, dimpled smile toward Robby now, like she was bestowing him with the highest honor.

“Don’t worry, Hannah,” Jack said, leaning in conspiratorially and lowering his voice as if sharing a great secret. “I won’t tell your dad that you actually think I’m the better doctor.” He glanced sideways at his best friend with a mischievous glint. “A man with a fragile ego like him couldn’t take it.”

Robby let out a low, genuine chuckle, shaking his head. “Is she clear to go back home?” he asked, his tone shifting into something more serious, though the corner of his mouth still twitched. “See? I’m asking for your professional opinion and everything.”

Jack nodded, glancing once more at the monitor readings before looking back at both of you. “I’d say she can go home. Fever’s trending nicely downward, and she’s keeping fluids down now. Just keep checking her temperature regularly to make sure it stays down. If she starts vomiting again or the fever spikes back up, bring her straight back, but you two already know that better than most.”

Robby stood, stretching his back with a low groan. “I should head out,” he said, glancing at his watch. “Shift starts in thirty. Gotta change, grab coffee, pretend I’m human.”

You looked up at him, still holding Hannah’s hand. “You’re going in?”

He shrugged, like it was obvious. “Someone’s gotta run this place. You—” He nodded toward Hannah, then you. “—should take the day. Go home with her. Get some sleep, keep an eye on her. She’s fine now, but she’s still wiped. And you’ve been up all night.”

You opened your mouth to argue, out of pure habit, mostly. The words were already forming on your tongue, something about not wanting to burden the team, about pulling your weight like everyone else. But they died the instant your eyes landed on Hannah.

She was curled up small on her side in the hospital bed, the blanket tucked around her shoulders. You couldn’t stay away from her, not today. The thought of leaving her for twelve long hours, of being stuck in the ED while she was at home, possibly starting to feel worse again without you to notice the fever creeping back up made your stomach drop. You wouldn’t be able to focus. You wouldn’t feel at ease for even a second. Every patient you saw would be overshadowed by the constant fear that Hannah might need you and you wouldn’t be there to catch it, to bring her right back in.

And honestly… part of you simply wanted the day off. You wanted to take her home, wrap her up in her favorite blanket, and spend the whole day curled together on the couch. Just the two of you. A Disney marathon playing in the background while she rested her head on your chest and you stroked her hair.

So instead of arguing, you closed your mouth and let the silence settle. The decision had already been made the moment you looked at her.

“Yeah,” you said quietly. “Okay.”

Robby nodded, satisfied. He leaned down to kiss Hannah’s forehead again. “I’ll come by after shift to see how you’re doing.” He straightened and hesitated for half a second, then reached out and squeezed your shoulder, brushing the side of your neck, just once, before he pulled back. “Text me updates. I’ll turn off silent mode.”

“Will do.”

He lingered for another beat, like he didn’t quite want to leave the room, then turned toward the door. “See you later, angel,” he called softly to Hannah, who was already drifting again.

“Bye, Daddy,” she mumbled, half-asleep.

He gave you one last look, longer than necessary, before slipping out into the hallway. You exhaled slowly, while Robby and Jack handled the last few details with the nurse, you gathered Hannah’s things. 

Home sounded like the best idea you’d had in hours. If there was one thing you truly hated about this life, it was how little time work left you to be the kind of mom you desperately wished you could be. Residency had already demanded so much, and motherhood had taken the rest. Every free moment you managed to carve out, you longed to spend it with Hannah. You didn’t want her to grow up one day and feel like you had missed it,  like you weren’t there for the special moments. You didn’t want her to remember a childhood where her mom was always rushing, always tired, always halfway out the door. 

By the time you pulled into your driveway, Hannah was already dozing in her car seat again. You carried her inside and laid her gently on the couch. The house felt wonderfully quiet after the night chaos of the ED. You changed into new pajamas, made her a nest of pillows and her favorite fuzzy blanket, then crawled in beside her, pulling her body against your chest. She stirred just enough to wrap one arm around your waist and mumble, “Mommy, will you stay today?”

“I’m not going anywhere, baby,” you whispered, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Today is just us.”

The rest of the day unfolded slowly. You started with her favorite movie, Encanto, because she never got tired of singing along to every song, no matter if she was just recovering. Hannah curled up with her head in your lap, as you gently played with her hair while she hummed to the songs.

When the movie ended, you made a simple lunch together, something easy on her stomach, a bowl of oatmeal with bananas and strawberries. She only ate half, but she kept it down, earning praises from you. After lunch, you moved on to Moana. She sat cross-legged on the couch, wrapped in her blanket like a burrito, occasionally lifting her head to point at the screen and say, “Look, Mommy, the ocean! Can we go to the beach too?” You laughed softly and pulled her closer, letting her rest her cheek against your shoulder.

Robby’s shift ended late, as usual, and by the time he signed out, he was bone-tired, but the pull to check on Hannah overrode everything else. He texted you: Just got off. Coming by to check on her. You home?

Your reply wasquick: Yeah. She’s asleep. Door’s unlocked.

He let himself in quietly, finding you on the couch where you were curled up with a blanket. “Hey,” you whispered. “She crashed about an hour ago. Fever stayed down all day, no more vomiting.”

Robby exhaled, shrugging out of his jacket and walking over. “Good. That’s good.”

You nodded toward the hallway. “You want to peek in on her?”

He did, already heading to Hannah’s room. She was sprawled on her stomach, with one arm flung out and her stuffed bunny tucked under her chin. Her breathing was deep and even, Robby stood in the doorway for a long minute, just watching her chest rise and fall.

When he came back to the living room, you’d poured two glasses of water and set them on the coffee table. He sank onto the couch beside you, close enough that your knees almost touched, far enough to keep the boundary.

“She looks so much better,” he said quietly. “Color’s back.”

“Yeah.” You tucked your legs under you, pulling the blanket tighter to your body. “I was terrified last night. Thought… I don’t know. Worst-case scenarios kept running through my head.”

He nodded. “Me too. When you called, my heart stopped for a second.”

You took a breath, then another. “You’re a great dad, Robby. You know that, right?”

He glanced at you, surprised by the sudden moment of honesty. “Trying to be.”

“No. You are.” You met his eyes so he could see how much you meant every word that left your lips. “I always knew you would be. Even back when… everything was a mess. When we were still figuring out how to be parents instead of just two people who accidentally made a kid. I saw it in the way you held her the first time. You stepped up. Every single time.”

He looked down at his hands, rubbing his thumb over a callus on his palm, like he didn’t know how to take the compliment.

“We might not have planned her. But Hannah got the best possible dad out of the deal.”

Robby swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing with the movement of his throat. His voice came out rough when he finally spoke. “I’ll always be grateful to you for that. For giving me her. For making me a dad when I didn’t even know I could be one. When I didn’t even know if I wanted to be alive.” He exhaled, sounding almost like a laugh without humor. “I look at her sometimes and think… how the hell did I get this lucky? She’s smart, she’s kind, she’s fearless. And half of that’s you. But the other half… I get to be part of it. Every day. Because of you.”

The air between you thickened, it was full of years of shared history, good, bad, messy, beautiful. “I still love you for that,” he said quietly. “Not like… not trying to cross lines. Just… I’ll always have love for you. Because you gave me the best thing in my life. And you trusted me with her. That means more than I could ever express.”

“I know. I feel the same way.” You rolled your head to the side, trying to loosen the knot that’d been building since last night. The motion made your neck crack loudly, and it pulled a wince out of you.

Robby lifted his brow. “You okay?”

“Just the couch napping. My neck’s killing me.”

He didn’t hesitate, standing up right away. “Come here.”

You did hesitate for half a heartbeat, long enough to consider the offer. You were too tired to argue, and you knew how good Robby’s hands were, so you stood up from the couch, then turned so your back was to him. He stepped in behind you, close enough that you felt the warmth of him before his hands even touched you.

He settled his fingers on your shoulders first, pressing his thumbs into the muscles along the tops of your traps, working in slow circles. You couldn’t help dropping your head forward on a soft exhale, closing your eyes as the pressure hit exactly where you needed it.

“God,” you murmured. “You’re still really good at that.”

He huffsed a quiet laugh against your hair. “Muscle memory.”

Robby moved his hands, working down the column of your neck, tracing the tense line on either side of your spine, then out across your shoulders again. You melt into it without meaning to, dropping your shoulders and slowing your breath as the ache unwound thread by thread.

For a minute, it was just that: his hands on your shoulders. Then he slid his palms lower, intentionally, until they settled at your waist. He pulled you back gently, just enough that he had your back pressed against his chest. 

He brushed his lips along the side of your neck, teasingly soft at first. Then, firmer in a slow, open-mouthed kiss just below your ear.

Your pulse jumped immediately at the contact of his lips against your skin. “Robby.”

He didn’t stop. Another kiss, lower this time, along the curve where neck meets shoulder. He tightened his hands on your waist, slipping his thumbs under the hem of your top, grazing your bare skin.

“This is a bad idea,” you whispered but it came out unsteady. 

Robby moved his mouth over your skin. “Then why does it feel so good?”

You didn’t have an answer, you couldn’t think of one that made sense. He kept going, trailing kisses along the side of your throat, sliding one hand up your side, splaying his fingers across your ribs, the other staying firm at your hip, holding you against him. 

You tipped your head back against his shoulder in instinct, and he took the invitation, kissing the exposed line of your throat. Robby drifted his hand higher, brushing the underside of your breast through the fabric. Your hands came up in response, half to stop him, half to hold on, and they landed on his forearms, gripping them.

He murmured against your skin. “Tell me to stop.”

You didn’t stop it. Not one single part of you wanted to. Maybe if you weren’t so bone-deep tired, physically drained from years of resisting him, of constantly convincing yourself that you didn’t want this, that you weren’t aching for this every time he got too close, you might have found the strength to push him away again. To remind yourself of all the careful boundaries you’d built for Hannah’s sake. To remember why this was dangerous.

But right now, none of that mattered. Right now you needed Robby. You needed his warmth, you needed his touch, those large, capable hands that knew every inch of your body better than anyone else ever had, or ever would. You needed the intoxicating pleasure only he could ever give you, the rumble of his voice in your ear, and the way he could make you forget every careful reason you’d built to keep him at arm’s length.

The resistance you’d been carrying for years suddenly felt too heavy to hold anymore. In this quiet moment all you wanted was to let go. To stop fighting the pull that had never really gone away. To let Robby remind you, just for tonight, how good it felt to be wanted like this.

Under your shirt, one of Robby’s hands cupped the swell of your breast through the fabric of your bra. He traced slow circles over the peak, teasing the nipple into a tight point, making you arch without meaning to, and he rewarded you with a soft bite at the curve of your shoulder.

“Fuck,” you whispered, the curse slipping out before you could stop it.

Robby exhaled a rough laugh against your throat. “There she is.” He sounded proud of getting this reaction out of you, of remembering your body even if it’d been years since the last time he’d touched you.

He palmed your other breast now, both hands working in tandem to knead your flesh, brushing his fingers back and forth until the friction through your bra was almost too much. Your nipples ached, already feeling oversensitive, and every pass of his fingers sent heat straight between your legs. You could feel him behind you, his thick cock rigid, pressing against the small of your back through his jeans. The size of him, the heat of him, the way he rocked forward just enough to let you feel every inch, made your thighs clench.

You should stop this. You knew you should. But your hands were already reaching back, curling into the fabric of his shirt at his hips, holding him closer instead of pushing him away.

He growled with approval, leaving one of your breasts to slide his hand down the front of your body. He was slow, giving you every second to say no.

“When was the last time someone fucked you the way you deserve?” he murmured against your neck, slightly tightening his fingers once he reached your thigh, dangerously close to the waistband of your shorts.

You stayed silent, like part of you didn’t want to admit the truth. Robby didn’t pull back, he kissed your neck again. “Tell me, baby. When was the last time you were properly fucked? Deep and hard like I used to… Until you couldn’t think straight?”

You swallowed once, then answered honestly, barely above a whisper. “I haven’t slept with anyone since the last time we were together. About four years ago.”

Robby stilled completely. He lifted his mouth from your neck like he was waiting for the punchline. “You’re joking.”

You shook your head. “I’m not.”

He stared at you for a moment, processing the new information. Then he let out a slow, disbelieving breath. “What about those guys you’ve dated? The vet? That other guy a year ago, what was he? An engineer? What about him?”

“Two dates, maybe three at most with any of them,” you said quietly. “Never went further. Never slept with any of them. Being a mom and a resident… there’s no time. Between Hannah’s schedule, shifts, studying, and trying to keep everything together, sex just wasn’t a priority.”

Robby tightened his jaw, and a fix of emotions flashed through his face, surprise, heat, and a fierce kind of possessiveness. “Fuck,” he muttered. “You can’t just tell me you haven’t been fucked in four years and expect me to act like it’s nothing.”

Before you could respond, he dipped beneath the waistband of your shorts, then under the elastic of your panties. “Four years. Four fucking years without anyone touching you the way you need. Without anyone filling this perfect pussy. I’m gonna leave you so fucking wet and satisfied when I’m done with you tonight. You’re gonna be ruined for anyone else after this.”

There was no hesitation now. He parted your pussy with two fingers, finding you already slick with arousal, your lips swollen, and he dragged his digits up through your folds in one long stroke, making your knees nearly buckle.

“Jesus,” he whispered against your ear, already sounding wrecked. “So fucking wet for me.”

Robby circled your clit, it was light at first, his touch feather-soft, just enough to make your hips jerk. Then it turned firmer, pressing down in tight circles the way he always knew you liked. The exact pressure, the exact rhythm. Muscle memory for him too, apparently.

You tipped your head back against Robby’s broad shoulder, fluttering your eyes shut so you could focus entirely on the intense pleasure flooding through your body. A shaky breath escaped your lips as his fingers worked you open with precision.

He kept his other hand on your breast, tugging your bra down roughly so he could give your nipples the attention they craved. He rolled the sensitive peaks between his thumb and forefinger, pinching and tugging in perfect time with the slick strokes between your legs. The dual sensation was devastating in the best way, making your pussy clench and flutter around nothing.

He slid one thick finger inside you, stretching you carefully, opening you up with a patience that drove you insane. When you pushed your hips back greedily, silently begging for more, he added a second finger, sinking them deeper. You were so tight, clenching hard around the intrusion, and Robby let out a guttural groan against your ear, like the feel of you was almost painful for him too.

“Still so fucking perfect,” he rasped with want. “Fuck… the way you grip me. Like you never want to let go.”

He curled his fingers deliberately, hooking them forward until he found that spongy spot inside you that made your vision flash white for a second. A broken moan tore from your throat as he started stroking your g-spot with every thrust. The sound was loud enough that you both froze for half a heartbeat, listening for any noise from upstairs. The house stayed quiet. Hannah was still fast asleep. Robby didn’t waste another second, he resumed his movements, going deeper now, fucking you steadily with his fingers while his thumb kept the pressure on your clit. 

Robby alternated the pace just to torment you, slow and deep, then faster and harder, then dragging it back to that torturous slow rhythm again. Teasing you right up to the edge without ever letting you fall over it.

You rocked back against his hand, chasing the pleasure, chasing him. Every curl of his fingers and every swipe of his thumb made your clit throb and your walls flutter around him. You were soaking his hand, the wet sounds of his fingers pumping in and out of your dripping pussy filling the quiet room.

Your breathing turned ragged. Small and desperate sounds slipping out despite your best efforts, whimpers, half-moans, his name once or twice when he hit the spot just right.

He kissed your neck again, sucking lightly and then soothing with his tongue. Robby couldn’t stop his hips from rocking against your ass in shallow thrusts, matching the rhythm of his fingers, allowing you to feel how hard he was, painfully so.

Your thighs started to tremble. The coil in your belly wound tighter and tighter. You were close, so close, and he knew it, still remembered how your body shook, how your pussy pulsed and clenched when you were about to let go.

“Come on,” he murmured against your ear. “Let go for me. I’ve got you.” He pressed his thumb harder on your clit, and crooked his fingers again, stroking that spot in quick pulses. “Let me feel you cum. Please, baby, I want it so bad.”

It hit you like a wave. As you orgasmed around his fingers, your back arched, throwing your head back against his shoulder, opening your mouth on a silent cry that turned into a choked moan when the pleasure finally broke. You came hard, shuddering and clenching around his fingers. He had to tighten his arm around your waist to keep you upright when wave after wave of pleasure hit you, until your legs felt like liquid.

Robby’s arms stayed locked around you for a long moment after you came down. Slowly, he turned you in his arms until you were facing him. Your legs felt unsteady, so he steadied you with his hands on your waist.

When he lifted the hand that was inside you, the one still slick and shining with you, he brought it to his mouth without breaking eye contact with you.

Robby licked his fingers slowly, first one, then the other, dragging his tongue flat and thorough, tasting every bit of you. 

“Fuck,” he murmured, humming as if the taste of your slickness pleasured him. “Still taste the same. Sweet. So goddamn good.”

Heat flooded your face, your chest, everywhere. You couldn’tlook away, the sight of him, with his lips wet and his eyes locked on yours, while he savored you like that, made your core clench again. It felt so aching and empty without him inside you, and you desperately needed to be filled again, to feel the stretch of his cock impaled inside you, to have his weight over you while he made you feel owned. 

The words slipped out before you could think them through. “Fuck me, Robby.”

His mouth curved almost predatory. The words he’d longed to hear for so long. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

He leaned in until his forehead rested against yours, allowing you to feel his hot breath on your lips. “Ask nicely.”

You narrowed your eyes with defiance even through the haze of want. “Go to hell.”

He laughed, the same laugh he used to give you in stolen moments years ago, when you’d push back just to watch him unravel. “Still stubborn,” he said, almost fond. “Good to know some things don’t change.”

Robby didn’t hesitate. In one smooth motion, his hands were under your thighs, lifting you effortlessly as if you weighed nothing. You wrapped your legs around his waist instinctively, nd your arms around his neck, as he carried you up the stairs. His mouth found your neck again on the way, kissing and nipping while he navigated the familiar hallway in the dark. 

He pushed open the door to your bedroom with his shoulder, kicking it shut behind him, and turning the lock with a click. Robby set you down on the edge of the bed but didn’t step back. He stood between your spread thighs, looking down at you with an expression that made your stomach flip.

“Fuck… I feel like I’m dreaming,” he cupped your face, stroking his thumb over your cheeks. “You, here, letting me touch you again after all this time. After everything.”

Then he was on you, Robby climbed onto the bed, his knees bracketing your hips, and pressing you back into the mattress with his weight. He crashed his mouth down on yours in a desperate kiss while he ran his hands over your body.

He groaned like a man starved, staring at your chest. “These tits… God, I missed them.” His mouth descended immediately, devouring you with almost frantic need. He sucked one nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue roughly around the peak before he sucked it hard, hollowing your cheeks. He kneaded the other breast, digging his fingers in, flicking and pinching the neglected nipple until you arched off the bed with a loud moan. He switched sides, licking and biting, sucking marks into the flesh like he wanted to claim every inch. His stubble was scraping deliciously against your skin, making you whimper and thread your fingers through his brown hair, holding him to you.

He was almost desperate in the way he worshiped your body, groaning against your skin, grinding his hips down against your thigh so you could feel how painfully hard he was. “So fucking perfect,” he mumbled between sucks and bites. “These tits were made for my mouth. Look at how pretty they look. I love sucking on them… fuck, baby.”

You were panting, pushing your chest further into his face as pleasure shot straight to your cunt. Robby spent long minutes there, alternating between teasing licks and rough hungry suction, until your nipples were swollen, sensitive, and glistening with his spit.

Then he started moving lower. His mouth trailed wet kisses down your sternum, over your stomach, pausing to nip at the soft curve just below your navel. He settled between your spread thighs, pushing your shorts the rest of the way down to bunch around your ankles. For a moment, he just stared at the damp spot on your panties with eyes full of lust.

“Look at you,” he rasped, his hot breath right against your dripping pussy. “You’re making such a big mess for me. You ruined your panties… so fucking soaked.”

He leaned in and mouthed at your pussy over the thin fabric, pressing kisses along your slit, dragging his tongue slowly from your entrance up to your clit through the soaked cotton. He sucked gently on your clit through the material, making your hips jerk. Then he pulled back just enough to blow cool air over the damp spot before diving in again, licking broad stripes, nipping at your folds, mouthing at you like he was trying to taste every drop of your arousal through the barrier.

You moaned louder, with your thighs trembling around his head and your hands fisting the sheets as he teased you mercilessly. Robby hooked his arms under your thighs, holding you open while he continued the torturous worship of his mouth. Every time you tried to grind harder against his mouth, he pulls back slightly, keeping you right on the edge, whimpering and desperate.

“Robby… please…” you gasped, but he only groaned against your pussy and keept teasing, determined to drive you insane before he finally gave you what you both needed.

He looked up at you from between your thighs, gleaming with satisfaction. Robby hooked two fingers into the thin cotton at your hip and ripped. The sound of fabric tearing filled the quiet room. You only had a second for the cool air to hit your bare, dripping pussy, because right away Robby’s mouth was on you, aggressive and devastatingly skilled.

He devoured you like a man who’d been starving for years. There’s no gentle buildup or teasing licks. He buried his face between your thighs with a hunger that bordered on feral. He drags his tongue broadly, giving you flat strokes from your entrance all the way up to your swollen clit, lapping up every drop of your arousal like it was the only thing keeping him alive. 

He groaned deeply into your pussy, the sound was filthy. “Fuck, baby… you taste even better than I remembered,” he said against your folds before diving back in.

He ate you out with aggression, swallowing your clit into the heat of his mouth, swirling his tongue around the bundle of nerves before releasing it with a filthy pop. The sudden loss of suction made you whimper, only for him to immediately flick the tip of his tongue rapidly against your clit as his stubble scraped against your inner thighs with every movement of his head.

Robby alternated between deep licks that plunged his tongue inside you, fucking you with it in slow strokes that had you dripping down his chin, and tight suction on your clit that made you curl your toes hard.

Every time you tried to muffle your moans, he only doubled down, sucking harder, licking deeper, devouring you like he’d been dreaming about this exact taste for years. He gripped your ass, spreading you wider for his mouth, holding you firmly in place so you couldn’t escape the assault of his tongue.

“Oh my God… Robby—” Your voice cracked as he flicked his tongue rapidly over your clit. “Fuck, right there, don’t stop, please don’t stop…”

He ate it like he loved it. Like he needed it. His hands weren’t idle either. One arm banded across your lower stomach, holding you down when your hips started bucking too wildly. The other hand reached up to palm and squeeze your bare breasts, making you moan louder.

You pushed up onto your elbows, desperate to watch him. The sight was both obscene and intoxicating, Robby’s head buried between your thighs, his shoulders flexing as he worked, eyes closed in pure bliss while his mouth devoured your cunt. His jaw was moving with every lick and every suck, his lips and chin already shiny with your wetness. When he glanced up and caught you watching, his eyes darkened even more.

He pulled back just enough to spit directly onto your swollen pussy, a thick glob of saliva landing right on your clit. The warm sensation made you gasp, asd he watched it drip down your folds for half a second before he drove back in, spreading the spit with his tongue, mixing it with your own slick until everything was messy and glistening.

“God, look at this pretty pussy,” the words came out muffled against you. “So fucking wet for me. Been waiting four years to taste you again.”

He continued his relentless assault on your clit, and you couldn’t look away. The sight of this strong man, completely lost between your legs, eating your pussy like it was his favorite meal, was almost too much.

“You’re so fucking good at this… shit, your mouth—” A broken moan escaped you when he sucked hard on your clit again. “I’m gonna… I can’t!  Robby, I’m close already…”

Your second orgasm built fast, and it crushed over you without mercy, making you bow your back off the bed, tearing a broken cry from your throat as the pleasure peaked. Robby didn’t let up for a second, he sucked your nub harder, drawing the orgasm out until it felt endless.

Your vision whited out, tears spilling down your cheeks as the pleasure rolled through you while he kept licking you through it greedily.

You sobbed his name, “Robby… fuck—oh god,” as your body shook uncontrollably, clamping his thighs around his head when the intensity bordered on too much. 

He finally eased off only when your cries turned into overwhelmed whimpers, your body limp and trembling on the bed. But even then, he didn’t pull away completely. Robby continued placing soft kisses to your folds, licking up every drop of your release like he couldn’t bear to waste any of it. His hands soothed your thighs, rubbing circles while you came down.

Robby lifted his head, letting you admire his lips and chin glistening with your cum between your spread thighs. “Four years… and you still taste like heaven.”

When he finally started kissing his way up your body, his mouth was soft, reaching your mouth and kissing you deeply, letting you taste yourself on his tongue. He pulled back, hovering his face above yours. “You okay, baby?” he asked with an edge of worry in his tone, cupping your cheek with one hand, brushing away a tear. “Talk to me. Was that too much?”

You managed a shaky nod, still catching your breath. “I’m… fine. Just… holy shit, Robby.”

He chuckled softly, pleased with himself after seeing the effect his mouth had on you. “You’ve got the most perfect pussy in the world, you know that? So fucking pretty when you cum. And look at the mess you made…” He glanced down between your bodies at the soaked sheets, a proud and filthy smirk tugging at his mouth. “You still soak everything when I eat you out. God, I love how wet you get for me.”

Your voice came out breathy, needy, honest in a way you haven’t been with him in years.You were finally embracing what you truly wanted. “I need you, Robby. All of you. Please.”

Something possessive flashed in his eyes. He didn’t make you ask twice this time, just sat back on his heels and stripped in a rush, yanking his shirt over his head, then shoving his pants and boxers down his thighs in one impatient motion. His cock sprang free, looking every bit as thick as you remembered it, with the head already flushed in a dark red, leaking precum. 

He was rock-hard, with the veins standing out along the shaft, curving slightly upward the way you loved, because it hit your g-spot so easily. He knelt between your spread thighs, pressing his into the mattress, and looked down at you with hunger. “Stroke it a little,” he asked you. “Let me feel your hand on me first.”

You sat up just enough to reach him, wrapping your fingers around his impressive length. He felt hot in your palm as you gave him a firm stroke from the base to the tip, swirling your thumb over the leaking head to spread the precum. Your touch made Robby groan deeply, twitching his hips forward into your touch.

“Fuck… It’s so big,” you whispered, locking your eyes on the way your hand looked around him. “I need it so much, Robby. I’ve missed this cock. Missed how full you make me.”

He watched your hand move, his breathing growing increasingly ragged with every stroke. “Slow, baby. Just like that. Real slow.” His voice was strained, like he was already fighting not to cum from your touch alone. “Shit, I’m close already. It’s been so long since I’ve felt this… your hand feels too fucking good.”

You kept stroking him slowly, twisting your wrist on the upstroke, squeezing just the way he’d always liked. Robby's head fell back for a moment, a moan rumbling in his chest, before he looked down again, watching your tits move with each stroke, watching your slick pussy still glistening from his mouth, waiting for him.

He reached down and gently took your wrist, stilling your hand. Then he shifted forward, gripping the base of his cock and rubbing the thick head up and down your soaked slit, coating himself in your wetness. The pressure against your clit made you whimper.

Robby leaned over you, bracing one hand beside your head, the other still holding his cock against your entrance. He locked his eyes onto yours. “Should we.. uh… grab a condom?”

You didn’t even hesitate, spreading your legs wider for him, sliding your hands up his arms to grip his shoulders. “I’m on the pill,” you whispered. “Go raw. I want to feel all of you.”

A deep groan escaped him as he notches the head of his cock right against your entrance, pressing just enough to tease the stretch without pushing inside yet. He cupped your face with his free hand, brushing your lower lip while he held himself right there, waiting for the moment he finally sank into you after four long years.

When he finally pushed forward, you felt the blunt pressure increasing, letting you feel every inch as he sank into you. You both moaned at the same time, he was thicker than you remembered in the haze of memory, and the stretch was intense, bordering on overwhelming after so long without anyone inside you. Your walls parted around him, fluttering and clenching as he slid deeper, inch by slow inch, until his hips were flush against yours and he was buried to the hilt inside you.

The fullness was perfect, almost too much, pressing against that deep spot that made you curl your toes instantly. “Fuck… baby,” Robby groaned, dropping his forehead to yours for a second. “You feel… Jesus Christ. So tight. So fucking wet and warm. I missed this pussy so much.”

He stayed still for a heartbeat, letting you adjust, both of you just breathing each other in after four long years. Then he started to move. The first thrust was slow and deep, pulling almost all the way out before sliding back in with a wet sound. The second was a little harder. By the third, he’d found a steady rhythm, long and powerful strokes that dragged against every sensitive spot inside you. The drag and stretch were incredible, every time he bottomed out, the head of his cock kissed that deep place that made sparks explode behind your eyes.

“Oh my God… Robby,” you moaned, already trembling, and he’d just started. “You’re so fucking deep.”

It felt amazing for both of you. For you, it was like waking up after years of numbness, every nerve lighting up, pleasure flooding your body in waves with every thrust. For Robby, the groan that left him is guttural, almost pained with how good it felt to finally be inside the only place that’d ever made sense in his life.

His hips snapped forward harder, the slap of skin on skin filling the bedroom as he fucked you with measured strokes. You were trying so hard to stay quiet, bringing your hand to your mouth to bite down on the side of it, muffling the moans that kept trying to spill out. You squeezed your eyes shut for a moment, then fluttered them open again. Robby was watching you like you were the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, flicking his gaze between your face, your lips parted, eyes glassy with pleasure, to your tits bouncing with every thrust, and down to where your pussy was stretched wide around his cock. 

He watched himself disappear inside you, the shiny wetness coating his shaft every time he pulled back, your folds clinging to him greedily. “Fuck, look at that. Your pretty pussy taking me so well after all this time. Stretched so tight around my cock… making such a mess on me.”

You bit harder into your hand as a particularly deep thrust made you whimper loudly. Robby’s rhythm started to pick up, snapping his hips with more force, the perfect angle to hit your spot inside you over and over, making you clench around his length.

“Shit… right there,” you whimpered. “That spot… fuck! I can feel every inch. God, I’m so full.”

“Stop squeezing like that,” he groaned, almost pleading, tightening his grip on your hips. “You’re gonna make me cum already if you keep clenching around me like that. This pussy is too perfect… so fucking good. Feels like heaven. I’ve dreamed about this for years… being buried inside you again.”

He leaned down and captured your mouth in a messy kiss, swallowing your muffled moans, before he suddenly gripped the backs of your thighs and lifted your legs, hooking them over his broad shoulders. The new angle let him sink even deeper, and the next thrust punched the air out of your lungs as he bottomed out completely, pressed his hips tightly against your ass, grinding his cock against that deepest spot.

“Oh my god—Robby!” You gasped against your hand, rolling your eyes back. “Like that! Like that… Please don’t stop.”

He fucked you harder now, making the bed creak softly beneath you. “So perfect,” he panted between thrusts. “You feel so fucking perfect. This body… these tits… this tight little pussy squeezing me. I missed you so much. Missed fucking you like this.”

He slid a hand between your bodies, finding your swollen clit with his thumb and rubbing firm circles in time with his thrusts. The added stimulation was pushing you toward the edge fast.

“Cum for me, baby,” he growled. “I want to feel you cum around my cock. Let me feel it.”

When the pleasure started cresting, your words turned into fragmented, needy whimpers. 

“Yes… yes… right there, oh fuck, I’m cumming. Michael, I’m cumming—”

The combination of his deep strokes, the pressure on your clit, and the overwhelming fullness after four years was too much. Your third orgasm of the night crashed over you even harder than the other two. Your back arched violently off the bed, a broken cry tearing from your throat despite your teeth sinking into your hand. Your pussy clamped down around him like a vice, pulsing and fluttering rhythmically as waves of intense pleasure ripped through you.

Robby groaned loudly, his hips stuttering as he felt his own impeding orgasm approaching. “That’s it—fuck, yes—milk me, baby. I’m cumming—”

He thrusted deep one last time, burying himself as far as he could go, and finally allowed himself to cum. You felt the thick pulses of his seed as he filled you up, rope after rope of cum flooding deep inside you, so much that you could feel it spilling out around his cock where you were stretched around him. Robby kept grinding his hips against you through his orgasm, drawing it out, making sure every drop stayed inside you as long as possible.

He stayed buried deep while you both came down, breathing hard, your bodies slick with sweat. Your legs were still over his shoulders, your pussy still gently fluttering around his softening cock. 

“Four years,” he whispered hoarsely against your lips. “And you’re still mine.”

An incredulous chuckle rumbled out of his chest, utterly satisfied. His brown eyes were in disbelief, like he genuinely couldn’t believe he just got to be inside you again after all this time. The lines around his eyes crinkled deeply as he smiled. “Jesus Christ,” he murmured, sounding a little husky fro  the exertion. “I can’t believe I just got to be inside you again. That was… fuck. That was the best fuck of my life. Better than I remembered. Better than anything.”

He stayed there a moment longer, savoring the connection, before he finally pulled out of you. You both groaned at the loss, a thick of his cum leaking out of you onto the already-soaked sheets. Robby rolled off you and onto his back beside you, reaching out with one arm to pull you against his side

He turned his head to look at you, brushing damp strands of hair off your forehead with gentle fingers. “How was that for you, baby?” he asked softly. “Tell me. Was it okay? Did I hurt you at all?”

You huffed a small, tired laugh against his collarbone. “You already know the answer.”

He hummed, but didn’t let it drop. “Say it anyway.”

“Robby.” You tilt your head back just enough to meet his eyes. “Stop fishing for compliments. You already know exactly how good it felt. It was amazing. More than amazing. I don’t even have words for it. I came so hard I— God, I needed that.”

He smiled again with a satisfied grin, and pressed a lingering kiss to your temple. “Good. That’s all I wanted, to make you feel as good as you made me feel.”

As the afterglow started to fade, and reality started to creep back in… the sleeping five-year-old down the hall, the careful co-parenting boundaries you’ve both worked so hard to maintain. You shifted slightly, propping yourself up on one elbow to look at him.

“You should get going now. It’s late. Hannah will be up early, and I don’t want her to wake up and find you here. It might make things weird or confusing for her.”

Robby let out a genuine laugh, rolling onto his side to face you fully. “Oh, so that’s how it is? You use me to break your four-year celibacy, three orgasms, mind you, and now you’re kicking me out?” His eyes sparkled with humor, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “Cold, woman . Real cold. I give you the best, and only, dick you’ve had in years, and this is the thanks I get? Straight to the door?”

You couldn’t help but laugh with him, swatting lightly at his chest. “I’m serious. You know how she is. If she comes in here looking for me in the morning and sees you in my bed, she’ll have a million questions. Or she’ll think we’re back together and get her hopes up. We can’t do that to her.”

He propped himself up on one elbow, too, mirroring your position, still grinning that cocky grin that made him look ten years younger. “Three orgasms,” he repeate, holding up three fingers like he was making a point. “I ate that pussy until you were crying and shaking, then fucked you so deep you saw stars, and now I’m being evicted? Harsh, really harsh. I feel so used right now.”

“Robby,” you said, trying to sound stern but failing as another laugh bubbled up. “Come on. You know I’m right.”

He sighed dramatically, flopping back onto the pillow but keeping one arm wrapped around your waist, pulling you closer so your bare breasts pressed against his chest. “I don’t want to go. Not yet. I want to stay here and cuddle you. Just hold you for a while. I promise I’ll leave early tomorrow morning, before Hannah wakes up. I’ll set an alarm, sneak out. She’ll never know I was here. Please, baby. Let me stay. I missed this. Missed holding you after.”

You hesitated, chewing your lip. The warmth of his body against yours, the beat of his heart under your palm, the way he kept tracing circles with his  fingers on your lower back… it all feels dangerously good. 

He sensed your wavering and leaned in, pressing soft kisses along your jaw, then to your lips. “You’re perfect,” he murmured between kisses. “So fucking perfect. The way you took me tonight, the way you came for me… You made me feel whole again. Nothing in my life has ever compared to this. You and Hannah… you two are the best things that ever happened to me. Being inside you again, hearing you moan my name… it reminded me how much I still need you. How much I’ve always needed you.”

He tightened his arm around you, pulling you fully against his chest so you were tucked into his side, resting your head on his shoulder. Robby slid one of his legs between yours, tangling you together under the messy sheets. He kept kissing you, your forehead, your closed eyelids, the tip of your nose, then back to your mouth in lingering presses. 

“I mean it,” he whispered against your hair. “You made me the happiest man alive when you gave me Hannah, but nights like this… being with you like this… it completes something in me. I feel alive. Whole. Like the missing piece finally clicked back into place. No one else has ever made me feel this way. No one else ever could.”

You melted into him despite yourself, and the night passed in fragments of deep sleep, the kind you haven’t had in years. Robby’s arm stayed across your waist the whole time, with his fingers splayed over your stomach like he was afraid you’d disappear if he let go. His chest rose and fell against your back in an even rhythm, and the snoring… God, the stupid snoring you’d missed so much.

You woke slowly, first to the weight of him, then to the ache between your legs, the reminder of last night still dried on your inner thighs. You felt him stir behind you as consciousness returned. You could practically hear the smile before you even turned your head.

When you did roll over, he was already looking at you with his eyes half-lidded, sleepy, and crinkled at the corners. And yeah, there it was, that stupid and contented grin spreading across his face like he’d just won the lottery.

“Stop smiling,” you muttered. “You’re creeping me out.”

He huffed a quiet laugh through his nose, didn’t even try to dial it back. If anything, it got wider. “Can’t help it,” he said. “Woke up next to the most gorgeous woman in the world. Kinda hard not to smile about that.”

Heat climbed up your neck despite yourself. You rolled your eyes, trying to play it off. “Flattery at six a.m. is a cheap move, Robinavitch.”

“Fuck,” he breathed, roaming his eyes over your face like he was seeing it for the first time. “Look at you.”

He dropped his gaze appreciatively, taking in the messy hair spilling across the pillow, the sheet tangled around your bare hips, the faint marks his mouth left on your collarbone last night. He reached out, tracing one with his thumb, gently.

“Don’t even think about it, Michael,” you warned him. You’d had your fun last night. It had been amazing, even better than you remembered sex with Robby ever being. But it had been one time. One stupid lapse of judgment, one moment of weakness that couldn’t repeat itself again. You couldn’t let it. Not when the delicate balance you’d fought so hard to maintain for Hannah was so stable. You refused to risk your daughter’s sense of security just because your body still craved the man who used to know every inch of you better than anyone else.

Robby snapped his eyes back to yours, looking equal parts hungry and amused. “You know how I get when you call me Michael.”

“Last night was a relapse. I was tired, and… Emotional. Not happening again today. Not happening again ever, as a matter of fact.”

“Yeah?” He laughed before he shifted, rolling you onto your back in one smooth motion. His body came down over yours, caging you under his weight. Robby braced his forearms on either side of your head, his knees bracketing your hips. “You sure about that?”

You pushed at his shoulder. “Robby… get off.”

He stirred above you, lifting his head. For a moment, he didn’t move, but you kept pushing, gentle but insistent, until he finally rolled off you with a sigh and propped himself up on one elbow.

“All of this… It was a mistake,” you sat up and pulling the sheet up over your bare chest, suddenly too aware of your nakedness.

Robby reached for you instinctively, but you shifted away, scooting back against the headboard. “Why?” he asked. “It felt fucking amazing for both of us. You know it did. We’re good at this, we’ve always been good at this.”

You shook your head, the memory of his hands, his mouth, the way your bodies still fit together like they remembered every single time before… it made your resolve weaken. “You know why not. I can’t just think about ourselves anymore. We have to think about Hannah. We can’t hurt her. We already crashed once, and I’m not putting her through big changes, through the uncertainty, the chance that everything falls apart all over again.” You swallowed hard, forcing yourself to meet his eyes. “I know you, Michael. In a month you’re going to regret this. You’re going to need space, and your head won’t be in the right place for commitment. I won’t do that to her. I won’t do that to any of us.”

Robby sat up fully now, the playful morning haze completely gone from his face. “It’s different this time. The first time… everything was happening all at once. You know how fucked up I was… After Covid, after… everything that happened. Having to take care of the whole ED… I was drowning. I couldn’t be what you needed. But I’m not that man anymore. You know I’ve changed. You’ve seen how much being a father changed me.” He leaned forward slightly. “I want you. I want this. I want the family. I want the commitment.”

You swallowed hard, and for one dangerous moment, you let yourself imagine it, waking up like this every morning with his warmth beside you, the three of you as a real family, lazy weekends and shared dinners and Hannah running between you both. The picture was so beautiful it hurt, but reality settled back in fast.

“You should go,” you whispered, looking away toward the window so he wouldn’t see the tears gathering in your eyes. “We shouldn’t keep talking about this anymore.”

Robby exhaled, running a hand through his messy, sleep-tousled hair. “It’s not fair.”

You let out a bitter little laugh. “A lot in life isn’t fair, Robby. You know that better than anyone else.”

He watched you for a long moment. The silence stretched between you until he finally swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood. You stayed under the sheet, trying not to watch the familiar way his muscles moved as he gathered his clothes from the floor and got dressed.

When he reached the bedroom door, he paused, turning back to you with that half-smirk that you knew meant trouble. “You can try, but I know you can’t stay away from all of this for too long. I’m a real catch.”

You couldn’t help the tired laugh that escaped you. “Goodbye, Michael.”

He gave you one last long look full of affection before he slipped out of the room and down the stairs. The sheets still smelled like him, your skin still remembered his hands, nd you were left alone with the echo of everything you wanted but couldn’t let yourself have. 

A/N: Oh my god, I finally wrote something!!!😭 I’d had this idea sitting in my brain for so long, and the other day I finally felt the urge to start it. After about a week, and using all the free time I have between work and college, I actually managed to finish it. Finally something with a bit of plot, lol.

I really hope you enjoyed this idea! I’d love to write a second part, but with my schedule… that could be anywhere from two weeks to a year from now. It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything, so it’d be really nice to hear your thoughts, if you liked it, your favorite parts, anything really🫶🏻

everything between you two is strictly professional, he never crosses a boundary, despite all the times he’s stared at you for too long or when he’s congratulated you on something and his hand lingers for a little too long on your thigh or the many times he’s jerked off in his office before you’ve dropped by, your name tumbling from his lips like a prayer, hoping one day that maybe you’ll hear him through the door—but you never have. you’ve always kept your distance when you’re on your little study breaks. that is until one day he offers to help you study—with consequences obviously.

he rests his hand on your thigh as he reads you out your flash note questions, making sure to slide his hand slowly up your thigh, purposefully getting you to mess up in order to punish you, sort of. you know what you were getting yourself into when he asked you about this a week ago. it should’ve been a no, but god you can’t help yourself—he’s so hot and you’d never forgive yourself if you turned down having sex with him. or rather, getting teased and fucked if you make a mistake during a study lesson.

“i know you know this stuff, sweetheart.. need to practice more, okay.. now c’mon, spread your legs for me.. that’s it, ‘atta girl..” he’s cooing at you, hand stroking your cheek and tilting his head, almost mocking you. you nod and bunch your skirt up, spreading your legs as you lay back on his couch, watching him stand up and turn slightly, kneeling between your legs. he pulls your underwear to the side, unbuckles his belt and pulls his cock out from his trousers, stroking himself a few times before he clicks his tongue at you and speaks again, “look at that pretty pussy, baby.. and it’s all for me? oh, baby, you shouldn’t have..”

you whine, glossy eyes staring up at him as he rubs the blunt head of his cock against your entrance. instinctively, you close your legs over, but his hands fly up to your knees, pushing them back open.