a/n: i love this gif so much i can't- lil domestic fic about robby having a stressful day and coming home to his sweet grad student!gf
He’s exhausted. Bone deep, a tiredness that haunts him in so, so many ways. It’s been a rough day- four codes, one of them being a kid, and he’s lucky Jack was on staff with him, because he’d kept both his anger and grief in check. The rest of the team had gone to get drinks, but not Robby. It used to be hard to hide, the way he would excuse himself from post-work drinks, or a meal, because there’s someone else he wants to chase. And now he has her, now she’s his girlfriend, waiting for him at home because she has a job that lets her be home at a decent hour. His wonderful girlfriend who laughs at his jokes and holds his hand and god, makes every day so much better since she started staying over most nights. The pleasure of her company always outweighs the embarrassment, even before she was waiting for him, and the jig was up incredibly fast. Now, the team teases him that he’s married, rushing home right after a shift. Robby always tries not to blush at that, or let it show how deeply he would like that to be true, and how even now, when his life includes a beautiful, incredible woman who snakes her arms around his waist and hugs him from behind when he’s cooking, who lets him lay his head in her lap after a long day and runs her fingers through his hair, who tells him she adores him like she doesn’t realize it’s a curse to love someone like him, that he cannot believe he could ever be so lucky as to be married to her.
She’s a workaholic in her own right, but she insists it’s just because she loves her job (where has he heard that before?). Tonight, and god, the sight is so endearing that his heart threatens to burst at it, she’s curled up in the blanket he always keeps as set dressing on his couch, especially as he so rarely used to have guests, head on the arm of his couch, a book in her hands, her hair a bit mussed.
“Hey, you,” he says to her, walking up to her and crouching down on the floor, looking up at her from his lowered position. It always feels right, looking up at her, “Having a good night?”
“Better now that you’re here,” she smiles, putting in the bookmark he’d gotten her into the middle of it, placing it on the coffee table before outstretching her arms, beckoning him into a hug. He was so fucking touch starved when he met her, and now- she gives touch like she doesn’t mind it, like she missed him, because she did. He rises fast, sits beside her on the couch and pulls him into her chest, and it’s a smooth movement how she shifts to be sitting on top of him, arms wrapped around his neck and his around her waist, her impossibly close to him as he pulls her into him.
“Long shift?” she muses as he rests his head against her neck. Her perfume is rose-scented and faded after her own day, and it’s a comfort that feels as though he shouldn’t be able to have. He hmmed into the skin of her neck, in lieu of a response. Oxytocin is an irreplaceable thing- he knows every single neurotransmitter that holding her brings out in him and this does not change that he loves her, only that he is invested in the science of loving her. “Have you eaten?”
“A bit,” she laughs, pulling back a bit so that she can look at him, “Why”
“Is a ‘bit’ popcorn and a Clif bar?”
“I really feel like you have cameras in here.”
“You’re just predictable, baby.” He starts the process of untangling his limbs from hers, which is colder than he’d imagined it would be.
“Honey, you don’t have to cook! C’mon, we can order in, I don’t want you to have to do work more after you get home.” She’s pouting at him, following him to the kitchen, and he’s still dumbstuck at his luck. A year ago, he’d be at the bar with his friends trying to forget whatever fucked up thing he’d seen, and now he’s cooking his girlfriend dinner.
“You have to eat a real meal, honey. Besides, it’ll be relaxing, I love cooking for you.” he’s careful when he says ‘love’ because he’s always close to confessing. He’s sure he does in a million ways, with the way he kisses her good morning, or keeps the notes she leaves on his fridge in his wallet. Dinner is easy to whip up- some chicken that he’d marinated and cooked the day before and pan-fried greens. It’s what he loves, caring for people, even if he’s so bad at it that he’s surprised she hasn’t left him yet. He’s not good at talking, worse at making time to spend with her. She’s patient with him, busy with her studies and gentle with her boyfriend who’s never home and never introduced her to his friends and hasn’t said that he loves her.
He can cook her a meal. He can love her well, like that. He plates it with surgical precision, pours her a glass of the nice white wine, because he could bet she had a long day too, even if she’s more reticent to share on days like today, where he comes home an open wound who’s channeling it through functionality.
“I’m spoiled,” she says, in a hushed tone. He hates when she looks at him like that- like he’s the best thing that ever happened to her, like he’s done her some great service by cooking her a meal and putting on her favorite show. It makes him feel small, like she’s only his as long as she doesn’t realize that she deserves this and more. As he sits next to her, slouching so far down his head rests on her shoulder, the tension drains out of him like air leaking from a balloon. Later, he’ll take her to bed and after, she’ll fall asleep in his arms, and it will be okay, because she’s there. She smells like home and it’s a privilege, being as they watch the same episode of television he’s watched with her time, and time again, he thinks of what to say.
“I’m the spoiled one, honey.”
And he really, really is.
germansingergirl
dededos
origamiaround
pixelskylines
turnnoffyourmind
