Not ANOTHER side blog for me. Sam. She/Her. Mid 20s. Reading *all the fics* is a passion and now a personal goal apparently??? 18+ my friends due to the content I post. Thanks. Links down below!
Ghost doesn't have loads of money, but he lives well, some would say modest, enough for his own level of comfort. He has his own little place when he isn't with the rest of 141 on missions. A house, a one-bedroom flat, something small and well concealed for his own paranoia when he is home by himself or is away for a while.
The extra money he does have? It is always anonymously donated to local women's shelters, rehabilitation centers, places that deal with displaced people/families/children, and other local centers or churches that take care of orphans. Sometimes Simon, sans mask because that is when he is truly Simon, goes and volunteers at the soup kitchen that the centers will hold--moving loads of food or serving the latest meal. Maybe even having a chat with those that are eating. If he is home, Simon is a local call when helping the shelter's inhabitants move into their own places once they get back on their feet. You might even catch him on the sidewalks, going door to door, to get more donations (cash, checks, food, supplies) for the places too.
He says he has a frozen heart, but I think he just leaves it with other people. In hopes that their lives will turn out better than his.
also this is just a lil thought i literally woke up in the middle of the night thinking about. homie really needs to do more background of ghost's life. i know like bare minimum about him and his mom/brother, etc.
ANYWAY... pls be kind this is some of the first stuff i have written AND published online since my Harry Potter fanfic era like 10 or 11 years ago.
and if anyone would like to make a full story about this GO FOR IT!!! i honestly thought it'd be cool if that was how he met the reader but idk. If you do write it just tag me pls!
୨ৎ summary .ᐟ.ᐟ dr. brendon park operated like most shark, always patrolling and returning to where he was familiar. he knew how to fix fractures and re-implant amputated limbs with confidence. he was a master in his professional craft. socially—brendon didn’t have that same skill, and when you moved to the night shift, the atmospheric change was something he couldn’t stabilize like bones.
୨ৎ tags/warnings .ᐟ.ᐟ female reader, no use of y/n, no physical description, sexism/conflict in the workplace, pediatric/mass casualty cases, burnout, slow burn, grumpy/sunshine, competence kink, emotionally repressed brendon (he honestly needs therapy), power imbalance, this is just park realizing he fucked up and lowkey yearns for reader to notice him again lol
୨ৎ authors note .ᐟ.ᐟ here is the long awaited continuation! someone said something of a park pov and i couldn't resist it!! i hope this is a worthy part two (yall let me know honestly, okay?) i love brendon park y'all and i know you guys do too, so i really hope you guys like it (i have a validation kink)
୨ৎ word count .ᐟ.ᐟ 14.4 k
part one: find another soldier!
Brendon heard more than what he wanted to about the hospital and its staff. Even though staff were acutely aware when he was around (typically refraining from making obvious comments about him), he was still able to pick up a few things here and there.
Observations of potential flings and affairs between nurses and doctors. The ‘drama’ that occurred within departmental staff—some of them including married couples who challenge their vows by working together. The latest news on what residents royally screwed up or who had been reprimanded for forgetting protocol.
Brendon Park, who had the hearing of a shark, picked up those sociable conversations between colleagues. He always stood a comfortable distance from the parade, finding no satisfaction in bonding with people he was meant to work with. The absence of relation and sharing intimacy such as personal details didn't affect his work negatively, which was all that mattered to him
He told himself he didn't care about any of it, even when he heard a thing or two about himself. Internally, he knew that was the absolute truth. There was no exception.
Until he passed by the nursing station where Sully, his chief resident, was speaking with Dr. Emmick, the night shift attending. The two were off to the side, speaking among themselves like the two had done so before. Sully held a digital chart in his hands, but his attention was on Dr. Emmick, casually slumped with her hands in her jacket pockets.
“She’s doing perfectly on her own.” Dr. Emmick shrugged, a proud smile on her face. The relief that escaped Sully made something tick in Park. “I mentioned nominating her for chief resident next year. That just seemed to amp up her determination even more, if that was possible.”
“That's not surprising. She’s always been miles above some of the other residents.” Sully responded with a buzzing smile. Brendon had resorted to stopping by the printer behind the station, pretending to be shuffling through pages he had already arranged. “She’s managed to teach me a few things I plan to take with me.”
“I’m sure she’ll be sad to see you leave,” Dr. Emmick patted his shoulder, that softer smile she reserved for praises and quiet appreciations painting her face. Sully nodded along with her words. “But, she’s blossoming here. Before you know it, she’ll be running this place.”
“Dr. Emmick,” Park cut through the conversation, standing from across the nursing station. He held up the papers in his hand, a curt nod in her direction.
She offered one more smile to Sully as she moved around the desk. Park didn’t look over at her as the two merged to walk alongside each other. In the time Dr. Emmick had been at PTMC, she never once spent time alone with Brendon Park. The most solitude the two of them spent was when they had meetings, and even then, those events included other admin or members of the collective hospital boards they were in.
She figured out he was a lone shark when they first met, preferring to slip in and out the doors without so much of a ‘good morning’ or ‘good night.’
The least he could do was offer her a nod whenever they passed each other by hand-off.
Dr. Emmick walked with a small sway, too much energy for someone who spent the entire shift focused on an emergency reconstruction of a patient with an unstable pelvic ring fracture. Brendon sensed the small glances she sent him, and he sighed out through his nostrils, maintaining his aloof demeanor. If he acted normal, she’d keep the curious questions to herself.
“We’re only a few months shy from graduation again.” Emmick mentioned casually, maneuvering around some nurses passing by, offering small ‘excuse me.’ “Do you have anyone in mind for chief residents?”
Brendon barely flinched at the question, keeping his attention straight ahead. The two pushed through the first pair of double doors until they reached the nonclinical area of the surgical department, where his office along with the other chief surgeons and attending lounge was.
He snorted lightly, shaking his head. “At the rate my residents are working, we may have to settle on one, if we both agree on someone.”
“That’s a lot of responsibility for one resident,” Dr. Emmick snickered. She was aware what residents wanted the title, which came with the most attention from the attendings. All the other residents were their little ducks to watch, a true simulation of being an attending in a trauma-1 hospital.
Which came with the responsibility of their wrong-doings as much as their wins.
Emmick brushed her stray hairs behind her ear, “And if you can't settle on someone from the day-shift, I’d hate to hear what you think of those in the night shift.”
“I’m assuming you're asking because you had someone in mind.” Brendon diverted smoothly, his tone even and rested. Despite the fact he knew exactly where she was reigning the conversation, he still held the detached perceptive look he had when he was making an objective judgment.
She hummed, advancing ahead of Park to scan her badge to enter the hospital-staff exclusive area. With a beep, the doors clicked open and Brendon stalked down first. When the door shut behind Emmick she stepped back to his side, “It’s someone we both have worked with extensively.”
When Brendon reached his office, he bowed his head slightly to hide the twitch in his nose. Once he sat at his desk, he had put back the stoic expression. Emmick shut the wooden door, pulling out a chair for her to sit across him. Both her hands folded onto her lap, legs crossed. The small twitch in the corner of her mouth all but confirmed his suspicion.
When your name escaped her mouth, he straightened his back. He was recalling the image of him sitting on his desk, your buzzing body standing in front of the door, waiting for the moment to escape. You had left and never looked back.
Once the switch was made official, Park wasn't expecting there to be a lapse in his day-to-day life. It’s not like you had moved departments or hospitals. He would see you passing by the halls during hand-off, the back of your head or the familiar fleece jacket you sported in the eerily cold hospital; but there was a distance that didn't exist while you worked the dayshift.
Working under his command and his directive as his resident.
“What about her makes her ideal for the position?” Brendon questioned. The current quarterly review the two were meant to oversee before their meeting pushed aside.
The question was firm, like he was interviewing his colleague instead of searching for her opinion. She raised her eyebrows at him, an amused grin flashing back at him. “You want my professional opinion?”
“Obviously.”
“She is a good mentor, has great instinct and initiative. She keeps a clinical perspective while under pressure.” Emmick listed out concisely, opting to appease the language Dr. Park preferred. He didn’t care about the mush or the personable trait that made you stand out to him, even if Emmick felt those strengths were your greatest virtues. “As a third-year resident, she is already doing the job of a chief resident, without the title.”
Brendon remained silent, pressing his lips into a thin line. The subtle movement of his jaw, an obvious tick, made it evident what he refused to put into words. He had doubts.
“This observation is based on the last three months she’s been on the night shift?” He clarified while crossing his arms over his chest. Through the sleeves of his scrubs, his muscles tightened, pulling the fabric tighter.
Emmick confirmed with one silent nod, eyeing Park from her chair. “As well as the double and previous night shifts she has worked.”
“And you're confident in her abilities?”
The more questions he spewed, the more it resembled an interrogation. He was investigating a theory he was keeping to himself through the people who knew you, instead of addressing the source. In three months, it was clear that you were keeping a distance.
No one wanted to spend five minutes alone in a room with Park, let alone talk to him that long. In your case, you confronted him of the clear judgments he made of your work while under his supervision. The public displays of his criticism had pushed you into the deep end of a pool, and as you found an edge to climb off, you took the extra steps to never fall in that situation again.
If you had asked him, he’d describe it as running.
“You aren’t?" Emmick resounded incredulously, like it was unbelievable he thought contrary to popular belief.
“I think that in the majority of the three years I’ve witnessed her work, I’ve noticed moments requiring additional correction.” Brendon commented with no hesitation, as if he was waiting for the opportunity to let it out.
The frustration you caused when Mr. Stevenson suffered through compartment syndrome. The lack of awareness when you were run down through your double shifts. Even the lack of urgency when treating patients. It was all hindering your ability to be a perfect orthopedic surgeon.
“All residents need to be corrected.” Emmick remarks with a humorous scoff. Park ticked his head to the side, displeased with her dismissing his objection. “I’m not saying she’s perfect.”
“It was implied strongly by your choice of words.”
“Well, in comparison to some of the other residents, she’s damn near it.” Emmick cocked her head to the side, almost daring him to utter a word. Brendon kept his eyes on her, and all he saw were talons flared out, like a hawk ready to protect its nest.
Emmick had traits he respected in a colleague. Working together as attendings undertaking residents with shaky hands became a source of common ground. What divided them was their nonidentical ways of going about it. Emmick stuck her ground when Brendon might expostulate with gravity to the risks. She believed in a hand-on validating method. Brendon had to see it first to believe it.
“I thought maybe you might agree.” She mentioned casually, picking at a lint on her jacket sleeve.
Brendon nose twitched, leaning forward in his seat to rest his burly arms on the table. “Why is that?”
“Because I like to believe you couldn’t possibly deny when a resident is good at their job.” Emmick narrowed her eyes at him, tempting to push him just close enough to the edge where he’d have to turn and face the issue.
What Brendon thought was nothing was something worth omitting. He could brood all he’d wanted, and most of his residents wouldn’t blink a teary eye, but what he cursed Emmick over was her peculiar talent at observation.
“Especially not a resident like her.”
He huffed out a sigh, almost cracking his resolve. This had to be a joke. “The residents chosen for the chief position need to have earned my utmost trust. It’s not a title handed prematurely.”
“Like Sullivan?” She asked skeptically, arms crossing over her chest as she leaned back in the chair.
Her steady stare dragged across every inch of his face. He didn’t bother intimidating a colleague who had proven time and time again she wasn’t to be messed with; even when people assumed she was too lax in comparison to him.
But, she had a nasty bite.
Brendon knew exactly what she was insinuating. Apart from Sullivan (who was personally chosen for the role by Park) his co-chief for night shift was also a man who (in Parks terms) got lucky from the process of elimination. Despite the fact Emmick might’ve argued the two female 4th year residents would’ve made wonderful selections.
“Look, before you snarl your shark-teeth at me, let me say one thing.” She put up a hand to restrain his irritability right before they were meant to meet with administration.
When he mentioned nothing more, she sat up straight, leaning in closer like she might tell him a life-changing secret. “If this is about her moving to night shift, that might’ve been my doing more than hers. No hard feelings, Brendon.”
“What do you mean?” He entertained, eyes turning into slits as he stared curiously. Like examining an amputation on the field.
“I told her I could use a resident with her skill.” She mentioned casually, like the concept was known by everyone. Brendon was aware of what Emmick thought of you, as much as the other resident did. She didn’t hide her affection or pride with a firm guard as he did.
She shrugged, her smile upside. “I didn’t think she’d want to give up the chance to be taught by you, but here we are.”
Brendon's eyes moved down at the desk, feeling the oak from that night as he gripped the edge of his desk. He conformed to the idea his sudden dissatisfaction was from you standing over him, pointing blame for affecting your work. He was too hard, too malevolent, or contemptuous for your liking.
All the effort he put in was just him being too “proud” and “arrogant.” He expected more from you, and he didn’t need your honesty (as you had put it), to remind him that you weren't up to the plate.
“I still stand by the fact she’s exceptional, and it would be a disservice if we didn’t even consider her.” She concluded, with the firmness that came from working her way to where she was.
On the very few occasions that they spoke, Emmick had expressed small gratitude for the trust he had extended to her when she first transferred over. He didn't comprehend the need to “thank” him. He assumed the hospital was hiring competent attendings to take over the hard work while teaching naive residents and interns.
So when he thought of you, as chief resident or an attending, the bill did not fit. Nobody just deserved the title. It was earned from hard work. You had yet to work hard enough to garner a standing ovation from him.
Philosophy wasn’t Brendon’s strong suit. He didn't waste his time on debates, but he did have strong beliefs. Medicine was a rational practice. There were right and wrong things to do in a hospital—as a surgeon—that could put the lives of others in the balance. He was taught that lesson long ago, and when it came time for him to pass along his teachings, he made sure to drill it in all his residents.
‘Your patient can die at any moment. Don't be the reason they don’t make it.’ was something he had reminded them time and time again. He didn't need to be pulled away from one life-saving surgery to futilely attempt another. His residents should be covering all bases, without serving any reminders.
He hadn't forgotten the occasions you had failed at that.
It was rookie mistakes unsuited for third year residents. When he enforced responsibilities, he expected stellar work in return. If the residents signed up for the work of orthopedic surgery, they should be held accountable for every action and inaction that they take. He expected them to enforce that upon themselves.
He had put that weight on you.
He was unapologetic for what he had done while you worked with him. It was all for the sake of the patients, himself, and you. Your work was a reflection of him, and if you couldn't figure out how to stand on your own two feet, how could anyone trust the training you had to save lives?
You had not seen it that way. Brendon shrugged it off in turn.
Maybe he was vindictive, waiting for Emmick to see the dangerous flaws he did. He expected Emmick to see it as he did, but she had other pillars in her teaching.
He saw it the way she smiled whenever you showed up around her. Brendon noticed it from inside patient rooms, behind nursing stations, and the few occasions you two were in the same space together. Emmick praised you with the same ease as breathing.
Everyone was aware how rare Dr. Park complimented anyone for his or her work. Marla Emmick operated oppositely.
She’d pat your shoulder, whisper something with that curled grin of hers, or give you a fist-bump as a supportive nod of your actions. Brendon rolled his eyes at it.
These weren’t kindergartners who needed a gold star for accomplishing something required of their program. These were grown adults who needed to comprehend the intensity of their choices, their observations and evaluation of patients, and the importance of knowing what they were doing as much as showing up to do it.
He was trying to make competent surgeons capable of saving fragile human life and he would do that at the expense of feeding the “shark” persona everyone saw. Cold-hearted, detached, and mean.
Even while you were under the supervision of Emmick, he still tried to figure out whether you had learned anything from the time you spent with him. He needed to see whether Emmick was right about her observation.
Park was making his way to the patient waiting in the pre-op wing. He stalked around, looking for the small group of residents making their rounds. He nodded at Annette, the charge nurse, as she pointed over to patient room three. When he made his way to the room, he saw the collective group of residents standing at the foot of the bed. He stood by the doorway, listening to the hand-off Reddy, the senior residents for the night, conducted.
Frank Giles, a 65-year-old, needing a total hip replacement after a nasty fall in his home, sat on the bed. He was cracking jokes with the residents, who seem to go along with it.
He was looking around the crowd, in search of someone specific. Frowning, he looked at Dr. Reddy, “Where is that one doctor? She’s the one who spoke with me when they first admitted me.”
Reddy furrowed his brows, glancing up from the device in his hand. He paused for a moment before speaking your name. It rang bells in Mr. Giles face as his smile widened, “Would it be too much to ask if she could do the operation?”
Sully smiled sincerely, standing center at the foot of the bed. “Her shift ends soon, unfortunately. But knowing her, she will likely check in with you tonight once you’re resting up in post-op.”
Mr. Giles conformed to the idea, despite the fact his smile was nearly as bright as before. “Good friend of hers, I assume?”
With a flustered grin, Sully nodded. “Roommates. Given the amount of time we spent together, I would hope we are.”
A belly laugh filled the room, and Mr. Giles identified with something Sully said. The endearing look on his face made it clear to Brendon, watching the old man examine Sully like he were someone familiar. “Reminded of my late wife and I.”
Brendon could make out a quiet condolence from Sully. Before Mr. Giles could go on a tangent, Sully smoothly transitioned the conversation into pre-op protocol. Reddy jumped in easily, going over the diagnosis.
He nodded along to what Reddy explained about the procedure assigned to Sully. After a couple of questions, the residents paid their farewell and filed out in a line.
Park stood back, waiting for the senior residents to emerge from the room. When his chief resident noticed Park, he gave him a silent tut of his chin. He fell in line beside him, silencing the quiet conversation between Sully and his co-chief resident.
“Where is Dr. Emmick?” Park asked without invitation. The question was directed to Dr. Reddy, who lifted his brows in response.
Park expectantly looked at him with hooded eyes. He shook himself from the daze, “She got stuck in a complex acetabular reconstruction. 3 hours and counting.”
“Alone?” Park followed up, eyes darting in front of him as he counted the back of the resident's head.
He knew exactly who was missing. He didn’t need to specify where his curiosity lied.
“No,” Sully jumped in, glancing at Park from beside him. Despite the fact they were about the same height, he still towered over the senior resident. He then said your name with a smile, “Dr. Emmick managed to rope her into a possible ten-hour surgery. Although, I doubt she would’ve said no to it.”
“Better her than me.” Reddy had mumbled under his breath, presuming his comment could be omitted from Park the Shark.
“As a fourth-year resident, it should be you.” Park swiftly remarked, barely jerking his head to look at Reddy. He did extend his arm to Sully, silently taking the device in order to sneak a look at the operation details. “How do you intend to make up for your lack of exposure in a different hospital? By choking up the minute you’re standing over a patient with everything at stake?”
Reddy's wide eyes panicked and landed on Sully, hoping the person supposedly in his corner would save him. Sully gave him a menial headshake, refusing to intervene. Reddy sighed in defeat, shoulders sagging. “It was a joke.”
Park didn’t elaborate more on the matter as he glared at him from the corner of his eye. As he opened the operation details, he read about the patient suffering a work-accident. Based on the intake details and initial imaging once in the ER, it was an unfavorable surgery to hop on while almost done with a 12-hour shift. With a both column fracture involved, you two were bound to be stuck there for ten hours.
Before Park could rip Reddy apart even more, he excused himself to debrief about a patient in post-op. Instead of joining the group, Park stopped by the nursing station, investigating the details of the case further. Of course, Emmick would choose her most prized resident to join the surgery.
However, Brendon couldn’t help but wonder whether you agreed for the experience and bragging rights that came from being selected over your senior resident only.
Sully stood in front of him, hands in his pocket while glancing between his fellow residents in the patient room and his attending. He leaned back on his heels, “I heard the patient was in a pretty bad state when he came in. Dr. Emmick might be stuck in there a while, if you needed her.”
Park huffed out a sigh, shaking his head slightly. With your absence, he was able to gauge what type of doctor Sully would turn out to be. He was the same ambitious and focused resident he always was, even without you to support him through every surgery.
Whether he wanted to or not, he had asked Park for a recommendation letter for an attending position he planned to take at a trauma-1 hospital in Chicago.
Brendon never embellished the truth—whether personally or professionally. There was no way he would lie on a rec letter for a resident, no matter how much they relied on it for a position anywhere. But, he hated to admit, Dr. Sullivan had managed to push Park to add some flourish to the letter.
“Maybe this is out of place, but I know talks about chief residents are being held around this time.” Sully leaned in casually, still keeping his focus mostly on Reddy and the other residents. They both could hear enough from outside the room. “Do you mind if I give you my opinion as their predecessor?”
Park lifted his gaze up, hooded eyes staring back at Sully, who waited patiently for a response. Looking bored, Park sighed, “Something tells me you’re going to give it to me regardless.”
Sully chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck casually. He shrugged, “I want to make sure you and Dr. Emmick consider everything to make the right choice, not that you need me to do that.”
Remaining silent, Park stared blankly at Sully. After a beat, he understood Park wasn’t going to welcome the suggestion verbally. That was beneath him. Sully leaned onto the nursing station, eyes focused on Dr. Park. “I don’t want you to think this is some plug just because she’s my roommate or because we’re close.”
Brendon didn’t need any more explanation as to who he was referring to. The utterance of your name from him was something he was starting to dread after the last conversation with Emmick. Sully stared skeptically at Park, trying to read into the stoic demeanor he had all the time. “She is a good surgeon, and as her chief resident, I do believe she could fulfill the position with ease.”
“Are you sure she’ll survive without you?” Park questioned, his eyes now narrowed on Sully. It wasn’t the type of concern Emmick would’ve shown him. It was a mockery of what Sully just expressed. The everlasting doubt in his resident still understands the work. He didn’t agree, but he didn’t vocalize it yet either.
Sully cocked his head to the side, “I don’t doubt it. The real question is if I’m going to survive without her. I got too comfortable having her around, I guess.”
Brendon saw the slight tenderness in his eye. Something soft he didn’t get to see every day between him and you. He could almost sense your presence while you were holed away in an OR. The way patients asked for you with the same affection they’d search for a comrade. He was aware of what the residents thought of you, often turning to you to save them from a sinking boat.
It was like they knew you’d throw them a life preserver, unlike the harsh suggestion to ‘figure it out’ on their own like Park would do.
“The lease of our apartment is already under her name. She is set for next year.” Sully mentioned coolly. Park hated small talk, but he found it odd within himself to hesitate with cutting the conversation short. He stared with the same blank expression at Sully, completely unsure what to do with that information.
Sully chuckled, “If she weren’t set on staying, I would drag her over with me.”
Brendon forehead creased in the center and his jaw clenched, similarly to when attending a consultation in the ER. A solid focus on trying to capture every detail of a patient’s leg, arm, or other joint susceptible to needing care under his department.
He never questioned where a resident went once they were done with their program. They all couldn’t stay here, and the ones that attempted found it hard to continue with the pressure pushed by ‘Park the Shark.’ Even if there were a resident whom he deemed sufficient to fill an attending position, he’d never advocate on their behalf.
Brendon didn’t get where he was by accepting a hand-out from anyone.
“I’m still going to hold her a place over there just in case.” Sully continued, still hanging around Park like there was more to discuss.
Park caught the residents leaving the room, walking over to another a couple of doors down. His eyes followed their movement, barely blinking when he looked back at Sully, questioning glare. “Shouldn’t you be doing hand-offs with the rest?”
Sully didn’t look over his shoulder, or show any attempt to attend to his duties. There wasn’t even a hint of hesitation, not even when he saw the glare from Park, staring him up and down. He was a man determined to do a job Brendon saw no point in. “I’m telling you this because I’d hate for you to come to the realization how critical her contribution to this hospital is until it’s too late.”
Brendon grinded his jaw slightly. Had Sully conspired with Emmick to shove you down his throat? Or maybe this was a lousy attempt at your end to get an apology out of him. Park didn’t relinquish. He didn’t care how much people argued the contrary, he refused to give in on what people may think was “best” for his department.
“You may not need her, but that doesn’t eliminate her worth around here.” Sully stated with firmness.
From the hardened stare of his resident, Brendon knew exactly what Sully was referring to. He didn’t doubt that you’d share the hostility brewing between him and you. It wasn’t exactly a secret. Park would not shy away from exposing a resident for their wrong doings.
What he was starting to notice was the courage of certain residents willing to put their foot down on what they saw was unjust.
They handed him the short end of the stick during his residency and med-school years. His teachers and attendings didn’t make it easy, and they certainly wouldn’t have tolerated being advised by residents like you and Sully.
Instead of picking a fight, he chose the silence. It was early in the morning to dig into Sully. He’d chosen to wait into swatting him around like a shark with its fin. It took another minute for Sully to realize Park the Shark was opting to glare at him, inserting dominance until he got the hint.
Park handed him the device back. Sully took it without question, swiftly turning to head in the direction the residents disappeared. Standing firm in place, he watched the cloud of plum scrubs move around the post-op floor.
He knew exactly which ones would cry over his directive before the start of their next year. Who would hesitate and second-guess themselves the next time they answered a consultation. He could acutely guess who would be eaten alive by the other attendings across different departments. If they couldn’t handle the likes of Robby or Walsh, then he saw them quitting sooner rather than later.
Yet, you didn’t fit that image, physically or metaphorically.
You, who was off doing a surgery only he trusted senior staff on, were ambitiously seeking to make yourself indispensable. There was no need when you had staff like Emmick and Sully in your corner, even the dreadful surgical attendings like Walsh were jabbing at Park to ‘ease up’ on the only resident able to keep up with him.
He heard it all and up until now, it never made sense to ‘ease up’ on his residents. It was far from his natural instinct to push until they finally figured to pull themselves up, even as he had control of the rope. You had managed to deny him that pleasure, opting to climb the side of the cliff with your bare hands.
Now, he was left watching and waiting, with the rope still in his hand.
When Brendon heard about the opening of OR 5, cleaned up after the complex acetabular reconstruction, it was past noon. He was doing the afternoon check in with Annette, and he hadn’t realized how late the surgery ended.
There was no sight of you or Emmick. He would not have assumed either of you were going to stay longer than necessary once charting was done. It was a difficult procedure based on the pre-operative details. The day had been lulled by a scheduled base itinerary that the residents could handle with limited supervision. He had time to spend, and he was analyzing the patients chart as if he was going to scrub in for surgery.
It was obsessive, but the compulsion to understand every surgery in the department he commanded, was a given.
He happened to be going around the post-op ward. Checking in with residents as patients moved out of surgery to observation or were discharged or transferred elsewhere. As he was passing by the room in the far corner, he heard a familiar belly laugh. Unrestrained and engrossed in whatever made him laugh.
Brendon peeked his head first, checking in through the window. Mr. Giles sat on the bed, glancing to his left with a toothy grin. The surgery had been done in a few hours, and although he’d probably feel better sleeping the entire procedure off, he had his own form of treatment.
He was staring fondly at a female visitor. It was hard to make out who they were from their face, but the silhouette was too familiar. He noted the black backpack sitting beside the chair, pulled close to the bedside. It wasn’t until the voice started laughing along with Mr. Giles that it clicked.
“I swear, I’ve never seen anyone slip so animatedly as then.” You breathed out, the laugh subsiding into giggles as you tried to catch your breath.
Stopping beside the filler of the wall between both rooms, he crossed his arms. Without realizing, he was inclining his ear closer to listen. You sighed out dramatically, “He’s not the most graceful, but he can suture up nerves and tissue even with his eyes closed.”
“So, how come he’s leaving?” Mr. Giles questioned, interested in the explanation. He cleared his croaky throat.
There was a beat of silence, and from the corner of his eye, Brendon noticed how you shrugged. “He doesn’t see himself staying here. This was always temporary compared to where he wanted to be.”
“And how about you?” Mr. Giles proposed, smiling again. “You’re pretty good at what you do. Where do you want to be?”
You hummed, nervously laughing after as you tried deflecting the comment. Too humble to know when to just take the compliment. “I haven’t decided yet. Dr. Sullivan has invited me to join him once my residency is over, but I still have a year to figure that out.”
“Don’t wait too long.” Mr. Giles advised in the antiquated fashion Brendon’s parents did to him.
Marriage. Kids. Retirement plans; personal-life-milestones Brendon put aside. He didn’t have to think about that while focusing on his career. As long as he could continue to be the chief orthopedic surgeon at PTMC, his life was as fulfilled as he felt it could be. He didn’t need personal distractions to keep him occupied.
“Sometimes, the things that are good for us are the things we let go.” Mr. Giles warned, turning his head to look up at the ceiling. “If I had taken my own advice, I would’ve married my wife before going to the Marines. I was lucky enough she came to find me once her first marriage ended.”
Brendon glanced down at the watch positioned on the inside of his wrist. It was past one and he didn’t need the liability of restless residents staying around past their bedtime. He advanced towards the patient’s door, one hand braced on the frame of the open sliding door.
He spoke your name briskly, title and surname firm into the air. You turned towards the door of the room, eyebrows raised to your hairline. Staring at you with heavyset eyes, he saw the casualness of your attire. Plum scrubs more than likely in the dispenser, changed into relaxed jeans, a grey t-shirt, wrapped in your fleece jacket.
Rotating from the hip, you put on a tight lip smile. “Dr. Park. Did you need to check in with Mr. Giles?”
“No,” The firm definition of his arm around the sleeves of his scrub tightened, gripping tighter to the frame. “I’m here to make sure all my staff is where they need to be.”
With the pronunciation of his possession over the day shift, you heard the message clearly. Facing Mr. Giles, your body relaxed with the revelation of his soft expression. With one hand stretched, you patted his hand lying flat on the bed. “I will check on you tonight.”
He scoffed, the corner of his lip curling up. “So soon? You just can’t stay away from this place, huh?”
While reaching down to slip on your backpack, you smiled coyly. You pushed the chair back to the corner, and once back by Mr. Giles bedside; you paused with your hands in your jacket pockets. “What can I say, I love what I do. Rest up, Frank.”
Making your way out the room, Brendon pulled his arm back, stepping aside to give you an undisturbed exit. The air that hit him as you were passing by was colder than the fuzziness between you and Mr. Giles. Brendon still found himself venturing in the same direction as you.
“If you’re looking for Dr. Emmick, I last heard she was speaking with the wife of the steel-yard worker.” You directed to Park walking behind you. As you turned the corner, walking in the direction of the elevator, he was still behind you.
“How did the surgery go?’ He asked with no change in the equilibrium of his tone.
You sighed, shaking your head. “He’s in the ICU. Apart from the fracture and the reconstruction, he suffered major trauma to his internal organs. Spleen was compromised, and Dr. Walsh removed a part of his kidney.”
The way you noted all the information was robotic. It was like having an automated voice read the chart. If he had wanted the differential diagnosis of the patient, he wouldn’t have asked. His eyes lingered on the back of your head, suddenly determined to leave the hospital as rapidly as possible. As if your pit stop to see Mr. Giles wasn’t the true reason you had delayed leaving.
Instead of heading straight for the elevators, you derailed into the residents lounge, slipping in and letting the door fall behind you. Park, with the reflexes from his childhood, pushed the door back with his palm. Inside the lights were dimmed, and you walked over to the fridge, as if you were utterly alone in the room.
“How come you were pulled to assist?” Brendon ruminated, eyes narrowed at you.
When you stood back up straight, you had an energy drink in your hand. The crack of the seal echoed and you shrugged while sipping the beverage. He awaited a verbal response. Some nonsensical explanation for an answer you had no way of knowing.
You took a couple of steps, in his direction, before stopping. He didn't move from the path to the door. With wide eyes and an awkward tight lip smile, you rocked on your feet. “Is there something else you needed to know about the patient, Dr. Park?”
The question wasn’t proposed because you wanted the conversation to continue. If it was the only way for you to be able to leave the confined space, you would; but you make it practical. About the patient care and the workload, the night shift was leaving the day shift. Nothing of the sort that related personally to you and him.
He knew with the scheduled double shift you were blocked for must have been a dread. If the current direction this conversation was heading was any clue, he could see the double shift being the last thing you want to do.
Working for 24 hours—half of them stuck with the attending you shunned from your education. Brendon was anticipating some form of retaliation. Letting your professionalism turn to spite. Lying in wait to see whether you’d give him the same treatment you felt you unjustly earned from him.
“Typically a fourth-year resident would perform or assist the procedure.” Park responded, completely guiding the conversation in the opposite direction.
You didn’t remove your eyes from him. They were glassy, and the way your lids would flutter ever so slightly, weary. With your lips sealed, you slowly nodded your head, as if remembering for the future. Don’t get used to this treatment. It’s not meant to last.
“I responded to the consultation and it was Dr. Emmick’s directive to have me on the surgical team.” You plainly renounced. This antagonistic approach was doing nothing in his favor. From the way you kept looking at him with the blank expression, he had more luck talking to a wall. “It was a learning opportunity.”
Brendon curtly nodded once, flexing his jaw as his teeth pressed against each other. Firmer than before. How were you supposed to be ‘equals’ if you could barely speak words to him?
“I have to go home. I work another shift tonight.”
Silently, you maneuvered around his body. As he felt your arm come up against his, he finally retracted himself. You only opened the door wide enough to slip your body, letting partial light from the hospital peek in the ambient lounge.
Brendon’s hand reached for the handle, pulling it open wider. You glanced up when you noticed the door leave your grasp. You spun around once stepping out the room, eyeing Brendon peculiarly.
He stood opposite of you, shoulder tall and pulled back. He nodded once more, “See you next week for day shift.”
Brendon prided himself on the control he had. The influence in his department that allowed him to rule over his residents prevented health violations and potential lawsuits from knocking on his door. It saved him from unprecedented headaches. The less likely he was to have an unplanned meeting with Admin, the better.
That idea was expanded to his residents. He deemed it efficient to harbor the tenacity his attending preached. If they put on a mile with an inch, they could potentially save someone’s quality of life.
That is a lot harder said than done when patients weren’t easily agreeable to their plan of care.
Which was the only reason Brendon was tenser with pediatric cases. With more parties involved with the care, there was more time dedicated to explaining operative procedures and post-op care. Everything was done for the consideration of the children, but Brendon didn’t understand that type of reliance.
Being a single man in his early forties, he had yet to figure out that stage of his life. There was no personal life with a wife or children waiting for him outside the hospital doors. So his approach was practical when explaining, but it was failing him at the moment.
A 12-year-old girl was trembling in fear, tears staining her cheeks, while sitting on the hospital bed. Her parents were sitting beside her, and after Brendon thought they might be able to proceed with the open reduction and internal fixation, they were pulling out with the consent forms before them.
“We just don’t feel as comfortable as we did before. I mean, how do we know the probability of the risks?” The father reasoned, similar in build as Brendon, one arm filled with tattoos. He twisted at the hip, as one hand held the smaller one of his daughter, while facing Brendon.
He shouldn’t have sent Jones to sign the consent forms.
“We don’t have precise numbers, but most children recover well.” Brendon’s concise answer was honest, not medically malicious. He couldn't provide them false hope. That was a lawsuit waiting to happen.
“But, could she develop this growth plate injury the other doctor mentioned?” The mother questioned, leaning forward in the chair. Her eyes were sunken from the exhaustion, and despite the fact, they had only been there for three hours, the hospital air and lights were draining the youth in her.
“So we aren’t even sure if she will be able to dance, let alone move normally?” She continued with a shaky breath.
He was totally going to rip Jones a new one.
Before Brendon could make a feasible attempt to remedy their concerns, they all heard a knock come from the door.
You peeked your head in, one hand braced on the door you slid open. Your eyes landed on the couple and their daughter, and as if you immediately sensed the tension in the room, you smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I need to borrow Dr. Park for a moment.”
When your attention moved to Park, he let out a heavy sigh, one raised eyebrows in your direction. What is it?
The subtle shake of your head, Not in here.
Brendon grabbed the device the parents put at the edge of the girls bed. The father stood up, wiping his hands on his black denim jeans. “We will need more time to think about this, anyway.”
“Let the nurse know when you’re ready.” Brendon curtly responded.
You opened the door wider, stepping back to let him through. Closing it gently once he stepped out, you spared the family a soft smile. You both walked away from the glass, over to the nursing station. Brendon put down the device, “What is it?”
“ER needs a consult.” You informed him immediately. He put his hands on his hips, turning to the patient's room.
When he glanced at you, he noted the army green scrub cap, beige stars littered around it. It seemed new. He shrugged his shoulders, lips pursed. “Why hasn’t anyone gone down?”
“Bryant did.” You affirmed, shaking your head as you scoffed. “Dr. Robby must be in a mood because he sent him up immediately. I just happened to catch him groveling when I left the OR.”
His eyes wandered up to drink in your nurtured appearance. Despite the last shift you worked being night shifts, you managed to come rejuvenated for the day. This was no longer the shift you mastered, but you appeared the same as before.
Except Park knew things were different. Unexplainable, but it was messing with the ‘control’ he had within himself and in his habitat.
When you came in for hand off, you joked with the night shift. Hugged and laughed along with whatever funny patient interaction they had that night. When you came around Emmick, she’d check in with you, tease you about the change of schedule.
Once Park came around to collect all the residents, he caught the slight wink she sent you when you both looked in his direction. Like the two of you had always spent your residency as close friends.
“So, how come you're here telling me this?”
You chuckled, grinning subtly. “It’s better than having to hear about you ruining another resident's spirit.”
The knowing look in your eye that twinkled before you looked away didn’t go amiss. That was shady, but something told him that’s exactly what you meant to do. Even if he couldn’t admit it, you were intentional with your action.
You looked back over your shoulder to pre-op room 6. “Was that the girl with the Salter-Harris fracture?”
Park hummed, shifting on his feet. You had noticed the patient from looks alone. The only time you could’ve heard of the patient was from nurses when they transferred her up from the ER, before participating in the rotator cuff repair. You had the faintest idea of who she was, but you were aware from when you walked in.
“Seemed tense.” You noted cautiously, eyeing Park from his face alone. It was like you were trying to angle out his response without words. You had been able to read any room you had entered, which is why he believed in practicality.
No need to play different parts every time you enter a room.
He looked down at you. You mimicked his posture, less weight on your shoulder, appearing casual. “Blame Jones. He’s freaked the patient out, and now the parents are hesitant to sign the consent forms.”
He scowled and there was a beat of silence.
“Is there any way I can help?”
The question was assertive. You weren’t planning to be overlooked, and you needed an answer. You weren't going to walk away without an answer. It was the drive he kept alluding you were missing. Whatever pushed you into wrapping your soul around another was showing up more in this two-minute conversation than before.
The private check-in that Brendon had never acknowledged as you were looking out for a colleague (as much as a supervisor) was an ‘act’ that disappeared in three-months. In that time, you had erased the previous routine and rapport with him, and started new. Brendon knew it was taking everything in your power to restrain yourself from doting on him as much as anyone else you worked with.
He was also acutely aware you didn’t stray away from what mattered most to you. Professionally or personally.
Brendon reasoned. This was genuine, but the way your steely eyes waited expectantly, it felt like looking in a mirror. He was sure the residents recognized the impersonal stares from the countless times he stared down at them. He didn't hide the fact he was displeased, stressed, or irritated with an outcome.
No one wanted to be the one sent to bother him during those moments. You had dared to step up to the plate in place of an intern.
“Why not answer the consultation?” Brendon fixated on the fact you heard of the consultation and preferred coming to him personally to let him know. You hadn't responded to it, nor were you aware there was a consultation to see until a few minutes ago.
You cocked your head to the side, playfully rolling your eyes. “I’d rather not get on Dr. Robby’s bad side.”
Fair, he supposed. You set boundaries with your own attending. He couldn't say he was shocked you’d do so easily with someone who wasn’t directly your supervisor. The slight stretch of his neck managed to pull at the muscles down to his shoulders, and the dread of the patient in room 6 was getting to him.
Before Brendon could assign you to some scheduled surgery to busy yourself, you pointed your thumb back to the room. “I will talk to the parents. It is best that they make a decision soon before the girl takes a turn for the worse.”
He was left with no choice but to stiffly agree with you. The careful steps you were taking backwards put immense distance again. “You better head down to the ED before Robby rips you a new one.”
The smooth turn you made flipped a switch. You sanitized before knocking the door. When you opened it, he could make out the faint sound of you greeting them properly while introducing yourself . He could see you smiling all over again. It wasn't just the bed-side manner you put for patients, but the authentic side of you that was patient and illumining.
Brendon buffered for a minute, waiting to see whether you’d come out, deferring to the idea of appealing to their psychological needs. After what felt like minutes, you hadn’t come out at all. No inkling of a potential departure.
Daring to fight against the curve, Brendon stalked close enough to peek in the room from the window. To any nurses or doctors passing by, he was the leader taking mental notes of what was happening in his area of control.
He saw your figure first from the angle. You were sitting on a chair, nodding along to something the girl was saying. Beside her, the parents were grasping onto her hands, while the 12-year-old patient let tears roll down her eyes.
You were on the mothers opposite side, listening intently like any other adult patient. Yet, this patient was comfortable being a frightened 12-year-of girl. The father jumped in, speaking at you with more elaboration as his hands moved.
The transition was simple, still empathetic and understanding as they explained in detail what they couldn’t tell Park standing in the room. You spoke slowly and steady, much more available to sit and reflect on every aspect of a surgery you had done before.
When Brendon assumed time was escaping him, you weren’t fighting nearly as desperately as he was. He was endeavoring to make it worth his while. You were working at the pace that suited the patient under your care.
While being young and having better neuroplasticity than him, you were malleable with every experience. You were adapting to every interaction with patients and coworkers—which explained why you were unrecognizable in an element Brendon Park had no intervention in.
No control over a habitat you were reigning with your mind and fortifying with your heart.
And after answering the consult from a brooding Robby and booking an OR, he found you sitting in the dictation room, typing away. You had lost the scrub cap, letting your hair be free. You hadn’t moved when he walked in, as if you had been expecting him to look for you.
He was looking down at the consent forms, initial and signed by the parents.
“How did you manage to get them to consent?” Brendon queried. He stood at the door, holding the device up.
There was a small hum to fill in the silence of the room. He awaited there, like you had the knowledge of the Holy Grail—waiting for you to bestow upon him the privilege of knowing.
Standing in front of anyone, he’d feel like an idiot. Standing in front of you, he was trying to get to know what everyone else saw. The missing piece to his elaborate puzzle with a decades work into.
You lazily lifted your head, briefly confused until you realized what he was alluding to. Shrugging your shoulders and leaning back in the chair, you sighed. “I just sat there and spoke to them.”
“The parents and the girl had questions they felt Jones didn’t address.” You clarified, simplifying the previous trouble Brendon was having.
You made it sound like the antiquated practice had somehow been lost between consultation and transfer to the surgical floor. “They just wanted to have a conversation instead of being mandated to agree with the surgery.
Standing up, you wandered over to the coffee pot with a mug already in hand. Pouring the liquid, your light breathing was calm. You weren’t rattled by emotionally distraught parents and frightened girls.
The same way standing up against him came out as if you had done it before.
The coffee pot clicks back on the machine. You carefully moved around, grabbing sugar packets and powered creamer. “They knew it was necessary, but it didn't stop them from feeling scared.”
“It’s all for the benefit of their child.” Brendon responded. You were a doctor. He was aware you knew that. It was a reflex. It was the practical answer.
It should’ve been a no-brainer. For you and for the parents. No parent should neglect or delay care necessary, especially if the odds of them being mobile without the procedure was at risk.
You stared at him with wide eyes, before chuckling. “They know that, Dr. Park.”
With the stare of your eyes, you were communicating what you weren’t going to put in words for him. They’re still human and afraid. It was redundant considering Park had scolded you for such. You weren’t going to bother with explaining yourself anymore.
“I also spoke with Jones about appropriate verbiage when getting consent from patients, specifically in pediatric cases.” You informed, holding the mug in two hands while
heading back to your workstation.
He shook his head, squeezing his teeth together until they rubbed. You stuck a hand out, halting whatever tangent he was going to start. “Not everyone’s preferred method of criticism is from Park the Shark.”
The small grin on your face while you typed didn’t agitate him as much as it would’ve from anyone else. Walsh would’ve earned a scowl. He might’ve glared at Emmick from the corner of his eye, with a strained stretch of his neck. Garcia knew better than to poke the Shark when she saw him send the senior resident out of the OR as a second year.
And while he thought he had sunken his teeth deep enough to be able to pull you from making grave mistakes, you had slithered from his grasp. You had him chasing your tail in a trail that would end with him going to the depths of the dark ocean.
“Some of us learn differently. There’s nothing wrong with that.” You casually mentioned, clicking around on the computer and typing. “The point is we learn to do better next time, right?”
When his brain registered you were talking with him, he huffed out a breath, tempted to let the corner of his mouth curve. He picked up the subliminal message. You were becoming braver with your jab; and even while you pretended not to be overtly interested in to stare him in the eyes, you were making precise stabs.
Before he could push the conversation further, there was a beep. You both glanced down at each other's pagers and the small scrape of your chair against the floor followed. You breezed past him without a second thought, leaving him in the wake of your sunshine. Even with the glumness of his personality, you were shining the darkest of places. He was inches from touching the sunlight, but some cloud always obscured it.
Brendon looked at the door click shut and he saw the same cloud shutting his limited sunlight once again.
“All non-emergent surgeries will be rescheduled. We need to focus on OR turnover to be quick. Some of these patients may not be able to wait five minutes.” Brendon instructed precisely, staring at the patient board over the nursing station. His arms folded over his chest, musing in thought.
“My nurses know what they’re doing, Dr. Park.” Annette joked, frameless glasses sitting on her nose as she stared down at her device. Her fingers moved eagerly to start moving the scheduled times of the current list of patients.
Brendon shook his head with a small hum. He heard the clacking of shoes down the hall and his head followed the noise. Emmick was typing rapidly on her phone, while approaching him. “What is the current count?”
“17 including children, right now. It can change soon.” Annette responded, glancing at Emmick who stood close to them.
Emmick sighed, pocketing her phone. She shook her head as she saw a couple of the residents rushing by to reach out to loved ones and run to the bathroom before they were buried in their work. A multi-vehicle pileup on the interstate, including an 18-wheel truck. Once the mass size of the gasoline truck flipped over, the rest of the cars followed, and the casualties were increasing by the second.
“Have you reached out to the rest?” Brendon asked, turning to Emmick.
She stiffly nodded, interlocking both her hands behind her head. “I’ve debriefed with the residents in the lounge. A couple of them will be going over 24 hours on their feet.”
He knew exactly who was supposed to be done with a double shift. That didn’t stop them from their responsibilities. They knew medical emergencies occurred at all hours, and anyone’s life could hang in the balance. Their job was to react to the trauma at hand and do everything in their power to stop the emergency.
As on cue, you were coming around the corner with Sully by your side. He was handing you a paper cup, probably filled with coffee, to push you through the unexpected extension of your shift. Despite this being your third consecutive shift, you were synchronized with Sully’s steps. He was light and energized, and with each sip of coffee, you were pacing yourself to reach the same determination.
When Sully found the two attendings standing in the small circle, he smiled casually, as if a car pileup was an everyday occurrence. “Residents are getting in their last moments of freedom. Let us know where you want us, Captain.”
“Trauma down stairs will determine priority. Dr. Emmick will run point with Garcia.” Brendon informed, tutting his chin to his colleague.
“Lovely.”
Emmick rolled her eyes, dropping her hands to her hips. Brendon briefly ignored the annoyance with a slight glare. “I will assign you all to cases as they come in.”
Sully and you both nodded to Brendon’s command. Emmick bumped your arm with her elbow. “Want to help me downstairs? Could use the second pair of eyes.”
“I’m going to need all R4 and R3’s in the OR.” Brendon intervened, glancing between the two of you through his hooded eyes. “I won’t have to check the work of the interns.”
Emmick narrowed her eyes while she pursed her lips. To the two residents in question, it would seem like Emmick was challenging the decision. It wasn’t rare that on occasion the two attendings would butt heads, like hammer-head sharks fighting for their space. But to Brendon, this was a jest. One more feather in her cap about how well she knew him while barely speaking to her.
“Fair point.” Was all Emmick mustered, suppressing the small grin on her face.
When Brendon looked over at you, there wasn’t any deflation of his prerogative. You weren’t visibly upset as you were focused. While still taking sips of your coffee, you were simply listening to the instruction. He could safely assume you were high-strung, from the small shift of your feet and your eyes to the group of your supervisors and friends. You didn’t let your face show it.
“Will you be able to manage?” Brendon questioned in your direction.
Humming, you furrowed your brows at the question. He crossed his arms, “I’m going to need you to be alert. Sometimes you’re going to have to work through the fatigue for the sake of patient-care.”
The statement wasn’t wrong. It was an observation any rational teacher would warn their student. Accepting to work at a trauma-1 hospital brought the exhaustive workload. If he was going to trust any of the residents to demonstrate leadership and initiative, it was a moment like this to prove it.
He noticed the hesitant eyes from Sully and Emmick, caught off guard from the warning. You nodded once, ignoring the uncertainty for your closest work-partners. “I understand, Dr. Park.”
Satisfied enough with that answer, he looked back to Annette who was watching the interaction carefully while speaking on her spectralink phone. She muttered small replies before hanging up. “Ambulances are 7 minutes out.”
“That’s my cue.” Emmick announced, clapping her hands together. She placed a gentle hand on your shoulder, sending you a small wink. “See you once the dust settles.”
Brendon scoffed, shaking his head. Emmick began her tread backwards, pointing a finger at Brendon. “Don’t’ go biting any of my resident’s head off!”
Sully snickered, covering his mouth with a hand and with the two of you standing in front of him, he didn’t see that task as impossible. He motioned his hands outward. “Get your nerves out before either of you kill a patient.”
You pushed a smiling Sully in the direction that Emmick went down, your free hand resting lightly on the back of his arm as you guided him away. He was mimicking an aggressive bite, chomping his teeth at you. Retracting your head, you laughed, eyes crinkling into little slivers.
The energy changed two hours later. With the surgical unit bustling with all the possible staff available, his residents were no longer smiling or kidding—covered in blood stained gowns, dispersed between the 25 operating rooms. Brendon stepped out of OR 17, doffing the gloves he was wearing. When he walked down the hallway, he noted another door slide open farther down.
You stepped out, hands on your hips as you sighed. When you looked in his direction, he was already heading towards you. “What do you have?”
“Bilateral wrist and humeral shaft fracture with a radial nerve injury. Put in plates and screws.” You sanitized your hands, rubbing vicariously through every side. Motioning your head to the ER you just exited, you sighed. “May is closing up.”
The double doors down the hallways clicked open. Turning both your heads at the sound, a patient was being wheeled in with a small group of doctors and nurses surrounding the head of the bed. Brendon recognized the vascular surgeon, Greg Norton tying up his scrub cap. He greeted Brendon with a grin, hands landing on the bed railing. “Park, ready to make mincemeat with this poor fellow?”
When the bed came up towards where you both stood, you had moved beside Brendon, hands on your hips as you stared down at the patient. He noticed the quizzical look in your eye, staring at the lower extremities. “I won’t be scrubbing in.”
You turned to look at him as Dr. Norton furrowed his brows, his grin faltering. “What? Don’t tell me you’re going to send me one of your pups?”
Looking down at you, there was a moment of doubt, like you couldn’t believe Park was actually looking at you. “Possible posterior wall acetabular fracture with hip dislocation. Emmick called beforehand about it.”
“What did imaging show?” You questioned, already honing into your diagnostic skill. Your eyes shifted around his face, and your mind was moving at an incredible speed attributed to the neuroplasticity you sharpened.
“Come on, Park.” Dr. Norton interrupted, leaning forward as to cut into the silent digression of the case. His thick New England accent bounced off the walls with the heightened volume he always spoke at. Brendon crossed his arms as he reluctantly glared at the older, fuller man. Dr. Norton then looked towards you, nose scrunched slightly. “What are you, sweetheart? R3?”
“I’ve done this procedure before.” Your calm voice still gives way for the displeasure of his dismissal.
It wasn’t disappointment, it was anger. Despite being 20 years his junior, you maintained a sense of composure for your age. Some might have acted ferociously. Brendon knew there were attendings that would not have kept up appearances for the sake of respect in the workplace.
Dr. Norton snorted, shaking his head. “Nothing against you, honey, but this procedure is made for meticulous hands. I don’t need the trouble of some shaky, doe-eye resident screwing this man’s possibility of walking.”
Brendon's own disbelief didn’t seem as animated as yours, widening your eyes while tilting your head to the side. Dr. Norton had been around since before Brendon joined the hospital. He always poked at the fact Brendon didn’t smile for a doctor with ‘razor sharp’ teeth. He thought Dr. Brendon Park was as animalistic as people described him to be, he’d flaunt it.
Before you could proceed by jumping into a pit of fire, Brendon crossed his arm, squaring his shoulders. “Dr. Norton, I assign the cases, and if you have a problem with that you can take it up with me after my resident performs the surgery.”
Dr. Norton snarled, lifting his top lip to his nose. He looked at you before smacking his lips. With the menial glare from Brendon, he could see his ego visibly deflate. If he wanted him to show his teeth, he should have asked nicely.
“You ready?” Dr. Norton grumbled, motioning his head to one of the OR’s down the hallway. He was turning his father away from Brendon and avoiding your gaze, as if you had ripped his jugular.
Offering a polite nod, you took a step back, still staring at him. “I will meet you there after looking at the imaging, Dr. Norton.”
Dr. Norton grumbled, signaling for the nurses to continue down the hall to the OR. Brendon stood there, eyeing Dr. Norton as he passed, burly arms crossed to intimidate with his physicality as much as his personality. When the doors to OR 22 closed behind the transfer team, Brendon finally turned to face you, who was staring up at him with a deadpanned expression. “I didn’t want you defending me.”
Brendon pressed his lips in a thing line. You didn’t deny that you needed it. Dr. Norton didn’t know how to talk to his female colleagues, and his brusque manners didn’t rub people the right way, regardless. You had worked with him before, under Brendon’s guide, which left you in the limelight compared to center stage.
The overcasting shadow of his reputation protected you from the scrutiny. While stranded at sea, you had to find your own anchor to throw.
“I wasn’t.” Was all he plainly said.
He wasn’t defending you. He was defending your knowledge. Had you been Jones or Reddy, he wouldn’t have jumped so eagerly. There were weaknesses in all his residents, some more than others, but you had been the exception in most areas. Even if it didn’t come at first, it came from work. You could not have survived up to 27 hours of traumatic repairs if you had not put sweat and tears into getting it right.
“You better hurry and scrub in.” Brendon advised, cocking his head to the side. Go look at the images and prove to him he’s wrong. Prove to me you’ve got this.
With less visible friction, you walked around Brendon, heading in the direction of the double doors. You walked with the power of someone prepared for the challenge. When Brendon turned around, he noticed another figure had joined the hallway, having exited OR 2.
Sully stood outside the door, speaking at you quietly. He furrowed his brows, hands on his hips as he saw you walk away. You nodded in response to his question, pushing the door open with you back and slipping through gracefully.
Brendon sighed, walking down the hall and nodding to Sully in acknowledgment. “You done? I have a couple of open-tibia fractures that won’t heal on their own.”
Buffering for a moment, Sully complied with a small smile. He turned back to the door, forehead pinched as he tried deciphering the scene. Park, you, and Dr. Norton. From the small snort, he had picked up all the clues necessary to make a bold assumption. It didn’t help Norton spoke with the volume of twenty people.
“Thank you, Dr. Park.” Sully gently grinned; slyly leaning forward as he suggestively spoke.
The word rang in his ear repeatedly: You may not need her, but that doesn’t eliminate her worth around here. Sully was assuming Brendon thought the hospital couldn’t utilize your brilliance. That the hospital didn’t need surgeons with exemplary bedside manner that matched their skills in an operating room; or that he couldn’t use someone he could trust at this very moment to dedicate themselves in a surgery he trusted himself to do.
In typical Brendon fashion, he stared at Sully, lips in a tight line that strengthened his jaw and cheeks even more. Sully pushed the limits by still standing before him and that distressed him more than he liked. He didn’t know whether it was the fact that Sully had thanked him something he saw as unnatural, or the fact you had yet again dismissed his efforts others would consider valiant.
He didn’t want to be a hero of any sort (not that you needed it, he was starting to realize). You could snarl just as nasty as him, but it wasn’t your preferred method of surviving—because you weren’t just surviving your residency. The formulated relationships with your co-residents, attendings, and patients were your life mission, apart from learning to improve someone’s life while living their worst day.
The vulnerability that he considered not outfitted for the workplace led to how you operated. Your life, the patients, even the residents you helped when they just were not there yet.
Brendon didn’t see the future as optimistically as you, and when the shattering reality came of how it could look different to what he was used to know, it did break his stride. The built of momentum between you and him—his correction and your fear of fucking it up—was his everyday routine. Not to minimize you, but to build the tools to survive.
Of course, the method didn’t work. And he stupidly realized he was attempting to survive on his own like a shark in a tank.
It was a hard lesson you were teaching him while baiting him. He was rolling his neck around trying to compose himself. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Right.” Sully responded, raising his chin higher as he squared his shoulders. The same self-satisfied grin gracing his youthful features. He watched for any unwelcoming passersby before leaning in. “Better you than me. I might’ve socked the guy.”
Brendon's lips twitched, and he looked at Sully thoughtfully. He definitely had the build. He had seen him work out at the gym across the street from time to time. “You wouldn't have.”
“For her? Yeah.” Sully confirmed breathy as he scoffed from the disbelief. “Like I said Dr. Park, she could survive without me, but I don't think I could’ve made it without her.”
“I don't take lightly when people dismiss her.” Sully stuffed his hands in his scrub pockets, shuffling briefly like the admission was something too vulnerable. For a conversation with Dr. Park? It was a revelation that went beyond professional bounds.
You had taught Sully a thing or two about being attuned with your inner spirits—and if that meant warding away what ate the center of it—there was worthiness in the cause. Park saw the deep resemblance in the now stoic impression on Sully’s face. Bold and Brendon couldn't ignore it.
Sully took careful steps backwards, arms falling to his side. “So, thanks, Dr. Park.”
“I’ll book the OR.” Brendon announced walking out of Trauma 2 in ER. He ripped off the gloves he was wearing, tossing him in a nearby waste bin. It was an ironic day to get into a motorcycle accident while the interstate was still being cleared from the debris of the MVA in the morning.
What more could you expect from a 21-year-old boy whose frontal lobe still had not developed.
It was almost 2 and the majority of the patients that came in during the accident had been moved to the post-surgical unit or the ICU while waiting for follow up surgery for open wounds. The surgical department had cleared half of its staff that stayed overnight or pulled the spontaneous shift. Those still on the clock were dragging their feet and it was taking everything in him not to bite. When the night shift residents were able to leave, they were also zombies walking.
All, except one. When he got up to the surgical floor, he walked into the viewing room, where their charge nurse could gauge operations with the camera live streaming it all. He could see OR 22 running up to 8 hours of operation time. He mostly was staring at the different scrub caps to distinguish all the involved staff.
The only one missing was a green cap.
“Are they finishing it up?” Brendon questioned, turning to Annette sitting at one of the open tables, typing into the device.
She hummed, head still lowered. “Ortho is done with the reconstruction. Vascular and trauma is finishing up.”
Brendon nodded curtly before heading back out the room. The surgery couldn’t have been too complicated if you were done in roughly 7 hours. He had slipped in once as he continued assigning residents to the incoming patients. You had stayed stuck there for the majority of it, and Brendon didn’t feel the need to come in after that.
His immediate thought was to check the dictation room. If you were still lingering, you’d probably be trying to finish up work you had, which meant charting. To his luck, when he peeked through the window on the door, he found you hunched over a computer. The same station you sat at the last week he had spoken to you.
Inhaling a sharp breath, he twisted the door open, and the click caught your attention. Lifting your head and eyebrows simultaneously at the direction of the door, your body visibly jolted. He knew you were awake enough to orally translate your notes, but your body kept succumbing to the sleep it needed.
“How was the surgery?” Brendon questioned, approaching the desk with his hands in his scrub pockets. With the height advantage, he had a clear view of the desk. You had a paper cup of black coffee, an open energy drink, and a small bottle of ibuprofen.
Straightening you back as a way to stretch your body, you shrugged. “Went better than expected.”
“Did Norton give you any grief?” Brendon followed up, not taking his eye off the obvious display of you recklessly messing with your body’s melatonin. From the look of it, you didn’t have anything of substance to run off.
You gently twirled your wrist to reboot your dexterity and putting down the microphone in your hand gave you the break your body needed to lean back in the chair. The question caught you off-guard, leaving your mouth open, while your brain lacked the reflex to come up with a response.
“He was fine. Didn’t talk much unless he was bragging about his NFL athlete son to the nurses.” The small scowl on your face made him bite back the laugh he wanted to let out.
He heard the stories. The accolades he made about a son who mostly sat on the bench. He couldn’t remember the last time they had even aired his face on anything bigger than a phone screen. Brendon crossed his arms, the slight cure of his lips gave him away. “He's the 2nd running back on a good day, at best.”
You bit your bottom lip, shaking your head lightly. “Have you told him that?”
“Almost.”`
The loopy grin on your face made you look cuter, as Emmick or Walsh might describe it. He was aware what staff liked you for your personality and which other liked you for something other than work-appropriate. In an objective sense, none of them were wrong, nor did it concern him or HR yet. Your hands rubbed the back of your neck, easing it from side to side. “Apart from that, he is a respectable surgeon. He just lacks the social cues to elevate him to a standard that I could befriend.”
Brendon arms crossed over his chest. When he looked away, he was starting to see there were some lessons you felt he needed reminding of. Brendon had casual friends, people from college or med school he kept in touch with enough to be invited to weddings. He didn’t plan trips to see them across the country, but he thought being mutual on social media made up for that.
When in comparison to you, he did fall flat of the mark. You had the charisma that engaged everyone, and no one forgot your name because of it.
In no way was it to save face for anything you may lack. It was your greatest strength, which as healers earned more respect that skill did.
You let out a choppy yawn, attempting to hide it before it just came out altogether. He cocked his head to one side, tightening his stance. “You’re exhausted”
“No, I'm fine.” You corrected him. He could not help to think that if Emmick were standing here, you would be more subject to her compassion than his no-nonsense tone. “I have charting to get done.”
“Which you are barely awake for.” Brendon pointed out.
The sigh that escaped you paired with the glare of your bloodshot eyes confirmed it all for him. You were past your limits, and there was no reason to prove you were capable of heaving the heavy load. Not to Brendon’s eyes.
He watched you reach for the energy drink and before you could take a sip, it was pulled from your loose grasp. You stuttered, sitting up taller while staring accusatory to Brendon, holding the now relatively small can in his hand. Before you could utter a word, he leaned over to grab the cup of coffee with the other. “You don’t need this. You’re frying the melatonin in your brain telling you to go home.”
“I am needed here.”
He scoffed, turning his back to you as he found a way to keep the caffeinated drinks from your reach. He opted to put it on a nearby counter, leaning back into it with feet crossed to hide the mere temptation of sight.
“If I did need you, I’d need you to stay awake and alert.” Brendon grasped the edge of the counter underhanded, flexing the muscles in his biceps. “Right now you are neither of those things.”
Sagging in the chair turned to face him, your computer with the dictation notes still open abandoned, you frowned. “You could use the help.”
“No, I need you to go home.” Brendon emphasized his stare glued to your tired body. You didn’t have the precision to walk in a straight-line let alone cut into someone and know the difference between each ligament in a fractured tibia. It wasn’t an undercut. He wasn’t even sure it was out of pity. It was the rational thing to do for both you and him. “I can't work if I'm concerned about the moment you come down from the adrenaline of everything else.”
“You’ve been working over 30 hours straight. Either go home or sleep in the on-call room until Sullivan is out, but I don't want to see you in any OR, understood?” He questioned the way a parent might give an ultimatum to their preteen.
With those options presented to you on a platter and not some vicious stab of his displeasure of your character, you came to your senses. “You’re right. It was stupid.”
“It’s the exhaustion.” Brendon huffed out, standing from the counter. He turned his back to you and dug in one of the cabinets.
“Is Park the Shark making an excuse for his resident?” You mused and he could imagine the dopey grin on your face.
“You’re my resident now?” Brendon questioned back, shutting the cupboard while hiding the item he grabbed in his wide fist. He glared at you through his eyelashes. It wasn’t nearly as fierce as Park the Shark could be.
“Honorary resident, depending on how I feel.” You joked, while craning your head back the closer he approached you.
The bags under your eyes were deserved. Not in a derogatory sense to put you down for your appearance, but because it felt like a badge you could brandish. The hard work you put while he pushed his thumb into your back, grinding your gears until you saw the same perspective from ten-feet above the ground, and you stood on your toes to match. It was an effort he could recognize in few residents.
Except not all dare yank him down to see it from their eyes. You had all but grabbed him from the collar and shook him. With dignity and pride to recognize yourself for something more than the surgical ‘pipsqueak,’ you humbled him.
That wasn’t an easy feat, and Brendon hadn't even snarled his teeth.
He held out his one curled hand, a protein bar in a plastic wrapper facing you. When you look back up at him, lips curled inwards and eyebrows curved in confusion, he sighed. He rolled his eyes, “Eat something. You’ve had enough caffeine to kill your heart two times over.”
Skeptically, you took the protein bar in your hand and muttered a small ‘thanks.’ Slowly peeling the wrapper apart, you took a generous bite. He stepped away, stalking around from behind, still making sure you were chewing properly the only piece of nutrients you’ve had in hours.
After sufficiently breaking down the food and digesting it down your esophagus, you spun your chair around, catching Brendon before he approached the door. “I appreciate your endorsement, by the way. With Dr. Norton.”
He looked at you from over his shoulder, before turning his body to get a better look. You nodded appreciatively. “I probably didn't deserve it, but I couldn't have entered that OR without some of your help.”
The cheeky smile on your face made him narrow his eyes humorously at you. He twitched his nose to hide the smile that wanted to break. If there was anything you were good at besides completely reconstructing the stability in someone’s hips, it was pecking at him with a double edge sword.
“If the patient makes a full recovery, Dr. Norton won’t have anything to complain about then.” He shrugged. It was a safe response. One that didn't compromise the stone-cold persona.
He knew you thanked him because you meant it, but also because he had already extended one hand to pull you back towards him. One step closer to reimagining what you both thought couldn't align.
“Not to be cocky, but I’m sure he will.” You said softly, the opposite of bold and pretentious. You hopped back on the computer, rapidly typing and clicking around on the screen.
Brendon snorted, enjoying the bona fide assurance. It’s the only reason he hasn't loiter or probe the medical judgment you made in the OR. Even with the pressure boiling like a cooker pot, you had earned the space to own the operation room he typically did with years of experience.
“I better not see you in my OR.” Brendon looked at you pointedly. “Not until your next shift.”
Now leaning in the chair, with your free hand, you lazily saluted to him. You brought up the protein bar and chewed lazily through another bite. He cocked his head to the side, awaiting a serious response from a third year resident.
“I promise, Dr. Park.” You added, reaching down for your backpack. With raised eyebrows, you wait for him to move along, proving he was satisfied with the response.
He looked you up and down once more before heading for the door again. With his hand on the door knob, he heard the shuffling of the chair and your bag. He opened the door and stopped when you called his name one more time.
With the sound of your voice, he pressed his back against the door, keeping it open while turning his head once more. You were approaching him, backpack hanging low as you trudged it. Slipping in between him and the space he held open with his body, he had to crane his neck down to watch the top of your head travel past him.
“Have a good rest of your shift, and I’ll see you around, Dr. Park.” There was a faint smile on your face as you started walking backward, still looking at him.
He stayed frozen holding the door, half his body stepping out into the hallway. You spun gracefully, fiddling with the wrapper of the protein bar. He believed the words, because they came tenderly from your lips. The easy steps of your walk communicated what you didn't say with the words. He was one step closer to getting in your good graces, and he rubbed away the stiffness in his jaw as he bit back the grin.
brendon park’s nonna insists he needs to eat more every time she sees him (despite the man being built like a goddamn tank) and he just goes along with it because he can’t bear to say no to her
summary : when jack comes home and finds you trying to relieve yourself with a toy and you admit you have no idea how to do it without it, he teaches you how.
Every creak of the building, every distant siren, just emphasizes the empty space beside you on the bed. You glance at the clock: 2:17 AM. Jack won't be home for hours. The Pittsburgh night shift is a killer, and while you're proud of the work he does at the hospital, the loneliness is a physical ache, a hollowness in your chest that mirrors the one between your legs.
Your fingers, almost of their own volition, find your phone on the nightstand. You open your messages, scrolling back to the ones he sent earlier.
A grainy selfie in the break room, his hair slightly messy from a long shift, the stubble on his jaw more pronounced than usual. He looks exhausted, but he's smiling, that tired, lopsided smile that makes your stomach clench.
Below it, a picture of his hand wrapped around a styrofoam coffee cup. You know those hands so well—the way they feel on your skin, the way they can be gentle or firm, the way they know exactly how to touch you.
Another photo. This one from the locker room before his shift started. He's still in his street clothes, a worn-out t-shirt clinging to his chest, the muscles of his arms defined even in the dim lighting. You stare at the image, tracing the lines of his body on the cool screen of your phone.
The ache inside you sharpens, intensifies. It isn't just loneliness anymore; it's a deep, pulsing need. You toss your phone onto the pillow and roll over, burying your face in the side of the bed he usually occupies. His scent is fading, but it's still there—a faint trace of his soap and the unique, warm smell of his skin. You breathe it in, a desperate attempt to feel closer to him.
It isn't enough.
It will never be enough.
Your hand slides down your stomach, under the waistband of your sleep shorts. You're already wet, your body reacting to the memories, to the pictures, to the thought of him. You tease yourself for a moment, your fingers circling your clit, but it's a frustrating, half-hearted attempt. You need more.
Sighing, you reach into the drawer of your nightstand. Your fingers brush against the smooth, silicone shape of your vibrator. You hesitate for a second, a flicker of guilt or maybe just shame, but the need is stronger.
These long shifts are hell, and you miss you boyfriend.
You turn it on, the low hum filling the silence of the room. You close your eyes, leaning back against the pillows. You try to focus on the pictures, on the memory of his hands, his mouth, the weight of his body on yours. You press the vibrator against your clit, a jolt of pleasure shooting through you. It's good, but it isn't him. It's mechanical, a poor substitute for the real thing. You move it in slow circles, trying to build the sensation, trying to lose yourself in the fantasy.
You're getting close, your breath hitching, your hips arching off the bed, but you can't quite get there. You're stuck on the edge, frustrated and more alone than ever.
The low hum of the vibrator is a constant, desperate sound in the quiet room. You press it harder, trying to push yourself over that final edge, your mind a frantic slideshow of Jack's hands, his smile, the feel of him against you. Your breath comes in ragged gasps, your body taut with a pleasure that's just out of reach. So close. You're so close.
Then, through the fog of your own arousal, a sound cuts through. Not the creak of the building or a distant siren.
"Baby ?"
The front door clicks shut.
"Sweetheart, are you here ?" Your blood runs cold. The voice, deep and familiar and here, cuts through the haze of pleasure like a shard of ice. Jack. Your eyes fly open, the fantasy shattering around you. Panic, sharp and suffocating, claws at your throat.
"Shit, shit, shit," you gasp, fumbling with the vibrator. Your shaking fingers can't find the off switch. The buzzing continues, a damning soundtrack to your humiliation. You finally manage to wrench it from your body and toss it into the nightstand drawer, slamming it shut just as his footsteps echo in the living room. You scramble to sit up, yanking the hem of your t-shirt down over your thighs, smoothing your tangled hair. Your heart is a frantic drum against your ribs, your skin flushed and hot. You try to wipe the dazed, desperate look from your face, to replace it with something resembling normalcy, but it's useless. You feel caught, exposed. You fly up to your feet and tear the bedroom door open, rushing down the hallway as you try to school your breathing.
"Jack !" You say, chest heaving, smiling at him. Jack spins around, catching your eye, and a tired smile immediately spreads on his face when he sees you.
"Hi, sweet girl." He hums, walking over to you and kissing your temple. "I'm sorry, honey. Did I wake you ?"
"No." Your answer comes much too quickly.
His eyebrows lift.
"You sure?"
"Absolutely."
He studies you for a second.
You can practically see the doctor in him waking back up despite the fact that he's been working for twelve hours straight.
"You're flushed."
"It's warm."
"It's seventy degrees." You tuck your hair behind your ears.
"Yeah, I- uh - turned the heater up too high." You say, gulping down the dryness in your throat. You say it with a confidence that would be impressive if the heater weren't currently switched off.
Jack glances toward the thermostat. Then back at you. Then toward the thermostat again.
"Sweetheart."
"What?"
"The heater isn't on." Your stomach drops.
"Oh." He doesn't laugh. He doesn't tease you. Instead, his expression softens.
"What's wrong?"
"N-Nothing." You say, smiling up at him. "Why don't you go hop in the shower and i'll get you some food before you head to bed-" You try to talk away from him, but his hand darts out to grab you.
"Woah, slow down there, baby." He huffs, shaking his head. His black shirt is tight against his chest, his army camo pants snug on his hips. He shakes his head, studying you. "You've got about twelve miles an hour worth of nervous energy happening right now."
"I'm just tired."
"You're the one who's tired?"
"Yes."
"Interesting." He steps closer. You immediately become very aware of how close he is. The exhaustion is still written all over his face—messy hair, dark circles beneath his eyes, the slight slump in his shoulders—but there's something warm in his expression now. Something that makes your stomach flip.
"You sure you're okay?"
"Of course."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I am." He watches you for another second. Then his thumb brushes gently over the inside of your wrist.
"You look like you've seen a ghost."
"I just wasn't expecting you home."
"Neither was I." That gets a tiny laugh out of you.
"I thought you had hours left."
"One of the residents swapped with me."
"And you didn't tell me?"
"I wanted to surprise you."
"You succeeded." He smiles.
"Good." You try to pull away again.
"Food."
"Later."
"Jack."
"Baby."
"I was going to make you something."
"You can."
"Then go shower."
"You really want me out of this room." Your eyes widen.
"No." The answer comes far too quickly. His eyebrows lift.
"…No?" You swallow.
"I mean—no. I just thought you were tired."
"I am." He steps closer. "But I missed you." Your face softens.
"I missed you too."
"I know." He studies you again. This time, his teasing disappears. "Did something happen while I was gone?" Your throat tightens.
"No."
"Are you sure?" You nod. He doesn't look convinced. His gaze is too gentle, too perceptive. It sees through your flimsy defenses, and you feel the last of your composure start to crumble. You can't hold his intense, concerned stare anymore. Your eyes drop to the floor, focusing on a loose thread in the hallway rug.
"Hey," he says, his voice softening even more. He hooks a finger under your chin, tilting your face back up to meet his. "Talk to me. What's going on in that pretty head of yours?" The kindness in his eyes is your undoing. A wave of heat washes over your face, a mixture of shame and embarrassment so potent it makes your eyes burn. You take a shaky breath, the words catching in your throat.
"I was just…" you start, then have to stop and swallow past the lump forming there. "I was lonely, Jack." His expression doesn't change, but you feel his thumb stroke reassuringly over your skin.
"These long shifts are hell," you continue, the words rushing out now. "The apartment is so quiet, and I… I was looking at the pictures you sent, and I just… I missed you. A lot. So I tried to… take care of it myself." You brace yourself for a smirk, a teasing comment, anything. But it doesn't come. Instead, a look of pure, unadulterated understanding dawns on his face, followed by a flicker of something else—amusement, maybe, but it's soft, not mocking. A slow, tired smile touches his lips.
"Oh, sweetheart," he murmurs, pulling you into a proper hug. He wraps his arms around you, and you bury your face in his chest, inhaling the familiar scent of him mixed with the sterile smell of the hospital. "I'm sorry I interrupted. I really did want to surprise you."
"You did," you mumble into his shirt. "It was a surprise." He chuckles, a low, rumbling sound you feel in his chest.
"I can see that." He pulls back just enough to look at you, his hands coming up to cup your face.
“You could've called me.”
“I know.”
“I would've answered.”
“You were working.”
“I would've answered,” he repeats, softer this time. Your eyes sting.
“I didn't want to bother you.”
“Baby.” His thumbs brush beneath your eyes. “You are never a bother.” That does it. Your face crumples, and you bury it against his chest again. Jack immediately wraps you up tighter.
“I missed you,” you whisper.
“I missed you too.”
“I know it's stupid.”
“It isn't.”
“It feels stupid.”
“It doesn't.” You sniffle.
“I got so lonely.”
“Baby.”
“And then you came home early.”
“I have impeccable timing.” You laugh weakly against his shirt.
“Terrible timing.”
“Fair.” He kisses the top of your head and holds you there for a moment, just breathing with you. Then, because he's Jack, the doctor in him resurfaces. “Also, for the record, you're flushed, you're breathing a little fast, and you're clearly embarrassed.” You groan.
“Please don't medically examine my humiliation.”
“I can't help it.”
“You absolutely can.”
“Nope. Twelve-hour shift. Doctor brain is stuck on.”
“You're impossible.”
“And you're adorable.” You peek up at him.
“You're not… weirded out?” His expression immediately softens.
“About you missing me?”
“About what I was doing.” Jack gives you the gentlest smile.
“Sweetheart, you're my girlfriend. You're allowed to miss me.” Your cheeks heat again.
“And,” he adds, fighting a smile, “I suppose I should apologize for barging in at the worst possible moment.”
“You really should.”
“I'm sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“Although…” You narrow your eyes.
“Although what?”
“That explains why you looked like you'd just run a marathon when I walked in.” You smack his chest.
“Jack!” He laughs, catching your hand before you can do it again.
“Okay, okay. I'm done.”
“You'd better be.”
“I am.” A beat. “Mostly.”
“Jack.”
“Done.” You shake your head, but you're smiling now. He leans down and kisses your forehead. "Come on. Let's go to bed. I'm exhausted, and you look like you could use some sleep too." He takes your hand, his warm, calloused fingers lacing with yours, and leads you back toward the bedroom. The walk of shame is short, but it feels like a mile. You're hyper-aware of the nightstand, of the drawer hiding your secret. Jack lets go of your hand to pull back the duvet, but as he does, his elbow bumps the nightstand drawer. It wasn't latched properly in your panic, and it slides open with a soft, damning shhhk.
Both of you freeze. Your eyes dart to the drawer, and there it is, lying right on top of a stack of old magazines—the sleek, silicone vibrator, gleaming faintly in the dim light from the window.
The silence in the room is suddenly deafening. Jack stares at it for a long moment, then slowly turns his head to look at you. His expression is unreadable, a careful blank.
"Is that what you were using?" he asks. Your entire face goes hot. You stare at the drawer. Then at him. Then back at the drawer.
“…Maybe.” Jack's mouth twitches.
“Maybe?”
“Don't.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“You're about to.”
“I was just asking.”
“You have a very specific face when you're about to tease me.” His eyebrows lift.
“I do?”
“Yes.”
“What face?”
“That one.” He smiles.
“Interesting.”
“Jack.”
“Okay.” He holds up both hands. “I'm behaving.” You glare at him.
“You're smiling.”
“I can't help that.” You fold your arms.
"Besides, i didn't even finish." You huff, rolling your eyes. Jack grits his teeth.
"Yeah, that's my bad." he huffs, throwing the silicone toy back into the drawer and closing it. He grins up at you. "I still think you shoulda called me, baby. I could've talked you through it." He says, wiggling his eyebrows. You laugh.
"I think it would've been hard to hear you over the vibrator, Jackie." You say. Jack frowns.
"That's not what I-" He freezes and turns to face you. "Baby, I need to ask you something." The shift in his tone is immediate. The playful teasing vanishes, replaced by that focused, serious-doctor look that always makes your stomach clench. He turns his body fully toward you, his eyes locking onto yours with an intensity that makes it hard to breathe.
"What?" you ask, suddenly feeling nervous again. He takes your hand, his thumb tracing circles over your palm.
"Have you ever.. touched yourself ?" He asks. You choke on a giggle.
"Jack. Of course I have. What do you think I was doing when you came home ?" He shakes his head.
"No- No, sweetheart." He says. "No, I mean… have you ever finished without the toy?" he clarifies, his voice gentle but unwavering. "Just with your own hand." The question hangs in the air, stripping away all the playful banter and leaving you raw and exposed. The blush that had been fading from your cheeks returns with a vengeance. You look down at your hand, still held in his, suddenly feeling clumsy and inadequate.
"Oh," you whisper. You shake your head, unable to meet his gaze. "No. Not really." He's quiet, and you brace yourself for his reaction. But there's no teasing, no mockery. When he speaks, his voice is soft, laced with a confusion that's somehow worse than a joke.
"What do you mean, not really?" he asks. "You've never…?" You take a shaky breath, deciding to just rip the bandage off.
"I mean, it never really worked for me, Jack. With my fingers, I mean." You risk a look at his face. His eyebrows are drawn together in concentration, the doctor in him trying to piece together the data. "It always just felt… awkward," you continue, the words rushing out now. "And frustrating. I could never get the right angle or the right pressure, and it would just end up feeling like a chore. So I've been using a vibrator since… well, forever. It just seemed easier." You shrug, trying to act nonchalant, but your voice is small. "But even then, I'm not very good at it. It's not like when you… you know." You trail off, too embarrassed to finish the sentence. Jack is quiet for a long moment, just processing your confession. He looks from your face to the closed drawer and back again, a slow dawning of understanding on his face.
"Wait a second," he says slowly, his voice dropping lower. He shifts on the bed, turning to face you fully, his exhaustion forgotten. "Are you telling me that you can… you know… finish with that thing," he gestures vaguely toward the drawer, "and with me… but not with your own hand?" Your face is so hot you're surprised the pillow isn't smoking. You give another miserable nod.
"Wow," he says, letting out a breath. "Okay. I… I had no idea." He leans forward, propping his elbows on his knees, and looks at you with an intensity that makes your stomach flutter. "So all this time, when you've been on your own…" You nod miserably.
"Pretty much." He lets out a long, slow breath, running a hand through his messy hair.
"Well, that just won't do," he says, his voice firm but gentle. He looks at you, a new determination in his eyes. "We're going to have to fix that." Your eyes widen in alarm.
"Fix-? Jack, —"
"Baby," he interrupts, a slow, wicked smile spreading across his face. It's the look he gets when he's about to do something that will completely unravel you, and it sends a jolt straight through your body. "I'm serious," he says, his smile softening but the determination remaining in his eyes. He reaches out and takes your hand, bringing it to his lips. "I'm going to teach you."
For a moment you can only stare at him, not quite believing what you just heard. The way he says it—serious, but with that devilish twinkle in his eye—makes you shiver. You try to laugh it off, but your voice is nothing but a nervous squeak.
“Right now?” Jack grins, and there’s nothing tired about him anymore.
“Why not?” He tugs you gently down to sit beside him on the edge of the bed. His hands are warm and dry, sure and steady, the way they always are when he’s prepping for something. You know these hands: the way they cradle your face, the way they pin your wrists, the way they can coax pleasure from you in ways you didn’t think were possible. But this is different. He’s looking at you with a kind of reverence, like you’re a puzzle he wants to solve with infinite patience. He slowly pushes you down onto the bed, kissing your knee, as he kneels before your spread legs as he peels your shorts and panties off. Jack’s breath is warm on your inner thigh. It’s barely there, a pressureless brush of lips, but it’s enough to make your pulse thud in your neck. He doesn’t touch you, not really—his hands are braced on either side of your hips, knuckles barely grazing the worn sheets, and you’re left open, exposed, every cell in your body attuned to the space he leaves between his mouth and your skin.
“Let me see what you think you should do,” he says. The thrum in his voice travels up your leg, finds the hollow beneath your ribs. There’s a pause, a silence so weighted it almost hums. Your hand hovers, then, feeling like it belongs to someone else, you slip it between your legs. You’re achingly aware of how you must look to him: your knees drawn up, the cotton twisted at your hips, your own knuckles white with effort. He watches your face, not your hand, and for a wild second you want to close your eyes, to disappear, but you don’t. You can’t.
Your fingertips find the wet, slippery ache that’s been building all night, and you circle, exactly how you always do, hoping it will be enough. It’s not. The friction is faint, the movement awkward, self-conscious. Jack’s gaze never wavers. You think you can see pride in the angle of his jaw, or maybe it’s just the heat under your skin making everything feel sharper, brighter, more dangerous.
“Slower,” he murmurs. You bite the inside of your cheek and slow your hand, but the pressure isn’t right, and you want to give up. The frustration rises, thick and bitter. Jack must sense it, because he lets out a careful breath, then shifts closer, his knee pressing to the mattress. “Show me how hard you think you should press.” The question is clinical, but his eyes are anything but. You flatten your fingers, press down as if you could force pleasure out of flesh by brute force alone.
“Okay,” he says. “Try this.” He wraps his hand over yours, guiding your motion. His skin is cool and dry where your fingers are fevered. He applies just enough pressure to make you gasp. “Y'a Like that?” he asks, and you want to die, but you nod, and when you look down, you see his other hand cupping himself through his pants. He’s hard. The sight sends a bright flare of want up your spine.
“Good girl,” Jack says, and the words nearly undo you. Your hand is guided, steady, and you realize you’ve been panting. You let your head fall back against the pillow as the shame is replaced by something sharper, sweeter, edged with power. He wants this, you realize. He wants you like this. He keeps his hand over yours, setting the rhythm.
“You feel how wet you are?” His voice is hoarse, like he’s barely holding himself together. You’re dizzy with it. “That’s from thinking about me?” You choke on a laugh, the tension in your belly coiling hotter.
“Yeah,” you manage. He leans closer, nuzzles against your inner thigh until you can feel his breath. The heat from Jack’s breath is a line of fire between your knee and the crotch of your shorts. Your hand, wrapped up in his, moves against your clit in slow, deliberate circles. You follow his rhythm, the pressure—just right, finally, finally—sparking pleasure through you in even, measured pulses. The shame is gone, replaced by something raw, a kind of pride in making him watch as you tremble and whimper for him. Jack’s own hand is at his fly now, palming himself through the camo. He’s not showing off, not putting on a show for your benefit—he’s desperate, so hard it almost hurts to watch. The muscle in his jaw flexes as he sets the pace for you, matching the slow drag of your fingers with the insistent squeeze of his hand.
“That’s perfect,” he says, voice barely more than a groan. “Just like that, baby. You feel how easy it is, when you do it like this?” You nod, biting down on a moan. It’s building, a hot ache deep in your belly, and you let your knees fall wider, shorts peeling at your ankles as you rock your hips against your hand.His teeth scrape gently over your skin, and you have to bite your knuckles to keep from making too much noise. He watches the way your abdomen jumps, the way your hips twitch under his grip, and his voice comes out quieter now, lower, almost reverent.
“Can you keep it right there for me?” His own need is obvious: the bulge in his fatigues strains at the zipper, and when your eyes flick down, he doesn’t even bother hiding that he’s palming himself through the fabric, slow and deliberate, matching your pace. You’d be embarrassed, but the heat and the praise and the way he keeps murmuring “good girl” into your thigh make it impossible to focus on anything but the way your body is starting to unravel. The friction is so much better, so much more, with his hand crushing yours in just the right spot, and when he lets go—just for a second—your wrist aches with the force of your own pressure.
He wants to see you do it. You realize this with a sharp, electric jolt. He wants you to know what it’s like to get yourself off, to do it while he’s watching, his face just inches from where your fingers are working. The idea is so impossibly hot you almost lose your balance and have to steady yourself with your free hand on the headboard.
Jack notices. He always notices.
“I love watching you,” he whispers, and then leans in until his breath is a wet, open-mouthed heat against your fingers. He doesn’t touch, but he doesn’t have to; you can feel his presence everywhere, the way your body hones in on the press of his gaze, the anticipation that maybe he’ll get greedy and taste you before you finish. But he doesn’t. He just keeps talking, voice a low, hoarse vibration that seems to settle somewhere deep inside you.
“Does it feel good?” he asks, as if he doesn’t already know the answer.
“Yeah,” you manage, barely, because your chest is tight and your thighs are starting to shake. The room feels too bright, your body too sensitive, every nerve ending tuned to the friction of skin and the promise of his mouth.
“You’re so hot like this,” he says. “I could watch you all night.” His words make you groan, and when your hips buck up, he finally brings his lips to your thigh, sucking a mark into your skin that makes you shudder. You feel the edge, so close it’s almost painful, and you can’t help it—you start rubbing faster, desperate, your own breath loud in your ears. Jack looks up at you from between your legs, eyes dark, jaw set like he’s memorizing every second, and his hand moves back to yours, grounding you, guiding you, making sure you don’t let up until it’s over.
He’s mouthing at your thigh, mumbling “good, good, good,” and you recognize the cadence of it, the way he talks to patients in pain, except this isnt the same. Jack’s eyes are locked on your face.
“You look so fucking pretty right now. You know that?” There’s a growl in it, a little unhinged. He’s losing the self-restraint, and the thought of him falling apart watching you is almost enough to push you over the edge. His hands reach for his fly, pulling his cock out. Jack’s cock is thick and flushed, arching up from the fly of his camo pants. He wraps his fist around the base, squeezes. There’s a bead of precome, glistening at the tip, and the sight of it is a punch straight to your gut. You almost lose your rhythm, but Jack’s hand is steady on your wrist, guiding your pace, his own movements matching yours with a desperate, hypnotic precision.
“Don’t stop,” he growls, the words almost a snarl. There’s a flicker of something frantic in his gaze, a hunger so sharp it borders on pain. His breath comes hard, and you wonder if he’s going to come from watching you alone. The thought makes you whimper. You’re so close now the entire world has funneled down to this single point of friction, this relentless grind of slick fingers and Jack’s voice in your ear, muttered praise and filthy encouragement.
“That’s it. Just like that, baby. You gonna come for me?” He’s stroking himself faster now, his knuckles going pale, the muscles in his arm tight as cable. You nod, frantic, your entire body straining toward the edge. You want to say something, but all that comes out is a broken, inarticulate moan. Your head tips back, vision going blurry around the edges. Jack’s hand is on his cock, the head glossy with precome, his knuckles going white around the shaft. He watches you the way he watches a trauma case, laser-focused, not missing a tremor or gasp. His other hand stays over yours, forcing you to keep the pace even when you want to speed up and claw your way to release. He knows what you want; he always knows, and that makes it worse, the way he holds you in place just below the edge.
“Jack,” you gasp, but the word barely makes it out. Your breath is all shudders and heat. He strokes himself, slow, matching your rhythm, the tip going dark and slick as he squeezes.
“Fuck, you’re beautiful,” he says, and you feel the words on your skin. You try to flex your hand, to grind harder, but Jack’s hand is a vise, holding you against yourself, making you ride the friction out slow and steady. His breathing is ragged.
“Don’t stop. Let yourself have it, baby. Show me.” You almost cry, the pressure so sharp you can’t see, and then it happens: the release is a white-hot burst that makes your hips buck clear off the bed, your hand flying up to your mouth to catch the sob, but Jack doesn’t let you off. He keeps your fingers moving, gentler now, coaxing every last aftershock out of you. Your hips shudder and your entire body goes slack, every muscle flaring with aftershocks. You feel wrung out, trembling all over, but Jack’s hand doesn’t leave yours. He slows you down, draws the sensation out until it becomes a kind of sweet, unbearable ache. Your chest heaves; you can't catch your breath, and for a moment the only sound is the wet, obscene slap of your own fingers under his, and the ragged exhale he lets out as he watches you go under. Jack’s cock, flushed and thick, is in his hand. He’s squeezing at the base, barely moving, as if he’s holding himself back with the barest edge of control. He doesn’t let go of your wrist, doesn’t let you pull away. Instead he leans forward, nuzzling his cheek against your thigh, inhaling the sweat and salt and musk of you. When he finally lets your hand fall away, you feel the loss in your bones. You can't help but laugh, a broken, half-hysterical sound. Jack grins back at you, chest heaving. "Easy, tiger," he murmurs, palming himself slow and rough, thumb brushing over the head, smearing the clear drop that wells up.
"You didn't—" you start, but he cuts you off by crawling up over you, making the bedsprings creak. He kisses you, slow and open-mouthed, catching your bottom lip between his teeth. There's a taste on his tongue: coppery, familiar, the ghost of your own pulse. You whimper, high and weak. He pulls back and looks at you, really looks at you, eyes gone dark and soft at the edges.
"You did so good," he says, voice cracked and ruined. "I've never seen you like that before." You blink up at him, eyelids heavy, fingers curled in the sheets.
"I can't feel my legs," you whisper, and it's almost funny, but not really. Jack presses a kiss to your cheek, your jaw, the hollow under your ear.
"Just means I did good," he whispers, and then he moves down, down, mouth trailing over your collarbone, tongue lapping at the sweat in the hollow of your throat. He kisses just above your knee, then trails his mouth up slowly, reverently, until his lips press a soft, open-mouthed kiss right at the crease of your thigh. Your skin is still twitching from the orgasm, every nerve ending raw and hypersensitive. You want to say something, anything, but your tongue feels stuck, your voice wrecked.
Jack shifts his weight so he’s kneeling between your spread legs. His hands—one still damp from covering yours, the other sticky with his own slick—move to the waistband of your shirt, pushing it up your stomach, bunching it beneath your ribs. He looks up at you, his eyes dark and blown so wide the color is just a ring around the pupil. He thumbs the skin of your hip, then dips his head and licks a slow, lazy stripe along your inner thigh. You bite down on a whimper. The sensation, even through the bruised haze of overstimulation, is electric.
“Still with me?” he murmurs, his voice gone hoarse and wrecked. He presses his mouth to your clit, just the barest touch, a question.
"Jack—" you gasp, but he just hums, hands bracing your hips tight to the bed. His tongue circles the oversensitive, raw spot between your legs, and it's almost too much. "Wait, wait—" He ignores you, licking slow, deliberate, as if he has all the patience in the world. The sensation is electric, a nerve ending re-igniting, and you feel yourself involuntarily buck up, seeking friction. He pins you there, forcing you to take it, slow and soft, lapping languidly at the mess you made. He grins against your skin and begins to eat you out in slow, deliberate passes, never moving faster than your trembling body can handle. Every lap of his tongue is patient, almost methodical—like he’s studying you. Like he has all night. You can't make yourself look at him at first, but then you do, and it’s a punch to the gut: Jack, on his knees, mouth glossy with you, eyes locked on your face. He licks you in slow circles, then sucks your clit between his lips, humming at the taste, as though nothing in the world could make him stop.
He ignores you, licking slow, deliberate, as if he has all the patience in the world. The sensation is electric, a nerve ending re-igniting, and you feel yourself involuntarily buck up, seeking friction. He pins you there, forcing you to take it, slow and soft, lapping languidly at the mess you made.
"Fuck, you taste so good," Jack groans, burying his face deeper, the tip of his nose bumping your clit. The aftershocks are so sharp they almost hurt, but he doesn't let up, just keeps going with the insistent, greedy rhythm of a man who's waited hours for this. He eats you out like he's starving, like his whole night has been spent imagining this exact moment.
Jack noses into you like he’s trying to memorize the taste, tongue lapping you up with a dogged, almost scientific obsession. It’s too much; you can’t possibly come again, but he seems determined to wring you out until your bones melt. Your hands scrabble at the sheets, your thighs shaking, and when he flattens his tongue and drags it just right, you’re gone. The world goes white; you convulse around a sob, your vision full of static.
“Jack, Jack, oh god—” You whine, high and needy, fingers threading into his curly salt and pepper hair. Jack’s hair is coarse between your fingers, and the back of his neck is slick with sweat. You hold on, not because you want to anchor yourself, but because you want to keep him right there, greedy. He’s making these desperate, guttural noises, like he can’t get enough of you, and it’s the dirtiest thing you’ve ever heard. When he pushes his tongue inside, you clamp your thighs around his head so hard your knees tremble. He doesn’t fight it. He just groans louder, grinding his face deeper against you, digging his fingers into your hips to keep you from wriggling away when the pleasure spikes too high.
It’s overwhelming, all of it—the pressure, the obscene wet sounds, the aftershocks never quite dying down before another one crests. You’re wrecked, legs shaking, the only thing tethering you to earth is the rough drag of his stubble and the heat of his mouth. At some point you stop trying to make words and just keen, fists blindly clutching at the pillow behind your head.
Jack doesn’t let up. When you try to push him away, he only growls, a vibration that ricochets inside you. He wants this—wants you, all of you, every ragged edge and ruined gasp. Jack’s tongue laves every trembling inch, not sloppy or showy but with an addictive steadiness, like the most disciplined part of him has been throttled loose, and all that’s left is want. At some point the humiliation becomes its own heat—a shame-feedback loop, devastating and intoxicating. The tension in your legs dissolves into open, boneless splay. He groans into you, a short, muffled sound, and you realize his hand’s nowhere near your wrist now. It’s back on himself, the rough slide of knuckle and tendon barely visible between your knees.
You try to tell him to stop, that it’s too much, that you’re going to—except there’s no room in your brain for words. He flattens his tongue and drags it up and over again, a slow, relentless pressure that lands right at your oversensitive clit.
He’s relentless, and when you think you’re beyond recovery, your body gives up another shuddering, involuntary climax. The world splinters. You clamp down on his head, vision gone completely white, and you might actually scream a little.Every muscle in your stomach contracts, and the next orgasm cracks through you like shrapnel. You sob, startled at the animal sound it makes, and Jack only grins against your skin, holds your shaking thighs open with surgeon’s precision, and licks until you go limp and boneless above him.
He comes up for air, face shining with sweat and the shine of you, and he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, smiling like he just aced a final exam. There’s a wildness in the whites of his eyes, a glassy shine, but he doesn’t look away. He looks at you, only at you, like he can’t get enough.
You collapse back, limp and boneless. Jack leans up, mouth and chin slick with you, panting like he just ran a sprint. You see the mess you’ve made of his hair, sticking up at odd angles, a silver curl plastered to his forehead with sweat. He looks so pleased with himself, so unbearably smug, that you almost want to slap him, but your arms won’t work yet.
“Holy shit,” you gasp, voice gone raspy. Jack sits back on his haunches, fingers still digging into the tops of your thighs. The camo pants are folded open, his cock hard and still leaking. He grins at you.
“You always make the best faces.”
You try to glare, but your face is too slack to do anything but smile back. He huffs out a laugh, then wipes his chin with the back of his hand. “You okay?” He says it gently, like he’s worried you might actually shatter.
You nod, trying to slow your breathing. “I think i had a heart attack.”
“That’s fair.” He pulls you up, cradling your head against his chest. You can feel the thud of his heart, hammering away. It’s weird and soft, this tenderness—his thumb tracing little circles on the back of your neck, almost chaste, except for the way his cock is pressing against your hip, hard as a fist.
“Jack-”
“I’m fine, baby.” he hushes. He shifts, reaches down to adjust himself, and you almost sob when you feel the tip of his cock slide against your inner thigh—the angle is wrong, not lined up, and you realize, with a start, that he’s not going to fuck you. Not yet. You arch into him, wrapping your legs around his hips, but Jack just grins, nips your collarbone.
“I’m not gonna fuck you right now,” he says, voice so serious and gentle it almost doesn’t register. “Not when you’re this out of it. You need to come down first, sweetheart.” Your head still buzzes with aftershocks, vision flickering at the edges as Jack hovers above you, holding you oddly gentle, like you’re a hummingbird with a busted wing. The sheets are a mess of sweat and spit and wet, the air still thick with your own heat. You want him. You want him so bad it’s a second hunger, raw and not even a little bit rational. But Jack—Jack with his goddamn self-control—just tucks you in against his chest and kisses your temple, his cock iron-hard against your hip, and you realize he means it. He’s not going to put it in you. You squirm, half in protest, half desperate, a helpless friction against his thigh, but he just laughs—ragged, indulgent, almost fond.
“You’re insatiable,” he mutters, tucking your hair behind your ear, and you want to argue, but all that comes out is a fractured, hungry whine. He grinds against your thigh, just a little, like he can’t help himself, and you reach for him, desperate to take him in your fist, to prove you aren’t just some wrung-out thing. You try to wrestle a measure of control back, but he catches your wrist, pins it above your head.
“Easy,” he says, and the sound is pure grit, nothing left of the doctor or the boyfriend—just want, stripped and feral. “Let me look at you.” You hold his stare. It’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done. The air between you is short-circuiting, every nerve ending still thrumming, your own insides turned out and flayed. He dips his head and kisses you, all tongue and teeth, his taste still heavy with the salt of your own body. He moans into your mouth, like this alone is enough to break him. When he finally lets go of your wrist, both of you freeze for a heartbeat, measuring the new gravity in the room. You push at his shoulder, roll him onto his back, and straddle him in one shaking, determined motion. You’re still shuddering, still riding out the aftershocks, but there’s no break in the need. You grind on him, heat slick on top of his bare cock, pressing your whole weight down until you feel the length of him pressing up, slick and hard against you. He holds your hips, steady but loose, like he knows you can’ Your knees dig into the mattress, either side of his hips. You rake your hands up his shirt, pulling it off him in clumsy fits and starts, exposing the ridged muscle, the soft mat of hair, the little line of freckles over his right pectoral. You rock your hips forward, grinding your slick folds against the length of his cock, not lining him up, just sliding up and down, using him for friction, for heat, for pressure. His head tips back, a low, strangled sound leaving his throat.
You use him like your favorite toy, rutting shamelessly, your clit catching on the soft skin at the head of his cock, the ridges of his crown dragging across your swollen flesh. The friction is wet, obscene, and the only thing keeping you from losing it altogether is the look on Jack’s face: the glassy eyes, the mouth open, his breath coming in harsh, ragged bursts.
“Fuck, baby, what are you—” he tries, but you shut him up by grinding down even harder. The head of his cock catches at your entrance, not going in, just pressing, and every slide makes your body seize up, oversensitive and desperate.
The pressure is perfect, a furious, almost cruel rhythm, and every time you rut forward, his cock slips just a millimeter higher, not inside, but so close you feel the hollow ache of it, the way your body tries to drag him in. Jack’s hands flex on your waist, like he can’t decide whether to hold you down or shove you off. His face is flushed—deep, splotchy red at his cheeks, sweat slick at his hairline, and the muscle in his jaw jumped every time your hips rocked forward. He’s cursing now, broken syllables, the loose ends of language. You can’t tell if he’s trying to warn you off or egg you on, but either way, you’re not stopping. Every drag of him against you sends a short electric spike up your spine.
“Fuck—Jesus—” Jack’s voice, gone raw. You lean forward, one arm braced beside his head, grinding your clit on the thick, wet crown of his cock, chasing a second high with the blind, greedy urge of someone who’s just remembered how much they want to live. He looks dazed, shattered, like his brain’s just stopped cold at the scene of the accident.
“You—fuck, slow down—” He scrabbles at your hips, fingers digging hard, trying to hold you in place, but then he gives up, lets the force of your rhythm move him. You rock forward, hard, until he’s pressed flat beneath you, your hands bracing on either side of his shoulders, and you grind over him, every nerve in your body on fire. You can feel the pulse of his cock under you, hot and stiff, so alive it almost hurts. He shouts out, fists gripping your waist.
“Jesus Christ, you’re—fuck, you’re killing me—” but his hips buck up, and he’s meeting every drive of yours with his own, matching you beat for brutal beat. “That’s it, baby, fuck, that’s it—” Jack’s voice is a thrum in your ear, praise and plea and holy-shit awe, and you want to think you’re immune to that kind of worship, but your body says otherwise. The tension draws tight in you, a high wire, and you ride it, not letting up, not even as you splinter into a second, shattering orgasm. The world tunnels for a second—all you know is the heat of his cock and the sharp, bright fire rolling through you. You spasm, hips bucking, and almost lose your perch, but Jack is there, strong hands cradling your ass, holding you steady so you can grind every ounce of feeling out of it.
“Good girl, fuck, you’re perfect—” Jack’s words are a lifeline, half-conscious, and you clutch at his arms, dragging him closer, trying to fuse yourself to him. You want him desperate, undone. You want to drag him under with you. Jack’s still hard, cock slicked to a violent shine, and you reach between your bodies, guiding him not inside, but back to where you want him—pressed tight against your clit, riding the edge. You grind on him, every wet drag of his cockhead hammering sparks up your nerves, slick as oil paint and twice as messy. You can feel the twitch of him, the barely-there pulse when your bodies slip just so. He’s close. You can smell it on him, the iron heat of his sweat, the raw chemical need. His voice is gone, so he talks with gasps, with hands—gripping your hips, your waist, your ass. Everywhere.
“Jesus, fuck, you’re gonna—” He doesn’t finish, just arches up, rutting hard against you. You press down, grinding circles, and even as you collapse and spasm on him, you don’t let up. You ride his cock like you’re trying to grind yourself through it, mean and greedy and single-minded. His eyes are glassy, pupils blown wide, jaw locked. He’s gone hyperverbal now, praise pouring out of him like overflow.
“God, fuck, you’re so perfect—can’t believe you—holy shit—fucking incredible, baby, you’re—” You grind harder, urgent, riding out the last shocks of your own pleasure but needing more, greedy for the way you can feel Jack unraveling beneath you. His knees draw up, heels digging into the mattress, and his hands clamp down on your hips, thumbs pressing deep. You know he’s trying to slow you, trying to ease you off the edge, but you won’t have it. You lean all your weight into your hips, rutting against that desperate, velvet heat, letting him feel every slick inch of want. Jack shudders. His head rolls back and he lets out a sound so raw it barely registers as human, a desperate, open-throated gasp.
“Please—fuck, like that—” He’s begging now, half-sobs punctuating every word. The tension in him is a live current; you feel it in the way he shakes, the way his cock throbs against you, way up past the limit of what he can stand. He grabs at your ass and pulls you down, almost too rough, but you love it; you want to be bruised from him, marked, utterly spent. You can taste blood in your mouth, biting your own lip so you don’t scream. The friction, the heat, the wet—every motion makes you feel like you’re being lit from inside.He’s not going to last. You know it with a weird, gleeful certainty—the way his breath saws out in helpless, crushed syllables, the way his thighs go rigid under yours. You rut down harder, mean about it now, grinding your clit across the swollen head of his cock, and he breaks. His hands clamp on your ass, bruising, and his hips punch up, desperate, the first hot smear of his orgasm slipping between your bodies, obscene and perfect.
“Fuck, baby—oh fuck—fuck—” Jack’s voice is hoarse, strangled, high with disbelief.He tries to hold back, you can tell, but you grind him down, relentless, never letting up, until his whole body bows up off the mattress and he’s coming, hard, hot spurts striping your inner thigh and the slick, writhing place where your bodies meet. He can’t stop making noise—just this low, broken string of fuck, fuck, fuck, and your name, said like it’s the only word left in his vocabulary. You watch his face as you ride him through it, every muscle stretched tight, eyes screwed shut, lips drawn back in a snarl of pleasure. It doesn’t stop you, doesn’t even slow you. You grind through it, riding the pulsing length of him, every spasm drawing out another ragged, worshipful sound. He tries to catch his breath, tries to slow you, but you won’t let him. You want to feel every second, every twitch and slick shudder, and you want to know you did this to him. You lean in, bite at the tendon in his neck, and Jack keens, his whole body tensing as another pulse of cum slicks the length of his cock. You ride him like you’re milking it out of him, greedy and relentless, his praise slurring into half-sobbed nonsense as you chase your own dying edge.It’s obscene, how long you keep him there, rutting against the tender, still-jerking length of him. Jack is all open mouth and half-shut eyes, arms trembling, grip bruising. He holds on like you’re the only thing keeping him anchored, spine arched, skin luminous with sweat. For a second you wonder if you’ve broken him, if it’s too much, but then he’s pulling you down, desperate hands sliding up your back, clutching the nape of your neck, gasping your name against your collarbone. His voice is already ragged, but he can’t seem to stop talking—praise spatters out of him, rough and runny: good girl, so fucking perfect, so good, so damn perfect. You’re greedy for it, the way it rubs your ego raw, and you rock down on him even harder, clit catching at the crown of his cock, dragging every last spasm out of him. Each time your hips grind forward, you feel the tremor of another little aftershock, the helpless jump of him under you.
Jack’s face is wet, at the temples, under his nose, and his eyes glass up, unfocused, strange. He looks ruined, but in a way that’s so reverent you almost want to apologize for what you’re doing to him. Almost. Instead you keep at it, chasing the tail of your own shudder, milking every last ripple of feeling from your bodies. He won’t let you go. His arms are as strong as you’ve ever felt them, locking you against his chest, making you part of whatever cataclysm is happening inside him. His breath is loud in your ear, almost a sob, and you feel the vibration of your own name in the bones of your shoulders.
When he finally comes down, he tries to talk, but can’t. Just breathes, big and shaky. You sprawl over him, limp, soaking up the sweat and the heat and the weird, heady pride. Your thighs are sticky, and there’s a mess everywhere, but you don’t care. He hugs you so tight it almost hurts, and you press your nose to his neck, breathing in the salt and smoke of him, feeling the way your bodies fit together, locked and trembling and spent.
Jack’s lips brush your hairline, soft and shaking. He laughs, but it’s a wrecked sound, totally devoid of bravado.
“You are…” He tries again, but the words tangle up. “Fucking hell, sweetheart…”He’s still shaking. You feel it through every inch of skin pressed to him, like you’re sharing a single heartbeat. Sweat cools on your back, and you’re sticky everywhere, but you’d stay here forever if you could. He kisses your forehead, then your nose, then your cheek. Reverent, almost. You laugh into his neck, the sound thin and exhausted.
“Did you mean it,” you murmur, “about making the best faces?” Jack huffs, the sound vibrating up from his chest.
“Best I’ve ever seen. Portfolio worthy.” His hands migrate up your back, fingers tracing over the ridges of your spine. “Did you mean it about almost having a heart attack?” You snort, the sound bubbling up before you can muffle it.
“Honestly thought I’d short-circuit. My legs aren’t even working yet.” He holds you there, easy, the way someone might hold a very tired but very affectionate animal. You melt, boneless, your nerves glimmering in strange, happy aftershocks. His heartbeat thuds against your ear, ratcheted down from panic to a confident, even rhythm. He strokes your scalp, gentle, more soothing than he probably means it.
“Jack?”
“Hm?” You turn your head, cheek mashed against his chest.
“Thanks for teaching me how to do that,” you mutter, a little embarrassed. “The whole, uh. Getting off on my own thing.” He pulls you tighter, if that’s even possible.
“You taught yourself,” he says, pride thick in his voice. “All I did was make the case for it.” You shake your head, hair catching on the stubble at his throat.
“I never would’ve done it without you. I genuinely thought, like, my body was just pathologically opposed to it.” Jack grins, and you can feel the movement in his chest.
“Which is so fucking weird, by the way. How does a person get to be twenty-three and not—” You smack his shoulder, but you’re smiling too.
“Shut up. Some of us had other things to worry about.” He kisses your eyebrow, gentle.
“Well, you’re a prodigy now. Seriously. That was—” He breaks off, shakes his head in mute disbelief. “You’re amazing. Like, kind of scary amazing.” You feel something warm and fizzy spark under your sternum.
“So you’re not mad I used you like a human vibrator afterwards?” He snorts, then rolls you both so you’re on your side, sandwiched between his body and the rumpled edge of the sheets.
“If you did that every day for the rest of my life, I’d die a happy man.” He tucks a knuckle under your chin, tilts your head back so you have to meet his gaze. “You’re perfect, okay?” You duck your head, embarrassed, but Jack doesn’t let you shy away. His thumb traces your jaw, slow. “You’re so fucking good at this,” he says, and his tone is suddenly dead serious. “You’re good at learning what you like. Good at bossing me around. Good at pushing me until I break.” He kisses the tip of your nose. “And you’re, like, criminally hot when you’re all gone and dumb like that.” Your face goes molten, but you can’t stop grinning.
“You too.” He laughs, voice a little ragged.
“Yeah? You like when I lose it?”
“I love it,” you say, and you mean it so much it almost hurts. He props himself up on an elbow, surveys the mess of sweat and come smeared between you.
“Jesus, we’re disgusting.” He looks actually delighted. “Stay put, baby.” He slides off the bed, finds the nearest dishtowel, and returns to wipe you down. He’s gentle with it, careful, like he’s afraid you’ll break if he’s too rough. You try to watch him, but your eyelids keep fluttering closed.
He’s gentle as he cleans you up, his touch reverent. You’re a boneless, happy puddle on the sheets, watching him through heavy-lidded eyes. He tosses the towel toward the hamper, misses, and doesn’t seem to care. He just slides back into bed, pulling the duvet over both of you, cocooning you in his warmth.
“Better?” he murmurs, his lips against your hair. You hum, contentment vibrating through your entire body.
“Mmm. Defibrillated.” He chuckles, a deep, sleepy sound.
“Good. My work here is done.” He’s quiet for a moment, just stroking your back, and you’re drifting off, halfway to dreamland, when he speaks again, his voice low and serious. It cuts through your sleepy haze. “Hey. Look at me.” You force your eyes open, tilting your head back. His face is shadowed in the dim light, but his eyes are intense, fixed on yours. “I’m serious about what I said before,” he says, his thumb tracing the line of your jaw. “About you calling me.”
“Jack, I was embarrassed,” you mumble. “I’m not just gonna call you at the hospital and be like, ‘Hey, can you talk me through an orgasm real quick while you’re saving lives?’”
“Why not?” he asks, and he’s not teasing. He’s genuinely asking. “Baby, there is nothing—nothing—I would rather be doing than talking to you. There are breaks. There’s downtime. You think I want to be sitting in some shitty lounge eating stale crackers when I could be listening to you fall apart for me?” He shakes his head. “No contest. So you promise me. Next time you feel that ache, you call me. I don’t care what time it is. You call.” He waits, his gaze unwavering. “Promise me.” Your heart does a little flip.
“Okay,” you whisper. “I promise.” A slow, satisfied smile spreads across his face. “Good.” He leans down and kisses you, a soft, sealing press of his lips. When he pulls back, his expression shifts again, turning thoughtful, a little mischievous.
“And as for that…” He glances toward the nightstand, toward the closed drawer hiding the vibrator. “We’re done with that.” You blink.
“What?”
“You heard me,” he says, his tone leaving no room for argument. “You don’t need it anymore. You proved that tonight.” He leans in, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “Besides, I think we both know I’m a much better teacher than a piece of silicone.” You feel a blush creep up your neck, but you’re smiling.
“You’re very smug for a guy who just got his brains fucked out.”
“Deservedly so,” he says, grinning. He kisses your nose. “So that’s another promise. No more toys. You don’t need them. You have me. And you have your own two hands, now that you know what the hell to do with them.” He looks so proud, like a parent whose kid just learned to ride a bike. It’s ridiculous and incredibly sweet. “Promise.” You let out a soft laugh, shaking your head.
“You’re bossy.”
“I’m a doctor,” he counters. “It’s in my job description. Now, promise me.” You look into his serious, loving eyes and feel the last of your resistance melt away.
“I promise,” you say, and this time, it feels easy. “No more vibrator.”
“Promise me,” he says again, softer this time, when you don't answer. You stare at him for a second.
“You're really serious about this.”
“Yeah.”
“Why?” His expression changes. Because underneath all the teasing, there is something vulnerable in his eyes.
“Because I don't want you thinking there's something wrong with you.” Your smile fades.
“There isn't?”
“No.” He brushes a strand of hair away from your face. “You spent years thinking your body didn't work the way it was supposed to. Then you figured out what worked for you. That's not something to be ashamed of.” You swallow.
“I just wish I'd figured it out sooner.”
“Maybe you weren't supposed to.”
“That sounds suspiciously philosophical for three in the morning.”
“I'm a doctor. We contain multitudes.”
“You also ate crackers for dinner.”
“Stale crackers.”
“Exactly.” He smiles.
“Point is, you figured it out. And now you know.” You tuck yourself closer against him.
“I like knowing.”
“Good.”
“And I like that you helped.” His smile turns impossibly soft.
“Anytime.” You yawn.
“I'm exhausted.”
“Yeah, I noticed.”
“You're the one who kept me awake.” He looks offended.
“I did no such thing.”
“You absolutely did.”
“Sounds like slander.”
“You're literally a doctor.”
“Exactly. I have a reputation to protect.” You laugh quietly, and he pulls the duvet higher around your shoulders. “Sleep, sweetheart.”
“What about you?”
“I'll sleep.”
“You promise?”
“Promise.” You close your eyes. A few seconds pass.
“Jack?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.” His hand finds yours beneath the blankets.
“Always.” Another quiet moment. Then his voice comes through the darkness. “Although I reserve the right to be extremely smug about this for at least the next decade.” You groan.
SUMMARY Trying to avoid your hopeless crush has worked surprisingly well… until you accidentally send him a consult request.
IN WHICH Brendon Park proves that the hospital's most intimidating attending has every right to his god complex.
WARNINGS 18+, MDNI, explicit sexual content, workplace romance, attending/resident, awkward crush, reader is down bad, power imbalance, praise kink, size kink (even though reader is mentioned to be curvy a couple of times, park is huge and so is his dick 😮💨), pussy pronouns, oral (f rec), unprotected pnv, body worship, breast play, nipple stimulation, mild choking, slight dumbification, discussion of fractures for like two seconds, mentions of Robby and Whitaker, no use of y/n. partially proof read.
NOTES gif credits : @bodeckerhedron thank you for making it just for me 🙂↕️ (you’re supposed to say “yes, i did make it for you!”)
Colles is a distal radius fracture, usually treated conservatively with a cast. The x-ray above is NOT Colles. It was the only ones that remotely matched my colour scheme. And as usual, the image above does not depict reader, just for vibes.
⟡ READ ON AO3 ⚚ PITT MASTERLIST
There's exactly one upside to being friends with someone in Ortho, even if all of them were just morons with a god complex.
Faster consults.
Peterson was the same as you. Same year, same matching cycle, equally sleep-deprived and increasingly philosophical about whether any of this was worth it — the answer was yes, obviously, but only at certain hours and in certain lighting.
He was Ortho and you were EM. The hospital's hierarchy made you equals, but if anyone asked you, you'd say he was doing a little better than you.
Officially he couldn't sign anything. Unofficially, he could tell you that you were right, and give you the right to say "seen by Ortho." Basically, an excuse wearing scrubs.
You keep Peterson on decent terms, he comes down earlier for consults. Everyone goes home.
Good networking, if you ever had to explain it out loud. Which you wouldn't, because there was one other reason, something that no one except you knew.
Peterson was the single most efficient way to get around a consult without having to see Park.
The problem wasn't that you didn't want to see Park. You wanted to see him, badly. It's just that, something happens when you do see him.
The brain that had passed med school, performed codes at asscrack hours, goes offline. You'd be a functioning person, and then Brendon Park would appear in your peripheral vision, and you'd be a nobody, standing with your mouth slightly open, aware that something was supposed to be happening somewhere and nothing beyond that.
You'd proven this spectacularly multiple times. The latest incident was a week ago. Park had come down for a consult, a MVC, called down to the ER by Robby himself.
You'd been so committed to not watching him, and guess what had happened?
You walked directly into his chest.
When asked about it, you'd learned to say "accidentally bumped into him."
But 'bumped' was underselling it honestly.
What happened was a whole body collision. Face-to-sternum. Your suture tray went in one direction. Everything on it — needle driver, forceps, the forever-in-shortage 3-0 ethilon — went everywhere else.
He'd caught your elbow for half a second, which to you, felt like years, everything playing out in slow motion. It was the kind of reflex one would use to steady a child. "Watch your step." His eyes did a quick pass over you, checking for any damage. "You good?"
You'd said something, that part you remember. For the life of you, you still couldn't figure out what exactly you'd said.
He didn't seem to mind anyway as he'd kept walking, not even throwing a glance over his shoulder. You on the other hand, were rooted to the ground, staring at his interscapular distance, a longing wife sending her husband out to war, a wistful look on your face.
Robby found you exactly like that. He brought you to your senses by snapping a glove at your shoulder, startling you. Without a single molecule of sympathy, he said, "stop drooling in my ER. And please pick those up."
You picked up the tray and it's discarded contents. What you couldn't pick up was your dignity, it had taken residence at the cold hard linoleum floor of the ER.
So yeah. Peterson. Earlier consults and a decent enough heart rate at all times.
That was why he got sent the text. 63 year old woman, fell on an outstretched hand in her driveway, arrived with pain and swelling at the distal radius, classical dinner fork deformity.
You got the X-ray. Classic Colles' — dorsal displacement, clean break. Needed Ortho eyes and a note in the chart and that was it.
You : Colles. You free?
You attached the X-rays, hit send and went back to your patient.
You didn't look at the screen.
You should have looked at the screen.
Forty-odd minutes later, Whitaker appeared at your elbow, looking pale. Well, paler than usual. "Why is Park down here?"
You looked up from your chart. "Sorry?"
"Shark." He lowered his voice, like the man could hear his own name from two rooms over. "I've checked the board twice. We only have one Ortho case and it's a Colles'." He frowned at his tablet like it had personally disappointed him. "He doesn't come down for a Colles'. He'd call every sleeping resident in the building before he personally came down here for a Colles'. Even if the systems didn't work, he'd make someone carry the films upstairs."
You followed his line of sight to see Park. Big mistake, your brain started bidding you goodbye. But you feigned indifference and continued your chart. "Maybe they're short upstairs."
Whitaker looked at you like you'd suggested maybe the defibrillator was decorative. "He's the attending. If they're short, he makes their lives miserable, he doesn't physically transport himself four floors down for a Colles' fracture."
"I don't know, Dennis. Probably came down for something else." You brushed him off, trying to block out the fact that Park was standing at a five metres distance and the traitorous organ inside your chest had already picked up on it.
Whitaker wandered off, probably to some hole where no one — no, Park — couldn't find him.
You continued for about one more minute. But then you remembered that Peterson hadn't texted you back.
He always texted back within ten minutes. That was the entire arrangement. The one rule. Immediate response. You knew he wasn't in the OR. There were no emergency cases in the morning, and as far as you knew, Monday wasn't elective OR day.
Peterson picked up sounding mildly surprised that you'd called instead of texted. No one called anyone anymore. "Hey. What's—"
"Did you get my text?"
"What — what text?"
The floor dropped out from under you.
"I'll call you back," you hung up before he'd finished his next word, your messages already open, thumb scrolling backward —
Dr. Park Ortho.
No, no, no. You'd texted him. You'd made him come down. God, if you still believed in her, was a cruel entity.
Park's name should not exist in your phone, a number you absolutely shouldn't have. You are not his resident, you are not even tangentially his responsibility, the only reason you have it at all is because you asked Peterson for it three months ago under the thin pretense of Robby asking for it. God knows why Peterson bought it, why the Chief of Emergency Medicine would need a measly resident to ask for the Ortho God's number, but he'd given it to you nonetheless. You just kept it there like a lottery ticket you knew wouldn't win.
Three images, sent at 2:23 PM.
Three? Shouldn't it be just two? X-ray wrist — AP and lateral.
Your thumb flied to the thread, and the first two photos were AP and lateral views.
The third though.
You almost dropped the phone. Almost being the keyword. Because you couldn't afford to drop it down the floor, what with the photo on display.
It's you.
The photo was taken three days ago. Having bought yourself an actual matching set for once, lace, dark red, you'd taken one picture. Just the one, for yourself. Like you take a picture of a meal you were proud of cooking. Same logic. You'd honestly forgotten all about it.
Until now.
Now Brendon Park had a photo of yourself in red lace intended for absolutely no one on this earth, with the caption 'Colles. You free?' underneath it like the universe's cruelest punchline.
Your options were limited. Transfer request, clearly. A sudden and urgent family emergency in another state, and you could continue your residency in some second rated hospital there. But, you liked working here.
You could disappear right now, walk out of this building and never come back, let your absence become the cautionary tale they told at department holiday parties for years. There was something almost freeing about that last one. But once again, you liked working here.
Also Robby would actually end you if you left mid-shift.
A throat being cleared brought you to the present. You looked up to see Park towering over you, shoulders so broad and perfect, you almost wanted to bury yourself in his chest and beg for forgiveness.
"Present the case, doctor."
"M-me?" You pointed at yourself with your free hand, like that one little duck from The Ugly Duckling, as though he'd asked you to march into battle, a bewildered look on your face. Like the medical degree you had held no value at all.
"You were the one who texted me, right?" He turned around and walked towards South 16, where the cause to all your problems peacefully existed, drinking orange juice.
Without any other choice, you followed him.
When you opened your mouth, you discovered that every word you'd ever known had evacuated your skull at once.
Park, for his part, did not rush you, looking at you with a sort of expression reserved for kids who threw tantrums, a somewhat 'go on, I'd like to see you try' look evident on his face.
"I, she's, it's a—" You looked down at the chart in your hands like it might volunteer to speak for you. It declined. "I-It's a wrist."
Transferring was the only option left for you now.
"Glad we covered that." Park deadpanned. "Walk me through it."
Okay, this was pushing it. There's no reason to walk him through a Colles'.
That only meant one thing. He was mad and wanted to kill you.
You were going to die in your own ER, of this, right here, in front of six witnesses. Whitaker was hovering at a respectful distance looking intensely curious.
Your pulse was audible. Well, at least to you.
Park stepped forward, barely an inch, and his voice dropped, his cologne invading your senses almost immediately. "I'd love nothing more right now than to have you dumb on my cock." It was conversational, almost bored, like he was commenting on traffic. "But you've got a patient in front of you, so how about you focus?"
Like he didn't do anything ridiculous like suggest you die a painful death at his dick, he slowly retreated, a smirk playing on his lips, composure perfectly normal.
You presented the case without making a fool of yourself any further than you already had. Mechanism of injury, dorsal angulation, neurovascular intact distally. Possibly because it was a play you knew well, watched and performed a thousand times, at a thousand other places, what with it being one of the most common fractures in the elderly.
Your mouth ran the whole program without having to consult the rest of you, while you sat somewhere a few feet outside your own body and watched him nod along and glance at the films on the tablet like the last ninety seconds had never happened.
"Closed reduction. I'll send a resident down." He spoke to the room, not you.
"Okay," you still responded, nodding your head for good measure.
He looked at you for one more beat, a look with nothing professional left in it whatsoever. "Wait for me. After your shift."
Before you caught up with what had happened, he was walking away, pausing once to nod at Robby — who was glancing between the two of you — and then he was gone up the elevator.
Once again, you stood at the middle of the ER, with your dignity at your feet.
Luckily, Robby did not materialise behind you, only Whitaker did. "What was that about?" His brow was furrowed like he was already constructing six different worst-case scenarios in his head.
"Nothing." You were already walking the other way, shaky legs and all.
"Why do you look like you just saw a ghost?"
If only he knew.
The rest of your shift was something you survived rather than participated in. You sutured, discharged, charted, and your brain ran on a loop the entire time: dumb on my cock — wait for me — dumb on my cock, with occasional breaks to consider which state had affordable housing before promptly circling back to the cock thing.
By the time you clocked out you'd made and unmade about nine decisions. You spent an embarrassing amount of time in the locker room that you'd defend as getting yourself together and anyone else who'd watched would describe it as you reapplying your lip balm.
Park was leaning against his car in the parking lot when you got outside, scrolling on his phone. He looked up before you'd made it halfway across the lot.
Your legs begged for you to turn back, it's not too late to maybe live out your days in the hospital, like Whitaker did that one time.
Thanks or no thanks to your prefrontal cortex, you did not retreat back to the confines of your job, put one foot forward and reached Park. "You didn't have to wait outside." And, that that was the sentence your mouth had chosen, out of every sentence currently available in the English language.
"Wasn't standing in that lobby with Robby asking me forty questions about why I'm still in the building." He tilted his head toward the passenger side. "Get in."
With a nod reserved only for superiors, you got in.
Your bag sat in your lap and you kept fiddling with the zipper, which you were aware of but couldn't stop doing.
"You gonna be okay over there?" His eyes were still on the road, but head slightly tilted over to your side. "Or should I be worried?"
"I sent an attending a photo of myself in my underwear. Attached to a wrist X-ray. Asking him to come look at it." You stared straight ahead, unable to look at him. "Doing great."
That pulled something out of him, not quite a laugh, more of an exhale through the nose, amused despite his best efforts not to be. "Wasn't my least favorite outcome of the day. And wasn't that lingerie?"
"That's an extremely unprofessional thing to say to a resident, Dr Park."
"Wasn't talking to a resident." The statement ended with your name, with the same monotone you used to deliver his. He didn't elaborate any further, and you decided, wisely, not to push.
Against better judgment, you looked at the side of his face though. You didn't know someone could look this good clean shaven. He did not mind you looking at him. Or if he did, he didn't show.
"How'd you even know it was me?" you asked, mostly to fill the air. "You didn't have my number."
"Caller ID's a hell of a thing." He said it like that should have been obvious, which, you supposed, it was. "Been trying to find a reason to come down and see your face all shift. You handed me one."
Park the shark? Coming down to see you?
You did not have a comeback, nor did you need one.
You spent the rest of the drive looking very intently out the window, aware of him glancing over more than once, the anticipation of what's coming twisting your stomach in knots you'd rather not feel right then.
His place was not what you'd expected. A man cave you could've predicted, preferred even. But this was more … homely, telling you this perpetually grumpy guy that you've been pining after has a soft side.
There was a blanket actually balled up on the couch, when you hadn't expected a blanket at all.
A framed photo on the stairwell wall hung slightly crooked. You had the genuinely deranged thought that you wanted to fix it, like you lived here, like that was a thing you got to have an opinion about. You did not get to have an opinion about it. You'd known the man's address for nine minutes.
He dropped his keys in a bowl by the door, the single most domestic gesture you'd ever watched him make. You stood in the entryway feeling abruptly, stupidly out of place.
"Shower," he said, moving toward the hallway, not framing it as a suggestion. "You smell like the hospital."
You almost laughed at the bluntness of it. The fact that he wasn't bothering to pretend this was smooth or romantic, loosened a knot in your chest.
The last person you'd done anything like this with — a general surgery resident — hadn't cared what either of you smelled like. He'd had you on his bed in your hospital socks within four minutes of his front door closing. You remembered lying there afterward, painfully aware of the day's grime still on his sheets, wondering if that was simply what dating other doctors was always going to be like. Safe to say, you never called him back.
But, this was shaping up to be a different experience entirely.
Park pointed you toward the bathroom and went to shower himself.
You showered fast, mostly out of nerves, with a bodywash that smelled unreasonably good for something so utilitarian. When you came out wrapped in a towel, you could hear water running behind a different door somewhere down the hall. A folded gray t-shirt sat on the counter that hadn't been there before, soft form what looked like a hundred washes, a faded logo on the chest you didn't recognize and didn't try to.
You put it on. Nothing else. It seemed like an instruction that didn't need spelling out. Some reckless part of you was already curious to find out if you'd read it right.
Park came out of his own shower in grey sweatpants and nothing else. His chest was, well… there.
When he found you sitting on the edge of his bed, he stopped in his doorway just to look. Your knees were pressed together like that was somehow going to undo the last several hours.
"That's a good look on you." Which was interesting phrasing, from a man who looked like that.
"It's the only thing you gave me to wear." You crossed your arms in front of your chest, the t-shirt riding up with the movement, soft thighs delectable for him to look at.
"Take the compliment." He crossed the room slowly and stopped right in front of where you sat, close enough you had to tip your head back to keep looking at him.
He leaned down and kissed you before you could come up with anything of value, one hand braced on the mattress beside your hip, the other curving along your jaw.
You'd been kissed before. If anyone had asked you, you would describ them as fine. Only now, you were learning that 'fine' is not a word one should use to describe a kiss, this one rewriting every touch of lips you've ever had.
A sigh escaped into it without you meaning to, a soft, helpless little exhale that you heard yourself make and immediately regretted because it meant he heard it too.
He pulled back maybe an inch, mouth still close enough that you felt the warmth of the words. "That good, huh?"
Smug fucking bastard.
"Shut up."
He kissed you again, shorter this time, mouth crooked as it pressed against yours. "You sighed."
"People sigh."
"Not like that they don't." Calloused hands spanned your hips, warmth of it raising goosebumps across your skin even through the fabric, as he softly tugged at it. "Take this off."
"You gave it to me thirty seconds ago."
"And now I'm asking for it back." A faint and wicked smile crept into the corner of his mouth. "Take it off."
Your hands weren't entirely steady when you reached for the hem, more nerves than cold as you pulled the shirt up and over your head in one fast motion. Mainly because you didn't trust yourself to do it any slower, letting it drop somewhere on the floor between you.
The air hit your skin half a second later, followed quickly by the realization that you were now sitting on his bed with nothing on at all while he stood there covered from the waist down.
Reflex more than decision, your knees pressed together, automatic modesty your body apparently decided it needed. His eyes dropped immediately, mouth curving into a half smile.
Big, rough hands made contact with the softness in your thighs, rubbing up and down like he was calming your nerves, followed by a soft tap to your outer thigh. "Open up."
When you stared at him blankly, upstairs evacuating again, he crouched in front of you, hands settling on your knees, thumbs pressing slow circles into the inside of them. "Open up, baby. I want to see her."
You blinked at him. "H-her? Her who?"
Brendon laughed like you'd genuinely caught him off guard. "Your pussy, sweetheart. What'd you think I meant?"
Heat went straight through you, a different kind than the embarrassment, though the embarrassment hadn't entirely left the building either. The two emotions tangled tight together until you couldn't separate one from the other.
You let your knees fall open slowly, watching his face the whole time, needing to see what it did to him.
The sound that left him when he finally got a proper look at your core went straight back to it, slick gathering. "Fuck." His thumbs kept moving, working higher up your thighs. "Look at you."
Only a whimper slipped past your lips, unable to look at his eyes anymore, even if they weren't focused on yours, but an entirely different part of you.
He dragged one finger up the inside of your thigh, slow enough to border on cruel, stopping just shy of where you actually wanted him. "You're soaked, baby. All this from a wrist consult?"
"From you —" Your mouth caught up half a second too late, and you paused, pressing your lips together.
He looked up. "What was that?"
"N-nothing."
"Mm." His thumb made one more lazy circle over your skin and you realised he probably already knew. He sat back slightly as he studied you, fingers not yet reaching for the delicacy on display, content with only working you with his eyes now. "You know what I was thinking when I came down?"
You were not going to ask. You were absolutely not — "What?"
"I wanted to see how you looked. You always get this look." He tilted his head to look at you, hands still stationed at your thighs. "When you see me. You know that?"
"What?"
"That one." He nodded at your face, like it was helpfully demonstrating itself for him right now. Knowing you, it probably was. "Like your brain just took a long lunch and forgot to clock back in."
"I do not."
"You do. The lights go out." He pressed a kiss to the inside of your knee. "I've been curious what it looks like when I've actually got my hands on you."
"W-what?"
A parrot. You were more parrot than human, what with all the 'what's you were repeating.
"You're so clueless it's adorable." Clueless from his mouth wasn't any different, having heard it strug with a hundred other insults aimed at his residents. Adorable, on the other hand…
"Don't say adorable."
"Why not?"
"It — it means something different when you say it." You pointed at him, which from your current position — naked, with his hands on your thighs — was a spectacular show of nothing. You held it anyway. "I'm not adorable. I'm a competent —"
"Mhmm."
"— medical professional."
"Okay." You knew every version of his okay. Months of listening to him from across rooms while pretending very hard you hadn't been doing that, and the 'okay' he'd just used meant he'd already won and had no further interest in pursuing the argument.
The Peterson arrangement was there specifically to avoid this and here you were anyway, sitting on his bed, having been kissed and told you were adorable, like you were a squirrel.
"You're not actually agreeing with me, are you?"
Brendon's eyes fluttered close with a soft smile on his lips. Domesticated almost, looking every bit different from the hospital version of him, damp hair falling onto his face without the usual gel to hold it back.
Piercing eyes bore into yours, an intensity that was miles ahead of what you'd experienced before. The tough guy act he usually dons at work seemed to have revealed itself for what it truly was — an act. "Do you want me to agree with you, or eat you out?"
It was so casual, interrupting your flow of thoughts about how soft Park the Shark looked. A minute to organise your head and you were stuck on the "eat you out." Who even asked things liked that?
Brendon was waiting for you and looked like someone who would be comfortable with the wait. He was good at that actually, the waiting it out. Once had even Robby cave, you still weren't sure how that happened.
"W-what?"
"Focus, babygirl." Babygirl. That was new, that was nice. "Use your words. What do you want?"
You'd think ER doctors would be good with words. You talked dying people down from panic, talked families through the worst sentence of their lives, knew exactly how to phrase things to a scared kid in triage. Words were the whole job, basically.
Apparently that didn't transfer, and once again, this was proving to be an uncharted territory. A shark swimming around you in the ER, you can handle. That was shallow waters, and you had an upper hand, known turf. Whatever this was, you absolutely couldn't.
Trying to repeat that sentence was hard, you opened and closed your mouth like a fish out of water, one the shark would very gladly devour, as you finally settled on, "yes."
"That's not what I asked, was it?"
"E-eat me out." Finally out of your mouth, heat crawling up your neck as his lips curved into an all knowing smirk, quickly vanished by your utterance of "Bren."
You had never called him that before. Even under your own sheets, with your hands between your thighs, you've fantasised and moaned 'Brendon', but this one had simply arrived. A new development, one that softened the shark's cutting bite.
"Good girl." Brendon praised, and it went straight to your cunt. "Such a good girl."
Shouldn't show all your cards the very first time you're together, you'd once decided long back, and had a stellar record of following it up until this point. With the way this night was going, you were pretty sure you'd be cardless by the end of it.
Before you could say anything, Brendon's mouth found your carotid, pressing soft kisses, and briefly — very briefly, for your disappointment — returned to your lips, a chaste kiss, a soft denial as you chased him.
As he continued marking you with featherlight kisses and gentle suction, you were becoming increasingly aware of the bulge in his pants.
There was this grey sweatpants theory your friend had told you about. Never had a reason to think about it before. You were thinking about it now.
Brendon's palms settled on the sides of your ribs. You must've been sleeping with pocket sized humans, because both of his hands seemed to span the whole of your torso, clearly big enough, having absolutely no problem showing it.
It wasn't like you hadn't noticed them before. You had, on numerous occasions, standing on the nurses' station while he picked up a severed limb to examine. But none of that actually showed you how large his hands were, and how it could make you look small in comparison.
His mouth was now warm at your clavicle, your sternum, until it reached one of your breasts. A sudden gasp from you, and you felt him smirk over your skin.
One of his hands left your hip to hold your other breast, palming it as he ravished this one with a particularly strong suction that made your toes curl.
Calloused fingers deftly played with your hardened nipple, and you yet again tried to stifle a moan.
Brendon pulled apart reluctantly, only to chastise you. "I wanna hear you. Don't hold back."
The next one came out loud as you nodded, the second his mouth closed back around your other nipple, tongue flicking against it while his hand kept working the first one between two fingers.
Your hips lifted off the bed on their own, looking for anything to grind against, and found nothing but air.
"Patience." He said it against your skin, not even looking up.
His trail of kisses lowered past your ribs, your stomach, the softest part of it you'd spent a considerable amount of time thinking about.
Brendon didn't seem to mind though, only pressing more open mouthed kisses, saliva streaking over bare skin, even sinking his teeth a few times, evidence of it you were sure to find the next day.
When his hands met your thighs, they spread them so wide, completely exposing you, even though his eyes made contact with yours once before looking back at your wet core, basically inviting him to taste.
Brendon's mouth descended to your cunt as his big hands kept your thighs open however he'd wanted. You squealed at the first touch of his tongue over your wetness, lips closing over your clit, while two of his fingers parted your slick folds with utmost care, the one contrasting his pull on the soft bud.
"You taste so good," his voice was muffled against your folds, the raspy tone almost had you coming right then, just from that.
One finger teased your entrance, circling it just right, his tongue taking the opportunity to delve into it, a high pitched moan — one that you didn't know you were capable of making — ripped past your lips.
The hands that were bunched at the sheets went straight to his hair, a tug that he seemed to enjoy as a groan vibrated through him.
His tongue worked slow circles around your clit while his fingers found a rhythm inside you, curling on every withdrawal, and your thighs started shaking against the sides of his head before you'd even seen it coming.
"Brendon —"
He hummed against you instead of answering, the vibration of it nearly enough on its own, and one of your hands left his hair to grab blindly at the sheet, twisting it into your fist like you needed somewhere else to put all of it.
He pulled back just enough to drag his eyes up your body. Chin wet and mouth shiny, as he reached for your hand — the one that had abandoned his hair — and manoeuvred it right back to where it was, encouraging you. "You can pull at me however you want."
Apparently he wasn't as attached to his hair as you'd thought.
With that, his mouth met your cunt again, a smirk right against your clit before gently sucking it between his lips.
The sound that tore through as you came wasn't one you were familiar with. Glad you weren't — it probably would've gotten you into trouble if this was your apartment.
When your thighs shook at the aftershocks and your fingers tugged at his hair with all their might, Brendon gentled his attack over your pussy, but kept nuzzling into you like he didn't want to stop.
He kissed his way back up. Your stomach, your sternum, your throat, and when he finally got to your mouth you tasted yourself on his tongue and didn't hate it the way you probably should have. "Gotta taste how sweet you are." It was said right against your lips.
A whimper left you in mock protest as you pushed at his chest with the heels of your hands.
"What? I'm not wrong." He kissed you one more time like he was trying to prove it. "You're sweet everywhere, you know that?"
"Stop it."
"Mouth." A soft peck to your lips, lingering there. He pulled back just far enough to watch your face catch up. "Neck." Shark teeth grazed the side of your throat gently, then again with more weight behind it, enough to make your breath catch. He stayed there a moment, mouthing slowly along your pulse.
"Clavicle." Of course the Orthopedician uses the anatomical term, instead of the romantic 'collarbone' you'd have gone for, but you weren't complaining, as his mouth pressed into the hollow of it.
His mouth found the space between your breasts next, a little towards the left, one kiss pressed right over your hammering heart, his breath warm and slow against your skin.
"Breasts." He took his time at your chest this time, mouth closing over one nipple while his thumb worked slow circles on the other, and you squirmed under him, fingers curling into the sheets, the whole idea of him making a point dissolving into the fact that he just wanted to.
His mouth dragged down over your ribs one at a time, like he was counting, his exhale warm the whole way down.
"Stomach." He said it against the soft give of you and pressed an open mouthed kiss into the part of yourself you were probably the most insecure about. But, insecurity didn't stand a chance against Brendon. He stayed there long enough that you squirmed again, and felt him smile against your skin like the squirming was exactly the reaction he'd been after.
The last one he skipped saying out loud. He looked up at you once, a darkness already sitting in his eyes. Every kiss before this was focused on this lips, but this one, his tongue came into action, flat and slow against you, and you understood, with sudden total clarity, that he'd meant every word.
This part wasn't about making you cum, as he immediately started making his way up, no, kissing his way up, at the same pace.
By the time he reached your mouth you'd pushed yourself up to meet him, sitting on shaking legs, hands sliding over his chest, his ribs, the muscle flanking his spine you'd spent months pretending not to notice.
When you dragged a thumb over his nipple out of pure curiosity, he jerked under your hand, a startled laugh breaking loose that didn't match the rest of the night at all.
"Did you just —" You did it again, intentional this time, grinning up at him.
"Don't." He caught your wrist before a third attempt, a boyishness flickering across his face. Evidence for later, blackmail for the next time he tried to act untouchable in front of everyone, dealt in private of course.
"You're ticklish."
"I'm not ticklish."
"Brendon Park." You said his full name like you were reading it off the board. "Attending Orthopedic surgeon. Ticklish."
"You're done." He caught both your wrists in one hand easily and pinned them gently to the side, just above your thigh. His other hand found your chest instead, thumb circling slowly over one nipple, watching your face the whole time. "That what you were trying to do?"
Your hands stayed pinned, no way to touch him back, and the lack of an outlet had your hips lifting off the bed before you'd decided to let them.
He let your wrists go, sitting back to look at you, a thought visibly surfacing behind his eyes. "You know people look at you, right?"
That came from absolutely nowhere, as you gawked at him, wondering who looked at you and where. "What?"
"At the hospital. People look at you."
"They do not."
"Night shift nurse. New surg intern." His eyes flicked toward the door like someone was about to walk through it. "Robby."
Robby couldn't possibly — "Robby looks at me to yell at me, those are very different things."
You crossed your arms on instinct, and the motion pushed your chest up, drawing attention to the soft flesh, drawing his attention.
He pressed you back into the mattress, mouth finding your nipple, tongue working slow circles while his hand kept the other one busy. "You'd know," he said between pulls, "if you weren't so busy ogling me."
"I don't ogle you." Your hands found his hair on their own, fingers soft against his scalp, betraying the indignation in your voice completely.
"Sure you don't."
"I don't." It came out breathier, not exactly your intended outcome.
"Yeah." Agreement, except you both knew it wasn't. He hooked an arm under you and shifted you higher up the bed. Easy, like you weighed nothing. Something about being moved effortlessly, like being tossed like a blanket, settled warm inside your chest.
Brendon kissed down your stomach again, on his way to sit up. When he finally shoved his sweatpants, you watched him do it without meaning to stare, except you were absolutely staring, probably with your mouth wide open.
He kicked them off the end of the bed and you got the full, unobstructed view of exactly what the grey sweatpants had been hiding.
"You're huge." The words left you without you having a say in it, hands immediately flying to clasp your mouth as if you can claw them back by sheer willpower.
"Yeah?" He wrapped his hand around himself and pumped slowly, watching you watch him do it. His hands pried yours from your mouth and wrapped your fingers around him in place of his own.
You barely managed to circle him, the size of him making your own hand look almost comical wrapped around it.
Brendon hissed through his teeth when you gave an experimental stroke, hips twitching forward into your grip like he hadn't expected it either.
He let you work him a few more times, watching your face more than what your hand was doing, before he pulled you off gently and laid himself down flat against your stomach instead, the full hot weight and length of him resting there like he was giving you a preview of what was coming. "See how huge, baby?"
A nod was all you could manage as you stared down at where he sat against your skin, leaking, a thin shine already smeared where he'd dragged himself there. The sight of him measured against your own body, against the soft of your stomach, made your mouth go dry all over again.
He tapped himself once against your stomach, a light thud right at your navel. "Say it again."
"No." Shaking your head, you wanted to disappear inside your own skin, the amount of attention lavished upon you almost overwhelming. The intensity of his stare alone made your knees feel like jelly.
Thank god he had you spread out on his bed. If not for that, you'd definitely have made a fool of yourself in front of him. Again.
"C'mon." He rocked his hips, dragging himself an inch across your stomach, sure of himself. It would've been obnoxious on anyone else, but he looked incredibly gorgeous and that only made your thighs press together. "I like hearing it."
"That's not — I wasn't complimenting you."
"Sure sounded like one." He braced a hand beside your head and pushed in slowly, the stretch of him pulling a gasp out of you before he'd even finished the thought. "Wanna see?"
It took you a second to get what he was offering, and you nodded. Brendon reached up, cupping the back of your skull, guiding your head up so you could watch where he was already halfway inside you, your walls stretched thin and shining around the sheer width of him, more than you'd thought your body had room for.
The sight was too much to take in directly, and your head dropped fully into his palm before he'd pushed in another inch, a laugh breaking out of him.
Watching your face now instead of where your bodies met, Brendon kept pushing in. Your walls clenched around him at every fraction of an inch, a stretch that bordered on too much before settling into something pleasuring.
"You good?" He asked breathless, jaw tight, hips frozen in place as he filled you to the brim.
"Uh-huh." Barely legible syllables were all you could muster.
"Words, baby."
"Move, Brendon."
The air left your lungs in one go as he pulled back almost all the way and slammed back in, your spine coming off the mattress on its own.
Somewhere at the start of this, or the weeks leading up to this, you'd thought he'd be controlled and calm, not one word wasted. He somehow turned out to be the exact opposite but also the exact same.
It felt like you were being taken apart, one piece at a time, while he was also losing himself a little. You could tell by the way his jaw kept clenching, his breath stuttering against your ear like he hadn't planned on that part happening to him too.
His hand slid up from your hip to circle around your throat, more a question than a grip.
"That picture." It barely registered as language. You were somewhere past language by then, his cock and his hand at your throat only things you could process. "Who was that for?"
"What picture?" It wasn't that you were being difficult on purpose. When put in a position you've been mostly dreaming about for the past however many months, the only thing grabbing your attention was right in front of — no, inside — you.
The question floated somewhere above you like it belonged to a conversation happening in another room.
He laughed against your throat, and bit down right over your pulse, sharp enough to sting and soft enough to soothe a second later with his tongue.
On top of that, one of his hands found your nipple, twisting the peaked bud between two fingers, hips coming to a halt.
A half formed protest rushed out of you. "Wha — why'd you — why'd you stop?" Breathy and whiny, your hips tried to chase friction, trying to take whatever he'd stopped giving.
"Tell me, baby." Soft and merciless words in the same breath.
"I don't — don't know, Bren." Your hands found his shoulders, nails biting in without much intention behind it, just somewhere to put the desperation since he'd taken away everything else.
"Did I fuck you dumb, sweetheart?
You shook your head against the pillow, which wasn't even an answer to anything, more just a reflex, the kind of thing your body did now in place of words.
His hips a dead weight notched right where you needed them moving, he waited, patient, that felt almost cruel given the state he'd left the rest of you in.
Like a browser with a hundred tabs open, your mind buffered, going through each of them until it landed on … The Picture. Right. The wrist X-ray, the caption, the —
Oh.
Oh.
The realization was so slow and stupid, the way answers always showed up two minutes after you needed them in a viva. "No one," you somehow got the words out. "I — I took it. For me. Wanted to see how it looked."
Brendon went still processing that — stiller than he already was. "Yeah?" His mouth dragged along your jaw, and his cock dragged out of you, then he pushed in all the way deep into you, like the confession had unlocked something in him he'd been keeping on a leash. "You looked real good, babydoll."
Heat crawled up your neck that had nothing to do with the stretch of him or the slow drag he'd settled into, just the stupid, helpless pleasure of being told that.
Babydoll settled alongside sweetheart and babygirl, right in between them like it had always lived there, and it hit the same place good girl had, and you knew it was all over your face. Every card, every single one, face-up. He looked at you and saw all of them.
You knew and couldn't stop it. You preened. There wasn't a better word for it. Your whole chest just sat up and asked for more.
If he'd noticed, he didn't make a show of it. "Next time," he said, "you're wearing that. And I'm taking it off you myself."
Your cunt clenched around him at the word 'next', an involuntary thing. Of course, he'd felt it, a laugh coming out low and a little wicked against your collarbone. "Oh." His hips stuttered once, to test you or if he was that affected, you weren't sure. "She liked that."
You wanted to die. You wanted to die and also you wanted him to say it again, both feelings sitting side by side without bothering to fight each other for space.
He hooked his arm under your knee and dragged it higher over his thigh, opening you up wider underneath him.
The new angle had you gasping before you'd even processed the shift, his cock pressing somewhere new and unbearably deep.
"Fuck, you feel —" His jaw went tight, breath catching against your ear, and the sentence just died there, unfinished.
You felt a little fierceness in you sit up too, a little smug. He wasn't unaffected. Whatever this was doing to you, it was doing it to him too. That single broken half-sentence felt like a win.
Somewhere underneath the noise, you understood it now. The thing the nurses whispered about — the god complex of it all. You'd rolled your eyes at every Ortho guy who’s acted like they personally invented bone.
Now, you couldn't speak for the rest of them. You hadn't slept with all of them, for one, and didn't plan to start now.
So, the sample size you were working with was n=1, which was not statistically significant in the traditional sense, but you were convinced.
This one. This infuriating, occasionally tender man currently splitting you open — he'd earned whatever god complex he wanted to keep.
"Where do you want it?" His voice dropped, hips losing the rhythm he'd clinged to, like he was holding the last of his control together with both hands. "Tell me, baby."
"Inside." It came out before you could second-guess it. "Please, Bren. Inside."
"Fuck. Good girl." The praise went straight through you, the same way it had the first time. Except now it had nowhere left to land except your shaking core, your whole body drawing tight around the words and around him at the same time.
Brendon reached between you, two fingers finding your clit, and the combination of that and the angle and the low filthy murmur of 'want you' and 'need you' against your throat sent you over before you'd even braced for it, your whole body locking up around him, vision actually whiting out at the corners for a second.
He followed almost immediately after, a groan tearing out of him that didn't sound anything like the composed, deadpan voice you'd known, hips stuttering, before he stilled deep, spilling ropes into you, both of you breathing like you'd run somewhere.
His forehead dropped to your shoulder, one hand smoothing the line of your hip.
You lay there underneath the weight of him thinking, distantly, that you'd never once associated gentle and Brendon Park before tonight and now you weren't sure you'd be able to separate them again.
Eventually he rolled to the side, pulling you with him against his chest, his hand now tracing slow lines up your spine.
"I should go," you said, even as your body did the exact opposite of going, settling deeper into him.
"Or," his mouth was against your neck, "you could stay."
"I'd be late." You'd already started counting the hours, and whether you had a fresh set of scrubs in your locker or if you'd have to do the walk of shame in yesterday's, whether anyone would actually notice or if you were just assuming the entire hospital revolved around tracking your sleep schedule the way you currently were.
"I'll write you a note." He said it with such a straight face, you almost believed there was a version of this where that worked. Brendon Park scrawling an excuse on a prescription pad and Robby just accepting it without asking a single follow-up question. The image alone nearly made you laugh into his chest.
You propped yourself up enough to glare at him, even though the effect was probably ruined by whatever state your hair was currently in. "First of all, I'm not five. I’m not going to school. Secondly, you're not my attending."
His hand found the back of your head before you'd finished the sentence, guiding you back down against his chest. "Robby's the only attending you take orders from, huh?"
"Well. He is my attending."
"Mm." For a man who'd had you twice in the last hour, he sounded almost petulant.
"Brendon. I'm in your bed." You tipped your head back to look at him, his mouth set in a soft frown, more like a pout. "You don’t have to be jealous of Robby."
"I'm not."
"You're jealous of Robby right now. Post-nut."
His nose scrunched up, and you immediately wanted to kiss it. "Don't — don't say post-nut."
A laugh cracked out of you, and not a cute one. "Park the Shark. Jealous. Of Robby." You dragged out the syllables, drawing it into a sing song taunt.
"Watch it."
You bit down on a smile and lost, mouth pressed flat against his chest where you figured he couldn't see it.
Apparently he could feel it though, his hand stilled mid-stroke. "You're hiding."
"I'm not hiding anything."
"You're smiling. I can feel it."
"Shut up, Brendon."
EXTRAS guess who was studying Ortho when this plot came to mind? Also final fic for a while, I’m going on a proper break this time 🙂↕️
summary ⸝⸝ Brendon Park has built an entire career on being the smartest person in the room. Then he meets you, who makes him forget what he was about to say.
warnings ⸝⸝ coffee shop meet-cute, grumpy x sunshine (?), fluff, pining, brendon yearns, he falls first and harder, jealous! park, park the goldfish bc he can’t keep his mouth shut with her near? (one of my tamest fics tbrh), abbot and shen cameo bc I love them. no use of y/n.
notes ⸝⸝ first official park fic yaay! I do realise I’m supposed to be on a break, but look at him! I genuinely don’t know why it took me so long to write for him, mainly because I've been told that if there's an ortho bro within a five-mile radius, I'll somehow manage to find him? It’s unfortunate that they’re truly horrible tho 💔
⟡ READ ON AO3 ⚚ PITT MASTERLIST
Brendon Park had not looked at anyone twice. Not in his surgical practice, definitely not at a fucking coffee shop of all places.
He'd had his thing in med school. Everyone did. Ill-advised entanglement with another type-A who wanted to win every argument and came close. It ended mutually around final year with shaken hands, which should tell you everything.
Ortho had a reputation and Brendon had leaned into it wholeheartedly. Fast, brutal, precise, and deeply uninterested in anything that didn't have to do with bone mechanics or operative planning.
Park the Shark. He'd heard the name passed between residents in the corridor like a warning, and he hadn't minded. Warnings kept the noise down.
He was, all told, completely fine.
And then he met you. At the hospital coffee counter on a Wednesday morning, over a cup of black americano, and everything went sideways.
The barista set his coffee down and he was on his way to get it. Pretty normal stuff. Stuff that happened everyday.
But before he could get there, there was you, his cup in your grasp, and then between your lips.
He'd opened his mouth to say something. Sharply, probably. The same voice that made interns forget how to speak. But then, you drank.
Your face did something spectacular. Nose scrunching up, eyes going slightly wide, mouth opened like a fish, as though you were offended, devastated, betrayed by a fucking beverage. You stared into the cup for a full second like you were waiting for it to apologize. "Okay," you said, to the cup, mostly. "That's — what is that?"
Brendon stared at you.
"What'd they put in this?" you continued, as if you were workshopping a complaint, a comical lilt to your voice.
In the fifteen seconds of you taking his drink and drinking it, it didn’t occur to you that you’d just consumed something belonging to someone else. The coffee — he didn’t think you’d agree for it to be called a coffee, to be really honest — had shaken you so much that it took you a minute to compose yourself.
When you did, you turned the cup in your hand, read the side and looked up, a sheepish smile on your lips.
As you found him just standing there, gaze locked on you, your eyes dropped between him and the cup. "Oh, it's got your name on it." You had the audacity to look adorable — what the fuck did he just think? "Is this yours?"
Brendon nodded. Fucking nodded.
Embarrassment should not have looked that good on anyone. How could someone look like that while questioning life decisions, evaluating choices that led to this moment?
"Right." You set it down on the counter between, like you were disarming a situation. "Sorry. I genuinely thought — mine's supposed to be a latte and I just grabbed it, I wasn't looking at the name. I'm really sorry."
Dark circles under your eyes, hair pulled back like it was done in thirty seconds without a mirror, lime green scrubs that had no reason looking good, no reason making you look good. Who even looked good in that colour? Who even chose that colour?
You were somewhere between mortified and trying to hold it together, which was fair, because you had just walked up to a stranger's drink and had at it. "Can I at least — I'll pay for a new one, here—"
You were reaching into your pocket and Brendon, who had been on the verge of saying something very reasonable like it's fine, not a problem— "No."
Accidentally spoke in the voice. He didn't always mean to use, it just comes out that way by default, making fourth-year residents straighten their spines. And he’d used it. To you.
You looked up at him with an expression he could only describe as a deer having second thoughts about the road.
He hadn't meant — he wasn't angry. He'd said no out of reflex. Most things he said were out of reflex, and now this person was staring at him like he'd personally threatened her. He had the strange and unfamiliar experience of wanting to walk it back. "I meant—" he started.
But you'd pulled yourself together, apparently deciding that whatever his problem was, it was his problem.
"Okay, no." You held your hands up, like you were placating a toddler. "Noted. For future reference though, why would you get it like that, it's — is this fun for you? Like do you enjoy it?"
He blinked, heat rising up to his cheeks. He could only hope you didn’t notice it.
What you did notice was that he looked clueless and you clarified, "the coffee," you pointed to his cup. "There's nothing in it. I took one sip and I think my tongue is still reeling from it."
"That's what coffee tastes like," Brendon said.
"That's a very sad thing to believe." You stated, completely without malice, which made it worse somehow. A genuine opinion. To make matters worse, you were already looking back toward the counter, scanning for your actual order.
Brendon stood there holding his americano while everyone else and everything else continued their life, including you.
The barista called your name. You went to get it, came back briefly into his sightline, and gave him a small, still-somewhat-mortified wave on your way out the door.
He watched you go and drank his coffee, the same one your lips touched. It tasted exactly like it always did, which was fine, he liked it fine.
Do you enjoy it?
He took another sip. It was objectively bitter.
Lime green. A colour he couldn't immediately place. It bothered him, sitting in the back of his head while he moved through his afternoon.
PTMC colour-coded by department. He knew this. He just didn't have them all memorized, a gap he'd never needed to fill before.
He decided to ask his ward nurse, Delgado, at the end of his post-ops. Casual as he could make it, which for him was still pretty clinical — "lime green. You know which department?"
Delgado looked up from her chart. "Lime green," she repeated, slowly, like she was checking the words for a hidden compartment.
“Yeah.”
“Are we talking about scrubs here, Dr Park?” She had her eyebrows crossed like she was trying to read him.
“Yes.”
“Neonatology,” she answered.
Four floors up, the opposite end of the building, behind two sets of badge-locked doors and a hand-washing protocol longer than some of his procedures. He'd been in there exactly twice in his career, both times for consults that took fifteen minutes and ended in a referral elsewhere.
It made sense. You looked like sunshine incarnate, all airy and beautiful, effortlessly skilful — not that he’d seen you work, but he had an idea.
"Right." He turned back toward the board.
"Dr. Park."
"Mm."
"Are you — Is there something involving neonatology that I should know about?"
A small, unwelcome lurch happened inside his chest. He kept his face the way he kept it in the OR — nothing on it, nothing to read — and he could tell, with horrible clarity, that it wasn't working.
“Something?”
“A case?”
Brendon could see that she’d worded it carefully. "No."
"Okay," Delgado said. "No reason then." She didn't believe a word of it and had decided not to push, which was worse because he could’ve handled an argument. An argument had an end.
Without looking at her, he said, “you can go.”
"I'm charting."
"You can chart elsewhere."
"This is the nurses' station, Dr. Park."
She was smiling. He knew that without even looking. He went back to his board and did not say anything else, hoping this was the end of it.
It was in no way shape or form, the end of anything. It only took him five minutes to look it up. Not you specifically, he wasn’t doing that. Yet, the back of his mind supplied.
He was just reading about fellowship timelines, the NICU admission criteria for some reason? He also learned it’s two or three more years of training, all of it happening four floors above his OR in a unit he had approximately zero clinical reason to enter.
The fact that he even went down this road is embarrassing. But he went a whole another mile.
Clavicular fractures were the most common birth-related bone injury. Unfortunately — now, he hated himself for even thinking the word — they were managed entirely conservatively. Swaddle the arm, follow up in two weeks. It wouldn't require an orthopedic surgeon, much less him, to stand in a NICU looking purposeful.
For about four seconds, he entertained inventing a reason. He got as far as picturing himself walking through those doors in his scrub cap with some flimsy excuse half-formed, and the picture was so stupid — so transparently, embarrassingly stupid — that he closed his laptop immediately.
The hospital was large and your departments were, in practical terms, on separate planets.
You’d been in the coffee shop on Wednesday, which meant you probably used it, which meant theoretically he'd encounter you again just by existing in the building. He told himself he wasn't going to engineer anything, he was just aware of the possibility. That was all.
Two days passed. He did four surgeries including a complicated tibial nail revision that took three hours and came out beautifully, and one very satisfying conversation with a referring physician who had misread an MRI and needed correcting. Normal week, right?
Next day, he got his coffee at six forty, same as every morning, and stood at the counter a beat longer than the transaction required, scanning the line behind him without meaning to. Nobody in lime green. He told himself that meant nothing, took his americano, and left.
Friday, same thing. He noticed himself doing it the second time, which didn't help — like catching his own reflection mid-expression and not recognizing the face looking back.
He didn't see you. Abnormal week.
ER consult. Friday, mid-afternoon. A fracture dislocation that the ER attending had flagged as needing operative planning. Brendon came down at two-thirty, and found Abbot by trauma three looking over a film.
Coming down to the ER wasn't his favorite part of the day. Not the work — the work was fine, usually obvious, usually somebody else's problem until it became his — but the way the place ran, all motion and noise hot under his skin. Abbot, somehow, thrived in it.
They'd gotten through about two minutes of the consult — Abbot walking him through the case, Brendon pulling up the images, the two of them doing back-and-forth of people who'd worked a building together long enough to skip the preamble. Uneventful.
But then the ER entrance on the left side of the bay opened and you walked through it.
Same lime green scrubs and a your Dunkin' cup in hand. Shen next to you, also holding a Dunkin' cup, saying something Brendon couldn't hear from this distance, and you were laughing. Brendon, to his disappointment, noticed it was not a poilte laugh. Your shoulder bumped into Shen’s with the force of it, a fully open-mouthed laugh, and you looked gorgeous.
The sight in front of him was only fogged by the fact that it was Shen who was at the receiving end of it.
The blush climbed before he could stop it, heat crawling up the back of his neck and into his ears. He thanked every god he didn't believe in, that Abbot was still looking at the film and not at him.
Brendon's jaw locked. Back teeth coming together, the muscle in his jaw pulling. He knew it’d give him a headache if he kept it up.
He didn’t really know Shen, not really. Having entirely met him through corridors and in consultations. But in that moment he decided, with an immediate, total conviction usually reserved for diagnoses, that he didn't like him.
Because he didn’t want to stare, he looked back at the X-ray on the tablet. "So the fracture pattern —" he spoke.
"You okay?" Abbot cut in.
Brendon looked at him. Abbot looked like he already knew the answer and was just asking to pull his leg, like most ER attendings.
"Fine," Brendon said. "The fracture is comminuted. Needs ORIF. I’ll book an OR, do it first case tomrorw morning."
Abbot nodded as he scribbled on the iPad. Didn't look fully satisfied with the fine but let it go. Brendon knew that about Abbot — the latter picked his moments.
Brendon looked back at the X-ray.
In his peripheral vision, you and Shen had stopped near the nurse’s station, still talking. You had the cup halfway to your mouth, nodding at whatever he was saying, and then you laughed again, smaller this time, shaking your head. Like whatever Shen had said was ridiculous and you were conceding it anyway.
His molars hurt from pressing down too hard. "ORIF tomorrow, first case," he said again, to the iPad at his hand, to no one.
"You already said that," Abbot noted.
He pulled up the next item on his consult list — a possible Montaggia fracture, a cakewalk for him, nightmare for others. "I'm confirming."
He was not confirming. He had no idea why he'd said it twice.
You'd moved further into the ER now, past his sightline, and he found himself looking at the entrance you'd come through for a second before he caught himself and looked back at Abbot. The latter was watching him like he was trying very, very hard not to smirk.
"Do you need something?" Brendon asked.
"I'm just standing here," Abbot said.
"You're doing something with your face."
"I'm a person, Park, my face does things." Abbot tucked his hands in his pockets. Nodding towards the general direction of where you might be standing, Abbot said, "I didn't know you knew anyone in neonatology."
"I don't," Brendon interjected soon. Too soon.
"Hm." Abbot’s head did a sweep of the ER, probably searching for you, and then looked back at Brendon. "Right."
Brendon put his iPad under his arm, said he'd have the operative plan by end of day and walked back toward the elevator, which took him directly past the nurse’s station, where you had apparently remigrated with Shen, talking to the desk coordinator about something.
He did not slow down.
But in the two seconds he passed within range, he did clock that you smelled like coffee and something warm underneath it, something sweet, vanilla maybe. You didn't notice him, but Shen did and nodded. Brendon nodded back and kept walking, very normal. Walk of a man who was fine.
The elevator took forty-five years to arrive.
He stood in front of it for all forty-five of those years, staring at the closed doors with his hands in his coat pockets, acutely, miserably aware that Park the Shark had just sped up his pace to get past a girl with a Dunkin' and was now standing at an elevator hoping it would hurry up.
Somewhere behind him, he was fairly sure, Abbot was still smiling.
It was a horrible week for the ortho residents. And it wasn’t even Tuesday.
It wasn’t because of the caseload. The caseload was what it always was, a rotating carousel of fractures and dislocations and the occasional spectacular screw-up from another department who'd missed a bone scan.
No, the residents had a terrible week because Brendon Park had decided, somewhere between Friday evening and Tuesday afternoon, that their technique was uniformly sloppy and their pre-op prep was an embarrassment to the profession, and he'd said so. Repeatedly. In front of each other.
It wasn't personal. He thought so and would tell you so, if anyone asked him. No one was brave enough.
His residents just kept standing in his eyeline when he was already irritated, and that was their problem, really.
Delgado, to her eternal credit, had not said a single word about it. She'd watched him tear into a second-year over a chart — like who enters the date wrong? — and kept her face entirely professional. The kid went pale, stuttering through his apology, and Brendon didn’t care.
He'd noticed it himself. The snapping. He was moving through the ward with even less patience than usual, which was saying something. He did a K wire banding, ate lunch at his desk, reviewed post-op films, and at six-fifteen found himself at the hospital coffee counter scanning the room before his order was called. It was mortifying enough on its own, and you weren't there, so it brought double the mortification.
He went back Tuesday. Sat down, which was something he genuinely had never done. He had always taken his coffee to go. There was no reason to sit, the hospital was across the street, he drank it walking.
But this time, he sat. Kept his phone out, drank his coffee and checked his messages. He absolutely did not look at the door every ninety seconds.
You weren't there Tuesday either. Which was fine. People had schedules. Neonatologists especially — the NICU didn't exactly run on a nine-to-five, he knew that much. He'd looked it up. For professional reasons, of course. For someone who’d prided himself for working 24/7, he was humbled real quick.
Wednesday, he sat again. He had a consultation at nine, no reason to rush. He could drink his coffee like a human being who used chairs. He pulled up his post-op notes on his phone, found Abbot's message about a fracture dislocation follow-up, which Abbot didn’t have to do but does it anyway. Abbot was like that sometimes.
When he looked up, his coffee was in front of him. And so were you.
Lime green scrubs, your own drink in your other hand, and you were sliding his cup toward him. The look on your face that said you'd been watching him not notice it for at least thirty seconds. He had been reading an MRI report. A fascinating one.
"I really should get you a coffee," you said.
Brendon laughed. It was him. That was his laugh. Coming out of his face, in a coffee shop, at seven in the morning.
It came out before he could stop it or do anything about it. Just a short, but real sound, surprising him enough that he almost looked around to check if someone else had made it.
You were watching him with that same expression from the first time, like you found him interesting the way you'd find an unusual rock formation interesting. Curious but not unkind. It was doing things to his blood pressure.
"You're still doing that to yourself, I see." You nodded at his cup.
"It's coffee."
"Doesn't taste like it, though." Your nose scrunched up, just like the first time, just as adorable. Did he just say adorable again?
He picked up the cup, took a sip purely out of spite, and looked back at you.
You sat down across from him. Which he had not expected and also had absolutely expected. Two things existing simultaneously, almost fucking him up.
"You're here a lot," you said.
"The hospital's down the street."
"Is it?" You glanced at him, stirring your drink. "Because I've only ever seen you take it to go, and now you're sitting." You took out the stirrer and placed it on a tissue. "Three days in a row."
The back of his neck went warm, mouth opening to say something. Deny it probably, which was stupid and a waste of time. But you interrupted him.
Brendon Park is not someone who’s interrupted. People let him talk, and only think about answering when they’re sure he’s finished.
You, on the other hand, did not care. "You're kinda hard to miss with all the brooding going on."
"I don't brood."
You took a sip of your drink, watching him over the lid, expression doing a tremendous amount of work without saying anything.
He held your gaze. You lowered the cup. "You totally brood. It's an ortho thing, right? Comes with it."
"You know I'm ortho?"
"Everyone knows you're ortho." You said it completely matter-of-factly. Like, yes Brendon, the sky is blue and you’ve got an Ortho bro vibe going on. "You have the whole —" You made a vague gesture in his direction, encompassing, apparently, all of him. "You've got the OR energy."
"Half the people here have OR energy. It's a hospital."
"No, see, ER people have this sort of —" you tilted your head, "— controlled chaos thing. They're always braced for something. But, you walk around like you’ve won everything already. It's very obvious, easy to pick out."
Pick out what? Him from a line-up?
He watched you say all of this with zero self-consciousness, just stating observations, a woman delivering a verdict. He realised his coffee was halfway to his mouth and he hadn't drunk it. You talked about him like he was a case study, and he was sitting there letting you, taking all of it.
"So where else do you brood," you asked, "besides here and the OR?"
"I don't brood."
"Besides here and the OR?" You prompted, dismissing his non-answer.
"The ER… sometimes," he heard himself say it. See, he did not think of saying it, but said it anyway. Crystal-clear experience of a man who had just walked directly into something. He'd had five years of attendings trying to catch him out on rounds. None of them had managed it. You'd done it in under ten minutes, twice, while drinking a latte.
You made a sound. Not quite a laugh, more like an intake of breath with amusement in it. "The ER."
"Consults."
"Right." You traced the rim of your cup with one finger. "Were you in the ER last Friday?"
And… there it was.
He could've said he didn't remember. He could've been very busy, very unbothered, a man who passed through ERs constantly and didn't register the days. He was a surgeon. He was in various hospital departments routinely. There was nothing notable about Friday.
"Yes," his mouth admitted.
You nodded slowly, like something had confirmed itself. "I thought I saw you. You walked really fast."
He put his coffee down. "I had somewhere to be."
"Okay." The word stretched, like you weren’t entirely convinced. He wouldn’t blame it, he wasn’t exactly convincing. An infant could catch him in a lie, and you apparently were their queen. You went quiet for a second and then looked back at him, debating whether to say it or not. Affirmative won apparently. "You saw me with Shen."
It wasn’t a question. And he wasn’t exactly thrilled to answer it. He'd spent five days being awful to residents over it. A little late to play it cool.
"I figured." The amusement on your face was warm rather than sharp, which made the ache in his chest somehow worse. Whoa, whoa, what ache? "We have a thing going, me and Shen. Whoever lost the bet had to do the coffee run. I'd just lost." You paused. "For the fourth time. I'm apparently terrible at predicting admission numbers."
"The fourth time," Brendon parotted.
"In a month. I know." You shook your head, shaking the thought, a soft sigh leaving your parted lips. "I don't know why I keep agreeing to it. Every time I'm like, this time I'll get it right, and then the board goes completely feral and I'm standing at Dunkin' at two in the afternoon getting Shen's ridiculous—" You stopped to look at him, and he had his utmost attention on you. "Anyway. That was just the loser tax."
Loser tax. He sat with this for a second. The whole week reshuffled. Him being a monster to those unsuspecting residents — it’s not like it's unwarranted, but still.
You and Shen, a bet. A coffee run. A losing streak that apparently had nothing to do with the bond between the two of you and everything to do with ER admission patterns, which, if he was being honest, were genuinely unpredictable, nobody could forecast those accurately, it wasn't —
"You walked so fast," you spoke again, this time interrupting his thoughts. He noticed you liked to do that, keep him on his toes. There was a laugh behind it now, delighted almost. "I didn't know an orthopedic surgeon could move like that without a reason."
"I had a reason."
"What was it?" You prodded.
I just couldn’t stand you bumping shoulders with Shen like you belonged together.
His eyes dropped to his coffee at his hand and found you again. You looked back at him. You had the same ‘interested in rock formation’ thing going on, except closer now and clearer somehow. He had the increasingly urgent sense that you knew exactly what you were doing.
"You were with someone.” He sighed.
A smile adorned your lips like you’d won, finally beat him.
Like your mind was displaying in neon, Sunshine neonatologist : 1. Big bad ortho guy : 0.
You let it sit there between you while you took another sip of your drink. "I was getting Shen's order," you said finally. "Because I lost a bet."
"I know that now."
"But you didn't walk fast because of Shen specifically. Did you?"
His molars found each other again. What is with you and asking him impossible questions? Was this like your hobby? Hit the ortho guy until he falls over? At what point in medical school had someone taught you to do this, and could he have a word with them?
Without giving him a moment to recover, you spoke again. "So," you set your cup down, straightened up a little in the chair, met his eyes with an expression so direct it nearly made him blink. "When are you buying me a coffee?"
He stared at you. Staring was not his thing. He assessed, evaluated, and arrived at conclusions. What he did not do was stare, sit with his mouth slightly open like a fucking goldfish.
"That's what you've been trying to do, right?" Your voice was mild, conversational, voice of a woman confirming a meeting time. "For three days. In a row. Sitting here."
The heat that climbed his face was complete, total and immediate, and there was absolutely nothing to be done about it. Park the Shark. Sitting in a coffee shop for three days like a golden retriever who'd learned to use a chair.
You laughed. It filled the air and came right back to him. And he thought, sitting there red-eared with his black coffee, that it was the best sound he'd heard all week.
Possibly longer.
He only remembered that you asked a question when you raised your eyebrows. Right. The question. Which he totally didn’t forget when he was staring at your lips and thinking about how they would feel pressed to his.
"I have a nine o'clock," he said. "Seven works."
"That's very early."
"You work in a NICU. You guys are up since five."
You looked at him for a moment and he had no idea what you were looking at. But he sat very still, which was insane on his part. He only hoped he passed whatever test you were conducting. Apparently having looked enough, you picked your cup up, along with the tissue paper and the stirrer you discarded, and stood. "Seven," you said. "Don't brood while you wait."
He watched you walk out. He looked down at his americano. He drank it.
It still tasted exactly like it always did, and he liked it fine, and he was aware, in a dim and reluctant and completely inescapable way, that this was probably not going to be the last time he sat in this coffee shop.
Not by a long shot.
MY MASTERLIST !
extras ⸝⸝ lime green scrubs bc I was forced to wear them during my NICU postings
Plot | The great shark struggles with modern dating --- a bar so low he keeps tripping on it.
Tags | no smut, mentioned skin to skin intimacy, virgin!reader (for the plot!), yapper!reader, celibate!reader but not fully, waiting for marriage reader, bad experience with dating (not with park), cursing, traditional roles, age gap (15 years), endearments (babydoll, sweetheart, sweetie, baby),
[Inspired by this drabble <3]
Brendon Park is a good man.
He calls his mother every week. Sends his father the good whiskey every year on his birthday. And does good on his job no matter how much he hates the … socializing aspect of it.
A good son, a good surgeon, and a respectable member of society.
“When are you gonna give me some grandbabies, huh?”
Just … a little delayed in certain aspects of his life.
It wasn’t on purpose.
When he was young, he was so deadset on becoming a surgeon that everything else became an afterthought. He maintained relationships here and there (he wasn’t a saint) but by the time he was an attending none of his girlfriends managed to keep up with his relentless schedule, demanding workload, and emotionally reserved nature.
Truly, he doesn't blame them. He wasn't exactly carving out the time for them either --- too focused on being the best and too single-minded in his career to put any relationship as a priority.
Long story short – good surgeon, bad boyfriend.
And then he woke up and he was 40 years old with a very pissed off mother.
When he reluctantly asked his friends about it, the warnings were immediate and repetitive.
Dating in the modern century is different now. The women are different. Difficult.
Too demanding. Too clingy. Too much.
By the time Yolanda sidelined him quietly with a proposition, he was already dreading the worst and preparing himself to disappoint his mother for the first time in his life.
You were a welcome (gorgeous) surprise.
Yolanda’s friend of a friend of a friend that she set him up with. Something about a ‘sweetie-pie that could just soften you up, big guy’.
What she failed to mention was the noticeable difference in years between the two of you.
He was never one to go for someone young just to compensate for a void in his life or make himself feel better about getting older. Even though he saw the appeal, it was never a requirement. If you had asked him before the date, he would’ve thought dating someone younger was more trouble than it was worth.
But watching you beam as he waits for you by the door of the café he had reserved a table for today’s date, holding a fresh pink bouquet of flowers just because Yolanda mentioned that it was your favorite, he couldn’t help but wonder if he was too confident with that assumption.
“Flowers on the first date? You’re winning me over already.”
He couldn’t help but frown in confusion, remembering a coworker's quip about not coming on too strong. Already feeling an unfamiliar feeling of minuscule panic creeping up his throat. “Is it too much?”
Your eyes widened, head shaking, “No! No, they're beautiful. It’s just – men don’t really – it’s less of a thing now.”
He hums, deciding that that was stupid. Especially when he saw just how beautiful the flowers looked when you held them --- like they belonged in your arms. He opens the door for you. “That’s a shame.”
You laugh, head back and so carefree. It warms something in his belly. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
The two of you continued a casual conversation as you lined up for your orders, an official introduction of sorts. Thankfully, it wasn’t as awkward as he dreaded, your cheerful disposition perfectly counteracted his restrained one.
He couldn’t help but notice you intimately checking out the pastries bar but not ordering any when you got to the counter. Thankfully, he was quick enough to take note of those that caught your eyes for longer than half a second, ordering it along with his drink and swiping his card for both of your orders.
As he pulled back a chair, he noticed the few seconds of shock on your face before you sat. A small touch on his bicep and a bashful ‘thank you’ had him concluding that this was also no longer ‘a thing’ in this generation.
If he were honest, he'd admit he was dreading this. It's been a while since his last proper date. He wasn't sure if he could muster up enough topics to keep the conversation going or accidentally say something rude or stupid that would turn this date into a humiliation ritual.
But you were pleasant company and a surprisingly great conversationalist. Picking up where he was prone to awkward silences. You carried the conversation with an ease that he admired. To his surprise, the conversation shifted from one topic to another, and by the end of the night, you somehow even managed to get him actually interested in the New York sports team you were dedicated to. A sport he had never given a thought to his entire life.
“You live in Pittsburgh.”
“So?” you giggle at his obvious accusation.
“Now, that’s just treason.”
That got an adorably loud laugh out of you that embarrassingly puffs out his chest – he knew he wasn’t exactly the funny type so to have you genuinely throwing your head back at his banter felt good.
Three drinks, 6 pastries, and too much caffeine later, he realized it had already turned dark outside and your friend (probably Yolanda wanting all the details) was already texting you incessantly about dinner.
“So, how much do I owe you?”
He looks down at you in confusion as he helps you put your jacket on.
“For what?”
A respectful palm gently leads you by the curve of your back and into his car, which was parked just a few feet from the café.
“Lunch.”
He shuts the door, still confused even as he pulls out of the curb.
“I asked you out, it’s on me.”
“Technically, you didn’t ask me out. We were set up.”
He rolls his eyes at that, huffing out a laugh. Cheeky brat.
“I’m the man. I pay for dinner.”
“That’s very old-fashioned of you, Brendon.”
“Well, I am 15 years your senior, baby." It doesn’t escape him how you press your legs together at that statement. Interesting. “I get to be old-fashioned, don’t you think?”
You turn your body fully toward him, blessing him with a shy, sweet smile.
“Old-fashioned enough to not to kiss on the first date?”
He takes a deep breath, pressing on the gas.
“Old-fashioned enough to ask first."
‘Busy morning and tied up in surgery this afternoon. I’ve got about 30 minutes for a call at 11:30 if you're free?’
‘Sounds perfect. Can’t wait <3”
“👍”
“What’s this?”
You flip the thick piece of paper back and forth as if the words were written in hieroglyphics.
He watches you register what he had just done.
“Tickets. For the Knicks game this weekend.”
You stare at him as if he just popped out a second head so he sighs and continues. “You said you loved them on our first date.”
“Brendon.”
“It’s the Eastern Conference Finals.”
“Brendon.”
“What?”
“It’s in New York.”
He cocks his head at another pair of tickets sitting on his coffee table.
“Those are our plane tickets.”
“You bought plane tickets?!”
“Can’t exactly walk there, sweetheart.”
“You bought Knicks tickets, plane tickets, and planned an entire trip without telling me?”
“Well, such is the nature of a surprise.”
You actually let out a snort of laughter before jumping into his lap on the couch pressing kisses and ‘thank you’s’ on whatever skin you could reach. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You haven’t even heard of the restaurant reservation yet.”
Or the fact that he somehow tracked down a friend of a friend of a friend who is somehow dating someone working game day operations just to make sure the kiss cam landed on the two of you during half-time.
And they said he wasn’t a romantic.
It took Park 3 months in your relationship to realize … you have never truly slept over his place.
When you mentioned on your second date that you were a virgin and that you planned to wait until marriage, he was – for the sake of honesty – taken aback.
Not that there was anything wrong with it and you had bashfully admitted that you were willing to do some 'other stuff' as long as you didn’t go 'all the way'. Something about a vow with the women in your family that the only man who should be able to touch you is the one who is willing to commit.
It makes sense, in theory. But they never took into consideration that the man who plans to worship the ground you walk on is a stressed-out orthopedic surgeon in a trauma center whose only source of relaxation is in between your thighs.
So, yeah. He was a bit taken aback. And frustrated.
But he respected it.
(He was too far gone for you to let this minor complication stand in his way.)
Sucked it up like a man, met your parents, swore to them that this relationship would end in marriage once you were ready, and now added meditation to his workout routine so he wouldn’t pop a boner every time you lounged around his place in just his shirt.
“What are you doing?”
He asks from the en-suite bathroom’s door, finally ready for bed after a long day of bullshit in the hospital only to find his girlfriend quietly trying to book a taxi from his bed.
“Oh! I figured you’d be too tired to drive me back home so I was just going to book a car.”
He frowns in confusion. Quickly walking to where you were lounging in his bed to grab your phone and cancel it.
“Wha – hey!”
“I think we’re past asking permission to stay over.”
You open your mouth to protest before hesitating, choosing instead to crawl to the edge of the bed so you can sit by where he was standing. The fresh smell of his soap, body wash, and clean skin lights your skin on fire.
“I don’t have my skincare stuff in here,” you weakly protested.
He hummed, hands petting the back of your head.“Let’s go buy it tomorrow after brunch. It’s my day off.”
You beamed, gasping in glee. “Really?”
"Really." He can’t help but chuckle at your delight – so pleased with a couple hundred dollars of products. Seems he wasn’t doing quite a good enough job spoiling you, he plans to change that starting tomorrow. “Anything else I should know before our first official sleepover?”
You rubbed your cheeks into his hands like a cat before shyly nodding.
“I know you’re having a hard time with the … abstinence thing,” you pout your lips up at him, your chin digging firmly on his navel which definitely didn’t help.
He clears his throat, taking a beat to look up at the ceiling and collect himself before letting his hands cup your cheeks, “I’m a grown man, babydoll. I can handle sleeping next to my woman without pouncing on her.”
“I trust you, Bren,” you insist earnestly. “But it doesn’t mean I want to frustrate you any more than I already do.”
“Hey, where is this coming from? I’ll behave,” he pokes the tip of your nose to lighten your mood but you only bit your bottom lip in even more hesitation. “Or is there another reason?”
He wouldn’t want to push you if you were truly uncomfortable.
“The thing is,” you groan, cupping the hands holding your face. “I can only sleep naked.”
If he had to go back to the bathroom for five minutes to listen to the calming meditation exercise his therapist recommended to him, it would be something the two of you agreed to take to the grave.
“Alright, my eyes are closed, babydoll.”
He prepared as best as he could.
Lights are off, sleep mask on.
Now he just needs to not think about his girlfriend sleeping naked beside him for the entire night. His adorable, sweet, angel of a woman who is not wearing a stitch of clothing on her bo –
“Thanks for doing this, baby.”
He sucks in a sharp breath when he feels you press a kiss to his cheeks.
He grips the comforter so tight he swears his nails ripped through it. “Warn a man next time.”
Your giggle disappears under the duvet. He makes it a point to put a pillow between the two of you – for your sake and mostly his.
It’ll be fine. Everything will be –
-- fucked! He is so fucking fucked.
The nudity wasn’t the challenge – difficult, yes but manageable with the proper monk-like focus. What you have failed to disclose was that you slept like a possessed octopus. Something he himself only found out when he felt your entire body weight on top of him at 2:47 in the morning.
Once he felt the swell of your chest on his ribs his entire body instinctively flinched so quickly, he almost developed a cramp.
“S-Sweetheart,” he whispered, trying to see if he could jog you out of your sleep gently to save him from the suffering of having to push you back.
To his horror, you just whined, grabbing even more tightly to his biceps as you dragged your body up the length of his so you could push your face in the juncture of his neck.
The contrast of the warmth of your skin on his, the small puffs of air a siren’s call on his ear, and the plump of your lips grazing his neck as you sleepily mumble mindless nothings was torture to his already frazzled sense of self-control.
He grips his bedsheet tightly, knowing his willpower would snap if his hands ever got ahold of you.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“’luv yu’, Bren.”
He sucks in a breath. What the – did you just say – “Babydoll?”
“So nice to me,” you whimper the words on his neck. “Love you so much.”
That felt like a jagged knife of guilt to his heart.
The shame and responsibility you felt for what he could only believe other lovers saw as a drawback or a burden. It must’ve been a heavy weight to carry for his sweet girl.
He swears you won’t have to carry it anymore as long as he is here.
He holds his breath for 10 seconds and lets it out for 5. He thinks about surgical risks, antibiotics, anesthesia regulation, and proper post-op instruction. Thinks about Gloria on his neck, the pressure to live up to their expectation as the upcoming Chief of Surgery. He thinks about Robinavitch’s jealousy even though the both of them knew the pressure Brendon was in would eventually fling the ER attending from the roof he so often escaped to.
Anything and everything to keep his mind clear and disciplined as he refuses to be another weak man who resents your boundaries.
With a deep breath he finally gathers you in his arms, curling around you until his body threatens to swallow you whole.
Saying instead the words that always seemed to get stuck between his heart and his tongue whenever you looked at him. Reminding himself to repeat it tomorrow before you could say it first.
He’s an old-fashioned man, after all.
“I love you, babydoll.”
'Going to the gym but i'm gonna be busy all day. Text me '911' if it's an emergency and my assistant will track me down.'
'Go it. I'm planning to cook you steak for dinner tonight, can I use your kitchen?'
'DON'T SEND ME MONEY. It's my treat.'
'I know your fingers are hovering Brendon Park. Don't!'
'Fine'
'Fine <3'
'Check your jewelry box. I slipped a spare key to my place there.'
'Okay <3'
'Wait what.'
“Hi, babyyyy,” you jump into his arms as he drops his work bag unceremoniously on the floor.
Your text that said you were going to spend your day off going to the grocery store and preparing him a steak dinner genuinely was the only thing that pushed him through a long day of surgeries and consultations.
He lets you rope him into a kiss, sitting the two of you down on his couch as you continue to map out his face with your mouth.
“Missed you so much,” you mutter in between kisses. He smiles at your earnest confession. “Say you missed me too.”
You press a finger on his chest, and he glances down at it as if unconvinced. You squawk in offense and try to get off his lap but not before getting caught in his arms and flipped into the couch.
“You’re all I ever thought about all day, sweetheart.”
You hum, running your hand on his hair. “That’s a dangerous habit, doctor.”
“Don’t worry. I’m a professional.”
With one last deep kiss he lets you out of his arms and back into the kitchen. He prepares to stand up and set the table but you pressed a hand into his chest with an explicit instruction to go shower and relax.
“It’ll be ready when you’re out.”
By the time he was done, you were already getting the wine out of the chiller. “Oh, by the way, some important-looking envelope from your bank arrived.”
You point a finger at the side table by the door. He opens it, his eyes moving carefully with each line.
“Babydoll?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you give me your landlord’s bank details?”
A pause, he turns back to see you staring at him in bewilderment.
“Uh, what for?”
He drops the letter on the coffee table before walking towards you. “I need it to set up an auto-pay in my account.”
You blink up at him as he casually presses a kiss on your lips before sitting at his seat beside yours.
“Are you … moving?” You ask even though you had to admit how incredulous it was. Why would he switch his immaculate penthouse to your subpar building? Is he buying the building then?
“No, for your apartment, honey,” he continues patiently, taking your hand.
Your eyes widened, finally getting what he is implying. “What?! Why – you don’t have to do that! I-I know I complain a lot but I’m fine really!”
He presses a kiss on the back of your hand. “I know, sweetie. But I’m planning on moving you with me by the end of the year, and I want that transition to be as smooth as possible for you.”
Your mouth opens and closes in shock as he drops two bombs on you at once.
“Are … are you asking me to move in with you?”
He slices a piece of his steak before feeding it to you.
“By the end of the year,” he reiterates casually. “At least that’s the deadline I gave my realtor.”
You audibly swallow the barely chewed steak, pushing it down with large gulps of wine.
“I … I don’t want to make it seem like I-I’m a gold digger or something.”
His face hardens at that. “Don’t say that.”
“I’m serious. People talk.”
“Let them talk,” the reprimand was there but it was gentle. “I know why you’re here.”
That softens you.
“Because I’m funny and a good lay.”
You almost snorted your wine into your nose and he finally smiles hearing you laugh. He raises an eyebrow as if to say ‘see?’.
“Brendon –”
“Hey,” he takes your hand, pulling you closer and letting the chair screech in protest. “You’re allowed to like the things I do for you. I work hard, I make good money. And I’d rather spend it making you happy than letting it sit there in the bank.”
He holds your hesitant eyes, only letting a victorious smile appear on his face when you let out a resigned sigh.
You stand up and he automatically pushes his chair back so you can sit in his lap.
“Okay. Thank you. I love you and I will move in with you by the end of the year even though you technically didn't ask.”
“You’re welcome,” he whispers on your lips. “Also, that was your new credit card in the envelope.”
brendon park obviously being a traditional man and most of his douche coworkers think that means he is an alpha-type-asshole who runs his house with an iron fist but brendon park grew up in a traditionally matriarchal household where his grandmother and mother had the final word about everything
"you let hour wife handle all your finances?!"
".... yeah she's my wife (???)"
And he gets so confused like wym your wives ask YOU for money that is so disrespectful to your wife and the mother of your children and the light of your house. who is raising these kids nowadays
Find part one here and part two here. Brendon Park x AFAB!female!reader
WC: 2.6k
CW: breakup angst, power imbalances, confrontation, harsh langugage, explicit language, alcohol and cannabis use, Crashtos in this because I said so, lots of comfort.
A/N: Dividers by @chrisssiren. Thank you all for reading this short series! I am so gagged by how many of you interacted with this. Love yall bad!!!!! Thank you guys for over 250 followers... I legit am shocked. Also, i'm sorry for the wait on this, I've had a harrowing two and a half weeks but I'm back baby!!
You were completely drained and left numb after the scary moment with the little girl followed by forcibly talking with Robby in the stairwell. It didn't help that after your discussion, he was terse when talking to you. Additionally, the motherfucker made it impossible to avoid him. Of course he was doing this. You'd hoped he'd heed your warnings, maybe listen to how angry you were with him but of course, he couldn't leave well enough alone. It wasn't just with you either. Robby was snapping at everyone, raising tensions, emotions, and anxiety throughout the Pitt. You knew that you weren't to blame for Robby's actions, yet you couldn't help feeling responsible for what was turning into an incredibly taxing shift.
You really didn't want to ask Brendon to come down and comfort you but you had been on the verge of tears for 10 minutes with no relief in sight. Although asking for things you needed was difficult, you knew he wanted to be there for you. So, with trembling fingers, you texted him, asking him to meet you in the on call room when he had a moment. You let out a deep exhale, not even realizing you had held your breath.
23 minutes later he said, "coming." And just like that, you were already beginning to feel soothed. But of course, nothing compared to when he opened the door and immediately, wordlessly, gathered you in his arms. Safe. Naturally, you began crying on him once again. Frustrated and humiliated by Robby's overt and pointed actions towards you; you were beyond hurt that someone you once loved was hell bent on exacting retaliatory pain. Plus, you were disgusted with what he said to you in the stairwell. The totality of emotions and the foundational unfairness and injustice of the situation were smothering you.
You weren't one to be a damsel in distress. You were independent, competent, and brilliant. That didn't mean you didn't need to be taken care of. To be comforted. Which is exactly what Brendon was doing. He was holding you tightly and gently swaying the two of you while his lips were pressed to the top of your head. He was even cradling your head against his chest. After a few minutes of that you let out a watery laugh.
"We have to stop meeting like this"
He let out a snort of laughter and said, "No I like meeting like this."
"Oh you like when people cry on you? You're kind of a sadist."
"No, I like being there for you when you need me." You could hear the frown in his voice. The rational part of you knew any disdain was directed at the situation and not at you, yet you couldn't help but worry you asked for too much from him.
Feeling like you wanted to address that insecurity, you replied, "I feel bad though. Like you have to keep dealing with me when I'm sad and crying on you."
Park leaned his head back and tipped your chin up to look at you when he said, "I'm not dealing with you. I need you to understand that I like comforting you. I like that you need me. Obviously I don't want you to be sad. But I'm glad I can be someone who you feel safe with."
His words brought on a new wave of tears. Being allowed to lose restraint for a little and truly feel your feelings while a reassuring, strong, trusted man comforted you was doing wonders for your emotional state. You had buried your face in his chest again and now, Brendon was slowly and absentmindedly rubbing your back. The tear streaks had dried on your face and your breathing returned to normal.
You weren't sure how long the two of you were wrapped together in the on call room. You couldn't bring yourself to step out of his embrace and return to your shift, which was decidedly less pleasant than being held by a hot, emotionally intelligent surgeon. Unbeknownst to the two of you, the reality waiting outside the on-call room included a very irate Robby.
Shaking his head and smiling in disbelief, Robby paced the hallway. Dana, who had been looking for Robby, walked up to him with her arms crossed.
She asked, "what's the matter with you?"
Unable to contain his aggravation, Robby said, " I've got two doctors fucking or fooling around in an on call room." His emotion was coming off of him in waves: palpable and dangerous.
Immediately realizing what was actually happening, a sympathetic expression formed on Dana's face, causing Robby to say, "no, don't look at me like that."
Not one to let Robby be hypocritical, Dana pressed him more. "Come on, you know you wouldn't care if it was anyone else. You're just angry because she's in there with Park. I know you don't want to hear this but tough shit. Let it go. You and I both know you got no leg to stand on here."
"Yeah well, regardless of what I did, it doesn't excuse this kind of behavior at work."
"What behavior? Having a partner come dry your tears after your boss yells at you in front of everyone? Sounds pretty reasonable to me."
Before Robby could respond, you and Brendon emerged from the on-call room. You, dewy-eyed and fresh-faced from all the tears were feeling better until your gaze landed on Robby. Fuck. Just as soon as Brendon built you up, Robby was about to tear you down. The only problem with that outcome were two very determined people: one Dana Evans and Brendon Park.
Dana broke the charged silence with a command for Robby. She said, "Ok, why don't you go cool off in the ambulance bay. Or go check on Myrna, huh?"
Ignoring her, Robby shook his head with that humorless smile and said, "I've gotta run my ER. Which I can't do when my residents are fucking surgeons in the on call room when they're supposed to be in triage."
Prepared to fight back against Robby again, you took a deep breath and.... and nothing. Because Park was pushing you, not unkindly, behind him. Shielding you and effectively putting himself between you and Robby.
"I've seen you lose your head before but this is a new low Robinavitch. Listen to Evans and cool off. I don't want to hear about you talking down to her or any of your staff for that matter." Brendon took another step towards Robby, trying to get him to back off. All in vain of course.
Robby's face was red and he was looking down with his hands on his hips. "Well this is just unbelievable." He leaned his back against the wall.
Brendon replied, "no, you're unbelievable and quite frankly should have stayed on that sabbatical."
Robby couldn't let that be. He looked up at him and said exactly what he shouldn't have said. "Yeah? Have fun with my sloppy seconds. This'll wear off."
As much Brendon wanted to pummel Robby into the ground, he knew he couldn't. He had to be the better man. One that actually had emotional regulation and didn't act on pure impulse without thought for consequences. Instead, Park said, "Yeah, keep being an immature little shit. See how far that gets you and your department. You'll be seeing me later, after my afternoon meeting, which happens to be with Gloria." Fuck. Something about a self-possessed man was so hot to you.
Scoffing, Robby stormed out of the hallway. Your chest heaved as you let out a breath you'd been holding in. Brendon was rubbing his hands up and down your arms. Dana smiled at the sight and said, "see you love birds later" She winked and left, leaving the two of you alone.
"I'd ask if you're alright but I don't like asking stupid questions."
You let out a snort of laughter and he grinned, victorious.
"Seriously though, if you aren't feeling like finishing your shift, go back home." Home. Brendon's brownstone: clean, familiar, lovely, wonderful.... As much as you wanted to be there, with him, you knew sticking it out would be better in the long run. Robby didn't get to have the last word and he certainly didn't get to have the power to reduce you to something small. No. You'd stay.
So you looked up at him through your lashes and said, "I know. I'm gonna stay though. I'll see you after the shift ends and my charting's over."
Park rewarded you with a warm smile, affection written all over his face. "There's my girl. Let me know if you want me to come down again or if you want to come up to me." He wrapped you in another hug and you breathed him in, savoring the moment and relishing the fact that he called you his girl. You knew you were but god... those words really did something for you.
"Thank you so much Sharkie." Without looking at him, you knew he was blushing again. He'd always blush when you called him "Sharkie." It was possibly the most endearing thing about the hulking man.
"Anytime sweetheart." He meant it. You knew he meant it.
You kissed him on the cheek and squeezed his arms before you finally let him go and returned to triage.
The thing was, deep down, Robby knew he had crossed the line and was being unreasonable. He couldn't seem to stop himself or reign in his reactions. He definitely couldn't tear his eyes away from the sight of the two of you in the hallway after Dana left.
Robby's stomach felt like it had fallen into his ass and his chest tightened as cold dread flooded his body. This was the moment he truly knew it was over between the two of you. Even as you were clearly upset over the day's events (Robby's actions), you looked genuinely happy with Park. Sure, he'd seen you happy before. But this.... this was different. You seemed brighter, more sure of yourself. Even Park, known to be stoic and brooding, looked happy. Robby'd never seen the Shark so much as smile and now he was watching him comfort and support you. To make it all worse -- Park was comforting you because of Robby's dumbassery.
He knew he should look away. But he couldn't. Not when Brendon smiled at you and not when you kissed him on the cheek. It felt like someone had taken hold of Robby's heart and dug their hand in his chest and squeezed as hard as they could. It hurt. It hurt. It hurt.
But... Robby had no one to blame but himself. He had so many opportunities to fix things with you. The countless times you asked, then begged, him to see a therapist and psychiatrist. Not to mention all the times you tried to talk to him but he shut you out. He'd built this reality, he paved this path. That's what was fucking him up.
And now he had to watch. Watch as you loved and were loved in return. Watch as you grew into the person he always knew you'd be -- he'd never considered that it would hurt so much to see you become this version of yourself that didn't include him.
5 months later
Brendon was hosting a game night for you and your friends (aka you and the Pittlings drink wine, smoke weed, and talk as loud as possible). As lovely as your new place was, it could never compare to Brendon's home. At least is was only three and a half blocks away from him!
Brendon refilled everyone's wine glasses before he took his seat next to you. Dennis had explained the rules at least two times but it didn't stop him and Trinity from getting into disagreements about the rules.
"God Huckleberry, you'd think we weren't on the same team the way you keep policing me and my plays!"
"I'm just trying to get you to play this correctly!"
"Yeah? Well what about when I ask you not to leave your nasty --"
"Guys!" Victoria butted in, hoping to steer them away from their argument.
"Sorry that I want us to play the game according to the rules! I don't see how that's--"
"It's so lame Fuckleberry."
You interrupted before the basically-siblings duo could keep arguing in circles and asked, "does anyone wanna smoke with me outside?"
"Fuck yes!" Trinity got to her feet and you quickly followed her, grabbing the joint and lighter as you two made your way to the patio space. You closed the door after you both stepped outside, the cool night air waking your warmed skin.
"Sooooooo..." Trinity said as you lit the joint.
"Yeah, Trin?" You said with it between your lips, words stifled by the joint.
"How are you and the Shark?"
Exhaling out smoke, you pondered her question. You guys were doing well. It was scary, as all relationships can be when vulnerability terrifies you. You'd never loved anyone the way you loved Brendon. He loved you unashamedly, unabashedly, loudly, proudly, and with no games and no keeping score against you. It was terrifying because you felt like you had so much to lose. Still, he made you feel secure and safe. Despite your fears, insecurities, and "baggage," you knew that he loved and cared for you. It was evident in his actions, his words, and his consideration of you and your needs or desires.
"Honestly really good. I don't know.... he makes me so happy and... I don't know. I love him a lot."
"God, you're sickening. Love sickening! Barf!" She proceeded to mime out gagging and you laughed, the weed and wine making everything sillier and funnier than it should be.
Handing the j to her you said, "as if you and Victoria are any better. You guys have been together for what? Like 3 months and you're worse than we are!"
"That's lesbianism for you. We're moving at the speed of molasses compared to other lesbians because we aren't living in the same place."
Laughing, you replied, "fair, fair. It is nice seeing you both so... like content and joyful." You smiled at Trinity and she bumped her shoulder against yours.
After finishing the joint, you two reemerged into a totally different atmosphere. Victoria, Dennis, and Brendon were laser-focused on a game. Not just any game -- Catan, which happened to be both Brendon and Dennis's favorite board game.
"Great. Now we're gonna be here all night."
Victoria sent a warning glare to her girlfriend and said, "what? Do you have somewhere else to be?"
"Careful crash." Javadi playfully rolled her eyes and returned to being locked in on the game.
You sat back down, next to Brandon of course and practically glued yourself to his side. Dutifully, he wrapped an arm around you but it wasn't enough. You laid your head on his legs and closed your eyes for just a minute. So, you fell asleep at your own game night. It didn't matter though. Brendon was entertaining your friends and stroking your hair while you slept. Hours later, you came to as everyone was getting ready to leave.
"Sleeping beauty has awoken!" Trinity teased you from the doorway.
"Shut up" Even though your limbs felt entirely too heavy, you managed to get up and hug your friends goodbye. Brendon closed the door and then you leaned into his chest. He pulled you in close, engulfing you in his embrace. Perfect.
"Thanks for hanging out with my friends while I slept."
"Hey I'm always down to play Catan."
You snorted into his shirt. All jokes aside, Brendon made an effort with your friends and the important things in your life. It was something you would never let go unnoticed.
"I know, I know. I'm just... grateful that you do all of this," you motioned around to the snacks he had prepared and the alcohol he provided, "I want you to know I appreciate it."
"You are probably the most grateful person I've ever met. You're welcome baby, even though you don't need to say thank you. I like your friends but more importantly I like and love you. I do these things because I want to."
You hummed into his chest: content, happy, tired, safe.
"Come on sweetheart. Let's get you to bed."
"Sounds like you want to get in my pants."
"Those are my sweatpants actually. And we'll revisit that idea in the morning when you're not so tired."
Maybe reader calling Park after being stood up on a date. She needs a ride home or something like that?
oh he’d come RUNNING (did a little twist to it but it's still the same thing)
Brendon Park x f!reader | overprotective!Brendon, friends who wanna be more than that, just teeth rotting fluff
It's been twenty minutes.
The chill you felt brush up against your exposed thighs is no longer thrilling, instead it has turned your body purple with shame.
Your freshly manicured hands are no longer pristine as your nails have dug into the cuticles mercilessly in your anguish.
He's not here. He's not coming. He's stopped responding to you an hour before you were supposed to meet up and you still thought, hopeful then, naively now, that he would still show.
The line to get into the restaurant is almost around the block now, your table most definitely given to someone else as the other half of your party never showed up.
You wrap your arms tighter around your body, desperately trying to cling to whatever body heat remains as you'd forgone a jacket because you desperately wanted to test your date to see if he would give you his.
A silly quirk of yours, it almost never failed you. But how could you test someone that never even showed up?
Tears threaten to spill down your cheeks and ruin the simple yet beautiful makeup you'd put on, so out of pure spite, you didn't let them.
No, you're pretty numb right now, mind drifting away from your body as you desperately try to will yourself to do something, anything.
You should go home. You should go to the diner down the street and get something to eat. You should, you should, you should.
But you're exhausted.
Why are you being forced to think right now? You're supposed to have your brain off, not have to fend for yourself tonight.
Ugh this sucks.
"Minnow?"
His voice sends a jolt of electricity through your body, whatever self-pity forgotten, now burning hot with shame.
Your glassy eyes meet his stark blue ones and you have to fight the urge to run away.
He looks really good, the casual yet intentional dress shirt clinging to every ridge of his muscled chest and arms, the dark slacks perfectly hugging his thick legs and...other bits.
Shit, he's here on a date too.
You watch her turn to face you as well as she waves goodbye to someone she knows.
She's gorgeous. Model-esque, tall, tanned. Fuck, this night truly is the worst.
And then the tears spill without your consent. Pathetically so.
How dare your body betray you right in front of your work crush turned best friend and his absurdly hot date?
He slips out of her grasp without even thinking about it, making his way over to you before you can even blink.
"What's wrong?" he whispers, gentle as always, always only with you.
You shake your head, placing your palms over his chest to push him back, desperate to tell him to go back to his date, to go have fun on his one night out that month.
But he's unfortunately an unmovable force, no matter how much you try. And to be honest, you don't try that hard.
How can you? When his gigantic hand captures yours and pull you closer to him, when his other paw comes up to grab the side of your face, his thumb absentmindedly wiping the wetness that keeps leaking.
He's so close you practically curl into his warmth, desperate to stop feeling cold everywhere.
He shushes you gently, letting you rest against his chest as he places his discarded leather jacket over your shoulders. He must've taken the Jaguar out tonight, the convertible, if he's got a jacket with him.
"It's okay, minnow," he coos, softly scratching the back of your head. "I've got you, you're okay."
He turns to look at his date then, to apologize, to explain, but she's simply not there anymore.
The worst part is, he doesn't feel bad about it.
He's honestly relieved. It had been a blind set up from Garcia. Maybe after word gets back to her she'll stop trying to pimp him out and back off.
There's never been anyone else for him. Not since he met you a year ago. But you've never shown any interest in him other than an emotionally rewarding friendship.
To say he doesn't want more would be a straight up lie.
He's always wanted more.
But if this is as much as you're willing to give him, he'll take it.
He'll be there, always. A comfort, a shoulder to cry on, a booty call late at night if you ever need it. He'll ask for nothing and give everything, he'll get on his knees right now and fall on his sword if you commanded it.
But you never have, you never will, because you like him too.
Stupidly so.
It's obvious to everyone except the two of you.
You only set up this stupid date in the first place because Garcia cheekily let it slip that she'd set up Brendon with one of her friends.
And now you've ruined that too.
"Brenny—” you choke. "I'm so sorry, I'm such a mess— is she—”
He shakes his head, pulling you further into him.
"Don't worry about it, baby," he kisses the top of your head. "Not worth it."
Your cheeks heat up with embarrassment. You drove her off with your borderline creepy display of affection, didn't you?
Distressed eyes snap up to meet his but there's no anger, no hurt, only patience and kindness.
"You hungry?" he asks you then, hand hovering over your stomach as it grumbles loudly.
You bite your lip, nodding as a laugh escapes your lips.
"There she is," he mumbles under his breath, finally stepping back to take you in.
The little purple dress you're wearing hangs off your body deliciously, the silk making it look like you're a mermaid, shifting under the warm street lamps magnetically.
The fabric is cut high on your thighs, your ass practically displayed for everyone to see if you so much as dare bend over. And your cleavage? Let's just say he is not sorry that unlucky asshole stood you up.
He adjusts his jacket over your shoulders, making sure you're all bundled up and comfortable, another excuse to shift closer to you again.
"Well I have a dinner reservation that's gonna go to waste," he smiles down at you, hands pulling you by the opening of his jacket into him. "Wanna join me?"
All the ways you've seen Brendon Park, and the way you realize he sees you.
cw: canon typical medical talk (possibly inaccurate but i tried!), like one horny joke statement
note: ik pittsburgh is in the states and all but i'm not bothered enough to figure out the intricacies of an american hospital. everything in here is either based on terminology and colloquialism from the show, or it's from my experience as a student nurse in australia. soz! also ?ooc park? he only had like 2 mins of screen time nothing's really ooc with that time frame tbh i get to make it up. not sure if this is that romantic, but i think it's cute even if it's not super lovey. also made up a bunch of characters bc we spend the whole show in the er idk who tf is in the or. garcia and shamsi make a brief appearance (being nosy)
...
Focus is an integral part of your job as a circulating nurse. Instrument prep, vitals monitoring, perioperative charting; it's all second-nature to you now. Muscle memory has forced you to keep your eyes on every hand in the room, ready to red card a break in the sterile field. But focus? In a quiet room where all you can hear is the steady beep of telemetry, the voices of the surgeons and scrub tech, the deafening silent questions in the eyes of interns and students, focus is hard to achieve. Yes, you're filling out the peri-op note as you go, and yes, you're busy making sure your hands do what the gloved ones cannot- but focus is still not easy. You're only human, thoughts break through. You've got a great lunch to look forward to in two hours, and you're really glad you got new shoes because your old ones used to squeak embarrassingly loud, and has Dr. Park always looked that good under harsh lighting?
Why, yes. He has. You know this because you've seen him under all kinds of lighting.
You and the chief attending orthopedic surgeon of PTMC have a long history- not that he's noticed, of course. It's not the kind of history with shared laughter and tender moments, or even one with distaste and scorn. It's a quiet, subtle, professional one. He's worked at the hospital eight years now, never moving since he was an intern. Eight years ago, you were in your final year of nursing school, your last clinical placement done in this very hospital, on a paediatric ward.
That was your first encounter. The little boy in bed ten with an olecranon fracture that had been casted too tight by the plaster tech earlier that day, causing paresthesia, numbness, and mild swelling. You'd done a set of neurovascular obs and rated his pain, letting your preceptor know before she uttered the words, "Why don't we give the ortho team a call? You wanna do it?"
And suddenly you were seeing Brendon Park's name on the medical officer list, under attending physician Dr Holliday's team, as the intern on call, first point of contact. You remember how you did your best to deliver a clear, quick handover, reminding him which patient this was, how his pain was, that your neurovascular obs were already documented, and emphasizing that you were a student nurse.
Normally, when you called a patient's treating team, they acknowledged you, asked to clarify with your preceptor. Not Brendon. He hadn't been quite as sharp back then, but still direct and unyielding. He must've been new too, it was a day in August, you believed. He'd probably only had M.D. after his name for a month. His response came clipped through the phone, "I'll be down in ten." Your preceptor gave you a dry, disbelieving look, but it was wiped off when Brendon actually showed up in ten minutes.
He didn't gel his hair back then, and he didn't have a thousand-yard stare that made people want to retreat to the morgue for more warmth. He casted a brief glance at you, eyes dropping to your name badge, and then walked straight into bed bay ten, pulling back the curtain with a brief introduction. Before he started, he poked his head back out and looked at you, saying nothing.
You blinked back, "Uh...everything okay?"
He let you freeze under his stare for a little longer, "Is he your patient?"
"Well- I'm working with...uh...Sarah, she's just with another patient, but- but yeah, he's part of my patient load this shift-" you quickly got out, not flustered, not afraid, just confused about where the question was going and how you should answer.
Brendon cut you off curtly, "You're not going to observe your own patient while I assess?" He said it like he was baffled you wouldn't grab at every learning opportunity possible.
You blinked before wordlessly stepping over and smiling at the little boy, who smiled back. Brendon began his assessment and then turned to you, "Ever seen a cast be put on?"
You paused and blinked, "Just once..."
"Know what you need?"
"I think so- like, padding and plaster and-"
"I'm not quizzing you, I'm asking. Six West is the ortho ward, go raid the supply closet. If you get stuck, tell someone it's an olecranon fracture and I'm doing a backslab." You were off as soon as he finished, returning with everything he needed (and a little more, because you panicked. He only raised an eyebrow and continued, letting you watch as he reapplied the cast in near silence).
You didn't see Brendon again until a few months into your grad year in PACU. It was nearing the end of your shift and you'd been checking drains and dressings for general surgery and urology patients all day, with one CABG in the middle just to throw you off. Bones were the least of your worries.
That is until he came into PACU with a patient, post-osteotomy. You were just finishing with the lovely old man who'd been a delight post-partial nephrectomy, when Brendon stepped in, escorting a young woman, asleep in her hospital bed, right into bay thirteen next to you. He didn't even look at you, "You have thirteen?"
You quickly whirled around and nodded, "Yeah, who've we got?"
He ran through a handover as the orderly kicked the bed brakes into place at the center of the bay. A twenty-four year old woman, had a distal femoral osteotomy to realign the left knee after a bad childhood fracture healed wrong, be sure to check the notes from March 2019. EWS of 1 on the ward and in theatre for a slightly low temperature, but normal for the patient, asymptomatic. All other vitals within normal limits. No complications during the surgery but she does have schizophrenia-
"Wait, what?" You blurted out in your haze of intaking Brendon's low, clinical tone.
Brendon raised an eyebrow, voice a little sharper, "I said no perioperative complications but she has schizophrenia in her history-"
You let out something between a groan and a pleading whine.
He narrowed his eyes. "Something wrong?"
"No- no, she just- is she on an antipsychotic? Was she off them prior to the surgery?"
"She-" Brendon stopped himself, because...he wasn't sure. He quickly flipped around the piece of paper in his hands, scribbles all over in poor handwriting (just typical), before glancing at the computer next to you, already grabbing his badge from the reel on his waist pocket, "can I tap in?"
With a quick sidestep, you were backed up against the railing of wholesome post-partial nephrectomy man's bed, and Brendon was bullying his linebacker frame into the gap between you and Miss DFO.
You'd never really described a person's body as linebacker before. Bronzed-up body-building show pony, yes, but Brendon wasn't quite there. He was pale, after all.
His card was swiped at the terminal like the broke resident silently drowning in loans he was, only instead of a declining card or the sound of more money going to an institution that could buy a small country, his mere username and password was inputted. He quickly opened up the patient's notes and clicked through a few of them before landing on a psychiatry team consult. There it was, right at the end in the plan, 'cease clozapine 200mg BD 12hrs pre-op. Restart when nil airway concerns + sedation score=0'. Brendon glanced at you, "There you go, she's been off it twelve hours since we started."
Without thinking, your hand grabbed the mouse and looked around, checking the eMAR, "...her surgery was delayed."
Brendon scoffed, "Look, the OR has been packed, what do you expect us to-"
"No, no, I don't mean that. I mean..." you hover your mouse over the last recorded administration of clozapine, two days ago. With a quick count, a little over forty-seven hours ago, "...the ward nurses must've ceased it for her scheduled time and then didn't give it when her surgery was pushed back." You glanced at Brendon, eyebrows drawn together slightly, "...is clozapine the one you have to retitrate after forty-eight hours ceased, or is that olanzapine?"
Brendon caught on and sighed, "...it's clozapine."
You let out another groan, "Ugh, I'll check with the ward to make sure they didn't give it and just didn't document, and then I'll call psych. There's no way I can give her that clozapine in the next forty minutes," you sighed, glancing at the patient, still blissfully asleep. You glanced at Brendon, "thank you for telling me."
Brendon looked surprised to be thanked, but he supposed a mistake would cost you your registration, "I had to, anyway. Good catch," he paused a moment before tacking your name on at the end, and then quickly turning away and walking off.
One of your colleagues, Matt, looked over from bed seventeen once the doors to the OR were shut behind Brendon, "You see him a lot since you start? Didn't think he'd know your name- no offense. He hardly knows mine, I've been on ortho and in PACU for years."
You shrugged, "Oh- it's- I dunno, we met once when I was a student, but I doubt he remembers that. Probably just read my badge." you said, turning back to your new patient.
But the truth is, Brendon did remember. It wasn't some quiet crush over years and years, it wasn't pining and yearning for someone he hardly saw- it was just...notice. Brendon had a fantastic memory, had to in his line of work, and he appreciated competence and a willingness to learn. A voice unafraid to be curious and to advocate. It wasn't unique to you, but it wasn't as prevalent as one would think in healthcare. Sometimes, it didn't even come easy to Brendon himself. PACU suited you, he thought, far more than ward nursing in paeds when he saw you last.
That's how your encounters with Brendon were for a while, sparse and sporadic, with professionalism and a single-minded focus on getting the job done. Not a bad mindset on the peri-op floor, though he could learn to be a little less brusque. His attending, Dr Holliday, was the jolliest little old man, all smiles and smaller than most of his orthopedic colleagues, though still sharper and stronger than all of them where it counted. Perhaps he could take after him. Though, most of Holliday's team took after his right-hand senior resident Dr De Silva, with eyes that could make a perfect incision with her gaze alone, and arms that were indistinguishable from those of a 20th-century circus strongman.
Perhaps that's where Brendon got it from. Over the years, you'd see him a few times, interact with him even fewer, and every time he looked a little harsher, sounded a little more curt, moved a little more decisively. Park the Shark was uttered as a joke by some employee everyone said was definitely not them, and then became more of a warning than a moniker.
It was around that time you went from PACU to scrub and scout nursing. You'd been around. Had your fill of five-minutely vitals and having to actually count respiratory rates lest the patient's care is transferred to the grim reaper. It was time for something more. As Aaron Burr apparently once said, you wanted to be in the room where it happens.
Steep learning curve aside, you did well, and for that most of the surgeons were pretty good to you. You even briefly dated a nice otolaryngologist. Sure, there were a few sharp comments, a few quick decisions, even a couple of raised voices, but it happens. Under the pressure, the lights, the sound of a heartbeat that might stop if you mess up, you understood where that sharpness could come from. Even if sometimes it was a little overkill, a little uncalled for, you could forgive. And more importantly, you could learn.
And that brings you back here, to the ORIF happening a metre away, to the retractor kindly opening someone's lower leg for you to peek in as you type in names and details and give another glance at beautiful normotension and sinus rhythm on the least interesting yet most important TV show ever. You've worked with Brendon quite a few times in the last few years, not having seen much of him in your initial foray into theatre, but now quite comfortable with him. He was gruff, he was mean, and he was the boss now, but you knew him to be great and you knew him to care about his patients. Even if he didn't seem like a good team player, with all the snark or the glare that could turn a med student back into the art kid they were in high school, he was able to cooperate, so long as he approved. So long as it was safe and best practice. If everyone around him was an idiot? Well, then they deserved what was coming.
This particular surgery hasn't been difficult, just a simple ORIF with a couple extra considerations and precautions because the woman on the table has type II Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. A medical student is watching, only an MS3 on his second rotation, where his first was palliative care. In addition to him, Brendon's latest bright-eyed intern is there to strictly listen to his orders and help only when asked.
You're busy typing when Brendon's voice cuts through, "Ramos. Light." The med student snaps to attention, reaching a hand up to the light to move it. You quickly lock eyes with him and shake your head before he can touch the handle with the sterile cover, and make a motion to move it from the top. He freezes and then swiftly moves his hand to above the light to awkwardly push it around a little. You point your fingers this way and that to guide him to where you expect Brendon wants it. Once he does, you shoot student doctor Ramos a warm smile and a thumbs up and he gives you a grateful look.
The warmth dissipates when Brendon speaks again, his back to you from where he's operating. This time, it's your name. Just your name. You snap straight up. "Yes?"
Brendon pauses for a long moment, letting you stew as you wonder what he wants to say, the same confusion you felt when you called him to the paeds ward as a student washing over you. He finally lets out, "Student doctor Ramos isn't a child, he can move a light by himself. If he needs your help to do it, he can get out of my OR."
You quickly lie, "I didn't help him. I didn't even say anything."
He doesn't turn around, still working, "The window is a reflective surface, I saw you. Don't lie."
You glance at the window straight ahead, in Brendon's clear view, and sigh knowing he caught you playing charades with his student. You mutter under your breath, "I'm circulating, it's my job to make sure no one breaks sterile field, I wasn't babying him."
"I heard that." Brendon replies without missing a beat.
You stiffen and then sigh, tone a little petulant, "Sorry, Dr. Park, won't happen again."
You can't see his mouth under the surgical mask, but you swear you see one side of his face raise ever so slightly in the window's reflection.
Must be a trick of the light.
After the surgery, you're at a computer making sure all the documentation is complete and correct while Brendon is in PACU down the hall giving handover. His student comes up to you as you're looking everything over, "Hey, uh- just wanted to say thanks for making sure I didn't mess up. And sorry- I didn't mean for Dr Park to get upset with you..." Ramos trails off, unsure and anxious as ever.
You look away from the computer and at him, "Oh, that's okay. Like I told him, it's my job to make sure. You're a student, it's fine to need reminding of those things, I know attendings that still forget. They're focused on other things, it's all good," you smile, before adding on, "and, don't mind Dr Park, he's a good surgeon. He just does weird stares and pauses and all to unsettle everyone. I think he just picked it up off his senior resident back in the day because she scared the shit out of him. He's not that tough," you shrugg.
You're not sure why Ramos' eyes slowly get more fearful when you were trying to reassure him. You're not sure why his mouth opens like he wants to dispute that. You're not sure why his eyes aren't really focused on you anymore-
"Is that so?"
Once again, tension shoots through you.
The voice didn't come from Ramos, or anyone nearby. It came from Brendon, who's now standing oddly close to your back. How he'd snuck up on you with such a towering frame and clogs that squeaked, you'd never know.
You don't dare turn around, "Dr. Park-"
"Look at me when you're talking to me, this isn't the OR." He shoots back immediately.
A little patronizing, you think. A little hot too, your brain supplies unhelpfully. That definitely says more about you than Brendon. Since working more closely with him, he'd grown from an on and off specimen with a nice jaw and ass to ogle, to a genuine crush. It only got worse. You don't fumble over yourself and plead for a shot, but at inappropriate times, your mind blanks and feeds you lines more suited to a (sometimes raunchy) rom-com than a medical documentary. Your own metaphorical intracranial hemorrhage, only growing and causing a bit of mild romantic delirium. Brendon isn't a neurosurgeon so he can't fix it. Well, he probably can, but it's not his specialty. You assume he's smart enough to. He walks like it's heavy: his brain and something else.
Right, you still haven't said anything. The heavy comment isn't one that needs to grace anyone's ears, let alone his. You finally land on, "Dr. Park, I didn't realize you were back from PACU."
No shit. You wouldn't have said that to Ramos (who ran as soon as Park showed up) if you had realized.
Brendon seems to have the same thought, as indicated by the narrowing of his eyes, but he doesn't vocalize it. Instead, he goes with, "After working with you for eight years, you think I'm intentionally unsettling and that I copied my personality from Dr De Silva?" He raises an eyebrow at you. You don't notice the slight quirk of his lip betraying amusement and teasing, stuck on something else he said.
"Eight years?" you blurt out with a blink.
It causes Brendon to blink too, "...yes...?"
He sounds more unsure that you've ever seen him.
He continues, "You- we met on the paeds ward, when you were a student-"
"You remember that?!" your words come out loud enough that Dr Garcia and Dr Shamsi hear you from not too far away. Garcia just raises an eyebrow at Brendon and glances back at a CT scan on a tablet, while Shamsi narrows her eyes and shrinks behind a clipboard to hide how she looks over once. Twice. Thrice.
Brendon looks at them but doesn't bother with any words or a glare, too focused on you, "Yes, I remember."
"You didn't know me!" you lower your voice a little, but it still has that undercurrent of surprise and incredulity.
"Yes, I did. You told me your name on the phone. You watched me redo that kid's cast." Brendon speaks plainly, before his eyes soften a little, eyebrows pulling together slightly like a marginally scolded puppy. It's not enough of a change in expression to warrant any grand exclamations of disbelief, but enough to make you question exactly what the emotion before you is, like an inkblot test, if Hermann Rorschach was a jacked ortho bro, with eyes so blue they'd put you in a code of the same colour. He finally adds quietly, "...do you not remember me from then?"
Your eyes widen at the almost hopeful question and you scramble to respond, "No- no, of course I do, I...I remember when I saw you. Obviously." You're not sure why you're so dodgy about it, when you definitely remember him. Perhaps not every interaction between then and your time in his ORs as of late, but you do remember.
"Good," he falters slightly, awkward in his delivery. Who says "good" to that? He continues, "good, as in, you're a good fr- nurse. A good nurse." he clears his throat once, "and you're- that's been evident, over the years. I'd hope you think the same of me, after all this time, even if I am unsettling and inspired by Dr De Silva, to you," he pauses, "...I didn't think anyone remembered her, she wasn't here long before she transferred to Presby."
Oh. Oh. That's what this was about. You've seen Brendon go from intern to chief attending orthopedic surgeon, even from afar. You've seen a lot of surgeons, but Brendon is one you've observed periodically since he started. Since his hair wasn't gelled and his tone wasn't so firm and he had a little more curiosity in his eyes. Since he had to copy his senior resident to fabricate a little respect. Since he was a keen intern redoing casts himself instead of just ordering to call the plaster tech and putting in a note, showing his eagerness not with a big smile and wide eyes, but quietly undertaking every task he could until he knew it all well enough to run orthopedic surgery the way Dr Holliday did.
You've witnessed all that from slowly accumulating consults and handovers and his name going from needing cosigning on notes, to the one who cosigns. From orders put in more specifically and plans becoming more meticulous. And sure, other nurses had probably witnessed him grow too, perhaps even more than you back then, but then you entered his territory. Worked with him a couple times a week, understanding how he worked and that he wasn't all bad. Brendon can't say anyone he works with today remembers his residency, let alone his intern year.
But you did, even if only bits and pieces of it, because those small parts were enough to tell a story with a man like Brendon Park. Above all, he respected you, in every role you worked since you were that student on the phone in paeds.
You knew him, and he valued you.
A smile works its way onto your face, soft and warm like it was for Ramos, the kind of reassurance you give when you coach grad nurses through subcutaneous infusions and help med students guess their glove size. Brendon was far older, far more experienced, but somehow you saw that intern in him, despite the way time had aged him.
"I do think the same of you, Dr. Park," you utter simply.
He blinks, not expecting the response so clearly. Perhaps that closed loop communication was affecting your everyday vernacular. He can't judge, he does the same on the phone with his mother. The sentiment is what makes his mouth curve ever so slightly, before he speaks lowly, "You can call me Brendon." Your eyes widen a little and you nod before he continues, already stepping past you, that cold surgeon mask slipping back, "be sure to round up Ramos and Richards for the TKR at two. I'm going for lunch. You should too."
Your mouth works faster than your mind, "with you?"
He's still walking away, but you see his head dip in a nod. You quickly glance at Rachel at the desk and she mouths 'go after him!', shooting you a thumbs up. You quickly tap out of the computer you're logged into and step quickly after him, "I'm coming, Dr Park-"
"Brendon," he corrects, glancing at you as he slows his legs and you fall into step beside him.
You nod, face a little warm. You notice his ears are too, a pretty pink flush, as you reply, "right. Brendon."
Dr. Brendon "The Shark" Park x Sunshine! Pregnant! reader
Summary: How Shark found out he was going to be a dad + how they welcomed their little girl into the world with an unexpected surprise.
Warning: Swearing, Brendon Park himself, Age difference, Height difference. Grumpy and Sunshine. Possible medical inaccuracies. There's talk of growing up in the system.
Words: 4277
Taglist: @my-whole-brain-is-crying @leksi-rae @chelle-1515 @minienix @mythologicallyversed @mxtokko @tears-of-acid-and-sluts @susp3ndedindusk @helenaellie @rei-scorpio @ivy-stuffs @dutch3-10 @catharticdesire @sidneysidney123 @fics-from-the-dead @eddiemunsonguitar @thedragonsrose @mynameisbaby9 @simply-lovley44 @dr3obsessed @mayabbot @bbblackmamba @harryswizzle @alphafemale-15 @rabbotseatcarrots @b38596012 @lipsunsmokedcigarette @pastlecow @kingtitus @stevieharrington71 @asfaraslifegets @noyaisasimp @loki-trickst3r @miahelen @xoxoloverb @brown-eyes-cello-and-books @seitmai @boricuas-fic-recs @outpostsworld @ohheyitssj @thedragonsrose @justanothersadperson93 @hcrm @vastscoutweapon @multifandom301 @travelingmypassion @carson1gg @mintoblobo @redhooduwu @twdhtgawm @annabethboleyn @ichibella @ramenblutte @happyendingarentreal @gardeniarose13 @jgoose13 @ilocuras24 @noxytopy
You were utterly submerged in the rhythmic domesticity of folding laundry, your headphones snug and your hips swaying—almost instinctively—to the music that anchored your private world. You had squeezed every drop of productivity from your day off: an exhaustive marathon of errands, heavy shopping bags filled with the absurdly expensive luxuries Brendon favored, and the endless hum of the washing machine.
Yet, there wasn't a flicker of resentment for having "wasted" your freedom on chores. Each time you smoothed a T-shirt or triumphed in matching a pair of socks—a feat far more complex than it seemed, as if they possessed a supernatural urge to vanish—a small, secret smile tugged at your lips. You couldn't stop visualizing your husband’s reaction.
Would he mirror your radiance? Or would he succumb to the phantom of panic since, in his own haunting words, "he’d never been granted a decent paternal example"? That doubt lingered in the back of your mind, but it only served as the fuel for your fire. Everything had to be impeccable. Today wasn't just housework; it was a silent, frantic race to ensure every detail of your home was a sanctuary. The life already blossoming within you deserved nothing less. It hadn't been a calculated pursuit—simply a choice to stop running, to step back and let fate take the lead.
Now that fate had spoken, Brendon deserved to hear the echo in a way he’d never forget. Between cycles of the wash, you had choreographed the moment perfectly. You wanted him to step through that door after a grueling shift at the hospital and find more than just a clean house—you wanted him to find the threshold of his new reality, neatly packaged in a box on the table containing a pair of tiny, shark-printed shoes.
You were so lost in your own thoughts, the music acting as a barricade against the world, that you missed the subtle creak of the front door. You didn't hear the heavy, exhausted sigh as Brendon dropped his keys into the ceramic bowl. You were still lost in the melody, carrying the final stack of clean clothes toward the dressing room, when large, warm hands suddenly cinched around your waist.
The shock was electric. You jumped, the sudden jolt sending a freshly folded cotton shirt tumbling to the floor. You spun quickly within his grasp, headphones still clinging to your ears, to meet your husband’s gaze. The exhaustion of a marathon shift in the operating room was etched into the tension of his shoulders, but his eyes held that soft, guarded light—the look he reserved exclusively for you—that never failed to make your pulse skip.
You slid the headphones down around your neck, discarding them onto the nearest surface without a thought.
"Your first day off in weeks and you spend it on labor, Sunny..."
"I slept in, Bren. Then I had a proper breakfast, got dressed, and conquered the shops," you replied with a tender smile, looping your arms around his neck and grazing the skin at his nape. "I bought those steaks you love. And I finally caught up on the laundry."
"You spoil me, Doll," he rasped. Before you could offer a retort, he closed the distance between you until there wasn't an inch of air to breathe.
His hands migrated from your hips to cradle your face with a fierce, possessive urgency as he kissed you. It was deep and desperate—a kiss born of longing and necessity, but anchored in a profound, quiet love. You felt the rigidity leave his frame as he melted against you, his thumbs tracing your cheekbones with a slowness that felt almost reverent.
"I’ve missed you every damn second of those sixteen hours," he whispered against your mouth, his warm breath ghosting over your skin. "I needed this. To feel you."
A lump of pure emotion tightened your throat. He had no inkling of the miracle growing in your womb—the tiny spark you had both kindled. You pulled back just enough to hold his gaze, keeping your hands on his chest with a mischievous glint in your eyes.
"Well, I’m right here... and I have something for you."
You slipped from his hold and walked to the dining table, where the small box rested on the dark oak. You lifted it with trembling care, as if the contents were made of spun glass, and returned to him. Brendon watched you with mounting intrigue, leaning lazily against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, a weary half-smile playing on his lips.
"A gift?" He arched a skeptical brow. "Doll, it’s not an anniversary or a birthday. You don’t need to buy me things."
"Just shut up and open it, Bren," you whispered, thrusting the box toward him, your heart hammering against your ribs.
He gave a soft, amused huff and took the package. His long, steady surgeon's fingers made quick work of the black ribbon, drawing out the suspense. But the moment he lifted the lid, the world went silent. His blue eyes locked onto the miniature shoes—tiny blue sharks, so small they could be swallowed by the palm of his hand.
He froze. He barely blinked, his analytical brain seemingly paralyzed by the image. The weariness evaporated, replaced by a sudden, stark pallor and a look of profound wonder.
"Doll..." His voice was a fractured whisper, his breath hitching as he delicately lifted one of the booties. "Tell me this isn't just a joke... tell me you didn't just find the design funny."
He looked up, searching your eyes for the permission to believe it.
"It’s not a joke, Bren. I’m nine weeks pregnant," you confirmed, your voice thick with tears. You placed your hands over his, which were still clutching the tiny shoe. "We’re having a baby, Big Guy."
The silence that followed was heavy and sacred. Brendon looked back down at the shoe, and for the first time in your years together, you watched a single, solitary tear track down his cheek.
Without a word, he sank to his knees. He pressed his forehead against your stomach, his arms wrapping around your waist with a desperate, grounding strength. It was the gesture of a man who had just found a new center of gravity.
"Nine weeks... a baby," he muffled against you, the vibration of his voice humming through your skin. "God, I’m going to be a father. I swear to you, Doll... I swear on my life I’ll be the best for them."
He stood, cupping your face once more to kiss you with a tenderness that nearly broke you.
"I'm buying a portable ultrasound machine," he announced, a flash of his usual professional authority returning as he wiped your tears away. "I don't care what it costs. I want to see this baby and hear that heart whenever we want."
"An ultrasound machine, Bren?" you laughed through your sobs. "That’s insane, it’s not even your specialty."
"I’m an orthopedic surgeon, Doll. I can read an image better than half the residents in that building," he countered with that characteristic touch of arrogance that made you smile. "Besides, I’m not letting our peace of mind depend on a waiting list. If I need to hear that little heart beating at three in the morning just so I can sleep, then I will."
"I married a madman," you joked, leaning into him.
"You married the man who is going to protect you and that baby better than anyone on earth," he corrected fiercely. "Tomorrow, I’m calling Dr. Bishop. She’s the best OB in the city and she owes me for fixing her mother’s hip. You’ll be seen in her private clinic. You’ll just have to tolerate me wanting to listen to the heartbeat every five minutes."
He folded you into his arms, and in that embrace, you felt like the safest person in existence. He fell silent, resting his cheek atop your head as you both stared at the tiny shoe on the table. The "Shark" had finally laid down his armor.
"It’s going to be so small, isn't it?" he asked suddenly, his voice laced with genuine awe. "The bones... they'll be so delicate. God, I’ll have to learn not to squeeze too hard when I hold them."
"You won't hurt them. They'll be in the best hands in the world," you assured him, rubbing his back. "You’re going to be an incredible father, Big Guy. Overprotective, but incredible."
In that moment of raw vulnerability, it was clear: Brendon was already as deeply in love with the baby as he was with you. It didn't matter how formidable he was in the OR or how much he terrified his residents; here, in the quiet of your home, he was simply a man captivated by the new life beginning to pulse within you.
"I'll be whatever you need," he promised, kissing your hair. "Rest now, Doll. I’ll take care of you both."
He wasn't lying.
Nine months later, you were a study in heavy, aching anticipation. Your daughter was a tempest, kicking your ribs with a relentless energy she had clearly inherited from her father. You felt as though you might split at the seams, yet stubbornness—another trait you shared with your husband—drove you from the bed. You wanted to brew one last pot of coffee for Brendon while he showered, preparing for his final shift before paternity leave.
But as your feet hit the floor, it wasn't a contraction that halted you. It was a strange, sudden rush of heat—the unmistakable sensation of liquid soaking through your clothes and pooling onto the hardwood. You froze, staring at the puddle with the eerie, detached composure that only an ER nurse could maintain in a crisis.
The bathroom door creaked open, and Brendon emerged in a shroud of steam, a towel slung low on his hips and his torso still glistening with droplets. He stopped dead when he saw you standing there, staring blankly at the floor. His blue eyes swept the room, processing the scene in a fraction of a second. There was no first-time-father panic; there was only the absolute, chilling calm of a surgeon.
"Bren... I just—" Your voice was a thin whisper.
"I know, Doll. It seems our daughter has a very loose interpretation of due dates," he replied. His voice was so steady it sent a shiver of pure relief down your spine.
There was no frantic rushing. Brendon dropped the towel and dressed with the clinical efficiency of a soldier on a mission. In a heartbeat, you were swept into his arms and carried down to the garage. He settled you into the leather interior of his BMW X6, reclining the seat just enough to keep you secure but comfortable.
"Bren, the upholstery..." you wheezed as a fresh contraction stole your breath.
"I can replace leather, Doll. I can't replace you two. The only thing that matters is getting you to that hospital," he said, cinching the belt over your belly with a tenderness that brought tears to your eyes.
He rounded the hood in three long strides and slid into the driver's seat. With a flick of his wrist, the engine roared to life. The drive was a masterclass in precision. Brendon kept one hand locked on the wheel, carving through the morning fog with surgical accuracy, while his other hand sought yours, squeezing tight every time a contraction forced your back to arch. His eyes flicked between the road and you, monitoring your vitals as if you were his most critical patient.
"She had to pick rush hour," you hissed through gritted teeth. Pittsburgh’s morning traffic was a legendary hellscape; the path to PTMC felt like an impossible gauntlet.
A new contraction, far more violent than the last, forced your eyes shut. You gripped his thigh with a force that would have made any other man falter, but Brendon didn't flinch. He absorbed your pain as if it were his own.
"She’s impatient. Clearly, she didn't get that from me," he joked, his voice a low rumble designed to ground you as he swerved around a delivery truck. "Breathe, Doll. You’re doing perfectly. You’re the strongest woman I’ve ever known."
"God, I don't think I'm doing this again, Bren..." you gasped, the pressure becoming unbearable. "I'm sorry..."
"Don't you dare apologize. Not for this," he countered instantly, his voice thick with devotion. He kept his left hand fixed on the wheel, dodging a slow-moving sedan, while his right hand remained a steady weight on your leg. "If this impatient little girl is the only one we ever have, she’ll be the luckiest, most loved child in this fucking world. I don't need another miracle to know how incredible you are. I just need you two safe."
You looked at his profile—a sharp, concentrated line of marble. There was no trace of the panic a normal father would feel. He was a surgeon in the middle of the most vital operation of his life, and you were his only priority.
"Bren... she’s crowning," you exhaled, the downward pressure forcing you to arch against the leather.
The atmosphere in the car shifted instantly. The air grew dense, electric. Brendon’s jaw tightened until the muscle looked carved from stone. You were gridlocked just blocks from the hospital. Time had run out.
"Damn it," he growled, though his voice remained low. "Okay, Doll. Listen to me. We aren't waiting for this traffic to move. We both know she isn't going to wait for a parking spot."
He shifted in his seat, placing a firm, steady hand on your stomach.
"Unbuckle the belt. Get your pants off. Now, beautiful. Don't worry about the car, just focus on me."
"We should call Dana... tell her to get the OB team ready..." you managed to stutter, your hands trembling as you fumbled with the fabric.
Brendon didn't take his eyes off you, but he slammed the hands-free button. "Call Dana Evans," he commanded. "Now, Doll. Get rid of the clothes. Forget everything else. Let's bring our daughter home."
The phone rang over the speakers just as you managed to kick the clothes to the floor. Dana’s authoritative voice filled the cabin. "Park? Why are you calling? Is everything okay with Sunshine?"
"Dana!" you shrieked, clutching the ceiling handle so hard the plastic groaned. "I’m in the car and she’s coming! I’m crowning!"
There was a half-second of silence—the time it took for a veteran nurse to shift gears. "Sunshine! Stay calm! Don’t push unless you can’t stop it! Shark! Tell me you aren't driving like a maniac!"
"We’re stuck in traffic, Dana," Brendon interrupted, his voice reaching that terrifying level of calm he only used when a life was on the line. "Clear Trauma 1. I want OB and a Neo-team standing by the bay. We're coming in hot."
He cut the call. The traffic broke, but your daughter had reached the point of no return. The "ring of fire" consumed you, and your nails dug deep into Brendon's knee.
"Don't hold back, Doll. If you have to push, push," he ordered. He covered your hand with his, welcoming the sting of your nails.
The BMW roared as Brendon tore onto the shoulder, burning rubber to bridge the final meters to the PTMC ramp. You felt a final, explosive surge of nature—a force that ripped a scream from your lungs that likely echoed through the entire ward.
"Brendon!" you cried out, your hands reaching down to catch the small, slick body of your daughter as she slid into the world.
He slammed on the brakes in front of the ER doors, the screech of tires bringing security running. The engine was still ticking, hot from the race, but the world went silent when your daughter’s first cry—a high-pitched, indignant, life-filled wail—broke the air.
Brendon unbuckled and lunged toward your seat. His surgeon’s hands, which never wavered, joined yours to hold the warm miracle against your chest. He shed his linen jacket to cover her, shielding her from the morning air. His blue eyes, usually so clinical, were shimmering.
"She’s perfect, Doll. You’re... God, you’re incredible," he whispered, kissing your sweat-soaked brow.
"She already has your look of annoyance," you joked weakly, tears finally spilling over.
The ER doors burst open. Donnie and Jesse sprinted out with a gurney, their faces a mix of terror and awe.
"I see Baby Shark is just as impatient as her mother, eh, Sunshine?" Donnie shouted, rushing to cover you with a blanket as they helped Brendon move you to the gurney.
"Shut up, Donnie!" you barked, a laugh bubbling through your sobs. "I would have made it to the ward if the traffic in this city wasn't absolute shit!"
"Hey, watch the language, Sunshine! There are innocent ears present!" Jesse teased.
As they began to wheel you inside, Donnie—ever the instigator—pulled out his phone. He had been waiting for this moment since the day he found out "Park the Shark" was the father. He hit play and turned the volume to the max.
The low, menacing notes of the Jaws theme began to thrum through the ER hallway.
Tu-tum... tu-tum... tu-tum-tu-tum...
The ward ground to a halt. Robby froze mid-note; Langdon dropped his pen; the nurses exchanged looks of pure shock. Even Dana couldn't hide her grin. The Great White Shark of Orthopedics had entered the building, not to hunt, but to protect his brood.
Brendon walked beside the gurney, his hand resting firmly on the edge. He didn't care about the ruined shirt or his fearsome reputation. He only had eyes for you and the tiny creature on your chest.
"Donnie, you're an idiot," you laughed.
"What? Baby Shark deserves the entrance of the century," he retorted as they swung you into Trauma 1.
The baby, oblivious to the soundtrack, snuggled into your skin. But the joy of the room shifted as Robby stepped forward, his expression darkening.
"You know what's crazy, Sunshine?" Robby said softly as the team began their post-birth checks. "Today is a day of miracles and cruel ironies. Baby Jane Doe came back in thirty minutes ago."
You stiffened. The memory of the little girl from the 4th of July—the one you had held until the system took her away—hit you like a physical blow. You had grieved for her, fearing the system would fail her.
"What? Why?" you asked, your heart sinking.
Robby sighed, glancing at Dana. "Her foster mother 'forgot' she was in the back seat while running errands. She was locked in the car, Sunshine. In the direct sun. A passerby had to break the glass. She's lucky to be alive."
You looked down at your own daughter, so safe and warm, and then up at Brendon. The contrast was agonizing. You had fought through a city to save your child, while Jane Doe had been left to bake in a metal tomb.
The silence in the room was deafening. Brendon stood perfectly still, but the air around him turned cold. That predatory, protective calm settled over him.
"Forgotten?" The word fell from his lips like a death sentence. His gaze turned lethal. "You’re telling me that while I nearly wrecked my car to ensure my family was safe, that woman left a child in a furnace?"
"Exactly that," Dana confirmed, her eyes bright with unshed tears. "She’s dehydrated and the heat stroke was severe, but she’s a fighter."
You felt the echo of your own childhood—the cold uncertainty of the foster system—resonate in your chest. You couldn't let it happen again. Not to her.
"Brendon," you whispered, reaching for him.
He looked at you. In his eyes was the man who had just realized his family wasn't yet complete.
"They failed you, Doll," he said, his voice a low, lethal promise only you could hear. "But we are not going to fail her. Not again. I know how hard it was to let her go the first time. Fate is screaming at us to fix this."
The room went still as his meaning sank in.
"You mean...?" Your voice broke.
"We should have done it from the start," he said, kissing your temple. "There will be no more goodbyes, Doll. Baby Jane Doe is staying with us. I don't care who I have to call—she isn't going back."
A few hours later, the frantic pulse of the ER had faded into the profound stillness of a private suite on the maternity floor. The late afternoon sun began its slow descent over Pittsburgh, hemorrhaging gold through the windows and bathing the room in a warm, ethereal glow. You were reclined against a mountain of pillows, your newborn daughter—the little "Baby Shark" who had claimed her place in the world so violently—sleeping soundly in the bassinet beside you.
The door moved on silent hinges. Brendon stepped inside, still wearing the clothes from the birth, though he had scrubbed the day’s grime from his face. The shadow of fury that had darkened his features in the Trauma Box was gone, replaced by a quiet, triumphant serenity. In his arms, he carried a small, bundled weight wrapped in an immaculate white cotton blanket.
"Brendon?" you whispered, shifting carefully.
He didn't speak. He crossed the room with the measured grace of a man who had already won the war. With the delicate precision he reserved solely for you, he leaned down and deposited the bundle into your arms.
"Emergency custody has been granted," he murmured, sitting on the edge of the mattress and draping a protective arm around your shoulders. "The judge is a former colleague, and the Chief of Surgery personally signed the suitability reports. There is no more 'Jane Doe.' The paperwork dictates she remains with us until the adoption is finalized. We’re going to need to give her a name, Doll... something other than what that woman called her."
You looked down at the infant. She was barely three months old, her cheeks still flushed from the terrifying heat she had endured, but as she felt the familiar warmth of your touch, she blinked open those sweet, dark eyes that had haunted your dreams since July. She seemed to recognize you instantly; her lips mimicked a soft, seeking motion before she curled into your chest, tucking herself directly over the beat of your heart.
"Hello again, little one," you sobbed, the tears falling unchecked as you pressed a kiss to her temple. "I promised you back in July... I promised you that someone would love you. And we are going to love you so very much. My sweet Cordelia Ondina."
The baby let out a long, shuddering sigh, as if she had finally found the only place in the world where she was truly safe. The hollow ache that had lived in your chest since she was taken from you weeks ago vanished, healing scars you hadn't even realized were open.
Brendon leaned his forehead against yours, absorbing the sight of the perfect tableau: his wife, his biological daughter, and the little girl fate had refused to let him leave behind. The three women who now held his world in their hands.
"And to think, I said we’d only have one daughter... then fate hands us two," you whispered, your voice thick with emotion as you stroked Cordelia’s cheek. Your gaze drifted to the bassinet where Baby Shark slept on.
"Fate didn't hand us anything, Doll. It simply pointed the way," he corrected in a low, gravelly rasp, his eyes locking onto yours with an intensity that made you tremble. "We took what was ours. And neither of them... they couldn't have asked for a better mother."
"And they couldn't ask for a better guardian, Big Guy," you whispered, brushing your nose against his. "The great Park 'The Shark'—the surgeon everyone fears, who turns out to have the largest heart I’ve ever known."
In the hallowed silence of the suite, there was only the rhythmic, synchronized breathing of the two infants. Though they had arrived by vastly different paths—one born in the leather-scented sanctuary of a luxury car, the other rescued from the cold abandonment of a failing system—they now shared a home, a future, and a name.
Brendon wrapped his arms around all of you, a living shield against the world outside. His blue eyes shone with a raw vulnerability—the kind only you could draw out, and the kind you suspected his daughters would eventually command as well.
"I love you, Doll," he whispered, the words heavy with a devotion that bordered on the sacred. "I love all of you. You are everything I ever wanted... even when I was too arrogant to know I needed it."
He kissed your forehead with a lingering, reverent slowness. Outside those doors, the hospital continued its frantic, chaotic dance, but inside the bubble of the suite, time stood still. You looked from Cordelia, dozing against your heart, to the bassinet where your youngest daughter rested, knowing that your real story—the one of the Shark and his girls—was only just beginning.
Hiii there! Editor here, sorry for the delay, university homework is killing me and since i'm on my last year the bomb us with everything they have just for their own enjoyment! By the way, the name was a little idea of mine, writer didn't even knew about it
It's okay, Robby. Me too. What you need to do is watch Disney films and eat salty potato chips and chocolate together. While a fat cat lays on top of you like a weighted blanket. With your head in Jack's lap.
Summary: Sunshine, an ER nurse, is called back from maternity leave to care for Baby Jane Doe. Everyone is in for a surprise when they discover that the baby in her womb is the daugther of the hospital’s most feared orthopedic surgeon.
Warning: Swearing, Brendon Park himself, Age difference, Height difference, he calls her Doll. Grumpy and Sunshine. Abandoned baby, there's talk of growing up in the system.
Words: 5026.
Taglist: @my-whole-brain-is-crying@celestephung@leksi-rae@chelle-1515 @minienix @mythologicallyversed @mxtokko @tears-of-acid-and-sluts @susp3ndedindusk @helenaellie @rei-scorpio @ivy-stuffs @dutch3-10 @catharticdesire
Editor and translator here! Sorry for the delay, i was really bussy on trying to convince her to post this, since she didn't had the confidence to do it, I did it for her
The scent of antiseptic and reheated coffee greeted you like an unwelcome old friend—a greeting made worse by the lingering nausea that refused to subside. By all rights, you should have been on maternity leave. Having officially started your time off just three days prior, you were supposed to be ensconced on your couch, feet elevated, with nothing but a tub of ice cream and a bag of chips for company.
You certainly weren’t supposed to be back in the hospital.
It was a decision that would undoubtedly infuriate your husband. He had left you in bed only that morning, curled up against a maternity pillow he was secretly jealous of—though he’d never admit it—clad in one of his oversized, impossibly soft, and expensive dress shirts. But the phone had rung with such frantic persistence that you couldn't ignore it. It was Dana, asking for a favor she knew you would eventually charge back in spades: a "Jane Doe" infant had been discovered abandoned in the triage bathroom, and the staff was drowning under the weight of a chaotic Fourth of July.
"Sunshine? Thank God you're here, honey. You’re a lifesaver." Dana’s voice was thick with relief as she used the nickname the entire unit called you—a tribute to your cheerful disposition and unwavering smile. "As you can see, we’re underwater, and it doesn't help that ICE detained Jesse. Between the firecracker injuries, the heat strokes, and the drunks... this holiday is driving everyone mad."
"You called, Dana, and I was going to be sitting down anyway. I might as well do it while keeping an eye on the baby," you replied with a weary smile. You adjusted your gray scrubs, which felt significantly tighter than usual; the curve of your eight-and-a-half-month belly strained against the elastic fabric.
"No, ma'am. You are only here to watch the little one," Dana insisted. "I’m not putting you to work when you’re practically in labor. Now go; she’s in Peds with Donnie."
You made your way toward the unit, your gait characterized by the unmistakable waddle of the final trimester. As you pushed open the glass doors, Donnie—a burly, towering nurse—looked up with an expression of pure amusement. He offered a sarcastic grin at your protruding stomach.
"Every time I blink, you’ve doubled in size, Sunny," he joked with the easy familiarity of a best friend. He stepped over to pull you into one of his signature bear hugs. "But I’m begging you... do not go into labor here. I’ll have to file for PTSD. Between the holiday rush and the system hack, we’ve had to revert to paper charts. It’s total chaos."
"Well, his father is a giant and I’m not exactly tall," you chuckled, pulling back from the hug. "The poor thing is fighting for space and I’m fighting to expand my lungs. How are the 'ducklings' handling the paper charts?"
"Some of them didn't even know what a fax machine was," Donnie sighed. "Imagine the disaster."
"I imagine the residents had a collective syncope when they realized they had to write by hand—and legibly," you murmured, thinking of the "ducklings" as you called them: the Grumpy one, the Clumsy one, the Adorable Nepo-Baby, and the Shy one.
You moved with slow, rhythmic steps toward the thermal bassinet. Donnie watched you closely, likely worried your shifted center of gravity might send you toppling; he had clearly just finished this stage with his own wife. You leaned against the edge of the methacrylate crib, the pressure in your lower back easing slightly. The little girl was a mere bundle wrapped in a hospital blanket, but seeing her made you forget the ache in your feet. Inside your own womb, your daughter kicked—perhaps outraged by the movement or simply waking from her nap.
"It honestly kills me that we had to call you," Donnie began, his voice dropping. "I wish ICE hadn't taken Jesse, and I wish this baby’s mother hadn't left her..."
"Things happen, big guy," you interrupted gently but firmly. "Would I rather be at home with my legs up, indulging in pregnancy cravings? Yes. But do I regret coming in so this sweet thing doesn't have to be alone in an ER box while Social Services moves at the speed of a quadruple-amputated turtle? Not for a second."
"You’re too good for this place, Sunny," he sighed, rubbing the back of his neck with the exhaustion only a sleep-deprived nurse practitioner and new parent could possess. "But you're right. We’ve been waiting hours for a placement. Pediatrics won't admit her because she’s technically 'too healthy,' despite the rhinovirus risk to other patients."
You watched the Jane Doe’s serene face. Her eyelashes were nearly translucent, and her rhythmic, light breathing was the only thing that felt sane amidst the roar of the hospital.
"It’s not about being good; I’m already sharing my body with one," you joked, patting your stomach and receiving another indignant kick in response.
Donnie snorted and pulled a chair closer to the bassinet. You sank into it carefully, feeling the sweet relief in your hips.
"She had a bottle a few minutes ago, so she’ll likely sleep for a while. Jesse gave her a dose of Tylenol before..." He trailed off, the bitterness of the situation hanging in the air, clashing with the brightly painted walls of the pediatric ward. He shook his head, trying to dispel the sour feeling Jesse’s arrest had left behind. "Anyway, the rhinovirus has her miserable. She’s irritable from the congestion, so when she wakes up, you’ll know—she’s got a very decent pair of lungs."
"Well, at least one of us has functioning lungs," you quipped, shifting to find a comfortable position. "Because right now, I’m sharing mine with a tenant who doesn't pay rent and has the kick of a Spartan warrior."
Donnie let out a short, tension-breaking chuckle and squeezed your shoulder. "Don't move from that chair unless it’s an absolute emergency, Sunny. I’ll check on you soon. I suspect Princess or Perlah will be by to see you... or the belly."
"As if I could move anyway, Donnie!" you called out softly as he disappeared into the corridor, which was teeming with doctors, orderlies, and the frantic energy of the Fourth.
The glass door hissed shut, muffling the din. The shouted orders and the frantic beeping of monitors faded into a distant hum. You were alone with the infant. You reached out, caressing her tiny, velvet-soft hand. She was so small, yet already abandoned. She reminded you of yourself—except no one had sat with you. The system had simply shuffled you from one place to the next until you were aged out at eighteen.
That pang of recognition hurt more than you’d ever admit to anyone—except your husband. That tall, formidable, overprotective man who could silence a room with a single glance. Everyone feared him; they called him Dr. Park, "The Shark," a title he secretly relished.
You remembered the day you gave him that navy blue surgical cap patterned with little white sharks. Brendon had looked at it as if it were a personal insult, his jaw clenched, his broad orthopedic surgeon’s shoulders casting a massive shadow in your living room. "Really, Doll?" he had growled in that deep baritone that made your skin tingle. But, of course, he had worn it during his very next surgery. Now, he wouldn't go into the OR with anything else. Seeing the hospital’s most feared surgeon operating with a parade of cartoon sharks on his head was your favorite victory—especially since no one but Gloria knew you were married.
Truth be told, Ahmad at the security desk had even started a betting pool about the identity of the husband you kept so strictly secret. Some bet on a heroic firefighter, others on a catalog model. You would laugh privately at the theories, but the reality was much more complicated.
More than a few people would lose their minds if they knew your husband worked just a few floors up. And he would be livid if he knew you had driven your old car here—a vehicle he had strictly forbidden you from driving in your condition.
You pulled out your phone, your fingers hesitating over the screen. You knew that the moment he saw a notification, he would abandon his professional stoicism and race down to find you. But it would be infinitely worse if he found out by accident.
"If he finds out I drove that old junker with this potbelly, he’ll put me under house arrest until you’re eighteen," you whispered to the baby in your womb, a smile of guilt and tenderness playing on your lips.
Just as you were about to hit 'send,' you were interrupted by Princess’s shrill, energetic voice. She swept into the room like a whirlwind of glitter, followed by the much calmer Perlah.
"Well, look! If it isn't our favorite pregnant nurse!"
You shoved the phone away, aborting the message. You couldn't delay it forever; Brendon had a sixth sense for when you were doing something "reckless," and you’d much rather tell him yourself before he spotted your car parked right next to his BMW X6.
"Hey girls," you said, forcing a smile.
"The Fourth is basically the apocalypse, but with more burst fingers," Princess blurted out, eyeing your stomach. "But look at you, Sunshine! You're radiant, even if that chair looks like a medieval torture device for someone with your... 'curvature of happiness.' By the way, I’ve got fifty dollars on the father being a firefighter. Come on, give me a clue!"
"Huwag kang mandaya, Princess," Perlah interrupted in Tagalog, reminding her not to cheat—though she had her own secret bet placed on the mystery husband.
You released a soft, breathy laugh, though the movement caused little Jane Doe to emit a faint groan, shifting as much as her swaddling would allow.
"I have no intention of breathing a word on the subject," you replied, raising your hands in a mock gesture of surrender. "If I gave you a hint, Ahmad would pin me to the board next to the 'frequent flyers' who only come in hunting for narcotics. Besides, a firefighter... really, Princess? Do you honestly see me with someone who spends his days scaling ladders and wrestling hydrants?"
"Hey, they’ve got wicked strength in those arms, and I’m sure they have a certain... rhythm in their hips." Princess left the thought hanging with a theatrical flourish, just before Perlah gave her a sharp, friendly nudge.
"Stop badgering Sunny; she’s already busy enough enduring the kicks of her own 'little fish,'" Perlah said. She used the nickname some of the staff had given the baby because of how restless she was during your shifts—none of them realizing how close that nickname hit to the truth. "Are you alright? You’ve gone quite pale all of a sudden," she added, her head tilting in clinical concern.
"It’s nothing, truly," you insisted, though a sudden wave of vertigo forced you to grip the armrests of your chair.
Perlah and Princess assessed you instantly, their veteran eyes catching the lack of color in your cheeks. You couldn't hide much from two seasoned nurses, especially two who knew your baseline so well.
"You need to eat. You're in the third trimester, Sunshine. I’m going to fetch you something to eat and drink. What are you craving?"
"Orange juice and a turkey sandwich, please," you conceded, your stomach let out a victorious growl at the prospect of actual sustenance. "Or anything, really—as long as it doesn't taste like standard hospital fare, Princess."
Princess nodded with the determination of a soldier on a high-stakes mission. Before disappearing out the door, she glanced back at Perlah.
“One feast for Sunshine and the little fish, coming right up. Tiyakin mong hindi ito makatakas (Make sure she doesn't escape).”
You were left alone with Perlah, who moved to the bassinet to check on Jane Doe. The rhythmic sound of the infant's breathing was the only thing filling the silence, but your mind was still anchored to the message you hadn't sent Brendon.
"Sunny, you're trembling," Perlah noted quietly. She didn't look up from the baby, but she could clearly see your hands shaking in her peripheral vision. "And I don't think it’s just a blood sugar crash. Did something happen with the 'secret husband'? Has he done something?"
"No, no—nothing like that. He would never hurt me," you said quickly, and it was the absolute truth. Brendon would sooner sever his own hands than lay a finger on you, a resolve born from growing up in the shadow of an abusive father. "Let’s just say... I’ve made a decision that isn't going to amuse him in the slightest. I drove here in my old car because he was already at work and couldn't give me a ride."
"Ah, the famous relic," Perlah chuckled, adjusting the baby’s blanket. "That car is a hospital legend. No wonder your man is a nervous wreck; if I were him, I’d want to keep you far away from that deathtrap, too. I know you’re sentimental about it, but you have to admit it’s ready for the scrap heap."
"I know, I know," you admitted with a guilty wince. "But it’s my car. It was the first thing I bought with my own savings after I aged out of the foster system—the only thing that has truly belonged to me from start to finish. To him, it’s just a pile of oil-leaking scrap metal, but to me... it’s a part of my history. I feel like if I let it go, I’m erasing a part of who I am."
Perlah sighed, reaching over to place a comforting hand on your shoulder.
"I understand the sentiment, Sunny. I really do. But that car is ancient and unsafe, especially in your condition. Letting it go isn't a loss; it’s making sure your story has many more chapters to tell."
Before you could respond, a sharp sound cut through the room. Little Jane Doe opened her eyes and let out a heartbreaking, jagged cry. Her congestion was severe; every time she tried to draw breath for a fresh wail, the mucus blocked her airway, sending her into a state of frantic discomfort.
"Oh, sweetheart, it’s alright... I’ve got you," you cooed, your maternal instincts flaring to the surface.
You stood up, ignoring the warning twinge in your lower back and your own daughter’s protest at the sudden movement. You leaned over the crib and lifted the tiny girl to your chest. She was so small that as you held her upright to clear her lungs, she practically rested on the shelf of your belly, leaning against her unborn baby girl.
You felt her tiny fingers hook into the collar of your gray scrubs—an involuntary reflex, a desperate anchor in the midst of her panic. In that moment, a profound, electric connection—one that defied medical protocols or nursing boundaries—seared through your chest.
"Sunny, I have to continue my rounds. Can you manage her alone?" Perlah asked, her eyes already darting toward the beckoning chaos of the nursing station.
"Of course. This little lady and I are just getting acquainted. Go on, Perlah. I’ll be fine."
Perlah gave you a skeptical look—the kind only a veteran nurse can give when they suspect a colleague is playing the martyr—but she nodded as Antoine signaled for her.
"Fine. But the moment Princess returns with that sandwich, you eat. That’s an order," she said, slipping out and closing the door to seal out the hallway noise.
Alone with the infant, you tried to suppress the realization of how dangerous it was to get attached. You knew the drill. You knew her future was likely a black hole of bureaucracy and shifting social workers. You had lived that life, bouncing from house to house, and seeing your past reflected in this sick, lonely baby was almost more than you could bear. It was profoundly unfair.
You sank back into the chair, your spine crying out in relief, though the weight of Jane Doe against your stomach triggered another indignant kick from your daughter. Space was becoming a luxury.
Jane Doe let out a wet hiccup against your shoulder, finally calming as she sought your warmth. With one hand supporting her, you awkwardly fished your phone from your pocket. The screen illuminated your pale face in the dim light of the room. No more excuses. You had to tell Brendon.
You opened the chat with <<Sharkhusband>>. His last message, sent at the start of his shift while you were still asleep, stared back at you:
"You looked beautiful this morning, Doll. Remember to rest, eat well, and stay hydrated. Do not go out unless it is absolutely necessary. It’s too hot and people are idiots; the ER is already crawling with drunks."
You smiled sadly. The nickname "Doll" always made you feel a little less like an overinflated balloon and a little more like the woman he had fallen for. It was so typical of him: hyper-protective, analytical, and forever bracing for the world's chaos.
You swallowed hard and typed quickly before your courage failed:
"I'm at the ED. NOT for me. Dana called; they needed help because ICE took Jesse. They have a Baby Jane Doe who needs a sitter while they wait for Social Services. Yes... I drove my car. Please don't be angry. I love you, Big Guy."
You didn't hesitate. Your fingers were trembling so much you nearly deleted the text, but you hit 'send' and immediately locked the screen. You let out a jagged sigh; you knew the moment he read that, the secret you had guarded so fiercely would be over.
You stroked the baby’s back as she drifted back into a congested sleep on your shoulder. The warmth of her tiny body and the weight of your own child created a strange, fleeting sense of peace.
“Well, little one... it looks like Ahmad’s betting board is about to be settled,” you whispered. “I hope someone put money on an orthopedic surgeon, because that’s exactly what’s about to come through that door.”
Less than fifteen minutes passed before you heard Dana’s voice outside. "Dr. Park? I was fairly certain there were no new ortho consults today—certainly none in Pediatrics."
Your heart skipped a beat. You could hear the suspicion in Dana’s tone; she was already connecting the dots. The silence that followed was deafening. You could envision the scene through the glass: Dana, chart in hand and eyebrow arched, blocking the path of a man who likely radiated the predatory energy of a Great White who had just scented blood in the water.
“I am not here for a consultation,” Brendon’s baritone rumbled, cold and unequivocal. “I am here for something that belongs to me.”
He didn't elaborate. He didn't have to. The possessive edge in his voice was enough to make the head nurse offer a small, triumphant smile. The mystery of the "secret husband" had just died a swift death in the middle of the hallway.
You watched him approach, but you didn't bother to stand. You simply continued to stroke the baby’s back as he entered the room. The pneumatic hiss of the door closing behind him marked the end of the rumors, the bets, and the whispers.
Ahmad’s bets and the frantic whispers of the staff—both in the ER and up in Orthopedics—no longer mattered. Dr. Park, "The Shark," had just marked his territory with the subtlety of a sledgehammer.
Brendon stopped a mere few inches from you, his massive frame looming over you like a shield of muscle and surgical scrubs. The silence in the room was heavy, broken only by Jane Doe’s soft snores, your own shallow breaths, and the ragged exhale of your husband as he processed the scene before him.
His ice-blue eyes—the ones that usually analyzed complex fractures with lethal precision—flickered frantically from your face to the infant in your arms, finally settling on the prominent curve of your stomach.
"Before you say a word... I couldn't just stay away. I wouldn't have felt right refusing Dana’s plea," you blurted out, trying to preempt the lecture you saw brewing behind his clenched jaw.
"Dana knows exactly which strings to pull to get what she wants, Doll. She knows you don’t have a 'no' in you for anyone—least of all a baby who needs us." His voice dropped an octave, losing its sharp professional edge to become purely, fiercely protective. This was just your husband now—a man who was clearly already planning to have your car towed to a scrapyard the second he was off the clock.
He moved closer, leaning down until your breaths intertwined. The scent of surgical soap and that woody citrus cologne you loved enveloped you, and for the first time since you’d stepped foot in the hospital, you felt you could finally let go and relax.
"But you are giving me the keys to that car," he continued. This wasn’t a medical suggestion; it was an order from a man who was half-distraught with worry. “You aren't driving that deathtrap anymore. If you're that sentimental, we can keep it in the garage, but you will not risk your life—or our daughter’s—in a rusted-out piece of junk that doesn't even have modern airbags.”
"Okay... I won't drive it again."
His hand, large and calloused, cupped your right cheek with an infinite tenderness he reserved only for you. His eyes narrowed, scanning the faint shadows under yours.
"You’re pale, Doll. When was the last time you ate?" The anger had vanished, replaced by a raw, singular need to care for you.
"Princess went to grab something... it’s felt like an eternity, honestly," you whispered, the fatigue finally winning now that you had him to lean on. "And with the combined weight of this little girl and the belly... I don't think I can actually get up."
Right then, the sliding door hissed open, shattering your romantic bubble. Princess sidled in, balancing a plastic cafeteria tray laden with orange juice, a wrapped chicken sandwich, and yogurt.
"I’m here! Sorry for the wait, Sunny, the queue was—" Princess froze, the words dying in her throat. Her eyes nearly popped out of her head at the sight of Dr. Park—the man who made residents weep just by breathing near them—leaning over you, one hand cradling your face while the other rested possessively on your pregnant belly.
The tray wobbled in her grip. She looked at Brendon, then at you, then at the wedding ring she had apparently never noticed on his finger before today. The hospital’s biggest puzzle had just been solved right under her nose.
"Oh... wow. That explains... a lot. A lot of things."
Brendon didn’t bother to move. The secret was out the moment he’d stared down Dana in the hall. He didn’t retighten his mask of coldness; he simply spared Princess a brief, acknowledging glance.
"Here you go, Sunny. Eat, for God's sake, before Dr. Shark sends me to scrub the OR floors with a toothbrush," Princess quipped, regaining her confidence despite Brendon’s imposing presence. "So... Dr. Park, huh? My God, Sunshine, you certainly like a challenge. How do you keep him from biting?"
"I actually happen to like it when he bites, Princess," you shot back with a mischievous grin. You took a long, cooling sip of the juice as you watched Brendon unwrap the sandwich with the surgical precision of someone repairing a tibia.
"Eat this, Doll. Now," he commanded, bringing the first bite to your lips. He completely ignored the nurse, who was practically vibrating with the gossip of the century.
You took a bite under Brendon’s watchful eye. He didn't pull his hand away until he was satisfied you’d chewed and swallowed. Princess let out a low whistle, a hand on her hip as she watched the most feared surgeon in the building play doting nursemaid.
"How did we miss this? It’s so obvious now," Princess murmured, shaking her head. "I never would have guessed Dr. Park had a domestic side. I just lost fifty bucks—I really thought you were married to a hot firefighter."
Brendon didn’t deign to look at her. He was too busy watching the color return to your cheeks.
"Speaking of the bet..." you said sarcastically, looking at Princess. "Since no one put money on an orthopedic surgeon, doesn't that mean I win the pot by default?"
Princess gasped in feigned indignation while a ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of Brendon’s mouth.
"The nerve! Sunshine, you are sitting on a gold mine of classified information, you're married to the 'Shark,' and now you want to take the pot? That’s insider trading!"
"Technically," Brendon interjected, his voice regaining that dry, authoritative tone he used with staff, though his eyes gleamed with amusement, "if no one bet on an ortho surgeon, the pot should be declared void. However, since my wife is the one who has had to endure the burden of secrecy, I believe she has every legal right to claim the funds."
"You are a total softie for her, Dr. Park!" Princess shouted dramatically as she backed out the door, racing off to find Perlah, Donnie, or anyone else who would listen.
"I think you just used my reputation to fleece your coworkers, Doll," he murmured, his blue eyes locking onto yours with a dark, animalistic glow. "I believe I’ll have to collect my share of the loot in 'bites,' just as you suggested."
"Don’t threaten me with a good time, big guy... even if I do feel like a whale right now."
Brendon let out a low, vibrant laugh that rumbled from deep in his chest—a sound that never failed to melt you. This wasn't the hospital’s "Shark"; this was your husband, the man who knew every one of your scars and looked at you as if you were the only thing on earth that mattered.
"You’re the most beautiful whale I’ve ever seen, and better yet, you’re absolutely mine," he growled, his voice dropping into a dangerous, possessive purr. "And believe me, I have a very detailed list of all the places I plan to collect my debt the moment we get home. Starting with that belly... and continuing with the 'pillows' this little one is currently using."
The door hissed open again, interrupting his wandering thoughts. Dana poked her head in, looking immensely smug.
"Sorry to break up the family reunion, Dr. Park," she said, her triumph poorly hidden. "But Social Services has arrived."
Brendon didn't flinch. He kept his hand anchored to your stomach, merely turning his head to acknowledge her. "They finally deigned to move their asses? Good. I’m here for my wife and my daughter. If you have no objection to me taking them home to rest, we’ll be leaving as soon as this little patient is settled."
"No objections at all. In fact, I insist," Dana replied, her eyes softening as she and the social worker entered. "You can go home, Sunny. Jane Doe is in good hands."
A pang of bittersweet sadness hit you as Dana reached for the baby. With Brendon’s steady hand supporting your back, you carefully transferred the infant. The baby let out a sleepy whimper but quickly settled against Dana’s chest. Suddenly, you felt strangely light—and exhausted to the bone.
Brendon didn't waste a second. The moment your arms were free, he slid his arm around your waist, anchoring you to his side as if he feared you might try to run off to help another patient.
"The keys, Doll," he demanded, holding out his palm with a look that brooked no argument.
You sighed, defeated by that alpha-predator intensity. You reached into your pocket and pulled out the old keychain—ironically adorned with a worn Great White shark. The metal jingled as it hit his palm. Brendon closed his fist over them tightly, stowing them away like a confiscated weapon.
"A tow truck is coming tomorrow. Not another word about that car," he said, turning back to the room. "It’s been a pleasure, but my wife has a date with her bed and a gallon of ice cream."
"Make it two gallons!" Princess shouted from the nursing station as you navigated the hall, leaning heavily on Brendon’s shoulder. "And remember, that betting money goes toward 'Baby Shark's' diapers!"
As you walked down the central corridor of the ER, you didn't care about the stares or the way the gossip was spreading like wildfire. Brendon walked with his head held high, his shark-patterned cap tucked into his pocket, his hand never leaving your hip.
Outside, the hot July evening air was punctuated by the distant boom of fireworks. Brendon stopped before you reached his gleaming BMW, pulling you against his chest with an urgency that took your breath away. He looked at you with an expression that made it clear the "debt" would be collected tonight.
"You drove me half-mad today, Sunshine," he whispered against your temple, inhaling the scent of your hair. "Don't ever scare me like that again. Not if Dana calls, not even if a meteorite hits a children's party. You and this baby are my world. I don't know what the hell I’d be without you."
"I get it, big guy," you smiled, resting your head on his shoulder as the car chirped unlocked. "But admit it—you liked being able to claim me in front of the whole department. No more secrets. Just you, me, and 'Baby Shark.'"
He simply growled, opening the passenger door with exaggerated gallantry.
"I just like being your hero. Now, get in, you sexy whale. We have a date with a bed, some ice cream, and those bites I owe you for the heart attack you gave me. Or did you forget I’m older than you?"
Summary: The biggest betting board in the history of the Pitt finally closes
Warnings: none, this is just funny and comedy tbh, a bit of angst maybe?, mentions of rough sex, maybe ooc Brendon Park
The betting board. It was one of the things that made working in the ED a lot more fun, it was almost like a bonding activity for the staff, guessing what was behind certain situations on the news or what was going on at other hospitals. That was at least the public betting board, the bets that were made without people blinking an eye at them.
Then there was the second betting board, the one that involved a bit more secrecy than the one everyone knew about, but it was also the one where the real money was in the end.
Mohan and Abbot: love confession in ambulance bay (Whitaker) 50$, make out session in supply closet (McKay) 80$, already in situationship (Santos) 70$, had sex once don’t talk about it (Princess) 50$, married by next June (Kim) 20$
Whitaker and Robby: Whitaker one sided (Perlah) 50$, Robby one sided (Shen) 40$, Idiots in love (McKay) 90$, already in a relationship (Princess) 110$, first kiss in supply closet (Ellis) 70$
-> Dana and Santos are BANNED from this bet
Santos and Garcia: toxic situationship (Princess) 100$ -> everyone agrees with Princess on that, except for Emma -> get in a happy healthy relationship, 60$
There was more on that board. It kept changing, moving like some ebbing and flowing eco systems of its own, bets were changed, new ideas were added, people collected wins or bets that were closed because they weren’t leading anywhere.
Still, there was one slot on that board that was a topic of discussion at least once per shift, everyone arguing about what would be the outcome of that bet. It was her relationship status, an R4 all smiles and good mood. The reason the bet had even started was because she kept rejecting advances from everyone that hit on her, may it be coworkers, patients or visitors, every time someone asked her out she denied politely, still smiling brightly. There was a wide range of opinions on that matter, not only from the day shift, but also from the night shift and some of the surgeons that came down for consultation frequently.
Married since med school (Whitaker, Javadi) 90$
Single and happy (Mohan, Santos, Garcia) 150$
Engaged (Shen, Ellis, Abbot) 160$
Dating someone in the hospital (Dana, McKay, Robby, Kiara, Princess, Perlah) 515$
Dating someone outside the hospital (Jesse, Donnie, Kim) 240$
Crushing on someone at the hospital (Larry, Antoine) 130$
….
There were over two pages worth of bets regarding that subject. Ahmmad kept the envelope with the money in a locked drawer at this point. Everyone tried to get some information, tried to see if they were on the right trek, but every time someone asked she would simply smile and shrug, like she knew why they were asking.
The bets shifted significantly for the first time after an incident that none of them would remember as pleasant.
“Okay,” Dana sighed, looking at her with mild worry, the curtain was drawn shut, shielding her from prying eyes. She was still a little shaky, a patient had shoved her against some equipment during a routine check up and probably broken one of her ribs. “Are you okay with lifting your shirt? The new policy-” She nodded, interrupting Dana.
“I know about the new policy of workplace injuries," she sighed, mildly annoyed as she shifted slightly on the bed. She knew that Dana would have to inspect her torso so that if this was to be taken to court as assault charges there was someone to verify the injuries. Theoretically they were also supposed to take pictures of the injuries, however she had vehemently told both Robby and Dana that she did not want that.
Sighing deeply she slipped out of the scrub top first, putting it beside her on the bed. Carefully and with a small wince she lifted the undershirt, the moment it hit the bed and Dana looked at her she could see the older woman’s eyes go wide in horror. At that exact moment she remembered that the state her upper body was in was not normal for most people.
“Sweetheart,” Dana said in a soft tone, averting her eyes from the nurse she shifted uncomfortably again. All over her hips and waist, as well as lower back were hand shaped bruises in various stages of healing as well as bite marks. Flushing slightly she scratched her neck, trying to not make this worse than it already was.
“Who is doing that to you?” Dana said in a gentle tone, at that moment it hit her that this looked like abuse. That the bruises in various healing stages and other marks left on her body would cause distress in someone that did not know where they came from.
“It’s not what it looks like Dana,” she hastily said, trying to stop the nurse from worrying too much, “My boyfriend and I sometimes-” she interrupted herself, wondering how to put it in a way that would not embarrass her even further. Dana’s eyebrow quirked upwards, the worry still evident on her features. Sighing, deciding that any amount of embarrassment was alright if it meant putting Dana’s worry at ease.
“My boyfriend and I are just a bit rough sometimes,” she looked at her hands, hoping that Dana would get the meaning of her words. For a moment there was silence then a quiet chuckle, Dana shook her head.
“You should put that in your medical file,” Dana smirked to herself as she continued checking out the broken rib.
——————
After that the betting board shifted, it didn’t stop, people started betting on who her boyfriend might be. Sometimes specific people, others decided to go for groups of people. The nurses were relentless in their effort to try and find out who she was seeing. Yet she remained quiet about it, deciding that it was after all none of their business.
Leaning against the nurses station she looked at the board, wondering what to take care of next. There were some things that were mildly urgent and could wait a few more minutes if need be and some minor issues that had been waiting for hours. Sighing she reached into her scrub pocket as her phone buzzed multiple times in quick succession.
Is the seventh circle of hell treating you well? (11:43 a.m.)
We got one of your guys just now, what did Robby think by putting that leg into a splint like that? (11:43 a.m.)
Please tell me that it was Robby and not you (11:44 a.m.)
I have lunch for you btw (11:44 a.m.)
The last message made her smile. Quickly glancing around she saw that Robby was lurking nowhere and she typed a quick answer.
Swamped.
Robby’s idea, never saw the patient
Can you bring it down when you have time? I’m pretty sure Robby would kill anyone that as much as tried to get in a bathroom break
She slipped the phone back into the pocket of her scrubs, deciding that she would tackle the minor issues waiting for treatment now, maybe take along one of the med students and handle that as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Many days she wondered if people were not aware of the difference between an urgent care and an emergency room. She had grabbed one of the med students and taken her along to get those things off her plate. It cleared a few beds at least, people finished with the tests and sent home with care instructions, all discharged within an hour.
As she returned to the hub she glanced at the board again. It was not getting any less and slowly started to feel like a fever dream. Grumbling under her breath she decided to take the next best case.
A broken arm in a kid. She took the history, ordered an x-ray and some pain relief after palpating gently and was out of that room again in no time, thinking that she would have to ask one of the nurses to get some of the colourful cast wrappings. As she headed back towards the hub she cursed herself for forgetting to restock the stickers she kept in her scrubs for pedes patients.
It felt like people were pulling her in all different directions. New patients, old patients waiting for a bed upstairs to open up, people needing something. The entire day felt like an uphill battle that would not come to an end soon.
Staring at the chart she typed as quickly as she could, hoping that between patients she would be able to get in some of the charting done at least, especially for the patients that were waiting for a bed upstairs.
“Park, what are you doing here, we didn’t page for an ortho consult,” she heard Robby say, sounding vaguely annoyed with him. Glancing up she couldn’t help but smile as she saw Bredon standing on the other side of the hub.
“I wanted to talk to one of your residents, Robby, relax,” he sounded exhausted, looking at Robby with an expression of mild annoyance.
“Which one of them and why?” Robby questioned, acting like Park would be this relaxed if one of the residents seriously did something wrong. Rolling her eyes slightly she got up from the chair, walking over two of them.
The moment she approached, Brendon's eyes found her, shooting her a slight smile as he turned away from Robby.
“Hey,” she greeted softly, nodding at Robby, though he simply looked between them, slowly circling around the nurses station as he gained distance, still looking at them over the rim of his glasses.
“Hey” Brendon smiled at her, then reached into his scrub pocket, “I also found those on the table, thought you might want them,” he hummed gently, handing her the stickers she had forgotten.
“Thanks,” she gently squeezed his hand after taking the stickers from him, putting them in her scrub pockets. “And my lunch?” she asked, tone joking, though Brendon rolled his eyes slightly before holding up the metal lunch box she always used.
“Didn’t forget it,” he handed her the box as well. Smiling slightly while shaking her head, she tucked it under her arm.
“Thank you, you really are a saint,” she sighed, leaning up and pressing a quick kiss to his cheek. With a soft huff, he reached for her hand, squeezing it softly.
“I gotta go back upstairs, need to be in the OR in twenty,” he sighed, shaking his head, like he was greatly disappointed about the entire situation.
“Alright, see you later then,” she bid him goodbye. As he was in the elevator on his way up she went back to the spot she had been occupying, putting her lunch behind the computer without really thinking about the interaction much. Though looking up she could see multiple pairs of eyes on her, all wide and apparently shocked. Smirking to herself she hoped that Cassie would at least give her some of the winnings, deciding to keep quiet about her having met Brendon and her in a coffeeshop about two and a half years ago when the biggest betting board of the Pitt started out for the first time.
park x reader who is assaulted by a patient? tyyy!!
Ohhhhh the ANSGT!!!!!! thank you for requesting!!! <333
Word travelled fast. Faster than it should have, honestly. Here you were sitting, cradling your arm, the bruise already forming, telling everyone that you were fine even though you were most defiently not but you'd put on a brave face for everyone and go home and cry rather than have everyone worry more than they already were.
Dana and Robby were already circling you like hawks, Mel kept asking if you needed something, Dennis was handing you water and Trinity was rechecking your injury to make sure that the wrist was just bruised and not fractured. The small crowd was already attracting more attention than you wanted at the nurses' station.
"The patient still needs an ortho consult." You mumbled. "Can you not tell-"
You were cut off by the patient who'd assaulted you, yelling loudly in pain. Everyone looked over to see Park manhandling him and checking his knee.
"Before that happens..." You sighed softly.
"I've never seen him that aggressive," Dennis whispered to Trinity.
"Can you blame him?" Trinity gave him a look and everyone fell quiet again, attention shifting back to you as most people entirely ignored the yelling completely.
Park exited the room and threw away the gloves, santizing his hands as he looked across the space and finally saw you. You gave your head a light shake to not make a scene which he promptly ignored and made his way right to you.
Before he could even speak, you were explaining how you were completely fine. Santos was still holding your arm.
"Well?" Park looked at her.
"Bruising and maybe a fracture. Will need an XRay to be sure." She immediately spoke.
"Fine, hm?" He turned to you.
"Okay, people. Show's over. Let's go." Dana herded everyone away, specially dragging Robby's nosy ass with herself.
"Why didn't you call me?" Park whispered.
"I'm fine. Really- It's-" You tried but he glared, making you pout. "It's not a fracture. See?" You grimaced as you showed movement of your wrist.
"Can I?" He asked softly and you gave him your hand.
He was so delicate with it. Touching and feeling around the joint.
"Still needs an XRay to be sure." He said, making you nod. "Did you call the police?"
"Dana did. Should be here soon." You hummed, "But I-"
"You will be pressing charges." He said firmly.
"Brendon." You sighed but he wasn't hearing any of it.
"You will." He repeated, still holding your hand carefully. "Please?"
"I... I'll talk to them then see. Okay? Best I can do for now." You gave him a hopeful smile.
"I can work with that." He returned the smile. "I gotta go back up but ... I'll wait up after my shift. I'll take you home. Okay? You shouldn't be driving with that wrist." He didn't leave room for an argument, just stood up, smoothed your hair and kissed your temple. "That'll give them something to talk about." He whispered to you and left.
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