PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
sheepfilms
@theartofmadeline
Not today Justin
oozey mess
Janaina Medeiros
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AnasAbdin
wallacepolsom
PR's Tumblrdome
let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open
Today's Document
Mike Driver
DEAR READER
Xuebing Du
dirt enthusiast
NASA
YOU ARE THE REASON
Aqua Utopia｜海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
No title available
seen from United States
seen from Germany
seen from United States
seen from Brazil
seen from Malaysia
seen from Brazil
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Brazil
seen from United States
seen from Brazil
seen from Germany
seen from Australia
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@eats-ants
🩷 Hi I’m Dianthus!!
🩷 Pref names: anthos, ant, anteater
🩷 Age: 22
🩷 Pronouns: Any/It/Sweet
🩷 Any terms! (masc + neu + fem)
❓ Misc:
❓ Multi kpop stan
❓ Big nerd
❗️ I reblog 18+ posts too so proceed with your own caution if you’re a minor
‼️ DNI ‼️
❌ Basic DNI
❌ Kpop antis
❌ Enganges in fanwars
❌ Anti xenogenders and neopronouns
(Dottore and his segments x gn!reader, a bit of obsessive behavior?, 8 is platonic, rest are all implied to be romantic, reader gets injured, reader gets drugged by Dottore, possible medical inaccuracies)
Your mission was in all forms of unpleasant, though you're not really sure what to expect since it was the doctor, second of the harbingers who assigned you this.
There was apparently some weird sort of plant that grew in Snezhnaya in the most specific of locations and bloomed in the most specific of timings. Oftentimes they're buried under the snow and ice, and people step on them all too often so it ends up looking a tad bit deformed. 35 wanted to research on this one plant, believing it to have some kind of hocus pocus property that you hadn't really paid much attention to.
The segment waltzed in on you while you were using your typewriter for another mission report, gloved hands drawing invisible lines on your clothed upper arm, pointy tip of the mask prodding against your ear and with an oh so sultry voice asking you to just be a dear and grab his latest object of interest.
You never finished that report.
In any case, the amount of vines and branches that snagged onto your clothes, piercing the skin and unable to be shoved out because of course they had to be barbed. Then, when you pressed a rag against the injury, the fabric hardened with frost now that it was wet with blood. Then frost started to build up on an open wound. Just great! Thinking about how you had to bribe Pantalone just so he wouldn't reveal your predicament to the segments had you visibly shivering.
In any case, you got the plant, stuffed inside of your leather pouch, and a whole bunch of scars along with it.
Instead of just walking into the abode, you decided to just use the trees right outside to climb into Dottore's (you forgot which segment's) office. If your memory served you correct, Pantalone's office was right beside this one, and you could always just hide in his closet while pulling out the splinters that hurt like an absolute bitch.
Only, when climbing the windowsill, and nearly falling due to the build up of the slippery frost, did you realize your plan would be an absolute failure when 8 decided to walk into the office just then to pick up a notebook of his.
He looked at you, you stared at him, and you just knew that you weren't going to escape the scolding.
25's tweezer holding an alcohol-soaked cotton ball dabbed at your cuts, and you bit the inside of your cheek to stop the violent wince that would've wrecked through your whole body. 18, unfortunately, noticed and gave you a dirty look for apparently trying to hide your embarrassing noises, before returning his glare to 35, who was holding a test tube filled with the petals of the flowers you managed to grab.
"This is all your fault old man." Aaand that was the beginning of your never ending migraine.
"Who, me?" Remaining as nonchalant as ever, he used a syringe to pour in a mysterious liquid into the flowers, and you watched in awe as the petals began to glow.
"Yes you! Look at them, they look like they've gone swimming in a sea of cacti! Could've asked a subordinate to get the job done."
"Hey what did you just say about me-"
"You're getting far too aggravated 18, no one could have brought such a fine specimen as they have."
"Aren't you such a flatterer..." You grumbled into your cheek.
"Don't listen to his flattery (Name), I'd much rather you listen to mine. I have much better things to say about you," 25 applied a salve on your cut, and you shivered at how cold it was.
"That's beside the point-"
"And besides, they're such a recluse even though many of us segments have offered to take care of them for the rest of their life. Don't you think it's better that they're hindered like this, since they can finally spend more time with us?"
The silence might've just been a death warrant. You sighed, breath fogging the air and pinched the bridge of your nose with the arm not held in a death grip by 25.
"... You do know I'm still in the room, 35."
He hummed. "I do, but this should help you understand the gravity of the situation no? You don't even know how much you hurt all the segment's, including mine, hearts when you insist on being so independent."
"Not me though, they sometimes come and talk to me." A childlike voice interrupted, and you heard the feral hiss similar to that of a cat coming from the volatile 18.
"Shut up 8."
"Now now, we are getting out of topic," 35 swatted away all the interruptions with a smile on his face, all the while you tried to escape 25's deathly grip when he wrapped your arms and midsection with those horrifically scratchy bandages.
"What was even the topic... Oh right, it's you guys being all overprotective freaks when all I got were a few scratches!" A cough erupted your throat, and this time you let the wince take place on your face. Maybe the cold got to you worse than you thought.
"Alongside hypothermia." You're not sure which segment responded, for you were cradling your face in your palms, absolutely defeated.
"I'll be fine," you grumbled, stepping out of the operating table with only one objective in mind, getting the fuck out of this room.
... Until 35 stabbed a syringe into your neck and you fell down promptly, limbs turning to jello.
"See, my dear (Name)," amused snickers entered your hearing range, "the flowers you brought works wonders as a mild pain reliever and paralytic without causing permanent nerve damage. I wasn't lying when I said I wanted to take advantage of your helplessness."
Fuck all of these crazy segments, actually.
[very clearly indulging the urge] im fighting the urge
[the most low energy you have ever seen me] we’re about to go crazy mode
Soft!Brendon Park doesn't want a one night stand - Complete
Summary
Brendon Park had waited a while before he had the courage to talk to you, and of course he didn't regret it especially as it had led to one of the best nights in his life.
But when he realises that you think that it was only a one night stand, he knows that he has to grovel to show you that it meant much more to him than just that.
Chapters:
Part 1: In which he grows some balls
Part 2: In which he asks you out
Part 3: In which you realise that Park the Shark is just Brendon
More info:
Light hearted story ; head cannons ; minimal smut ; soft!brendon
Masterlist
My Pen Pal Keeps Critiquing My Poisons!
Lohen X Reader
Summary : In which, you find a poisoned meal at your doorstep every morning. And so, you make it your life's motto to savor it and provide your thoughts.
Much to Lohen's dismay, you never seemed particularly impressed by any of his carefully crafted poisons.
While most love stories begin with flowers, yours began with poison.
Most people reacted poorly to poison. They cried, screamed, and maybe even succumbed to death.
You, apparently smiled.
Lohen had first heard the rumor by accident.
"Apparently the new medic (Y/N) has a strange fascination with toxins," a knight muttered over drinks.
He hadn’t meant to care. He really hadn’t. But something about the word 'fascination' lodged itself under his skin like a splinter that refused to be ignored.
So, naturally, he did what any reasonable man with too much curiosity and too little restraint would do—he investigated.
Two alchemists confirmed it later, whispering that you had once voluntarily tasted diluted snake venom just to observe its effects.
That further piqued his curiosity.
And what better way to find out the truth than test the rumor himself?
After a day of locking himself in his house, he had come up with his very own poison. Made from the remains of a dendro slime, mixed with a few crushed petals of Dendrobium, and a generous splash of expired alcohol stolen from the Cat’s Tail.
He didn't know if it was truly toxic. In fact, he just mixed random ingredients he found revolting.
He wasn't planning on truly poisoning you after all. In its current concentration, it would merely cause temporary numbness (maybe).
And so he placed a cute little package in front of your house (he stole the documents that held information of those working under the Grand Master to find your address). Inside the package was a plate of Hash Brown he had cooked himself.
Of course, the poison was sprinkled on top as well.
He knocked on the door to your house and hid in a bush nearby.
He watched the door open, a shiver of excitement going down his spine.
But when you stepped out, his eyes widened. You weren’t what he had imagined. Not old, not bitter, not hunched over with tired eyes and stained robes.
You looked... young and composed. Normal in fact.
You glanced at the package, shrugged, and brought it inside.
The next day, he had half hoped there would be some commotion. Instead, nothing happened.
Lohen found that significantly more unsettling than if you had screamed.
Did you not open it?
Did you die?
Worse, did you throw it away?
By the second day, irritation curdled into curiosity again, and curiosity dragged him back to your house.
He hadn’t even reached the door when something stopped him.
A box.
His box.
He stared at it, then at the note pinned neatly on top.
It read-
---
Observation Log
Possible dendro slime derivative.
Taste profile:
Slight bitterness.
Floral aftertaste.
Perhaps traces of alcohol.
Symptoms:
Tingling lips.
Mild numbness in fingers.
Onset approximately twenty-five seconds.
Conclusion:
Sloppily made poison.
---
He stared at the handwriting. The faint smell of alcohol lingering on the hastily ripped paper.
'..... Sloppy?' he scoffed, annoyance creeping up into his face. He crumbled the paper, staring at the door with a sadistic smile.
"Fine then. I'll show you real poison."
The next morning, another box appeared at your doorstep.
Like last time, you took it into your home. You had no idea who was delivering these, but the last package being drenched in a mild toxin made it interesting enough for you to open.
You tore open the box.
This time, it was a plate of mushroom pizza.
"Oh, that looks delicious." you muttered to yourself, noticing the unusual purple coloring on the crust.
You reached and held a piece of the pizza near your mouth. And without a care, you took a huge bite from the area where the coloring was the brightest.
The following day, Lohen returned to find another note on your doorstep. This time it was more detailed than the last.
---
Observation Log
Low concentration of Aconitum.
Taste profile:
Initial sweet-bitter note.
Followed by burning sensation.
Symptoms:
Numbness.
Dizziness.
Loss of strength.
Conclusion:
Good posion. Easily countered.
Although, I liked the taste of the pizza.
(attached are my other observations)
---
There were six pages attached.
Six.
Lohen stared, flipping through the pages with a smile. "God. She's insane."
This started the exchange of poisons and paper notes.
The next package that Lohen put on your doorstep had a small note of his own.
---
To the Medic
Firstly, fuck you.
Secondly, you missed a secondary ingredient. (Hint : It was Naku weed)
Thirdly, thank you for complimenting the pizza.
I made it myself.
---
Your response appeared the next morning.
---
To the Poisoner
1. Rude.
2. I did not miss the ingredient. Naku weed has no toxic properties. Just color.
3. The posion on the crust was obvious. Are you perhaps new to this poisoning thing?
---
Your responses pissed the Vice captain even more. Because how dare a lowly medic like you have the audacity to critic his cooking?!
He tried even harder after that.
More precise blends. Better masking. Controlled dosages. Carefully calibrated ingredients. Tried perfecting the recipe so you couldn't find any faults.
Everything.
After making sure everything was perfect, he delivered the next package. A plate of Northern Apple Stew.
The reply next day was written in a crumbled paper with messy handwriting.
---
Rules for Future Poisoning
1. No explosive diarrhea.
2. No permanent injury.
3. No organ damage.
4. No blindness.
5. No poisoning children.
6. Food should remain edible
---
Lohen rolled his eyes at the rules. "Killjoy." To him these rules just were unnecessary boundaries that ruined his fun.
But he never wanted to stop this exchange between the two of you. It was much too entertaining for him.
Unknown to him, that night ended with you locking yourself in your room. Having non stop diarrhea for hours.
Soon the notes became longer than the poisons themselves.
One morning, the package you opened had a plate of Cream Stew.
And this time the note attached had a list of ingredients used.
---
Current Theory
The toxin should produce localized muscle weakness.
Estimated duration:
Two hours.
Possible side effects:
Dizziness.
Drowsiness.
Complaining.
Will you be able to guess what I used (Y/N)? °^°?
---
Three days later Lohen received something he could only call a report.
A dossier.
Twenty-two pages which included diagrams, charts, annotated symptom timelines.
And corrections.
So many corrections.
---
Page 14: dosage error.
Page 17: please stop using kitchen spoons as lab tools.
Page 19: “Did you eyeball the concentration?”
---
Unfortunately Lohen had. And he hated that you noticed.
Months passed and somehow it became a routine.
Your medic colleagues grew increasingly worried seeing you drowsy every other day.
"Do you know who keeps sending you poison?" one asked.
You shook your head. "No, not really."
"Shouldn't that concern you?"
You looked confused. "Why?"
"Because they're poisoning you...?"
You blinked. Honestly, if the person wanted to kill you, they could have used other deadly toxins. Yet, they always made sure to use small doses and non lethal ingredients.
You smiled to yourself. "They are very considerate actually."
"... Oh." the medic froze.
You tapped a finger on your cheek. "They also have lovely handwriting."
"..."
The medic walked away. Unable to continue the conversation.
Lohen, meanwhile, was also not doing well.
Varka had his suspicions when he first saw the crazed man laughing while tasting the exotic plants he had ordered.
One day, while Lohen was away on a mission, he broke the lock of his drawer and read through all the papers in there.
Papers about toxic plants. Possible ingredients. And of course, all the notes you had written to him.
He ran a hand through his hair. "What the hell is happening in Mondstadt?"
Varka immediately dragged Lohen by the collar and pushed him into the store you worked in to apologize.
You looked up from your desk and instantly recognized him as your mysterious poisoner.
Not by his face. But by his hands.
The stained fingertips. The chemical burns. The ink marks. The quiet proof of obsession.
"Oh," you smiled softly. "It's you."
Lohen blinked.
Varka shoved him forward. "Apologise to the lady Lohen."
Oh. So his name was Lohen.
The boy looked deeply offended. "I don't want to."
"Apologize." The Grand Master repeated, his gaze cold.
Lohen sighed dramatically. Then glanced toward you. "...Sorry for poisoning you."
You immediately shook your head, a small laugh escaping your lips. "There is so need for apologies. I should be thanking you actually."
Silence.
Even Varka froze.
You continued, brighter now. "The poisons were genuinely fascinating."
Varka looked horrified.
"I learned to make dozens of new antidotes!"
Lohen stared. Mesmerized.
"Also the toxins were quite creative! Honestly, every morning became something to look forward to."
Varka took a breath, and turned his gaze to the ceiling, perhaps praying to Barbatos why they allowed these two people to exist.
"Also the notes were fun!" you added, opening your drawer and placing a the stack of notes you had carefully stapled.
Lohen wasn't even listening anymore.
Because you were smiling.
At him.
Because of him.
Because he had poisoned you.
It was a stupid conversation. The girl in front of him was grateful for poisoning her. It was reckless, idiotic and yet...
At that moment his heart made some several terrible decisions.
He realised.
With a lot of hesitation...
That-
'Oh.'
'Oh no.'
'You were kinda cute.'
He had known your name for months. Known where you worked. Known your habits. Your favorite medicinal herbs. The way your handwriting became messier when excited.
But seeing you in person? Actually talking to you?
He was finished.
Absolutely in love.
That night he didn't sleep. Instead he sat at his desk surrounded by herbs, powders, vials, and failed formulas, staring at his next experiment like it might hold divine answers.
Most men wrote poetry.
Most men gifted flowers.
Most men confessed.
But Lohen was not most men.
He lifted a vial of deep red liquid, watching it swirl under lamplight with a manic smile. "If she barely liked the last one... I'll just make one that is even better."
And thus began the greatest romantic pursuit in history.
Not through gifts or heartfelt letters.
But through an escalating series of increasingly sophisticated poisons.
Lohen's new life goal was simple.
Create a poison so fascinating, so beautiful so perfect....
That when you tasted it—
You'd fall hopelessly in love with its creator.
Unfortunately for him, the only thing you fell in love with was the chemical composition.
Fin
😭 😭 😭 I CANT WITH THIS GUY. I FEEL LIKE HE'S SOMEONE WHO'D GIFT YOU A BOMB CUZ HE LOVES YOU.
Some of the ingredients used r actually toxic while others r just bs. I tried making it as Canon as possible but I'm sure there r some mistakes. Sorry abt tht.
Anyway! Hope you enjoyed! Let me know your thoughts.
my cat stopping me from petting her
her swift maneuver, for context
this turned into something way longer but— my brain is thinking again !!;
reader who lives next to a sweet elderly lady who’s always trying to set her up with someone/encourage her to meet somebody.
will peer over the fence & be like “you got a boyfriend yet, hun?”
when reader says no the older lady just tuts & all exasperatedly says; “why not!? pretty girl like you outta have a boyfriend.”
reader just laughs; “well unless he just falls out of the sky…”
& it’s this sweet back & forth banter over the fence. they sit & have tea on sundays, reader helps her with her plants & around the house stuff when she asks.
then one day her neighbor is sitting on her porch at night & jack just…shows up. maybe he’s bringing reader home from work/just dropping her off. reader’s neighbor is immediately intrigued. jack just waves at her with a small smile & nod of his head before getting back into his car.
the neighbor doesn’t say anything, doesn’t ask reader anything until the following sunday.
“you get home ok the other night?”, she’ll ask.
“oh, yeah! my co-worker brought me home.”
“that hunk of a man is your coworker?”
reader almost spits out their tea; “he’s—what? yes uh-“
“don’t know how you work with him everyday without doing something about that…lord I was blushin’ just seeing him once.”
“oh so you knew I got home ok then, you’re sneaky.”
“I try…you like him?”
reader chokes on their tea this time; “what!?-“
“the handsome man, you like him?”
reader stares with wide eyes; “I don’t know how to answer that…it’s complicated.”
“well uncomplicate it then, sweet girl. what’re you waiting for?”
“him to fall out of the sky I guess…”
then jack shows up at reader’s house alone; maybe to water their plants while reader is out of town??
the neighbor calls jack over who just is kind of taken aback, pointing at himself & looking around before walking over to the fence.
“who’re you?”
“i’m jack.”
“you know the sweet girl who lives here?”
“yes ma’am, we work together.”
“hm…you got a girlfriend?”
“no, widowed ma’am.”
“…you like the sweet girl?”
jack’s crimson, stuttering out a; “y-yeah, very much so.”
the neighbor just nods once; “you tell her that before you’re both shriveled up like me.”
jack doesn’t mean to laugh, but he does; “yes ma’am.”
then the neighbor just slowly…pushes them together !!
-
i’m crying over them FOR REAL…someone take my phone i have fics i need to finish first—👀
caleb and nonMC!reader in an loveless arranged marriage, where he's secretly in hopeless love with her
warnings. angst fest, eventual fluff, failing marriages, misunderstandings, suggestive content, jealousy, stalking/following, caleb getting rejected, reader in denial, feelings are hard preview. "Why wouldn't I be romantic? I'm your husband." He's been doing that lately--dropping lines like that out of nowhere, like they're nothing. Somehow always when you're least prepared for it, and always with a lopsided grin that tells you he's either completely oblivious or knows exactly what he's doing. You're willing to bet on the latter. wc. 7.4k
Your husband does not love you. He doesn’t love anyone except for one, and it is not you.
You used to like romance. You’d fantasize about who your beloved forever would be in your room, kicking your feet childishly at the thought of someone loving you so purely. So innocently. You wondered what kind of person they’d be, what kinds of foods they’d like, what their family is like. You wondered which holiday would be their favorite, whether they’d want children, whether they’d have a time-consuming job. But really, none of it mattered, because you only wanted someone by your side.
So when you were told you’d be put into an arranged marriage, you tried to be hopeful. An embarrassing, pathetic hope that maybe this man could love you the way men love in books and movies if you tried hard enough.
Caleb Xia is not a loving person. You realized this the moment he stepped into the room with cold, lifeless eyes that seemed to stare straight through you as if the wall was worth more than your presence. He’d smiled, but it felt stiff. Awkward. But you’re sure yours was the same.
Still, his eyes were beautiful. Your hope flickered like a small stubborn flame in your chest that you wanted to guard against the blizzard. The marriage was simple. You showed up to the courthouse in a knee-length white dress, constantly adjusting at the pearls around your neck anxiously while he signed the papers. Once he was done, he’d simply slid it over to you, evidently avoiding your eyes.
“Are you sure?” you’d asked meekly, as if speaking any louder than a whisper would shatter your heart. You weren’t sure if you were asking him or yourself. Not that it mattered, much.
He spared you a soft smile. Pity, maybe, with how his eyes remained empty, but you took it anyway.
A starved man does not beg for more. The flame remained.
The only reason he married you was because MC had gotten married to another childhood friend of theirs. When he mentioned it, you thought nothing of it at first. But when the only photo he’d put up throughout your entire house was one of him and her as children, while your awkwardly situated courthouse picture sat beside it, you knew. He didn’t stop to stare at your photo, ever. Not any of the photos. Only hers.
The final blow to the puny flame remaining in your heart was when you’d finally initiated physical contact. To perform the marital duty, he’d hovered above you in just his pants while you stared up at him in your thin pajamas that did little to hide what was beneath it. There was no setting the mood. The air was cold, the room dull because only your half had any semblance of effort that had gone into decorating it. When he kissed you, it felt more like his lips were simply touching yours gently. Almost tapping it.
It felt like nothing.
This was not romantic at all.
“Are you okay? Is this okay?” he asked, pulling back with a furrow in his brows—probably because you were lying lifelessly while holding your breath. You wondered how he could ask something so softly when his eyes remained so muted. Maybe not softly. Maybe just quiet.
“It’s okay.” You wanted to curl up and go to sleep, but he was the only semblance of warmth in the freezing room.
But when his hand slid up your shirt, resting atop of your stomach, you stopped breathing again. He stopped as well. Your gazes met silently, and for a moment, the world seemed to stop. A dull, slow stop. And then suddenly, he was off you, clambering to pull his shirt back on as you sat up in confusion, eyes wide.
“I can’t,” he muttered. “I’m sorry.”
The flame went out.
Were you really so distasteful? So disgusting that he didn’t want to lay his hands on his own wife? Or was it that you were just too different from her? Should you be offended? Are you even offended? Relieved? Hurt?
Does it even matter?
Once you were sure he’s gone, you cried yourself to sleep.
The next few years are a blur that you wish had somehow gone even faster. The days are a bore. He’s away for weeks—maybe even months—at a time. In those periods of time, the house feels like a maze not meant for only one person. At the same time, maybe it’s better he’s away.
Caleb Xia is not a mean person. On paper, he’s a decent husband. He cleans, cooks, and never complains if you ask him to do something. He smiles, nods, and goes on his way. Yet, it feels more like a vaguely close roommate than a husband. The two of you eat in silence, watch TV in silence, and even go to bed in different rooms. You suppose you can’t complain—it’s not like you put in much effort to get to know him well anyway.
The only thing he does that even comes close to romance is bringing you flowers. You’d told him once that you wished the house had space for a garden to plant them, and he’d brought you a bouquet later that week. Since then, he brings them every few weeks routinely. They appear in the vase beside the couch as if they’ve just magically appeared.
They’re pretty, you think.
Resentment builds, slowly but surely, probably on both ends as in most marriages. This kind of life is killing you inside. This lonely, aimless life in a house that makes you feel like you’re the only person in the world, in a bed that feels too large.
“I want to work,” you say one day, picking at your food blankly. “I have an interview tomorrow, so I won’t be here for most of the day from now on if I get it.”
A fork clatters from across the table. “What? Why?”
You don’t necessarily have to work given Caleb’s plentiful paycheck, but you want to anyway because you can’t stand being in that gigantic house all by yourself. But of course, how could you tell this to the man in front of you? The man you don’t even know the favorite color of?
“It’s a regular office job.”
“I didn’t ask what it was,” he blurts, eyes narrowing in concern. “I’m asking why? Do I not give you enough money? You know you have access to everything on the card, right?”
You shrug. “It’s not about the money…I just think I need something to do throughout the day.”
“What about picking up another hobby?”
“I’ve exhausted most of them.”
“Then traveling?”
“By myself?” you frown. “It’s not like you’re ever here.”
You’re not sure why the words slip through your teeth, but they do, and the disdain is apparent. He seems surprised at first, blinking, before his shoulder slump again and the corners of his lips twitch downward. For some reason, it makes you feel—good? Alive, more so. So you keep talking. “You’re always working. You even missed my friend’s wedding after I told her we’d be there.”
He shoots back immediately, brows tight. “That was a special case—it was an emergency.”
“That’s fine,” you chew slowly on your food. “But I don’t want to wait around all day for you to get back.”
“You shouldn’t work if you don’t have to. I make more than enough.”
“Again, not the point.”
His lips tighten, pursing. “What will your family think if they hear that I’m making you work after I told them that I’d take care of you?”
You snort. “Is this what you call ‘taking care of’?”
Immediately, you can tell that you’ve struck a nerve. And for some reason, it feels good again. Like you’re alive, again. Maybe you just like pissing him off. His expression shifts momentarily to something you can’t recognize before it settles disapprovingly and silence befalls the both of you. You like when he doesn’t have that stupid smile he always has. The fake, lifeless smile he’d given you when you first met. You’d rather he just be upset, just like this. He looks like he wants to say something, but then shuts his mouth, swallowing the lump in his throat.
His phone rings, slicing the tension in the air like a knife. Caleb glances at the caller ID for a split second before he’s already on his feet, pacing to the sink to put his plates away in a hurry. “I’m sorry, I need to take this. Let me know how the interview goes..”
You stare at your plate, listening to his feet pad around in a hurry. “Is it MC?”
He whips his head around. “What?”
You stand from your seat to dump your food into the sink, ignoring the slight clench in your chest. He’s always been this way. Jumping at any opportunity to be useful to her, while he leaves everyone else in the dust. “Nevermind. Go.”
Once you hear the front door shut, you slump into the couch face first, hoping it swallows you whole before he comes back. This has to be some sort of humiliation ritual. Perhaps you committed a grave sin in your past life, because you’re not sure what you could’ve possibly done to warrant such a feeling. The sunset seeps through the window planes and hits half of your face, bathing you in a warmth that had been missing from the rest of the house. The heat makes you sleepy, and you soon find your eyelids drooping shut, gazing lazily at a photo of the two of you on the coffee table. You don’t remember when it was taken, but in it, you genuinely look like you’re almost enjoying yourself. You can’t tell with him, though. You can never really tell.
“Stupid Xia,” you mutter as you fall deep into slumber.
When you awake again, the sun has fully set. There’s a blanket draped over you and when you blink away the blots in your vision, you’re met face to face with a fresh vase of flowers on the coffee table. They smell nice.
Damn it.
Sometimes, you wish he was just an asshole.
You learn about him through the photo albums he has stashed away in the attic. It’s not like you were looking for them. You’d only been cleaning when they managed to topple right into your hands, and since he always says whatever’s his is yours, you figure you might as well satisfy your curiosity. There’s less than you expected, unfortunately. Most photos are taken by him, but there’s a few in between where he’s the subject. Him at his birthday party, his graduation ceremony, him packing for college, and the day he left for the DAA.
It’s odd. You forget he was a normal teenager at one point, and not a high ranking colonel.
The pictures are through his eyes. Before you can stop, you find yourself becoming engrossed in lacing the photos together into some semblance of a story in your head. You see his childhood home and the model planes he enjoys building. His outings with MC and his grandmother. His last minute halloween costumes. Him and his friends carrying out a prank on someone. His studies. His likes. His dislikes.
Caleb Xia is a charming person. If you hadn’t met the way you did, you think you might’ve liked him a little more.
When you ask him a question regarding one of the photos at dinner, he nearly chokes on his food. You quirk a brow in response. “Was I not supposed to see them?”
“No, it’s fine if you look…” he mumbles, taking a sip of water to gather himself. You squint—are his ears pink? You didn’t know he was capable of doing something kinda adorable. “It’s just a little embarrassing.”
“Like the picture of your airplane swim trunks from when you were a kid–”
He coughs again, and you snicker.
You think he’s tolerable—just a bit.
Weeks pass. Life gets a little easier with your job and more to do—it might even be a bit fun. With your new friends at your workplace and a new sense of accomplishment, the less you stress about your loveless marriage and the more you appreciate what you have. Your interactions with Caleb become less forced. Not because you’ve somehow managed to miraculously understand how his brain functions, but because you put less weight on what you say. It’s hard to see someone as intimidating when you’ve seen a photo of them in a stupid halloween costume. He seems to notice the change too.
[Caleb Xia]: I got us fried chicken for dinner. Don’t be too late so it doesn’t get cold :)
Your mouth waters. It’s nice, almost. Emphasis on the almost.
Outside, the evening chill hits your cheeks, sharp enough to wake you up and wrap your jacket tighter around yourself. The street is busy but not crowded, as the sun has just set. A couple laughs too loudly across the road. Somewhere, a bus exhales.
You start down your usual route.
At first, it’s nothing. Just footsteps. Not out of place. People exist. People walk. People go home.
But something’s off. Your gut insists on it, and it’s hard to ignore.
You slow slightly, just enough to be subtle. The footsteps slow too.
Your fingers tighten around your bag.
Coincidence, surely.
You don’t turn around, yet. Turning means you have to see something and acknowledge that it’s real. Instead, you adjust your pace again. Faster this time.
The footsteps quicken, dropping your heart to your stomach.
Your eyes dart around you anxiously. It’s dark. Streetlamps are guiding your path home, and though the neighborhood is nice, it’s empty. Well, except for you and the footsteps that seemingly sound like they’re getting ever so closer every few seconds. You throat feels dry.
Phone. You need to tell someone. Even if you’re wrong—even if it’s just a hunch.
[You]: Still there?
[Caleb Xia]: Yea. why?
[You]: I think there’s someone following me
Your message sends, and for a moment air doesn’t enter your lungs.
The typing bubble appears. Disappears. Appears again.
[Caleb Xia]: I’m coming.
You don’t know how he’s going to find you, but you don’t bother questioning it at the moment. You swallow, and your throat is dry enough that it hurts. The streetlamps cast long shadows across the pavement, and it’s hard to discern whether something is just a shadow or something else in the dark.
You don’t turn around.
Your legs carry you as fast as you can go without breaking into a sprint, and your grip tightens around your phone until your fingers ache. Hurry, you think. Hurry up, Caleb.
A car passes.
He’s closer now, whoever it is.
Your breath catches. Your shoulders tense, every instinct screaming at you to run, but your legs feel like they’ve forgotten how.
Suddenly, a car turns the corner too fast, tires kissing the curb before readjusting and you nearly jump out of your own skin. The tint on the car makes it too difficult to see inside, not that you’d be able to see much regardless due to the dark. It slows to a stop as it sees you, and you think if this isn’t who you’re expecting, it might actually be the end for you.
The passenger door swings open.
“Get in.”
Relief floods your body when you hear his voice and you stumble to clamber in.
Relief?
This is Caleb Xia you’re talking about. Now that you think about it, you’re unsure why he was the first you contacted instead of the police. Your fingers had tapped on his profile faster than you could think. Was it just because he was at the top of your contacts? Was it because he was near? It must be, right? It had been instinctual. Your body had reacted—and it had somehow worked out.
Regardless, you can’t possibly deny how relieved you feel right now.
You wonder if this is how MC always feels. It must be nice to know that someone so reliable is always at her beck and call, right? To come running at just a few words—maybe she wouldn’t have had to walk home in the first place. Maybe he would’ve driven her. You feel sick. This isn’t what you should be thinking about right now. Right now, you need to report it to the police and take a much needed nap.
A part of you is envious of her.
“You should’ve called me earlier.”
The chicken doesn’t look as appetizing anymore even despite it sitting before you in all its crispy fried glory. The growling in your stomach from earlier is replaced by a slight pain, and it’s difficult to tell if you’ve only lost your appetite or if it’s a different kind of anxiousness. He watches you from across the table with a perplexed frown while you pick at the chicken aimlessly, nodding blankly.
“I’ll report it first thing in the morning,” Caleb sighs. “I should pick you up from work from now own. Or I’ll call you a taxi if I can’t.”
You nod again.
“Are you okay?”
Ah, he’s asking that again. You hate when he does.
You tilt your head. “I’m just sort of in shock, I think.”
“I know, but you should eat at least a bit. Here.” He holds a piece of chicken on a fork to your face and you scrunch your nose. He smirks. “Here comes the airplane?”
“I might vomit all over you.” A half lie.
He replies instantly. “Then I’ll clean it. Eat.”
For a reason that you just attribute to exhaustion, you don’t bother arguing. Instead, you pop it into your mouth, cheeks dusting pink at the intimacy of the act. He hums in approval and you try your best not to choke. Why was he feeding you—a grown woman? And why were you letting him?
How bizarre. This whole day is bizarre.
At least you’re home—thanks to him.
“Thank you,” you mumble softly. “For getting there so fast.”
He looks almost offended, shaking his head. “Don’t thank me, it was a given. I’m just happy you thought to call me. I was worried you wouldn’t.”
Why did you call him? Well, you suppose he is your husband at the end of the day. One who has eyes for another, but your husband nonetheless. “Why wouldn’t I?”
He stops for a moment, as if in thought, and then smiles sheepishly. Not the annoying fake smile he puts on for show, but one that’s riddled with guilt. Shame. You want to know why. “Just assumed you wouldn’t.”
Strangely, the words make your chest tight.
Your eyes meet his usual striking violets, shoulders slumping as you look away once the eye contact feels too intense. “I’m glad I did.”
You barely catch the tips of his ears turning pink.
Caleb keeps his word for the months following the event. You never have reason to pass by that street again on foot, and although you continue to insist it’s not necessary, having him as your private driver of sorts does feel kind of nice. You think eventually, you’ve come to call him more than a stranger. He’s easier to talk to. Funnier than you thought, actually, when he’s not being annoying to tease you.
You’d never tell him that though, of course.
You blink warily, rubbing at your eyes with the back of your hand when a ray of sunlight escapes through the shades of your bedroom and hit your face. However, it’s not what awakes you. Rather, it’s the insistent buzzing of your phone on your bedside table, which you barely manage to snatch without falling off the edge of the bed.
[Caleb (husband)]: morning sleepinghead, you awake?
[Caleb (husband)]: Come eat breakfast :> made apple juice too
[Caleb (husband)]: I better hear you shuffling around in your room in the next few minutes or i’ll have to come drag you out.. :)
Caleb Xia, you find, nags a lot.
“Sleep well?” he chuckles when you finally emerge, still half-awake despite being fully dressed. You scratch the back of your neck, yawning as you perch yourself on one of the chairs at the counter where he’s standing with an apron tied neatly behind him. If you were just a tad bit more awake, you’d have a field day making a snide comment about it.
“Mm.”
He laughs again, gently. Did he always sound so soft?
“You can always quit your job, y’know,” he shrugs, placing a plate of breakfast foods in front of you. It smells immaculate, as usual. “Offer’s always on the table.”
You shove a forkful of eggs into your mouth, squinting at him. “Why do you wanth me shoo be unemployed sho bad? My parentsh don’t care.”
“It’s not about your family…It just doesn’t seem necessary.”
“I like working. Just not waking up so early.”
“I only want you to avoid overextending yourself if you don’t have to,” he pops a tomato into his own mouth. “I make enough for you to get whatever you want, don’t I?”
“But I want my own money, too.”
“My money is your money. This is the least I can do.”
“Careful,” you snort. “You sound dangerously close to being romantic.”
He tilts his head. “Why wouldn’t I be romantic? I’m your husband.”
This time, you really choke on your food, coughing as he quickly hands you the apple juice. He’s been doing that lately—dropping lines like that out of nowhere, like they’re nothing. Somehow always when you’re least prepared for it, and always with a lopsided grin that tells you he’s either completely oblivious or knows exactly what he’s doing.
You’re willing to bet on the latter.
Caleb Xia, as you figure out in the time you spend with him in his car on the way to work, has terrible taste in films.
“That movie is awful. There’s no way that’s your favorite.”
He gasps dramatically and you don’t bother suppressing the urge to roll your eyes. “Hey, don’t judge before you try it.”
“I’d like it if I never had to try it, actually.”
The smile adorning your lips falls in an instant the car slows to a stop. You find yourself growing disappointed when you arrive at your workplace, because it means you’ll have to leave him. You want to scold yourself for thinking such preposterous thoughts. What are you? A teenager who’s hanging out with a boy for the first time?
You’re married, for god’s sake.
Then again, so what if his company isn’t so bad? What if you think he’s a bit more to you than tolerable? Isn’t that allowed? He’s your husband, after all. If it doesn’t feel so bad, maybe you could let yourself reprise and enjoy it while it lasts.
“Ah, right, I should tell you—I’ll be leaving this weekend for work.”
Ah, nevermind. Reality has a way of slapping you across the face when you least expect it.
“How long?”
“A few weeks at best,” he pauses, voice quieter. “Months, if I’m unlucky.”
You really despise the subtle aching in your chest.
You hate how easily it slips in. How, for a second, it makes the flame that’s gone out years ago flicker, as if these moments could mean more than they do. They don’t. You know they don’t. They aren’t yours to keep. None of it is.
The warmth, the ease, the way he looks at you like this—like you’re something he actually cares about—it’s all fake. Stolen. You’re just standing in the space where someone else is supposed to be.
You press your lips together, forcing the feeling down before it can spread any further. Get a grip.
His palm pats the top of your head, making your cheeks heat against your will. With a grin, he nods. But it’s stiff. The slight crinkle between his brows. Upset. Upset? “I’ll see you tonight.”
It’s like he knows what you’re thinking before you know yourself.
“Who said I want to?”
“You wound me.”
As soon as you enter the building, you feel your phone buzz in your pocket.
[Caleb (husband)]: I know you’re at work, but…
[Caleb (husband)]: Movie night tn ?? i can make us popcorn :D
[Caleb (husband)]: And yes we’re watching my fav so you can stop calling it bad :>
[Caleb (husband)]: Last hurrah before i leave
This is dangerous, you think. Really, really dangerous.
You seriously hope you don’t fall for him, if it isn’t too late already.
A few hours later, the living room is dimly lit with soft lights, the low hum of something playing in the background as Caleb sets everything up. The bowl of popcorn ends up a little too full, a few pieces spilling onto the counter as he carries it over, muttering something under his breath as he munches on the ones that are about to spill over. You sink into the couch, watching him move around the room—adjusting the volume and flipping through options he’s already decided on.
It’s strange, how easy it feels. How normal.
You don’t realize you’re staring until he glances over.
So you look away quickly, fixing your gaze on the screen. But a few seconds pass, and you can feel his attention still lingering.
You pretend not to notice.
What are you doing? What are either of you doing?
You don’t say anything, swallowing the question down into the pit in your stomach.
The movie stars a side character with a passionate devotion to his family, who reminds you of Caleb. Oddly enough, the resemblance is almost uncanny. You kind of want to root for him but also want him to lose terribly. You huff quietly. “He’s so intense.”
Caleb glances over, a hint of a smile tugging at his lips. “What? You wouldn’t want someone like that?”
You tilt your head, pretending to think. “I mean… he’s a bit much.”
A pause.
“…but it comes from a good place. I like him.”
He stills.
You pick at a piece of popcorn, rolling it between your fingers. “He reminds me of you a little.”
“Yeah?”
You shrug, still not quite looking at him. “Yeah.” A small breath escapes you before you can stop it. “MC is really lucky to have you.”
He goes quiet. When you glance over, he’s already looking at you.
“…Lucky,” he repeats, almost to himself.
You hesitate, then ruin it by saying more. "I mean, you're always there for her, you know? If she calls, you come running. Everyone wants someone like that."
It was supposed to come off lightheartedly, but it only digs the hole deeper.
Something in his expression shifts. His smile fades, his face losing its usual ease as it drops to something you’ve never seen on him before. It contorts in phases. Surprise, and then confusion, and finally into one you prefer the least.
Panic. Something is wrong.
You wish you’d just shut up. The long pause makes you wish you were just a fly on the wall right now.
“Is this why?” he blinks, and his eyes glisten with something you haven’t seen from him. Void of the usual emptiness but replaced with something fuller. Heavier. “Is this why you hate me so much? Because of MC?”
Huh?
“Fuck,” one hand pulls at the roots of his hair, his top teeth sinking into his bottom lip as he attempts to hide his face from you. “I’m a moron. I should’ve known.”
What? Despite your hands growing clammy, you feel cold. Like the blood is draining from your face.
“You must hate me so much.”
When did you ever hate him? You’ve loathed him, certainly, when he’d disappear for weeks on end leaving you all alone in this cold, lifeless house. You’ve wanted to punch your balled up fists into his chest, knowing that it wouldn’t phase him in the slightest simply to alleviate some of your own anger. You’ve wanted to run away a multitude of times. But hate? Have you ever hated Caleb? Can you hate Caleb?
“Caleb.”
“This is my fault. I should’ve been more aware. It’s so obvious now, I feel like an idiot.”
“Caleb.”
“I thought you just hated me because this isn’t a marriage you wanted,” his voice cracks, and he’s burying his face into his palms. “I thought staying away from you was what you wanted. Shit, I’m so stupid.”
“Caleb,” you say, more firmly this time, and he finally looks at you. There’s a watery film over his usually lifeless eyes, glistening against the light of the TV screen, and it makes the pit in your stomach grow deeper. You don’t like seeing him like this. You thought you would, but you don’t.
His voice is a mere whisper now. He looks like he wants to vomit out a million words at once, but there’s three specific ones that linger on his tongue. Is this what they call a woman's intuition? You’re not sure how, but in the moment, it feels like you’re in his head. For the first time in the 4 years you’ve been wed to Caleb Xia, you feel like you can understand him.
A victory that doesn’t feel like one at all.
“Listen to me,” he grabs your hands in his, holding them in front of his chest. “I don’t love her—not as a woman. I haven’t in a long time. She and Zayne are like my family, and I’d be a terrible person not to be happy for them. I’m sorry I didn’t make it clear to you. I’m so sorry.”
Your heart doesn’t seem to be beating anymore.
The air is too thick. Like liquid entering your lungs.
Caleb opens his mouth and then shuts it again, his words stuck in the back of his throat. You’re not sure if you want to hear what he wants to say. The words hold too much value, too many years of hurt, and you don’t know how you’ll react. You don’t want to acknowledge any of this as real, because if it is, what was all of this for? What were the years you spent holed up in your room meant to achieve? Were you just being a fool? And in that case, would you even want to know?
No. You don’t.
So instead, you kiss him.
A wordless, messy kiss. Though he’s taken aback at first, he’s quick to slot his mouth against yours eagerly, hands flying to your waist to pull you closer as if a man starved. It’s desperate. Different from the kiss you shared with him at the courthouse, or for transactional purposes. His mouth feels hot against yours, and when his tongue swipes against your lip, you let him in.
You climb onto his lap, straddling him as he presses you flush against him. The movie is long forgotten. His hair weeds through the crevices between your fingers and he deepens the kiss as if he’s trying to physically become one with you. His heart hammers against your own like a timer, warning you of what this could mean, but you don’t care.
“Put your arms around my neck,” he mumbles against you, and then you’re suddenly being lifted up to your room with his hands supporting your thighs around his waist. But even those few seconds aren’t worth staying apart for, because he’s kissing your neck, mouthing at spots that have you pursing your lips to avoid making any embarrassing sounds. He lets you down gently onto the middle of your bed and follows suit, pushing you onto your back.
You’re here again.
He’s looming over you, face flushed in a deep red this time. He’ll ask if you’re okay. If this is okay. And then he’ll take off his shirt and his hand will slide up yours. It’ll be better this time, because it’s not out of some twisted sense of duty. Desire pulses at your core, but you can’t help but shake off this curdling feeling in your chest, as if you want to hurl. You wait for what you expect, eyes never leaving his.
Instead, he breathes sharply. “I love you.”
The world stops.
“You don’t have to say anything back that I don’t deserve. I just want you to know,” he whispers.
Can anyone love someone like you—much less, your husband? You start breathing again because you have to, staring up at him as if he’s gone insane. In fact, you think you’ve gone insane. Kissing him, lying beneath him, enjoying his presence, looking forward to his breakfasts, letting him drop you off at work, feeling disappointed that he’s leaving—you’ve most definitely died and come back as another person, because this is not you.
This is Caleb Xia. He is an unloving person. He cannot love. But what happens if he does? With tears stinging at his eyes, watching you with a mix of pure adoration and sorrow, he’s telling you he loves you. Love is a strong word, isn’t it? But he means it. He loves you. Caleb loves you. You want to call him a liar, but he’s not.
You want to cry into his chest and run away at the same time.
The flame flickers, and you panic. Not because you despise him, or because his confession is one you don’t want to accept, but because this flame is not one you welcome with open arms anymore. It’s too easy to hurt. Too easy to shrink, yet somehow impossible to destroy.
“I can’t,” you croak. “Not right now.”
Even Caleb can’t mask the hurt that deepens his frown, as if you’ve torn his heart straight from his chest. For a man with so much power, he’s never looked more powerless than he does now.
It feels too vulnerable. Open. As if you’re naked and he’s fully clothed, when it’s infact the exact opposite. You don’t want to open up to him again. You don’t want him to snuff out that small flame you have that never seems to go out no matter how much you douse it in water. Or maybe you do?
He forces a crooked smile, strained against his very will and nods before leaving the room. As the door slips shut, he doesn’t turn to look at you. “Sleep tight.”
You don’t get much sleep that night at all.
Morning comes anyway.
And then another.
And another.
His absence returns, but this time because you’re the one avoiding him. You leave earlier than usual, linger longer at work, find excuses in the smallest things—emails, errands, anything that keeps you just a little out of sync with him. When you do cross paths, it’s brief. Polite. A short good morning or a quick goodnight. It’s easier that way.
You tell yourself this is what you wanted—to put distance back where it belongs. Whatever that night was, whatever flame flickered between you, it will fade. It must fade.
He isn’t yours. Even if he says he is, there’s too much pain--too many years of resentment built up that you don’t know what to do with.
You catch yourself thinking about it at mundane times—standing in line, walking home, staring at your coworkers chatting amongst themselves. The apartment feels different already, like it’s preparing to be emptier. As cold as it was a few months ago, when he was still Caleb Xia, and not just Caleb.
You take the time away from him to reset. To think, but not too much. You find yourself flipping through his photo albums again, smiling when you flip to a particularly embarrassing one. You hear him shuffling outside your room, probably packing for his business trip. You’re aware of what he risks everytime he disappears for weeks at a time—not only his life, but the lives of his men—and you don’t know how he bears to leave home everytime he does.
But he always comes back. He has to.
You suppose it’s for the best for now. And when he returns, things will return to normal. The house won’t be as awkward as it is. The two of you will slip into your usual routine of a loveless marriage, and you’ll find other avenues in life to derive joy from. So will he.
The front door shuts faster than you anticipated.
He’s gone.
This is fine.
This is what you wanted.
The house is empty again. You pace to the living room, and surprisingly, a fresh bouquet of flowers is propped inside their usual vase. You lift the vase into your hands, letting the scent of the flowers waft into your nose. They smell good. New. Sort of like the detergent he uses when doing the laundry.
You set the vase back down, nails pressing faint crescents into your skin.
His face when you last saw him keeps flickering in your mind. So much hurt. Raw with fear.
“I love you.”
You want to tell him he doesn’t. You want to remind yourself that this is your husband. Your heartless, cunning husband who kills people for a living—who doesn’t care about anyone but his family.
But you’re his family, aren’t you?
You can still smell his cologne in the air.
You must’ve missed it from the glint of the sunlight in the glass coffee table—there’s a small shimmer of something sitting beside the vase. With a quirked brow, you pick it up. He usually never leaves trash lying around.
You nearly drop it.
His wedding band.
Your breath stutters, sharp and uneven, like your lungs have forgotten how to work. Your heart pounds as you realize that you're shaking, eyes wide as saucers as you stare at the object in your hands.
No.
He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t just leave it.
The ring sits in your palm like a brick that weighs your entire body down. This isn’t something you can pretend will reset when he comes back.
This means no more quiet dinners. No more stupid arguments over movies he insists are good. No more messages waiting for you when you’re at work. No more him, standing at the counter every morning with a pan in his hand. No more him.
And worst of all, no more chance to fix it. To tell him your side of the story.
Your body moves before your mind catches up.
You wrench the front door open, not bothering to lock it behind you as your feet hit the pavement with just your socks. The air burns your throat as you run, lungs screaming, heart still pounding like it’s trying to break through your ribcage.
He can’t leave.
The stinging beneath your feet go unregistered as you clutch the ring so tightly that it feels like it might dig into your flesh.
Just forward, you hiss to yourself. Faster. You turn corner after corner, your body begging you to stop overexerting yourself, but you can’t bother to care. You don’t even register where you’re going, but you need to go somewhere. It feels like ages and seconds at the same time, as you beg nobody in particular for one more chance.
A chance for what, you're not sure.
Reconciliation? Love? Understanding?
Is any of that possible? And if not, why are you running like your very life depends on it?
The ring digs further into your skin, and you realize it doesn't matter as long as you find who it belongs to. Him. Caleb. The reason and bane of your existence, and apparently what has you running across the entire town in hopes of bringing him back.
Finally, you slam into something solid.
The impact knocks the breath out of you, your grip loosening as the ring nearly slips from your fingers. A hand catches your arms before you can stumble back too far, steadying you with a familiar scent that somehow lets you breathe again.
“Hey—watch it—oh.”
You freeze in place, breath hitching as you look up. Standing right in front of you, he appears slightly disheveled, one hand still gripping your arm while the other awkwardly balances a paper bag of groceries. Caleb blinks, his eyes immediately scanning over your frame before landing on your feet. “Why are you here? Are you okay? And where are your shoes, it’s dangerou—”
“Don’t go, Caleb,” you sniffle, tears already stinging at your eyes as your body finally has a chance to rest, though it doesn’t feel much better. “Please don’t go.”
He stares at you as if you've grown a third eye, nearly dropping his bag of groceries at your pleas. Even the tips of his ears turn red, flustered. "What are you--"
“Why did you leave the ring? Did you lie?” About loving me?
His expression falls, attention honing in on the ring gripped in your fist. Something seems to click in his head, and immediately, he shakes his head. “No, of course not, I was going to leave a note. I just went out to get groceries before I left—”
“So you were going to leave the ring?”
“Well, yes, but can we–”
“Do you not like me anymore?” you blurt, finger bunching at the fabric of his sleeve. “Is it because I ignored you for a week?”
He almost looks offended. “Of course I still like you.”
“Then why?”
His voice softens, as if speaking too loud will scare you away. Hesitantly, he sheepishly releases your arms. Instead, he slowly takes your hand in his, lips pursing as he sighs. His palm feels rough with calluses from the work he does, but light as feathers against your skin. His touch is gentle, as if you’re the most precious thing in the world. “I figured there was no reason for me to tie you to me anymore. I won’t force you to be with someone you can’t even stand to be around. Someone you hate. It’d be selfish.”
Your words tumble out before you can process them. “I don’t hate you.”
Finally, with your hand in his, the world feels okay again. This feeling tells you you’re screwed, but you don’t care.
“I’ve been mad at you, and I don’t know what to do with your feelings because they make no sense, but I don’t hate you,” you mutter. “You’re just too confusing.”
“...Confusing?”
“I just—I don’t know what to do, Caleb,” you wipe vigorously at your eyes with your free hand, head falling to avoid looking him at him. “I don’t know what to think about you. How to feel about you.”
His eyes ease, and you feel him squeeze your fingers. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No.”
“Do you love me?”
“I don’t know.”
Caleb has always been better at reading you than yourself. A flash of hurt ripples across his face, but his eyes maintain its soft glimmer—because he knows. Even if you say you don’t know, he knows. He also knows that you’re afraid of those words, and he doesn’t blame you for it.
So instead, he asks something else. “What am I to you?”
You want to call him a million things. The man who left you by yourself, the man who refused to touch you for so many years, the man who’d chosen to sleep in the guest bedroom just to avoid taking up space in yours. He’s felt awful, inconsiderate, and cold. But he’s also the man who’s gotten you flowers, the man who’d break four speeding laws to make you feel safe, the man who makes sure you’re never hungry, the man who folds your laundry neatly and organizes it color-coded in your closet. The man who you wish you could slap across the face and hold close to you at the same time. The man who’s made you feel alone yet so cared for all at once.
You like him, you think. In some strange way that’s never been covered in the romantic films you used to clutch onto like a life line, you like him. The ‘L’ word teeters on the tip of your tongue like a marble rolling around to decide what these emotions settling in your heart really are, but it doesn’t really matter. All you know is that you need him. You want him. You want him to hold your face and kiss you tenderly, like he did that night. You want him to do it again and again until you can’t breathe, and all you can feel is him. You want to eat dinner with him every night and wake up in the morning to his stupid apron. You want to go grocery shopping with him. You want to fall asleep watching a movie in his arms.
“What am I to you?”
Tears fall down your cheeks in fat globs and you try your hardest not to let your voice crack. “My husband.”
His eyes widen for a moment, and then his lips split into a wide grin that resembles the lovesick expression of a teenage boy who’s holding hands for the first time. Caleb drops his grocery bag to his feet and reaches either hands to the sides of your face, cradling you gingerly as he guides you closer. Before you’re even registering it, he brushes a strand of hair out of your forehead and presses a soft but firm kiss to your temple, where you can feel him smile against your skin.
“Who am I to say no my wife?”
Your marriage is a messy, complicated jumble of emotions. The confusion. The fear. The warmth. It’s not perfect. It never will be. And despite it all, you don’t want it any other way, because Caleb Xia is a loving person.
taglist. @inzanekillian @someonestopsoren @sweetieelilii @3rdslide2heaven @gabburabbu @moltensceptergambit @cherrysherryblossom @younbeanz @txtworlddom @glitterykingdomheart @applebrat9 @ephemeraleb @cherrybomb5000 @chartreuxxlikesboba @corvusmemoriae @toorulee @ilovecoffe8 @cordidy @younghideoutberserker @yesbiaswrecked @madnesslusy @bypanana @noosummert @littleappleorchard @anyeeyna @xie-hua (I apologize if I didn't add you! I always struggle with tagging on tumblr lol!)
AWEE!! Angst with a happy ending will always be my fave 😭♥️
—the cure
jack abbot x people pleaser! reader
"All because my head is full of poison And my heart is full of doubt I got toxins in my bloodstream You tried so hard to suck out —the cure, Olivia Rodrigo
summary: you’re the ray of sunshine and overly dependable smiling intern the night shift crew has been needing. But a certain attending begins noticing you might need more help than you let on.
wc: 11.7k (a short one sorry guys)
warnings: crippling perfectionism, high-key people pleasing, reader is bright and bubbly to compensate for how awful she feels day to day, one vomiting scene, service dom jack, santos is on nightshift bc i love her and i wanted her in this fic. trinity and dennis and reader r basically siblings, jack’s characterization in this is DEF andrew pope cody-esque panic attacks, mental health struggles, reader is an intern again but i swear it’s just cause i watch a lot of greys and interns r the only stage of medical career i know enough about to write semi-well T-T
acknowledgments: once again a round of applause for @wesandresons for the lovely gif, and @uzmacchiato and @cursed-carmine for the dividers!
a/n: i’m not rlly sure i like how this turned out but oh well @leeknowpegger i hope this keeps you company
masterlist
When you first get to the PTMC, Jack can’t decide what he thinks about you.
He vaguely remembers you— you’d done a rotation here, some time ago. One of the unfortunate ones who’d drawn the short stick and been stuck on the night shift. He has a hazy recollection of your face during an MVC, your jaw hard set and a permanent smile to your face. He vaguely remembers, at the time, the only thing he’d really though was:
Jesus, this kid needs to dial it back.
The sentiment, of course, remains the same when it’s handoff time, and Robby is telling him all about what an awful fucking day it’s been, and of course now he says “Oh, remember that med student you got stuck with awhile back? Smiley-face? You must’ve done something right, because she matched into the ED for her residency. She starts today.”
Not exactly the news an attending wants to hear right after the horror show the day has been so far. Especially when intern/baby resident in question is… charismatic.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Ellis says, her eyes trained on you as you soothe a crying teenager who just got wheeled in. “If you ask me, we could use someone who actually smiles. Bit too dark and dreary in here for my taste.”
“You like dark and dreary.”
She gives him an unimpressed raised eyebrow. “So? We can’t all be doing it. Like, we’ve got Shen, but his is more iced-coffee induced than actual smiling charm.”
“I can be charming when I want to be.”
“No, you can be flirty or suggestive. There’s a difference.”
Jack does not justify her response with one of his own, instead choosing to look down at his tablet and pretend to chart while he listens to how you’re interacting with the patient. The teenager seems to be calmed down, and the parents don't sound frantic or worried.
Maybe Ellis is right. Unfortunately, this tends to be the case fairly often.
He sighs and focuses on the chart he’s supposed to be doing and attempts to wipe his mind of bright smiles and glittering eyes.
—
The PTMC and Emergency Medicine in general was not, actually, your first choice. It wasn’t even your second, or your third.
First was surgical. Everybody wants to be surgical. You wanted surgical. It’s flashy, it pays well, and it’s cool as fuck. Plus, unlike some of your classmates, you actually have the stomach for it (one of the many things that eventually translated well to emergency medicine.)
Second was Ortho. Because bones are cool. Ortho surgeries are fun too, when they’re not arthroscopy after arthroscopy.
Third was any kind of unit like Burn or ICU. A high stress program that wouldn’t let you think, let you run on adrenaline all day.
But then you did your rotation in general surgery and absolutely fucking hated it.
Surgeons are assholes. Surgeons are uptight nerds who like to subject anyone they consider beneath them to cruel and unusual punishment.
Even in during the short duration of your rotation through surgery, it almost killed you. You could practically feel the light in your soul dimming at every pointed comment, every sharp correction, every barked insult and something or other cruel word.
And then there was the PTMC. The stupid ED that wasn’t supposed to fun, was supposed to be grueling and exhausting (especially since you’d gotten assigned to the night shift.) But instead of awful you got amazing, which sucked.
Seems counterintuitive, but it’s true.
You wanted to like surgery enough to power though. But not a single rotation after the ED even came close to measuring up. The speed, the action, the gore, and the kind but firm guiding direction from the attending’s and residents.
Matching into the PTMC was an event actually worth celebrating. As in, you decided to un-tense minutely and splurge on actual champagne that you drank in your apartment while dancing to your favorite music.
And now, you’re here. Determined to not fuck this up. To keep moving, keep going, and be a fucking excellent ED doctor.
Except your attending, Dr. Jack Abbot, one of the reasons you joined the ED in the first place, keeps giving you funny looks when he thinks you’re not looking.
You’re not sure if he’s aware that you know that he’s staring at you. You do have a wider than normal field of peripheral vision, so maybe he doesn’t know that you can still see him out of the corner of your eye?
Regardless of if he knows or not, it’s unnerving. Because he’s your boss. And you know he’s capable of being an incredible doctor and mentor, because you see it every single day.
Just not directed at you.
He’s not really mean, or standoffish, or anything like that, he’s just… not necessarily kind. Not in the way that you see him with the other residents on his service or even with you, during your rotation as a med student.
Hell, he’s nicer to Santos than he is to you.
“Did I like, say something to offend him and I don’t know?”
Trinity makes a face at you from over the edge of the monitor. “Isn’t that more my area of expertise?”
“No. You offend people on purpose.”
“True.”
You prop your head on your hands, resting your elbows on the counter above her. Your keycard, attached to your breast pocket via a red, heart-shaped badge reel is lovingly adorned with pink rhinestones and cute stickers. The pocket itself is filled with several glitter gel pens (and regular pens, just in case.)
“I just don’t get it. I’m nice, right?”
“Disturbingly so.”
“Exactly. The only thing I can think of is that I’ve messed up or something, but it’s Dr. Abbot. He’d tell me if I did. He doesn’t exactly hold back.”
“Do you really need me for this conversation?”
You level her with a look, but she just groans.
“Why do you even care? So what, one guy doesn’t like you, boohoo.”
“He’s not just some guy. He’s my attending. And you might’ve secured your spot here, but i’m all shiny and new. I can’t exactly earn people’s respect if our boss doesn’t like me.”
Trinity doesn’t immediately respond with a scathing remark, which usually means that you’ve made a valid point.
“Should I talk to him?”
She sighs. “I think you’re overreacting. You’ve only been here for like, two weeks? Three? He’ll probably calm down the more you work together.”
“Did he stare at you all weirdly when you first started?”
“Well, no, but that’s because I don’t suck at my job.”
Now it’s your turn to glare.
“Sorry. I guess you’re not completely hopeless.”
You roll your eyes. “Thanks, Trin.”
She scrunches her nose up at the nickname like you knew she would, because she hates it, which makes it one of the only weapons you have against her.
Trinity wasn’t as helpful as you’d hoped, and night shift means no Dana to ask for advice. There’s Dr. Ellis, but she’s pretty close to Dr. Abbot, which means there’s a high chance that whatever you ask her will make it back to him. You aren’t really close enough to Dr. Shen to ask him “Hey, how come Dr. Abbot stares at me when he thinks I’m not looking and isn’t as nice to me as he is to you guys?”
The question is stupid and kind of pathetic, so really, you shouldn’t be asking anybody, but you’ve always been crippled by an intense need to be well-liked. It feels like winning, and it feels good and safe. Safe is good. Safe is great.
Wanting the guy who's essentially your boss to like you is completely rational, right?
You just wish he’d tell you what you’re doing wrong, so you can fix it.
Also, it’s just driving you crazy.
Even if he just legitimately didn’t like you, and made that apparent, it’d be something. You could work with that. You could figure out what it was he didn't like via intense pattern recognitin and fix it. Problem solved!
But he isn't obvious about it. He behaves indifferent and detatched- like you could die tomorrow and he wouldn't care.
It’s the not knowing. If you could just ask him, if he could just give you an answer, then you’d know where you stood, and everything could be fine.
What changed? You want to beg, What happened after my med student rotation? Do you even remember that? What did I do? Where did I go wrong?
It eats away at you over the course of the week. It has been since you noticed, which was pretty much on day one. You don’t show this outwardly of course, because you’re pretty sure you can get through to him and level out the wrong-footedness you feel around him through stubborn determination. Surely, at some point your unwavering nature will win out and he’ll finally see there isn’t anything he needs to hate about you. This is an incredibly healthy mindset to move through life with.
The week closes with an MCI around 5pm, which is just everyone’s favorite thing in the world. The night shift gets called in, minus Trinity, who was already there working a double, and everyone sets in for the long haul. You do your best to focus on the patients and do not at all think about the ease and camaraderie between Mohan and Abbot, because that would be a very fucked up progression of priorities.
Eventually it’s all over— patients are stabilized, some aren’t. Overtime ends with phantom blood on your hands and being strong-armed into drinks in the park afterwards.
You feel awkward, because you don’t work with the day shift people that often, so you’re not really sure how best to be yourself and not come across as weird. Neither of your “safe” people (Trinity and Dennis) are present, so there’s no way in hell you’re going to be capable of relaxing.
You take the beer that’s tossed to you, even though you think beer is gross (why does it taste like that? Why do people enjoy it?) and sip on it excruciatingly slowly, trying to hide a grimace and occasionally chiming in with mentally rehearsed and carefully crafted jokes and comments.
It’s exhausting, and not at all how you wanted to spend your night after an MCI. In a dream world, you don’t have the social backbone of a wet paper bag, and you say no, and you go home to your house and shower, then watch one, maybe two episodes of a tv show, scroll through Pinterest, and then go the fuck to bed.
But for the low low price of much needed rest, you get to drink one of the most disgusting alcoholic beverages known to man and worry if everyone thinks you’re being weird! Yay!
Also. Side note. Minor comment. Little issue.
Jack Abbot is sitting next to you. Like, right next to you on the bench. Because he came late and it was the last spot open. So he’s just right there. Posture loose and open and not at all like he didn’t just help you try to save a girl your age who had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Like two hours ago your elbows weren’t brushing, elbow deep in a man’s organs, saving his life.
Jack, unlike you, looks comfortable to be at the park with everyone. He doesn’t look like he’s analyzing conversation to determine the best thing to say next.
Jack isn’t looking at everyone. He’s not looking at anyone. He’s looking at you.
You turn, give him a little smile.
Again.
Maybe he doesn’t know you can still see him out of the corner of your eye. (No, he’s a vet, he’d definitely also have wide peripheral vision. But maybe he thinks that you don’t have it, because you’re not a vet.)
(You’re probably thinking too much about the peripheral vision.)
Jack doesn’t stop staring at you. Instead, he reaches over to where your barely-drunk beer is in your hands, and says:
“Here, give me that.”
And then he just. Takes your beer. Straight out of your hands.
Jesus fucking fuck he so hates you.
—
“He took your beer?”
“Yes,” You groan from the kitchen island in Trinity’s apartment, “He said ‘here, give me that’ and then just took it. He didn’t say anything else to me for the rest of the night.”
She lets out a low whistle. “Maybe he doesn’t like you. What could you have possibly done to make him not like you?”
“I don’t know!”
“Well, you better fix it. Having your attending hate your guts will like, majorly suck.”
“I don’t know how to fix it. That’s what i’m over here for. To brainstorm.”
“I thought you were here to steal the cookies Huckleberry made?”
Dennis peeks his head up from the couch. “Wait, what?”
You wave a hand. “Semantics. Focus.”
“Okay,” Trinity taps a pencil on a notepad, “Have you tried sleeping with him?”
“He’s like, probably over twenty years older than me.”
“So? I know your type.”
You roll your eyes. “As if he’d go after me, Trin. He doesn’t like me.”
“Hate sex is a thing.”
“Name one time hate sex solved the hate part.”
She purses her lips. “Touché. What about like, baking him shit, like Huckleberry does for—“
“Shut up Trinity!”
You both snicker.
“No dice,” You sigh, “I can’t bake for shit. Recipes never have enough context. They’re never specific enough.”
“Two tablespoons of sugar isn’t specific enough for you?”
“You’re not helping.”
Trinity holds up her hands in mock surrender. “To be fair, I never agreed to help. I just said we’d both be here if you wanted to come over.”
“I think you should just ask him.” Dennis pipes up.
He shuffles off the couch and slides into the second chair at the kitchen island adjacent to you. “Dr. Abbot is a straightforward guy. He appreciates honesty. Doesn’t beat around the bush. I can’t imagine him being truly upset that you tried to fix a problem.”
“I want to, but that’s like. Too straightforward. What if—“
“Oh my god,” Trinity moans, “Just ask him. Or fuck him. Do something so I don’t have to hear about it anymore.”
You frown, opening your mouth to object, then close it with a sigh.
She’s right.
You have to just move on. Either deal with it or deal with it by… not dealing with it. Talk to him or don’t.
Easier said than done.
—
It takes two more shifts of unrequited awkwardness for you to finally reach your limit. At a certain point, probably when you almost snapped at him for hovering (doing his job) while you were trying to intubate a patient, you realize that you cannot, actually, just get through to him via stubborn determination.
Damn.
So when you have a second, you corner him in one of the quieter hallways. The conversation has the potential to be horrifically embarrassing and mortifying, so it’s best if there’s no audience.
“Do you have a minute, Dr. Abbot?”
He glances down at his watch, then crosses his arms and leans against the opposite wall.
He doesn’t talk (unnerving, annoying) and his sharp, ever analyzing gaze makes your skin prickle as you cross your hands behind your back and mirror his position, leaning against the wall.
He’s so irritating. He won’t even give you a fucking inch. There’s nothing to go on.
“Did I do something wrong?”
For the first time since you became a resident in the ED, he makes an expression: surprise.
“Why do you think you did something wrong?”
“Because you won’t fucking talk to me!” You hiss, absolutely fed up with Dr. Jack Abbot, “Half the time you only look at me when you think I won’t notice. You don’t talk to me unless it’s required for teaching, and even then, it’s short and stilted. I’ve seen how you interact with literally every other person who works here. I know you can be nice. You’re just not nice to me, and I’d like to know why.”
You pause. “And you took my beer!”
There’s a moment of silence, and then there’s a breathy, almost wheezing sound that takes you a minute to place.
He’s laughing.
Jack fucking Abbot starts laughing.
You honest to God want to kill him.
“Sorry,” He says, eyes sparkling with mirth and shoulders loose, “I can see how all of that can be taken negatively—“
“How else was I supposed to take that.”
Jack levels you with a look, and you shut your mouth. “But it was not my intention.”
He just stops speaking there, like that’s a perfectly adequate explanation and not at all vague and almost more disconcerting.
“So…,” You drawl, “What was your intention?”
Something interesting, a little more heated than just analytical sparks in his gaze, and he tilts his head, eyes flicking up and down your body.
Under the silence and scrutiny, you resist the urge to squirm in place, hands squeezing themselves in an effort to subdue the itch.
“You hate confrontation.”
Your chest feels like a cinder block just slammed onto it. “What?”
“You,” He levels a finger at your chest, “Hate confrontation. You hate it so much that you lie about yourself to people instead of saying things they might not like.”
You laugh nervously, voice high and reedy. “A lot of people do that. I don’t think that’s a crime.”
“It’s not. But it doesn’t exactly make me want to trust you with my residents. With my team.”
“You’re worried I’ll what? Get somebody in trouble? Do something shitty?”
“I’m worried that something is going to happen to you, and you won’t tell anyone about it.”
The hallway grows silent. In this distance there’s beeping, someone shouting orders, a child crying. But not in the five feet of space you, Jack, and the conversion currently occupies.
“Why do all of this?” You gesture vaguely to the space between you two, unwilling to be more specific. He does not deserve the itemized list you assembled in your head.
“I wanted to see if you’d confront me about it or not. Confirm my suspicions.”
“That’s—“ You wrinkle your nose, “Actually kind of shitty of you.”
Jack just hums.
“So what now? Did I prove myself to you?” Your tone is mocking.
He scoffs, “God, you really hate confrontation, don’t you?”
Your skin prickles again. “No.”
“Lying again.”
“Shut up.”
He knows how uncomfortable he’s making you. He’s doing it on purpose. And right then and there, you decide you don’t care what Jack Abbot thinks, because if Jack Abbot is going to be a self-assured asshole, Jack Abbot can go fuck himself.
Your pager going off saves you from verbalizing any of this, and with one last glare, you’re gone.
—
If Jack was an obnoxious lurker before, it doesn’t hold a damn candle to how he behaves now.
He’s just. Everywhere. Around every corner. Driving you crazy.
When you bring this up to Trinity, she looks at you like you’ve finally lost it.
Which. Okay. You probably have. But that’s beside the point! The point is…
…The point is that Jack Abbot is getting on your last nerve and you really don’t have any to spare. Life has been stomping all over the other ones, so the singular nerve Jack is stabbing with his annoying pointed looks and almost lingering touches and stupid little questions (“Hey, that was a rough one, are you alright?”) is just worn out. It doesn’t have anything left to give. You don’t have anything left to give.
But, like you were brought up to do, you keep right on giving. And working. And smiling.
Because it goes a little something like this: There’s no one to pick you up if you fall. You pick yourself up when you fall, and you’ve gotten pretty fucking good at it. All of your friends (read: Trinity and Dennis and maybe Mel) are doctors, which means you all have shitty work/life balance and no one would even be available if you called and said “Hey, every morning I lie awake and stare at the ceiling and convince myself to get up while listening to Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley, after which I will inevitably cry on the bus to work. Would you mind helping me with my laundry?”
Okay. Well. Trinity would probably show up if you asked because once she decides that you’re her friend she’s really intense about it (she’s a bit like a Doberman or some other dog like that, not that you would ever tell her) and Dennis probably would too, but only because he never says no when someone asks for help so it kind of just feels like you’re taking advantage of him. Mel is far too busy juggling being an ED doctor and caring for Becca for you to even think about asking her without feeling intense, soul crushing guilt.
So yeah. You don’t really have a best friend, unless one would count the singular romance book you’ve read so much the spine is completely fucked and the pages are yellow from years of travel and rereading. Counting any book as a best friend is probably very pathetic. But hey, don’t fix what isn’t broken.
So you have a system and a method and crying before and after work every single day is totally, completely normal, healthy, and sustainable. Probably even more so in the medical field, and especially since you’re a PGY1. Interns gotta suffer and all that jazz.
Jack Abbot does not need to make the suffering worse by existing near you constantly. Things are really honestly bad enough.
“Hey,” Trinity grabs your arm as you’re going by during a mellow shift, grip not tight enough to hurt but enough to be a bit past uncomfortable, especially for a girl not used to physical contact, “You good?”
‘No,’ You want to shout, collapsing on the floor in a heap of bones and tears, ‘I haven’t done laundry in so long that I’ve started wearing my cleanest dirty socks instead of washing more. I don’t have the energy to spend my days off doing anything productive, but every time I sleep instead of doing chores the anxiety eats me alive. I can’t sleep at night because the guilt makes me so nervous sometimes I throw up. Sometimes I don’t wash myself in the shower and I just stand in the water until it gets cold. Every day I wake up with the same headache, and then I take medicine for it, but by the time it’s gone I’m going to bed and then I wake up with it all over again. I think my liver is shot from over-the-counter medication usage. Everything hurts. I’m so tired.’
Trinity needs you to be okay. Trinity is too busy and under too much stress to worry about you. She needs you to be okay. Everyone needs you be okay.
“Mhm!” You nod, lips spread wide, “Pretty good day actually, all things considered.”
It’s not a total lie. The headache relief you’ve been taking religiously is kicking in faster than it usually does today.
Trinity scans your face, looking for signs of a lie, and she must find something (not shocking, it’s very hard to pretend that everything isn’t awful when Everything Is Really Awful) because her grip tightens minutely and she does that pursed lip thing she does when she’s worried and about to express it through anger or bitchiness.
“Don’t fuck with me. I don’t want to find out you’re like, doing drugs or something stupid like that. If you’re having a hard time—“
“Trin,” You interrupt, skin prickling uncomfortably as she implies that you’re not capable of handling things on your own, “If I need help, I know I can ask for it. And look,”
You tap your unbroken collection of glitter gel pens still intact in the front pocket of your scrubs. “It’s gotta be a good day. I still got my glitter.”
She wrinkles her nose, but drops your arm. “I don’t even know why you keep those. You can’t use them on like, anything. It’s against hospital policy.”
You shrug. “Glitter is a great motivator and mood elevator. Plus, kids love ‘em.”
You manage to feign something important coming up and duck out of the conversation and then, when the coast is clear, dart into one of the lesser used bathrooms and tuck yourself in the darkest stall.
Even in a hospital, toilet seats are disgusting, but you can’t quite summon any actual disgust as you plop down on the white porcelain, only lightly cracked, and cradle your exhausted head in your hands.
You have to keep going. There is no alternative. There is no other option.
Your chest feels tight and loose at the same time, and your skin feels clammy and wrong. Everything feels wrong. The lights are too bright and the material of your scrubs is scratchy and awful, and the longer you sit in the stall the more you want to throw up.
Someone knocks on the door before you get the chance to move down to your knees and start worshipping the porcelain altar. Assuming it to be Mel, who sometimes has a habit of showing up at the wrong time, you open the stall door to reveal none other than Jack Fucking Abbot.
You stare at him blankly for a few beats, too bewildered to feel sick. “You’re not allowed to be in here.”
“In the men’s bathroom?”
“This isn’t the men’s bathroom.”
“The sign on the door would say otherwise.”
Embarrassment brings the nausea back tenfold. You hold the stall door in a white knuckle grip to keep yourself upright and from hurling onto your boss.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I swear I didn’t do this on purpose—“
Jack raises an eyebrow, his hands folded behind his back. Military man, right.
“Clearly.”
You stumble forward. “I need to go—“
“Woah, down girl. I didn’t knock because I cared which toilet you use. You work here. Use whatever toilet you want. Preferably not the one in the attending’s lounge.”
“There’s an attending’s lounge?”
“No.” He grins, a devilish upturn to just the corner of his lips.
“Oh,” You pause, then catch up to the rest of what he said, “Then why’d you knock?”
“Cause it kind of sounded like you were dying in there, and I’d rather if you didn’t.”
“Why not?”
“The paperwork, for one. Two, Santos would probably shank me.”
“Ah.”
“Also,” He shrugs, “I’d miss you.”
You scoff. “No you wouldn’t.”
“I would.”
“You don’t like me. You don’t even trust me.”
Jack gets this pinched look on his face; his lips pull down, his brows furrow and he narrows his eyes, just a bit.
He opens his mouth to respond when the door bangs open.
Jack doesn’t even look up before he’s barking:
“Find another bathroom.”
“But I have to—“
“Find another bathroom or I’ll cut your dick off.”
The guy grumbles away, but Jack never takes his eyes off you. It’s unnerving— to be the sole focus of his attention.
You’re the first to break the now tense silence of the bathroom.
“That seemed a bit extreme.”
“I’m not a man who does things by halves.”
“No,” You sigh, “I suppose you’re not.”
Jack cocks his head to side, almost predatory. More methodical than anything. He looks at you— really looks at you. Shamelessly drags his eyes up your body, likely cataloguing every mystery bruise, frown line, eye bag, freckle, and all the million lines of exhaustion that seem etched on your very being, right down through the bones and marrow.
He sighs, crossing his arms before leaning back on the opposite wall of the bathroom.
“What am I going to do with you?”
His words instantly have you on edge, bristling at all the unsaid things behind his tone.
“I’m not something to be dealt with. I’m a person, not some fucking—“
“You’re like a stray cat,” He interrupts, “Always hissing. Do I need to win you over with treats? Should I start bringing canned tuna?”
“You’re an asshole.”
“And you’re drowning.”
Just like that, all the humor gets sucked from the room, replaced with the cold, sharp grip of reality. Suddenly exhausted by the weight of it all, you drop back down onto the toilet seat.
Jack gives you a few moments to respond, get angry, or defend yourself, but you don’t. He’s too good at reading you, it seems. What is there to say?
When you don’t speak, he does.
“Did you think no one would notice?”
“No one has.”
“Am I no one?”
You lean back, closing your eyes and awkwardly resting the back of your head against the wall and the back of the toilet.
“You’re nosy.”
If this were any other moment, any other scenario with any other person, you would never ever act so contrary. But you’re tired and Jack seems to bring out the worst in you.
He makes an amused huffing noise. “You’re good at what you do, I’ll give you that.”
“What, exactly, am I doing?”
“Pretending.”
You scoff. “Fuck off.”
“Come on, sweetheart. How much longer are you going to do this to yourself?”
You lift your head off the back of the toilet. “You act like I’m killing myself:”
“You are,” His inclined his head, “Just really slowly.”
You scrub a hand down your face.
“Look. I understand why you think you have to care, but you don’t. I’m just going through a rough patch. I’ll get through them like I always do. I’m not gonna crash and burn or endanger myself or do whatever it is you’re worried I’m going to do, okay? So you can leave me alone. I’m fine.”
Jack doesn’t get to respond, because the second the words are out of your mouth the nausea that’s been churning in your stomach since you made it to the bathroom rises all at once, and you barely have time to slide off the toilet and turn before you’re throwing up hard enough to almost choke.
The worst part is that you forgot to eat lunch so your stomach is woefully, painfully empty. You’re throwing up nothing but bile, throat burning and tears streaming down your face.
“Alright, come on,” A warm hand rubs soothing circles on your back, and if you weren’t busy hurling your guts out, you’d marvel at the feeling and juxtaposition between the Jack you know, who’s all cold indifference, and the Jack currently holding your hair out of your face while you vomit.
“Let it out,” He soothes, hand still rubbing, “Don’t fight it. It’ll be over soon.”
“I hate throwing up.” You choke, coughing and gasping.
“No one does. But you’ll feel better when it’s over.”
Over feels like it’s never going to come. But eventually your stomach stops clenching, you manage to stop heaving, and you’re slumped over the toilet, sucking down gulps of air, sweat beading on your forehead and the back of your neck.
“This,” You mumble in between gasps, “Means nothing.”
You can’t see Jack’s expression, but his response is so quiet you almost miss it.
“Okay.”
You can’t see his face, but you know this isn’t over.
—
Jack sends you home once you’re capable of standing on your own two feet without shaking like a newborn fawn.
(“You can’t send me home.”
“Yes I can. You’re not allowed to come back to work after throwing up in the bathroom.”
“We both know I’m not the only person to do it.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t caught the other people in the wrong bathroom and held their hair back while they vomited.”
“…”
“You only have two hours left anyway. Go home.”)
The problem lies in the fact that the buses aren’t running yet, which means that you can’t, actually, get home. Your house is an hour away on foot. An hour you’d normally be capable of walking, but your phone is almost dead, you’re exhausted, and you still feel a little weak because of the vomiting.
So after retrieving your things from your locker, you find yourself sitting on the little bench outside the PTMC, waiting for the minutes to tick by. If you didn’t bring at least one book with you everywhere you go in case of emergencies (like this one) you probably would have just walked into oncoming traffic.
It’s cold out and your jacket is cheap so you have to burrow into it, hood up to retain any semblance of warmth. It would be almost cozy —huddled in your jacket, watching the city go by, tucked into your favorite romance book— if the shift hadn’t gone the way it had and if a grueling bus ride and half mile walk didn’t await you once the buses finally start running. Waiting for you beyond that is just chores and an empty apartment.
Your fingers tighten on the edges of your book.
“Why the fuck are you still here?”
You jolt in place, cracking your neck over to the side and blinking blearily.
Jack. Again.
He makes an expectant face at you as if to say ‘Well?’ when you don’t answer immediately.
Your eyes dart back and forth nervously, even though you know you haven’t done anything wrong. “The buses aren’t running yet. It’s an hour walk to my house.”
Jack scrubs a hand down his face and curses under his breath.
“How long until your bus gets here?”
You check your phone. Shit. Only four percent left.
“And hour and a half. Maybe a little longer if it’s running behind more than usual.”
He seems put out by your answer, as if the bus’s heavily fluctuating schedule is of personal consequence and offense to him.
“Um,” You start, both uncomfortable at having been caught reading a romance book in public and at the general air of frustration Jack seems to be venting at the moment, “I’m fine. I have my book. I don’t mind waiting.”
Jack just sighs.
“Do you really think I’m just going to leave you out here, in the cold, after you threw up in the bathroom, to wait for the bus, for nearly two more hours?”
You wince. “Well, it doesn’t sound great when you put it like that.”
He works his jaw. “Have you eaten?”
“No…?”
He shakes his head.
“Come on. You’re coming with me.”
—
“I have to admit, this isn’t where I thought we were going.
Thirty minutes later finds you seated on the cracked vinyl seat of a booth in a cheap diner, staring at a menu and rationalizing spending your last $15 on what will probably be mediocre pancakes.
Jack is seated across from you, already two mugs of coffee —black, but oddly enough, decaf— and not even bothering to pretend to look at his menu. He either comes here often or doesn’t care to act like he isn’t staring at you.
Probably both.
“Where did you think we were going?”
Steam curls out of your own untouched mug of coffee —ordered for you by Jack, also unfortunately decaf— and you debate just getting up and running out of here.
Too bad you’re too exhausted to run anywhere. Jack’s probably banking on that.
“I don’t know,” You shrug, setting the menu down, “Maybe to Gloria’s office to write me up or something.”
“What would I even be writing you up for?”
“Disobeying direction? I’m sure you could come up with something.”
The waitress chooses that moment to appear, notepad in hand. “Are we ready to order?”
Jack rattles off his order, and then two sets of eyes turn to you expectantly. Before you can order the single fruit bowl you were planning on getting (the cheapest thing on the menu) Jack pipes up:
“Order whatever you actually want. Not whatever you think is cheapest or easiest.”
The waitress, a middle aged woman who has probably seen much worse than whatever the two of you have going on, just chuckles lightly under her breath.
You hesitantly list the item you’d been eyeing and thank the waitress.
It isn’t until after the menus have been taken and Jack’s coffee re-upped for the third time that you manage to courage to speak.
“You didn’t have to do this, you know.”
“I know.”
“No, I mean,” your fingers curl on the edge of the table, desperate for something to hold onto, “I can’t— It’ll be awhile until I can pay you back. I barely made rent this month.”
“Do you think I would take you to breakfast and then make you pay?”
“Yes…?”
“You’re not touching the bill, kid. I’m a gentleman.”
“Oh,” You didn’t really see that coming, “Okay.”
Jack gets a funny expression on his face, then resumes his drinking coffee and glancing out the window routine.
“So,” You say after a beat, “Was there something you wanted to talk about…?”
The silence just feels so awkward. It’s killing you.
He raises a brow. “Do you want to talk?”
“I’m asking you.”
“And I’m asking you what you want to do. What do you usually do when you come out to eat?”
“I don’t? Eating out is expensive, so. But when I do it’s usually by myself, so I end up just reading.”
Jack gestures to your bag beside you. “Don’t let me stop you.”
“What?”
“Read your book.”
“But that’s— isn’t that boring for you?”
He sets his mug down. “I didn’t bring you here because I wanted something from you. I brought you here because you had a shitty day and it seemed like you could use some cheering up. If reading makes you feel better, then do it.”
You have to look out the window to avoid his gaze. You don’t understand how your perfectly crafted facade just crumbles into fucking dust around him. How he manages to see right through you at every turn, how he manages to uncover every lie and every half truth.
“How did you even know I like diner food?”
“Because I pay attention to you.”
You finally look back over at him, arms folded across your chest; not really defensively, more like you’re trying to hold your entire body together by sheer force of will.
Jack’s lips twitch. Not really a smile, but almost. “You bring it up every time Santos wants to get food after a shift. She always says no, because she hates it, but it never stops you from suggesting it.”
It’s just one detail. One tiny, inconsequential detail that he’s apparently memorized and held onto because to him, it’s important. For some impossible to understand reason, he seems to care.
"Also," He shrugs, "I'd miss you."
You scoff. "No you wouldn't."
"I would."
“Do you hate me?”
Jack looks back at you, seemingly startled by the abrupt question.
“No.”
You take a deep, shuddering breath.
“Okay.”
—
“You did what?”
You wince from your spot lying face-down on Trinity’s couch.
“Not so loud, Trin. I have a headache.”
She ignores you, seated on the floor almost directly in front of you. “So you’ve gone from hating each other to going on a date?”
“It wasn’t a date,” You groan, “We spent almost the entire time in silence. I read my book and he stared out the window and did… whatever it is men like him do when they stare out the window.”
“Brooding,” Trinity says, “He paid. That means it’s a date.”
“No it doesn’t!”
It doesn't. It totally doesn't. Just because Jack said he doesn't hate you doesn't mean he likes you either. There are a lot of emotions in between hate and love. Like toleration, for example. Mild amusement. Exasperation. An appropriate amount of annoyance.
Trinity pokes you on the back of your head, having none of it.
"He likes you. Why else would he willingly hang out with one of us after work?"
"He goes out for drinks in the park sometimes." You mumble.
"Yeah, after an MCI."
What Trinity doesn't know is the events leading up to breakfast at the diner, because that would involve telling her about the whole throwing up from anxiety in the men's bathroom directly after a mini-panic attack because she confronted you about your unhealthy lifestyle (which all just sounds a lot worse than it is), so there isn't really a way to give her the kind of context necessary to get her off your back and dissuade her from her (insanely insane) belief that Jack likes you. Romantically.
"Trust me Trin, he was just being nice. Nothing romantic about it."
It was kind of romantic. Just eating surprisingly good food in the company of someone you don't need to pretend around, enjoying being in the company of another human being without worry or expectation.
Not that she needs to know that.
"Jack doesn't do nice. Have you seen him? What happened to the hating?"
You shrug. "You'll just have to ask him, because I don't know."
You do know. He told you. Explained it.
It doesn't make sense.
Trinity throws her hands in the air dramatically.
"Whatever. You two are impossible."
She finally withdraws, leaving you to wallow in your headache-induced misery by yourself on her couch.
Your phone vibrates on the floor next to you, and you groan, rolling further over to hide yourself in the crack of the couch, shunning the light like the reclusive vampire you are.
Your phone vibrates again.
“Dennis,” your voice is muffled by the couch cushion so it ends up sounding more like ‘denim’, “Can you please see who’s texting me and tell them to fuck off?”
Dennis, who was eating cereal at the tiny table near the kitchen when you first showed up fifteen minutes ago and has pointedly stayed silent throughout the entire exchange between you and Trinity, finally speaks.
“Your phone is two inches away from your hand.”
“I have a headache I don’t wanna look at the screen.”
You feel rather than actually see him roll his eyes, but then there’s the clink of a spoon against a bowl and the faint sound of socked —you’ve genuinely never seen him ever be barefoot under any circumstances, no matter what, he’s always wearing socks— feet as they make their way over to your temporary pit (couch) of despair.
There’s a quiet rustle as he picks up your phone off the floor.
“Oh.”
You whine, dramatic and upset. “What?”
“Um,” He grabs your shoulder, slowly rolling you over and away from the back of the couch, “It’s Jack?”
“What!?” You screech.
You throw yourself up, wincing as you immediately regret it when the pain in your head doubles, take a steadying breath to ignore it, and then grab the phone from Dennis’s outstretched hand.
You turn on the phone and— yep. Sure enough. A text from Jack, complete with the stupid picture of a dinosaur you made his profile picture. Because he’s old.
(It was funnier at the time.)
Somewhere behind you there’s a crash, and then the thump thump thump that can only mean a person running towards you at dangerous speeds for sock covered feet on cheap linoleum.
“Incoming,” Dennis mutters.
“Did I just hear that right?” Trinity gasps, nearly giving herself blunt force trauma via the back of the couch, “Did Jack just text you?”
“I don’t know!” You cry.
“How do you not know! Your phone is right in your fucking hands!”
“I’m tired! Stop yelling at me!”
“Guys!” Dennis shouts, holding up his hands, “I refuse to spend my day off listening to you two argue over the validity of romance with our attending. Give me the phone.”
He snatches the phone without waiting for a response, quickly typing in your password (if there was ever a moment you regret telling him in case of emergency…) and opening the text.
He makes an incredulous face at the phone before saying:
“He asked what you’re doing today.”
Trinity claps once. “Fucking called it!”
“Trinity!” Dennis snaps, before sighing and tapping at your keyboard, “I’m telling him that you have a headache and you’re at our place and to please not text again—“
“No!” You squeal, launching yourself off the couch, arms outstretched, but your legs tangle over each other and you fall and slam, gloriously and beautifully, face first into the coffee table.
“Oo!” Trinity winces, covering her mouth.
“Oh my god!” Dennis balks, “Are you okay?”
“Just give me the fucking phone.”
Peeling your face off, you grab the phone, squinting at the screen and ignoring the black spots in the corner of your vision.
hi, you type, I’m at Trinity and Dennis’s. Did you need something?
You hit send before you can talk yourself out of it.
“We,” You haul yourself to your feet and stagger over to the kitchen table, “Will never speak of this.”
“I definitely am. When I’m the maid of honor at your guys wedding, I’m gonna give a speech and be all ‘you guys, she gave herself a concussion the first time he texted—‘“
“There will be no wedding!”
“That’s just what you think.”
Your phone vibrates again, signaling a response.
Just wondering how you were doing. Surprised to hear you’re not holed up in your apartment reading something.
Ah, sexy old men and their correct grammar and punctuation when texting. Shouldn’t be endearing.
“What’s he saying?”
“Go away!”
You tap out a quick response.
Not today unfortunately lol I have a headache so no reading for me
Isn’t this the sixth day in a row you’ve had a headache? Should I give neuro a call?
You stomach flips.
nooo I’m fine i get them all the time
That’s not exactly reassuring.
I went to the doctor for them awhile ago apparently they’re normal
Who?
if I tell you, are you going to call him and make him send over my chart?
Yes.
Your heart is starting to pound a fluttering beat in your chest, and you hunch over your phone.
then i’m not telling you. it’s fine, really
they usually go away when i take over the counter stuff
So your plan is just to destroy your liver?
pretty much
We need to work on your planning skills.
we?
I’m not doing all the work.
Now stop looking at your phone. Drink some Gatorade and take a nap.
this is a resident apartment there’s no gatorade here just redbulls
Have either of them buy you one. I’ll pay whichever one it is later. Go to sleep. You need it.
You turn off your phone, shuffling back over to the couch and flopping down onto it.
“I’m taking a nap. Jack wants one of you to go buy me a Gatorade. He said he’d pay you back later.”
“He said what?”
—
You end up sleeping the entire day away, which should have screwed up your sleep schedule, but thankfully you live in a state of perpetual exhaustion and are fully capable of falling asleep anytime, anywhere, no matter how much you last sleep. It’s a gift.
Shockingly, the shift you work the next day is actually much easier to survive and your smiles aren’t nearly as forced. Go figure. Who knew that getting an appropriate amount of sleep would be so helpful?
“Somebody’s in a better mood today.” Jack mutters as you sidle up next to him under the board.
“I’m pretty sure I slept for like, fourteen straight hours. Thanks for the Gatorade, by the way. I woke up around hour three, chugged it, and then went back to sleep. No headache when I woke up!”
“Wonderful,” He drawls, “It’s almost like taking care of yourself is actually beneficial.”
“I take care of myself plenty.”
He casts you a sidelong glance, expression pinched.
“When was the last time you drank water without being prompted?”
“That’s different.”
“Okay,” He dips his head, “When was the last time you ever felt truly relaxed?”
You give him a beaming smile, so wide it hurts. “We’re not going to talk about this right now!”
“You started this conversation. I’m trying to do my job.”
You snort. “You’re waiting to see if someone else is going to take the sunburn guy.”
“Are you accusing an attending of cherry picking?”
“Of course not. Just observing, sir.”
Jack’s turned to look at you now, head tilted up, hands folded behind his back.
When you say sir, his eyes flick down to your lips, and then his jaw tightens.
The air suddenly becomes charged, the space between you two filled with something too electric to be air.
It smells like aftershave, hospital antiseptic, wanting, and something that’s distinctly masculine.
You look away first, swallowing hard past the sudden dryness of your mouth.
“You know,” You say, crossing your arms and looking up at the board, “Trinity thinks you like me. Romantically.”
“Mm.”
“I told her that was dumb,” You babble, “Obviously it’s not true, but. She won’t let it go, so if she says something, just ignore her. Or not. Whatever you want.”
“Why wouldn’t it be true?”
You whip your head around so fast you’re pretty sure something cracks. “What?”
“I mean,” Jack’s voice is gruff as he shrugs once, “Is that really so unrealistic?”
“Of course it is,” You sputter, “You don’t like me.”
“I’ve actually never said that. That was a conclusion you came to on your own. I distinctly recall telling you that I don’t hate you.”
“Just because you don’t hate me doesn’t mean that you like me, let alone— like that.”
Jack tilts his head, almost predatory, and all that sharp tension rushes straight back in.
“Like what?”
Something hot and dangerous is starting to unfurl in your chest, untethering from where it was previously lodged deep behind your ribs, out of sight, out of feeling.
“Code Blue en route, ETA two minutes.”
Jack jerks his head in the direction of the ambulance bay. “You gonna go get that?”
“Uh,” You’re pretty sure you’re stroking out, having a seizure, or something, because the only thing you’re capable of comprehending is the fact that Jack just not-so-subtly implied to actually liking you. Romantically.
“Get going then.”
You scurry away, hot all over and absolutely done with emotions in their entirety.
—
The rest of the week is hell on Earth. Perks of being in your twenties.
Things could be worse though!
Kind of.
It’s just that it’s been several days since Jack basically confirmed Trinity’s suspicions on romance and you can’t stop thinking about it. Obsessively.
It’s bad.
Bad enough that when Mel asked if there was any way you could cover her shift, you said yes.
“Okay,” Dennis stage-whispers as you’re downing your third coffee of the day, miserably charting at the nurses station, “I feel the need to ask how bad things can possibly be if you’re covering a day shift.”
“Mel asked.”
Dennis blinks incredulously. “You love Mel, but not enough to work a day shift voluntarily.”
“What exactly are you asking me here?”
“Did you and Jack hit a rough patch or something?”
“Keep your voice down!” You hiss, ducking your head as if you can hide from Princess and Perlah, “And for your information, no. We didn’t. I just wanted to do something nice for Mel.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t need you to believe me.”
Day-shift crawls on in a whirlwind of chaos and a level of dumb-fuckery that can only be achieved from the hours of 8 a.m to 8 p.m. As usual, the place is understaffed, overcrowded, and filled with a lingering sense of impending doom.
By the time night-shift starts filtering in, you’re ready to completely give up and start a new life a sheep rancher in New Zealand. It’s always been the plan if being a doctor didn’t work out.
Jack finds you in the locker room once the handoff is over, sitting on the little bench in the same position Dennis found you in earlier. Face in your hands, heels in your eyes, methodically counting breaths and wondering if that fluttering feeling in your chest is from caffeine consumption or sleep deprivation.
It’s fine. Your fine. Everything is fine.
“You don’t look too good.”
“I’m—“
“Don’t say you’re fine.”
“But I am,” You grit, “I just need a minute.”
“Okay.”
There’s the distinct sound of Jack’s slightly uneven footsteps, and then there’s a warm weight pressed against your side.
You take another shuddering breath that feels less like breathing and more like placing a single brick in a wobbly foundation.
“Shouldn’t you be out on the floor?”
“I don’t work tonight.”
You raise your head just enough to look at him. “You don’t? I thought I saw you on the schedule. Why are you here if you don’t work?”
Now that you’re looking at him and not starburst patterns on the back of your eyelids, you can see that he’s wearing casual clothes, not scrubs, and he doesn’t have his usual army-issue backpack with him.
“I got Shen to cover me. I came here for you.”
Your next breath in almost gets stuck in your chest, air struggling to move past that alive and wriggling thing that keeps moving every time Jack is around.
“What’d you do that for?”
The barest hints of a smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “Dennis called me. He said you’d need picking up after your shift.”
Shame, guilt, and embarrassment flood your veins, turning your blood into sickly-sweet poison that makes your stomach roll and twist.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I have no idea why he did that. You really didn’t have to drive all the way over here, I swear I didn’t tell him to call you or something like that—“
“I know you didn’t,” Jack soothes, voice a rumbly, smooth timber that washes over your permanently-frazzled nerves like a balm, “Which is why I came.”
“I don’t understand.”
Jack stands, pulling your bag and change of clothes out of your locker.
“I’m going to ask you a question, and I need you to be honest with me, so you don’t have to answer it again. Can you do that for me?”
You nod once.
“Words.”
“Uh— yeah. Yes.”
“Good.”
Thank god the locker room is empty— everyone’s either on the floor or already left for their homes.
He closes your locker down, shoulders your bag, and hands you your clothes.
“Is it easier for you to accept help when you don’t have to ask and don’t get the chance to say no?”
It sounds so pathetic, hearing it laid out like that. The ugly guts of you; cut open, laid bare, and marked for research. Exhibit A, the inside of the girl no one ever needed to worry about.
You don’t want to agree. You want to laugh it off, maybe run away from it. Sit up straight, wipe your face, take the bag from Jack and explain that this is all a big misunderstanding and you’re perfectly fine and he can stop worrying about you now.
“Yes.”
Jack doesn’t verbally acknowledge your response besides a single dip of his head, like he knows that if he does anything more it’ll turn your response into a confession and that’s just too vulnerable for the hospital locker room.
“I’ll drive you home.”
“I don’t mean to be this way, you know.”
The passenger seat of Jack’s car isn’t somewhere you’d ever imagined yourself being. Not even late at night or on the bus when you’re pretending to be someone else who’s better at chasing what they want.
“It stopped being intentional a long time ago,” your hands are fisted into the material of your sweatpants, nails digging into the fabric, “It was just the natural progression of things. I like being liked.”
What you don’t say, what becomes an unspoken truth that lingers in the air despite not being verbalized, is the survival aspect of it. Why and how a person fuses this kind of thing to their personality; to their life. The circumstances that makes the natural progression of things end it being better for everyone if you just don’t have needs.
“I know.”
“I know you know, I just… needed to tell you. Myself.”
It’s odd seeing Jack illuminated by streetlights instead of fluorescent overheads. It’s odd being able to watch his hand flex on the steering wheel, watching his forearm tense as he shifts gears in his old stick-shift.
“You like being told what to do.”
Your face heats, but you’re determined not to lose face now. Especially after managing to survive being emotionally flayed open, willingly, by him.
“It feels safe. If I know what yo— someone wants, then I can’t mess it up, and I can relax.”
You can practically see the gears turning in Jack’s mind.
“Makes sense.”
The rest of the drive is quiet, the silence only filled by the sounds of Pittsburgh around you and the gentle crackle of something from the radio turned down too low to hear.
And for the first time in longer than you can remember, you begin feeling something that approaches calm.
Jack doesn’t have any expectations. There isn’t any one particular way he wants you to act or expects you to behave like. There’s nothing he wants you to do.
So you do what you want to do.
You relax.
—
In the weeks following Jack driving you home, there is a quantifiable shift in behavior between the two of you.
He starts pulling back.
It strikes you as odd first, and your natural inclination is to pull back too— to guard the soft, vulnerable bits you’ve showed him in case he throws them back at you.
But then you realize what he’s doing.
Instead of telling you how to proceed on a case when you come to him for advice, he asks you questions and steers you to the answer. He holds back when he’s evaluating a case with you, patiently following your lead and only interjecting when necessary.
He’s making space for you try new things and learn without fear of rejection. Building your confidence bit by bit.
It feels more intimate than sex.
After much deliberation, screaming into your pillow, and Reddit forum searching for HR violations, you decide to get him a card. Because he’s actually been really kind and helpful and he makes you feel like you can actually survive residency.
“What’s this?”
“A thank you card.”
You’re staring at your shoes, eyes flicking up and down between Jack’s face and the floor.
“What for?”
“It says it in the card.”
You scurry away, attaching yourself to the closest patient to avoid seeing Jack’s face when he does finally open it.
But when you look back, he’s just staring at it, a small smile on his face.
—
It’s the card that does him in.
Jack hasn’t made his feelings for you a secret, despite your unwillingness to see him as anything other than standoffish in the beginning.
He came on too strong at first— that was his fault. He didn’t yet understand how imbedded your need ran and how long it’d been since anyone bothered to look deeper.
He’d hoped, at least, that you were letting Whitaker and Santos help, and though you let them closer than most, it was clear you still seemed intent on holding up yourself and everyone around you on your own.
But it wasn’t just that. It was the way you oozed kindness— like it was a byproduct of your existence. He watched you get so wrapped up in being the perfect resident, perfect friend, perfect person, that no one ever stopped to let you know how good you were just by being.
He hadn’t planned on developing feelings or anything of the sort. At first, you’d just been one of his residents. Smart and capable but lacking confidence in yourself to fully commit. Then there was that MCI, and drinks in the park afterwards where he’d painfully watched you sip a beer you clearly hated, and everything just clicked right into place.
He never intends to flirt with you. It just happens. He can’t help himself. He’s a weak fucking man when it comes to you.
And then you bring him a card. A fucking card. To thank him for doing his job as an attending, a job he should’ve been doing better from the start. It has an illustration of bananas on it and says “Thanks a bunch!”.
He knows he’s completely gone, then. He was capable of being in denial before, could delude himself into thinking that what he felt was casual, but the sight of you before him, hands nervously wringing, your glitter gel pens sparkling as they caught the light was just the final nail in the coffin.
He allows himself a modicum of flirting on a day to day basis, mostly because if he couldn’t tease that real smile out of you at least once per day, he’d lose his mind.
Sometimes he takes you back to the diner, especially on longer days where none of your smiles reach your eyes and you start obsessively uncapping and capping your gel pens.
Even though you think it “looks dumb” you’ve also taken to sitting shoulder to shoulder with him in the booth, and he pretends he can’t see you sneaking fries off his plate because he knows how much effort it takes you to ask him if you can sit with him instead of on the opposite side.
Then he starts driving you home during a string of bad weather after you start sneezing from walking in the rain everyday, but even after the storm passes and the weather clears up he still finds you at the lockers, every day, car keys in hand. No matter how many times he does it, you always look so happily surprised that he’s still offering.
As if he’s not wrapped around your finger.
One day, after things have been mellow for awhile, Whitaker calls him and says that neither he nor Trinity have seen you in three days and you called out of work.
So naturally, as a calm and collected man, he showed up to your house.
You’d answered the door after the third time he knocked (which was great, because he was gearing up to force the door open) and you just looked miserable. Your hair was a mess, you head blanket wrinkles imprinted onto your face, and your eyes were puffy.
“Jack?” You’d mumbled, squinting your eyes against the not very bright light in the hallway, “Why are you at my apartment?”
“No one’s heard from you in three days.”
You wince. “I swear I meant to text Trinity. I just have a bad headache.”
His fingers twitch towards a penlight he doesn’t have. “How bad?”
“I don’t know. Like a seven on the pain scale?”
“Jesus— I’m coming in.”
“Nooo,” You cry, but shuffle back from the door and put up very little fight as he ushers you to the couch.
Your apartment is….. exactly as messy as he’d imagined a resident who lives alone would be. For someone who doesn’t drink enough water, there are an incredible amount of beverage bottles and cans littered about.
“Do you have headache relief?”
You gesture to the kitchen. “Cabinet furthest to the left.”
While rifling through your very disorganized medicine cabinet, he spies an orange prescription bottle with your name on it, dated for the previous year.
“Why do you have a prescription for a high level antihistamine?”
“Stop snooping. It’s for my migraines.”
“You’ve had a prescription this entire time and you’ve been taking all that over the counter shit?”
“Stop being mad,” You mumble into the couch cushion, “My migraine meds put me to sleep, so I can’t take them when I’m working. Plus I don’t have any refills left so I save them for when it’s really bad.”
“You called out of work and haven’t left your apartment in three days and you don’t consider this bad?”
“Could be worse. Could be throwing up.”
He sighs. Sets the bottle on the counter, breathes in once, then lets it out slowly. Imagines all the ways he could murder whoever made you think suffering alone for three days is preferable to asking for help.
“I’m going to help you back to bed,” He starts, voice low as he rounds the couch, “And then you’re going to drink some electrolytes, have a snack, and take your meds. Okay?”
The migraine has clearly taken it out of you, because you put up zero fight as he manhandles you to your feet and helps you drag yourself back to your bed.
“M’ sorry my apartment is a mess. I was supposed to clean it.”
“I’m not judging, sweetheart,” He says, tucking the blankets up around you, lips twitching as you make grabby hands for a giant triceratops plushie that looks to be the size of your upper body. “I’m gonna make you a snack, so try to stay awake until I come back. Can you do that?”
“Mhm. I’ll try.”
“Good girl.”
He manages to find a cucumber in your fridge, cuts it into slices and then adds a few pieces of lunch meat for protein. Last but not least, he snags a bottle of blue Gatorade from your pantry.
(He only knows they were there because he bought them for you a few weeks ago.)
He doesn’t make you sit up to eat, but instead scoots you a little ways away from the edge of your bed so there’s space for the plate.
You slowly nibble your way through, taking little sips of Gatorade when he nudges the bottle into your hands.
You finish the cucumbers, eat most of the lunch meat, and drink half the Gatorade before burrowing back into the blankets and declaring yourself done.
“Can I have my sleep mask please? I think it’s on the floor under my nightstand?”
“Of course you can.”
After your face mask is on and the curtains closed, he gives you the correct dose of your meds and gently shuts the door to your bedroom.
He fires off a quick text to Whitaker (he doesn’t have Santos’s number) that says you’re fine, stuck in bed with a migraine, and that he’s handling it.
And then he gets to work.
Two hours later your apartment is clean, your laundry is started, and Jack’s relaxing on your couch, aimlessly watching the news.
He hears the door creak open but knows you hate feeling on the spot, so he keeps his gaze trained on the tv even as he hears the sound of you shuffling over to the couch.
And then you pause.
“Jack.”
“Yes?”
“Did you clean my apartment?”
He finally looks over to you, and when his gaze reaches your face his stomach drops.
You’re crying.
He hauls himself off the couch (he’s thankful that he put his leg back on a few minutes prior) and stops in front of you, arms twitching at his sides with the need to fix, help, to stop whatever it is that’s making you cry.
“What’s wrong? Did I overstep?”
“No,” You warble, voice wet, “I just haven’t had the time or energy to clean in here for so long, and it’s been stressing me out so bad I avoid staying here during my off days. It’s just really, really nice of you.”
You look at him, eyebrows pinched and eyes wide with worry, “I— I’m not sure how to repay you for all of this. I know you said going to the diner was fine, but this is— a lot.”
“Sweetheart,” He starts, bracing one hand on the side of your face, thumb deftly sweeping across your cheek and wiping away the quickly drying tears, “I’m not doing any of this because I expect you to repay me. I’m doing it because I care about you and I want to see you happy.”
You sniff hard. “This is a lot of work, though.”
“I like doing it. I like taking care of you.”
Another sniff. “It doesn’t seem very fun.”
“I told you. You’re like a cat. Had to coax you over and now look at you,” he thumb rubs circles over your cheekbone, “Practically purring.”
You wrinkle your nose. “I don’t know if I like this metaphor.”
“Get used to it.”
You sigh, dramatic and long.
“I suppose I’ll allow it.”
“Oh, you’ll allow it, huh.”
You fold your hands behind your back, rocking back and forth on your heels. “Yes. I’ll allow it.”
“Well, aren’t I lucky.”
Later, when you’re lying on the couch, two movies into what Jack thinks is an unofficial early 2000s rom-com marathon (your favorite genre) you turn to look up at him from your spot tucked into his side.
“This is romantic, right?”
He presses a lazy kiss to your forehead, because he knows how much you like physical affirmations as well as verbal ones.
“Yes.”
“You’re serious about this?”
“You need confirmation?”
“I’d rather have it in writing, but this will do for now.”
He huffs a breathy laugh, tucks you closer to his chest.
“I’ll put it in writing for you later.”
You hum, pleased, and snuggle back into him, letting out a content sigh.
You’re both right where you want to be.
Your Husband Is Who? - Jack Abbot
Pairing: Jack Abbot x Reader
WC: 1.4k
Summary: A routine IT call in the ED turns into an unexpected reveal when Santos realizes the quiet IT specialist she’s been talking to is married to the doctor she works with.
A/N: Requests are welcome! This work is entirely mine and has been proofread with Grammarly.
Masterlist
Your pager went off mid-sip.
The page had come in as “urgent” which, in hospital terms, usually meant one of the doctors couldn’t figure out how to access their records without their badge automatically logging them in.
It was one of those calls that could be quickly fixed if they bothered to remember their hospital-given access codes.
You grabbed your coffee, badge swinging against your chest as you made your way down to the ED.
The second the elevator doors slid open, the chaos hit you. Phones were ringing, stretchers rolling in, voices overlapping. All of it made you grateful to be hidden away in a room for most of the day.
You made your way to the nurses' hub; it was bound to be the location of the confused doctor.
“Someone called for IT?”
“That would be me.”
You followed the voice to find Dr. Trinity Santos sitting there, staring at a frozen screen as if it had personally betrayed her.
“I’ve been trying to fill out charts forever,” she huffed. “Damn thing kicked me out.”
You stepped in beside her, setting your coffee down carefully before leaning over the keyboard.
“Let me guess,” you said, already reaching for the mouse. “ You tried a couple of passwords, got locked out, and now it's not letting you in.”
Santos pointed at you as you’d just insulted her personally. “First of all, I tried multiple passwords. It’s the damn computer that won't take them.”
“Incorrect passwords are still incorrect to the computer,” you mention lightly, finger moving across the keys as you pull up the backend system.
She groaned, dropping back in her chair. “I swear, technology has it out for me.”
You smiled to yourself, suppressing a laugh. “Technology is a neutral party, but user error isn’t, however–”
“Don’t,” she warned, though there was no real heat behind it.
You hummed, still working. “Alright, I’m going to unlock your account. It might take a couple of minutes.”
She leaned back in her chair, eyes catching on your ring while you typed.
“That’s a really nice ring.”
You glanced down, almost like you’d forgotten it was there, your thumb brushing over the band without thinking.
“Oh yeah, thanks,” you said, a small smile slipping through. “My husband actually picked it out on his own.”
“Did he?” Santo leaned forward slightly, interest replacing her earlier frustration. “Damn girl, he must make a pretty penny. That’s a good choice.”
You laughed at her comment, a grin spreading. “He’s a doctor.”
Santos blinked. “Of course he is.”
“How do you even make that work?” she continued. “I barely have time to see my fling that works here, let alone manage to date or marry anyone.”
“You get used to it.” You shrugged, “Schedule lines up sometimes. Other times you just make time even if it's not very long.”
“That sounds way too functional,” Santos muttered. “Are you sure he’s actually a doctor?”
“Pretty sure.”
“Does he work here?” she asked, curiosity creeping in now.
You tilted your head, like you were considering whether to answer, before just focusing back on the screen. “Try logging in again in a minute.”
Santos huffed, watching you work. “You computer people are too calm. If my job locked me out of patients, I’d lose it.”
“You are losing it,” you pointed out.
“Fair.”
There was a pause while you worked, the hum of the ED filling the space.
“So,” she said again, clearly not done talking, “married life.”
You glanced at her briefly. “What about it?
“How long have you been with Mr. Fancy pants?”
“A while,” you said vaguely.
“That’s not an answer,” she said immediately, narrowing her eyes at you.
You smiled slightly. “It’s a safe answer.”
“You’re funny. I like you.”
“Dangerous combination,” you muttered.
She ignored that. “Okay, seriously though, what’s it like being married to a doctor?”
You leaned back in the chair, still working as you spoke, as the words came easily now.
“It’s kind of funny, actually,” you started. “We met here at the hospital. I was fixing a printer no one wanted to deal with, and he was hovering like I was about to make it worse.
Santos snorted. “That tracks.”
You smiled slightly, shaking your head. “I thought he didn’t trust me at first. Kept asking if I knew what I was doing.”
“Please tell me you humbled him.”
“Oh, immediately,” you said. “I finally turned around and snapped at him, told him if he was that concerned, he could fix it himself.”
Santos let out a sharp laugh. “No—”
“Yeah,” you nodded, smiling a little at the memory. “And he just” you paused, mimicking it slightly, “kind of froze for a second.”
“Shut up.”
“I’m serious,” you said. “Then he goes all quiet and goes, ‘I just figured you might need help lifting it…’”
Santos blinked. “…lifting what?”
“The bottom panel,” you said, gesturing slightly. “The paper tray was jammed. He thought I wouldn’t be able to lift it.”
There was a beat.
Then Santos’ face lit up.
“Oh my god,” she laughed. “He was trying to help you.”
“Yeah,” you said, taking a sip of your coffee. “Just… very badly.”
“And you snapped at him?”
“I didn’t know,” you defended, smiling. “He was hovering.”
“That is so much worse for him,” she said, shaking her head. “He tried to be nice and got told off.”
You hummed. “To be fair, I fixed it without his help.”
Santos let out a quiet laugh, shaking her head. “Wow.”
She leaned forward again, interested now. “Does he still work here?”
You hesitated just long enough to be annoying on purpose. “Sometimes.”
Before she could even question it, a voice cut in from behind you both.
“Dr. Santos, trauma room four needs your signature before we can send the patient home.”
You didn’t look up right away, your gaze still on the computer loading screen, fingers idly tapping against the desk.
Santos did. “Yeah–got it, I–”
She stopped mid-sentence because Dr. Jack Abbot was standing right next to you, tablet in hand.
He was calm, as usual, not caring that he just walked into the middle of someone's conversation.
You finally glanced up, meeting his eyes for half a second.
It was hard to notice, but the small shift at the corner of his mouth gave him away. Quick enough that anyone not paying attention would’ve missed it, he added the slightest wink to match.
Your fingers stilled for just a second against the desk before you picked your coffee back up, as if nothing had happened.
Santos definitely didn't miss that.
Her brows pulled together instantly, eyes flickering between the two of you.
You, who suddenly looked just a little too composed.
Him, who was already looking back at her like nothing had happened, one hand resting against the counter just beside yours. Close enough that if either of you moved an inch, you guys would touch.
Her eyes slid back to you. Then to your ring.
Then to him.
And something clicked.
Her posture straightened just a little too much.
You took a slow sip of your coffee, unbothered.
Jack didn’t help her either.
Santos looked between the two of you one more time.
Her eyes widened.
“No way.”
You set your coffee down, pushing your chair back just slightly like you were getting ready to leave.
“Try logging in now,” you said casually.
She didn’t move.
Her mouth opened slightly. “…that’s your husband.”
You tilted your head, a small smile pulling at your lips.
“You asked if he worked here,” you reminded her lightly. “You managed to answer your own question.”
For a second, Santos just stared at you. Then at Jack. Then back at you.
Her jaw dropped.
She just stared at the two of you, eyes wide, as her brain had stalled completely.
You stood, grabbing your coffee like nothing had just happened.
“You’ll be fine, Dr. Santos,” he said evenly. A beat. “Try not to make it a department event.”
That made it worse.
Santos made a strangled sound, still staring between you and him like her brain refused to cooperate.
You stepped back from the desk. “Try logging in now,” you said, already turning away.
Jack’s eyes followed you for a moment as you walked off, expression holding the faintest hint of amusement that lingered a second too long before he looked back at Santos.
you've been friends with satoru since you both were kids. satoru always tells you about omegas are weak, clingy, and too dependent on alphas. you never really cared about secondary genders enough to argue with him. satoru turns to look at you with those bright blue eyes and grins. "we will be the strongest alphas."
the day your secondary gender test results are handed out, the class feels unusually quite. you've always doubtful that you'd present as an alpha, but the look in satoru's eyes is full of hope. you unfold the paper, eyes catch the results, an omega. you turn to look at satoru with a small shrug like it isn't a big deal, but it is for him.
you start avoiding satoru, and he never questions it. the first few months are easy enough, until you develop your pheromones. things start going missing after that. first a hair tie, handkerchief, headband. you think you've simply misplaced them. until one day, you catch a glimpse of white hair slipping out of an empty classroom, with your scraf in his hand.
you find your scarf again the next day, neatly folded on the desk, right where you left it. when you bring the scarf close to your face, satoru's pheromone clings faintly to the fabric. it calms you. so you wear it the rest of the day.
there's an alpha tries to approach you, only to stop halfway. his expression shifts the moment he catches another alpha's scent on you. across the room, satoru looks far too pleased with himself.
you start purposefully leaving your things behind on the desk, so satoru can take them whenever he wants. the scarf, hoodie, sweater are the only things he gives back. of course he always leaves his pheromones on them. then, one day, your first heat starts. you absence in the class.
satoru grows restless. he hears omega's heats aren't easy. they're painful, exhausting, and dangerous around alphas. he intimidates another omega student into delivering a bag to your dorm immediately. when you open the strange bag, there are two hoodies and spare shirts. they're all carrying the heavy scent of his pheromones.
it doesn't stop there, from the first day of your heat until the last, satoru keep sending more of his clothes. more of his scent, more of satoru. after your first heat, things between you and satoru never return to normal. he still steals your things, and you still leave them behind on purpose.
graduation comes quietly. by then, you and satoru barely speak unless necessary. still, he finds you after ceremony. "so, what are you gonna do after this?"
you glance up at him, since when did he become so tall? "I'll still work as a sorcerer, whenever they call me." you clear your throat, hiding the awkwardness. "what about you?"
"thinking of becoming a teacher."
"you? teaching?" despite everything that happened over the years, you naturally laugh when he's around. satoru just laugh with you.
"I'm sure the kids will like me, because I'm good at everything, you know." and just like that, the conversation keeps flowing.
before leaving, you stop in front of satoru. "thanks," your cheeks heated up when he gives a confusion look. "for the clothes... your pheromone helped me during heat."
"i could send my clothes to your place if you need." for once satoru doesn't joke around. and you nod your head.
you reach out a hand. "see you around, satoru."
"yeah, see you." he takes your hand, his fingers linger for a second too long before letting go. you don't notice the missing bracelet until hours later, and you don't go look for it.
years pass, you still come to solo missions and sometimes leading the new students through the assignments. one time, you go with satoru alone in a special grade mission.
your body hits the ground before satoru can catch you properly. everything goes silent for a second, then your pheromones spill into the air all at once. it's not heat, it's distress. you're in pain and exhausted.
satoru doesn't think twice, he brings you to his place. because go to infirmary, everyone could smell your pheromones. satoru carefully tends your cuts and bruises, then fill the room with the comforting scent of his pheromones.
sometime later, the smell of food slowly pulls you awake. your body still aches, the overwhelming distress from earlier is gone, replaced by the familiar comfort of satoru's pheromones lingering around the apartment.
you sit up slowly, eyes wander around the room, then stop at the box on the nightstand. you open it, there are dozens of your hair ties, bracelets, and handkerchiefs. your things, years worth of your things.
satoru walks in to check on you, he freezes, you find his secret box. when you look up at him, he lets out a breathless chuckle. "you caught me."
a small laugh slips out your lips. "no, i already knew you were the culprit."
satoru steps closer, a blush creeping up his neck. "yeah, of course you knew." he slowly sits next to you. "sometimes i look at them when i miss you."
"i thought you hated omegas." your small, hesitant voice makes satoru's head snaps back toward you. then realization slowly settles across his face, all these years, you've been avoiding him because of something he said.
"i... please ler me correct myself." his hands on your shoulders, gently turning you to face him. "i don't hate omegas, especially not you. omegas aren't weak, and i like it when you dependent on me, only me."
"i thought you wanted an alpha as a partner."
"you seriously think i care about that?" his fingers tightening on your shoulders. "wheter you're an alpha, beta, or omega... i would've still wanted you. it was always you."
your face grows warmer, instinctively look away from him. "you say embarrassing things so casually..."
a grin slowly spreads across satoru's face as he slowly leans in. "you like hearing them?"
while satoru keeps talking, your attention drifts back to the box beside you. between the bracelets and hair ties, something unfamiliar catches your eye, a small velvet ring box.you blink in confusion before picking it up. "i don't remember losing this."
the second satoru realizes what you're holding, he nearly chokes. “wait—”
too late, you already open it. the inside is a diamond ring. you turn to look at him, demand an answer.
"i was saving that." satoru's swallow hard before continues. "for romantic moments like... i take you out to candlelit dinner, dramatic confession, all that stuff."
"papa is not romantic at all." your daughter cuts into the story immediately. satoru lets out a dramatic gasp, clutching his chest like he wounded.
"that's right, papa was a coward for made mama sad for years." your eldest son is judging satoru with the same bright blue eyes.
satoru turns to look at you like he's about burst into tears. "sweets... tell our children i can be romantic."
you burst into laugh, your swell stomach trembling slightly with the movement. eventually, you force yourself to calm down, one hand resting protectively over your belly, worried the twins might get uncomfortable inside. "don't bully your papa too much, he's still trying."
your eldest son places a hand on your stomach, gently rubs the swell. "when i grow up, I'll be the best, strongest alphas. so i can protect my little siblings."
your daughter, already half asleep, crawls into satoru's arms and clings to him sleepily. "better than papa?" she mumbles.
"better than papa." your son nods seriously. satoru gasps in offense while you break into laughter all over again.
i didn't realize, i wrote this until 2 am. anw thank you for reading 🤍
Ep. 4
I love you beary much 🥹🧸💤😴
Naps with bearleb are probably the best 🥹
in retrospect
Pairing: Dr. John Shen x Reader
Rating: Mature
Length: 7.2K
Notes: Can I interest you in parentified eldest daughter falling in love with a man with some fucking whimsy
Warnings: Exes to lovers; Whump. Lots of whump; descriptions of Reader being sick multiple times (not super explicit); mentions of pregnancy (but no actual pregnancy); reader is a workaholic; cursing; flashbacks; complicated family dynamics; reader has named sisters - no physical descriptions; canon-typical medical situations; reader's age is unspecified, but she and her sisters are all adults
Summary: John’s hands hook onto the railing of the gurney, his eyes darting to your face every few seconds as your entourage of medical professionals steers you down the hall.
“So,” He offers, “Fancy seeing you here.”
And you so don’t want to let him make you smile, but you can’t help yourself.
“This is a bit much,” He adds as you’re wheeled onto the elevator, “I mean, I told you you could call and you show up at my job instead? I appreciate the effort, but you're coming off a little desperate.”
When you propel yourself out of bed, you’re blindly guided by two things: your instinctual knowledge of where your en suite bathroom is, and your stomach violently rejecting its contents.
You drop to the floor, knees roughly smacking the cold tile as you fumble with the lid of your toilet. Your body shudders as you heave, fingers gripping the cool porcelain desperately. When the sickness finally lets up, you lean back, blinking the tears from your eyes. You swallow thickly, drawing in a deep breath, then wincing as your stomach threatens to revolt again. You lean back, closing the lid and flushing the toilet as you fight to steady your breathing.
The knocking on your door makes you jump, and you raise a shaking hand to your chest, croaking,
“Yeah?”
“You okay in there?”
You nod, though your youngest sister can’t see you, then manage, “‘M fine.”
“Can I open the door?”
“...Yeah.”
It’s a moment before Lisa’s opening the door and peering inside, her brow furrowed at the sight of you where you’re still sitting on the floor.
“Are you okay?”
“You already asked me that.”
“Yeah, but that was before I saw you looking like…Well, this.”
“Who taught you to be so sweet?”
“You did.”
You offer a wobbly smile, huffing softly as you push yourself up. “Asshole.”
“Uh-huh.” Lisa folds her arms across her chest. “What the hell, by the way?”
“I don’t know,” You grumble, pumping soap into your hands and scrubbing up along your arms where you were leaning against the toilet. “Probably something I ate last night.”
“Could always call your doctor friend and make sure.”
The mention of him has your stomach churning again. “Ha-ha.”
“He should be getting off-shift soon,” Lisa adds as you rinse with mouth wash, “Could invite him over for a check-up.”
You swish, spit, and shoot Lisa a glare couched in a sickly sweet smile.
“Thanks for all of your help, Li.”
Lisa snorts, pushing off of the door frame as she drawls, “Fiiine. I’m gonna get ready for class.”
“You need a ride?”
“No, Joey’s gonna come pick me up—don’t.”
“Hm.”
“Don’t start.”
“I wouldn’t have to start if you weren’t making bad choices.”
“You never like my boyfriends.”
“That’s because all of your boyfriends—” You cut yourself off, raising a hand to staunch a nauseating belch, “Suck.”
When Lisa doesn’t answer right away, you figure that she’s left—but as you straighten back up, you find her watching you in the mirror with a narrowed gaze.
“Are you sure you’re gonna be okay?”
“Yeah,” You nod, turning to face her. “I’m working from home today, anyway. We’ve got rice, we’ve got broth, we’ve got saltines. Honestly, that was probably it, nothing left in the tank. I’m fine.”
Lisa hesitates before she closes the space between the two of you, raising her hand and pressing the back to your forehead. You force a poker face, doing your best not to lean into the coolness of her fingers. Her brow wrinkles, lips screwing to the side, then—
“I have no idea what your forehead is supposed to feel like.”
“Go to class and learn.”
Lisa scoffs, finally turning away and slouching back to her room. You wait until her footsteps have faded completely before reaching out, quietly pushing the bathroom door closed again. You swallow, wincing at the slight ache in your throat.
You don’t feel like you’re going to throw up again, but there’s an pain in your side, one that you hadn’t noticed when you were stumbling your way to bed. You raise your hand, rubbing slightly over a spot on your right and wincing again. Christ, that hurts. Did you bang it when you were getting down to get to the toilet? That must be it.
Of course, it couldn’t hurt to ask a professional. You didn’t block him, he said the door was still open if you ever wanted to talk, so maybe you could just send a quick little question—
No. No.
You have broth, you have rice, you have Google. You can figure this out. Besides, it probably really was just something you ate.
--
“This is John, the guy I’ve been telling you about!”
The words were half-lost on the music being pumped through your best friend’s place, and the chatter of the other people crammed into her shared 450 square foot two-bedroom apartment. You had been tempted to dip out of the party nearly an hour ago, but your friend had sworn that not only was the guy she was setting you up with going to eventually be there (even though he was running late), but he was well worth waiting for.
You turned to face the mystery man, and you were, admittedly, caught off-guard. It was a combination of things: the scrubs he was wearing, the Dunkin cup in hand, and the fact that the guy was really, really cute.
“Hi,” You said, offering your hand and your name in tandem. He took hold of your hand, dipping closer and requesting:
“One more time?”
You hesitated before leaning in and giving him your name again.
“Nice to meet you!” He smiled before glancing around. “It’s a little loud in here. You wanna get some air?”
It was cooler on your friend’s fire escape, and so much quieter. You curled your arms around yourself, toying with your little plastic cup of wine before glancing over at John.
“Can I ask,” You nodded toward the Dunkin.
“Oh—You want a sip?”
“No, no,” You shook your head. “I was wondering why you brought a…Frankly massive Dunkin iced coffee to a housewarming. Seems like an odd choice.”
“I could only stop by for a bit before I have to go to work.”
“Jeez, what time do you start work?”
“Shift starts at seven. Twelve hours.”
“Explains how big the coffee is.”
“Sure does.” He raised it again, giving it a little shake, the ice rattling against the plastic. “You sure you don’t want a sip?”
“Uh—No. Thanks.”
John just shrugged, raising the orange straw to his lips and taking a deep pull.
“You know, I was curious about you,” He offered once he’d swallowed.
“Oh?”
“Mhm. Heard a lot.”
“Good or bad?”
“Good, I think.”
“Like what?”
“Like…You’re the oldest of three sisters, really family oriented. Have your life together, have very high expectations for yourself…And that you’re a stickler for punctuality.” His teasing smile made your belly flutter. “Even more surprised that you’re still here, considering I’m late for our little set-up.”
And you could have told him that your friend had to talk you out of leaving twice, that you had nearly called it when her roommate’s sleazeball of a boyfriend tried to hit on you. All of that was true. But—
“Maybe I was curious about you, too.”
John’s bright smile made staying all the more worth it.
--
According to Google, you have food poisoning, stage 4 stomach cancer, and your period all at once.
And while you could waste your time speculating about something that’ll probably just pass, you choose instead to focus on your job. All you know for certain is that you have two reports due, three RFPs, and a presentation draft due by EoD, as well as a meeting with your manager for your annual review. All of that means only one thing:
You do not have time to spend fucking around, half-asleep in bed, or throwing up the little bit of room-temperature water that you’ve been able to get down.
But that doesn’t stop your body from revolting against you.
You manage to get bits and pieces of your work done in five to ten minute intervals, with your belly betraying any little bit of liquid, nutrients, or hope that you manage to take in. You go through your recipes, your fridge—you just manage to stop yourself from going through your trash to double check the dates on the ingredients that you used to make dinner last night. But it couldn’t really be that, could it? You’d checked all of the dates before you’d cooked, even thrown out a couple of ingredients because they were just a day past their best-by.
It’s your period, it has to be. This doesn’t feel anything like the last time you had food poisoning—at least, what you’re pretty sure was food poisoning.
--
“How ya doin’ over there, champ?”
You glared down at your phone, lips twisted into a pout. “I feel like death.”
“You’re answering me, so definitely not death.”
“I said I feel like death, not that I’m dying—ugh,” You groaned as your lower belly gurgled, shifting where you’d been sitting on your toilet for nearly ten minutes, “God.”
“What are your symptoms?”
“I really don’t want to disclose that to you.”
“Oh, c’mon,” John chuckled, “I’m a professional.”
“No!”
“Why not?”
“It’s embarrassing.”
“It can’t be anywhere near what I see in the ED on the nightly.”
“What’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever seen?”
“Honestly? Couple’a days ago, we had a guy came in with a Darth Vader figurine stuck up where it shouldn’t have been.”
Your jaw dropped with a stunned laugh. “Are you serious?”
“Oh yeah. He thought he’d be able to keep it from slipping in completely because the cape was triangular, but it went a little too far. He came in when he gave up reaching for the feet.”
“...Okay, this is one step below that.”
“Just one?”
The slight smile in John’s tone had a grudging one pulling at your lips. “Maybe a couple.”
“Uh-huh. Tell you what, I get off shift in twenty. I’ll swing by with a goodie bag.”
“I can’t handle goodies right now, John.”
“Not even if those goodies include animal crackers, broth, electrolytes, and pepto bismol?”
“I’m not going to be much of a conversationalist.”
“It’ll be a drive by. You buzz me up, I hand you the bag, I steal a couple of kisses, you go back inside.”
“You have a suspicious amount of this interaction planned out.”
“Well, this girl I’m dating has told me that she likes a man with a plan.”
Your smile stretched into a full-blown, lovesick grin, and you raised your hand to scrub across your eyes.
“Fine. Just…give me a five minute warning before you get here?”
“Sure. Hey, you might even find a surprise Darth Vader figurine among your goodies—”
“John!”
--
By noon, you’ve managed to polish off your notes on the RFP, but the presentation and reports have barely been touched. You message your manager reluctantly, warning that you’re a little under the weather, but still in a good place to finish everything on your plate by EoD.
And you do have every intention of finishing things off. You decide to take a half-hour nap, just give your body a little bit of a rest before getting back on the horse.
It’s a good plan in theory—but your head hasn’t been down for two minutes before you’re clambering out of bed, hardly making it to the sink before the singular sip of gatorade you’d taken twenty minutes ago is making a bid for freedom.
You groan, resting your forehead against the sink—and then whine when you hear your cell phone ringing. You straighten slowly, bracing your hand back against the wall and stepping back into your room, taking up the phone from your bedside table. Oh—god. Do you have the patience for this call right now?
You lower yourself to your bed, swiping the call acceptance and sticking it on speaker.
“What’s up, Lilah?”
“Holy fuck, Lisa wasn’t kidding. You sound like shit.”
You muster a weak smile, drawing your legs into the bed and pulling your blankets around your lap.
“Mom and dad did a hell of a job curating your manners.”
“Mm, but you’re the one who really honed them, generalissimo.”
You roll your eyes, resting your pounding head back against the wall of decorative pillows that you’ve piled up, and have been using to keep yourself upright for the last few hours. Growing up as the middle child, Lilah had always been the one raging against your de facto parental machine, where Lisa tended to push back a touch, but ultimately fell in line.
You pull in a steadying breath, catching on the sounds of school kids in the background on the other end of the phone. Must be recess.
“Whaddaya want, bean?”
“I can’t just wanna talk to my big sister?”
“Willingly? It would be a first.”
“Are you pregnant?”
The thought nearly triggers another heave.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” You snap. “Did Lisa tell you that?”
“No, but—”
“I’m on birth control, I have always used protection—”
“Those things aren’t always 100%, accidents happen—”
“And it’s been a while.”
“...If you’re sure.”
“John and I broke up months ago,” You remind her, “And even before that, we hadn’t been…” You wince. “Intimate.”
“Blegh, okay, we get it.”
“I’m just saying—”
“God forbid the two of you pushed the beds together.”
“Lilah, for godssake—”
“I still don’t understand why you broke up with that man.”
The comment stops you in your tracks, eyes unfocused on your dimming laptop screen. You’ve done your best not to think about John—your ‘how’s and ‘why’s and ‘what might’ve been’s. The closest you’ve gotten in the last few weeks is the brief flirtation with his contact in your phone that morning.
“...Okay,” Lilah finally concedes, seeming to take your silence in the spirit with which it’s meant. “Not pregnant.”
“It’s probably actually my period, anyway. You know I get queasy when I’m PMSing—and my cramps suck right now. I’ll be spotting by, like, 3pm at the latest.”
“And if you’re not, your uterus will hear about it.”
“Exactly.”
A moment of slightly tense silence, punctuated only by the odd giggle and screech of children from her end.
“Alright,” Lilah sighs, “The principal is giving me the stink eye, I should probably pay attention to the kids.”
“Lilah—!”
“Kidding! Jesus. Feel better.”
“Thanks.”
Lilah’s grunt is her only sign off before the call cuts. You reach out, drawing your laptop close and squirting at the screen for a moment before squeezing your eyes shut at the throbbing of your headache. Christ.
It isn’t as if you haven’t explained your break up to Lilah, because you have—at least twice. But you’ll tolerate her needling, her willful ignorance, it doesn’t matter. It’s not her relationship, it’s yours—was yours.
--
“I don’t think I’m gonna get Christmas off.”
“Aw, really?” You frowned, setting your planner down on the kitchen table and watching John reach for one of the two remaining Munchkins in the carton he brought over. “I thought you asked.”
“I mean, I did, but it was a little slammed when it came up—more of an informal request.” He raised his fingers to suck the powder off of them, adding through a full mouth: “I put in for it, but it’s up in the air.”
“Hmm. Well if you can’t, that’s alright. It’s just gonna be me and the girls.”
“What about your parents?”
You waved John off, shaking your head. “They’re going to be on a cruise.”
“Oof,” John sighed, slouching back in his seat, “You think you felt bad when you had food poisoning—”
“Okay.”
“Those floating buffet-laden crap shows.”
“Okay!”
“Nice scenery, though.”
You rolled your eyes, propping your chin up on your hand as you considered him.
“What’s your mom gonna do if you can’t get Christmas off?”
John’s lips pressed into a thin line, and your eyes caught on the bob of his Adam’s apple, the fidget of his fingers toying with the strings on his hoodie.
“...John?”
Another moment before he shrugged. “What she does when I usually can’t get the holidays off, I guess.”
You opened your mouth to ask, but he was sitting up before you could, shuffling his chair closer. “So what’d you get me?”
Your confusion melted to fondness, mind flashing to the smart watch you’d spent weeks researching and comparison shopping for, and you scoffed, “As if I’d tell you.”
“C’mon, gimme a hint. Is it black? Red? Lacey?”
--
Your manager only gets two minutes into your performance review before she ultimately cuts it short.
“You know what, why don’t we reschedule?”
You try to tell her that you’re fine to go through with it, but she waves you off: “I’ll throw some time on for tomorrow. Take a break.”
You manage a weak smile, an, “Okay,” and a, “Ping me if you need anything,” before you close out of the meeting. You lower the laptop lid with a sense of defeat, tears crowding your dry, tired eyes. When the urge to puke pops up again, you can’t make it all the way to the bathroom, instead lowering yourself to the floor and hunching over the trash bin by your bed.
It’s nothing but bile that devolves into dry heaves, and by the time you’re through, your pounding head is spinning. You brace your hand on the floor, trying to ground yourself, but it doesn’t hold, and there’s nothing more you can do as your world tilts.
--
The hand on your cheek, then your forehead, is so cold, and a distant, “Holy shit,” sounds so familiar. It’s chased by, “How long has she been like this,” and a frantic, “She wasn’t this bad this morning!”
You groan as you’re turned onto your back, wincing at the onslaught of bright light. It takes a moment, but the face that swims into view is comforting.
“Li-Li,” You smile, raising a hand to cup Lisa’s cheek. “How was school?”
“How long have you been on the floor?”
“Did that boy drive you?”
You hear a scoff, a grumble of, “On death’s fucking doorstep and still the captain of the morality police.”
“Lilah, shut up—”
“Bean,” You struggle to crane your neck as you look for Lilah. “Lilah, what are you—” You try to sit up, flounder, flop back and whack your head roughly on the nightstand, “What’re—”
“Christ, Lilah, call a fucking ambulance!” Lisa snaps.
“Where’s—” You raise your hand, patting along as much of your sheets as you can reach, “Where’s my work laptop?”
“Okay,” Lisa soothes, easing you to lie down fully, “Just relax, okay? We’re gonna get you help.”
Even in your confusion and fog, you can hear her panic, and you tut softly. “I’m okay, Li. Tell bean.”
“Lilah—”
“I’m on with the fucking operator—No, I won’t watch my language, we need a fucking ambulance here, like ten minutes ago!” --
You do your best to answer the EMTs, but they’re only a few questions in before they’re loading you onto a stretcher, telling your sisters that you’re being taken to Pittsburgh General.
Lisa’s climbing into the back of the ambulance with you, and you only manage to request that someone grab your work laptop before the doors are being slammed shut and Lilah is out of sight.
The ride is hellish, bumpy and painful, and far longer than it should be when you wind up rerouted to PTMC.
--
“Can we talk about Thanksgiving?”
“Sure. Are we rankin’ sides?”
You shot a sidelong glance in John’s direction, eyes narrowed slightly.
“Trying to make plans, actually.”
“Ah,” He nodded. “Yeah, we can try.”
“My parents are probably going to be in town for it this year,” You shifted in your seat, trying to settle your nerves. This was normal, this was something that couples dealt with all the time. So why were you bracing yourself? “And…I mean, we’ve been together for a while, almost a year now, so I wondered if you wanted to…Meet them, finally.”
“You really think they’ll hold still long enough for me to make their acquaintance?”
And it was a fair question, but stacking that on top of your mounting nerves was nearly enough to send you over the edge.
“It’s a yes or no question, J. I mean, I know some of it will hinge on whether you can get work off or not, but—”
“If they’re the deep fried turkey type and I’m on shift, maybe you can bring them in. They can see me in action.”
You closed your eyes, taking a steadying breath in and shaking your head. “Forget it.”
“I’m kidding—”
“Not everything is a joke, John.”
--
There’s so much input at once. The ambulance was its own array of sound, but now you have doctors, nurses, EMTs chatting over you, underscored by the chatter and yelling of fellow patients—and somewhere, not far off, your sister’s panicked voice as you’re wheeled into a room.
“I'm gonna be okay, Lisa,” You mumble, but your promise is cut off by a surge of pain. You can’t help but cry out, trying to squirm away from the pressure that’s been applied to your right side.
“We’ve got rebound tenderness.”
“What’s that mean?” You hiss.
“That means,” A new voice in the room, but not a new voice to you, “That we’re looking at—”
You lift your tearing eyes to that all-too familiar face as he finally registers that it’s you in the bed, as it stops him in his tracks.
“Shen?” Someone urges, but he’s breathing out, “Shit,” eyes flitting to where Lisa is huddled nearby.
“You know each other?” That same voice presses, and John manages,
“I was—She’s my—”
“Okay,” Someone else steps up to the bed, leaning over you, “Ma’am, I’m Dr. Abbot—”
And you’re trying to listen, you are, but you’re also tracking where John is rounding over to Lisa, leaning in to ask questions, to talk, to reassure, you can’t tell—
“Do you understand?” Abbot tacks on, but no, you don’t. You didn’t catch a word, he said, so you shake your head. “Your appendix is on the verge of bursting, we need to get you up to surgery.”
“Surgery?” Lisa pipes up, “Like, now?”
“As soon as possible.”
“Where’s Lilah?” You whimper.
“Oh—Shit, she’s going to the wrong hospital!” Lisa’s out the door without a second glance, drawing her phone out of her pocket.
“Listen,” Abbot leans closer to hold your attention, “If we don’t get your appendix out, it could cause some serious problems. It’s still intact, but we need to remove it before it can rupture and cause you any more problems.”
“OR’s prepped,” Is mentioned somewhere behind you, and suddenly the bed is moving again.
“I’ll go up with her.” John’s at your side in a second, and he and Abbot are sharing a look that you don’t understand over your gurney before Abbot drops away completely. John’s hands hook onto the railing of the gurney, his eyes darting to your face every few seconds as your entourage of medical professionals steers you down the hall.
“So,” He offers, “Fancy seeing you here.”
And you so don’t want to let him make you smile, but you can’t help yourself.
“This is a bit much,” He adds as you’re wheeled onto the elevator, “I mean, I told you you could call and you show up at my job instead? I appreciate the effort, but you're coming off a little desperate.”
“John.”
“Appendix, too, you overachiever. Couldn’t you have broken your wrist, gotten a concussion, something easier?”
Your mental fog is melting to clarity, mingling with your panicked nerves, and the little laugh that leaves you makes the ache in your side twinge.
“I mean, come on,” He’s leaning against the railing now, seemingly unaware or uncaring of the looks that the nurses are giving him, “All of this, just to get my attention?”
“You’re so full of yourself.”
“And you know what you’re gonna be full of if we don’t get that appendix out? Pus.”
“Ugh,” You wrinkle your nose, closing your eyes, “Stop.”
“Better pus than Darth Vader, though.”
You laugh again, and the pain swells, worse.
“Please stop making me laugh, it hurts,” You whimper, and he mutters, “Alright, alright,” as the elevator chimes. You pull in as deep a breath as you can, the full weight of panic weighing down your chest. You swallow roughly, mumble, “John?”
“Yeah?”
“Make sure they give me the good stuff.” When you open your eyes, take in the sweep of lights haloing him as you’re guided down another hall, you find him smiling softly.
“For you? The best,” He promises. “I’ll tell them to check on your funny bone while they’re in there.”
Your laugh turns to a muted sob, the sound half-stuck in your thickening throat as tears spill over. But he’s reaching out before one can slip to the gurney below, swiping it away.
“I’m scared,” You whisper.
“I know. But it’s gonna be okay.”
--
“I like him.”
It was the last thing you expected to come out of Lilah’s mouth. You’d already known that she was miffed at you for taking so long to introduce you to John, doubly so when she found out that Lisa had met him nearly two weeks before she had (that had been an accident, though—Lisa had come home early from what was meant to be a romantic trip with her latest boyfriend, but had crashed and burned into a fight when she found out she was the other woman).
You didn’t answer, just watched Lilah from your end of the couch as she picked her nails. When she glanced toward you, she scoffed, “What?”
“I’m waiting.”
“For?”
“The punchline.”
Lilah rolled her eyes. “No punchline. I like him.”
Your brows rose at the insistence. “That’s a first.”
“Well,” She sighed, pushing herself up, “All of your other boyfriends sucked. I’m gonna raid your fridge now.”
You watched her go, processing for a moment before you followed. “What do you mean, all of my other boyfriends sucked?”
Lilah shrugged, eyes set on the inside of your fridge, scanning the shelves lazily.
“Just what I said.”
“They were all nice guys.”
“No, they were all assholes.”
You scoffed, “They were not all assholes.”
“Fine. They were mostly dickheads, with one or two of them crossing firmly into asshole territory.”
“They were all accomplished.”
“Yeah,” Lilah laughed derisively, “Especially that dude that got nailed for insider trading. How’s his prison sentence going by the way?”
You folded your arms tightly across your chest. “He was only fined and you know it.”
“Right, right.”
“Would you close the fridge door if you’re not gonna take anything? You’re letting all the cold out.”
Lilah raised her hands in surrender, allowing the door to slowly swing shut before she turned to your cabinet.
“As I was saying,” You added, “They were not all dickheads. I prefer to surround myself with ambitious people, and they can be…Difficult.”
“If by ambitious you mean rich, then yeah, you’re usually all over ‘em.”
“That is not what I mean—”
“Hedge fund managers, healthtech douchebros, morons who insist that they’re practically liquid when their entire net worth is in crypto.”
“That was one guy!”
“You know why I like John?” Lilah leaned back to face you, bag of chips in hand. “Cause it’s like you’re not dating with mom and dad in mind for once.”
It was like a slap. It rendered you completely speechless, sending heat creeping across your face, down your neck. And you couldn’t tell if Lilah knew the effect the comment had, but she pushed on:
“John’s ambitious, sure, he’s a doctor, but he’s also, like, genuinely a nice dude, you know. And you’re not trying to be perfect for him the way that you usually do for your dates, or for mom and dad. You’re not preening or constantly fixing your hair or checking your posture with him. You’re just, like…You. It’s good. Kinda freaky, but good.” She popped a couple of chips in her mouth, chewing slowly as you both mulled that over.
“Anyway,” She shrugged, pushing off of the counter, “Only a matter of time before you fuck it up, so. Enjoy it while it lasts.”
You rolled your eyes, following her back into the living room. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, bean.”
“Anytime, generalissimo.”
--
Coming to is slow, and uncomfortable. You’re propped up in bed, the room is bright, even with your eyes closed, and the beeping monitor beside you is starting to get annoying—but can you really begrudge something that reminds you that you’re alive?
You open your eyes, wincing into the light and allowing your vision to adjust. You can see a duffel bag on the chairs across from you, spot coats laying over the back of those same chairs. And when you let yourself glance around, you find someone at your bedside.
John is seated, folded over your bed with his head pillowed on his arms. His eyes are closed, and he’s breathing steadily. You can’t tell if it’s light outside with the shades closed, so you reach your IV-laden hand out, tapping on the face of the smart watch you got him a couple of Christmases ago. The screen flashes, but not in time for you to get a good look. You’re about to tap again, but—
“Are you snooping through my messages?”
Groggy, soft, warm—there’s that sleep-roughened voice you’ve missed so much. You smile a little.
“No. Trying to see what time it is.”
“Mm,” John pushes himself to sit up and proffers his wrist, scrubbing his free hand across his eyes as you get a better look. Nearly half past eight.
“Maybe a silly question, but is it AM or PM?”
“AM,” He chuckles, lowering his wrist.
“Shouldn’t you be home?” You ask. But before he can answer, the door to your hospital room opens, and Lisa and Lilah are trailing in with cups of coffee in hand.
“You’re up!” Lisa screeches, hurrying forward so quickly that some coffee sloshes over the side of the little paper cup. Lilah’s joining her a moment later, crowding in against you with leans, hugs, and carefully placed hands. You begin to reach for them with both arms, but wince when your IV pulls slightly. Lisa steps back, allowing Lilah to lean into you more closely.
“Did you grab my phone?” You ask, “And did you call…You know?”
“We didn’t,” Lisa winces, “We weren’t sure—”
“No, no. You did the right thing,” You soothe before glancing at Lilah. Her smile is watery, thin, and she seems to be opening her mouth to start to say something, but you have to ask:
“Did you bring my work laptop?”
That watery thin smile is gone in a second, mouth flat. Her eyes seem to glaze over, hands drawing back and curling into fists at her sides.
“I—No.”
“Lilah,” You groan, “That was, like, the one thing I asked you to bring—”
You barely get it out before she’s stomping out of your hospital room, Lisa hot on her heels, swearing, “I’ll get her.”
You close your eyes, sinking back in your bed. “Shit.”
“You shouldn’t be working right now, anyway,” John warns. You peek one eye open, frowning as he rounds the bed, pouring water from a pitcher on the bedside table. “Here.”
You take the cup carefully, though John keeps a loose grasp on it as you take a sip. He sets it aside once you’re finished, offering, “You want some more?”
“Nn-nn,” You shake your head. You perk up as the door opens again, but Lilah’s sweeping in and grabbing her coat without looking at you.
“Bean, I’m sorry—Hey!” You call out as she turns away again, “I’m not mad at you!” But your protests seem to fall on deaf ears as she rounds back into the hall. You close your eyes, tipping your head back against the pillows. “Great.”
“You want me to go get her?”
“No. Lisa’s gonna try to do that, anyway. And when she’s pissed at me, Lilah needs time to just…Decompress. Trust me,” You huff a laugh, “I’ve pissed her off a lot.” You tip your head to the side, wiggling your fingers toward his hand. And you expect him to just take it and hold on, but John is climbing into bed with you, carefully nestling against you. You sigh softly, turning your head and nuzzling against his neck. Neither of you speak for a few moments, the room falling into quiet, save for the beep of the monitor beside your bed.
“...Shouldn’t you be home?” You finally ask again.
“Mm…You want me to go?”
“No.”
“Then I’m right where I should be.”
And it’s so gentle, and firm, and certain. Your eyes well with tears again, and you try to squeeze tight against them, to hold them back, but they’re slipping before you can stop them. John doesn’t tut, tell you that it’s alright, that you’re okay. He just cuddles closer, intertwining your fingers.
“When I’m, um,” You sniffle, “When I’m less of a mess, can you explain what happened? Like, properly?”
“Using all of my big brain and science-y knowledge? Sure I can. Dr. Garcia will probably come to speak with you, too.”
“Did they do the surgery?”
“No, Dr. Walsh did. Case got handed over to the day shift, though.”
“Oh.”
“...So next time you want my attention, I’m thinking a kidney stone could be the way to go.” He keeps on over your quiet giggles—“Getting rid of those is way more fun than an appendix. Hey, when’s the last time you were on a roller coaster?”
--
It’s nearly ten by the time John is leaving your room with a kiss on the forehead and a promise to check in with you over the next couple of days. Lisa is back, but the two of you are speaking little. She won’t tell you where Lilah is, or what she said when she stormed out. You fall asleep around noon.
When you wake up around two, your work laptop is sitting on top of your duffel bag, and Lilah is nowhere to be seen.
--
You can’t remember the last time Lisa played nurse maid to you like this. You try to think of it, but you’re coming up with…Well, never. On the odd occasion you’ve gotten sick, you’ve always managed it yourself—but this isn’t just getting sick.
You can get around on your own, but it’s not the most comfortable. Lisa emails her professors, lets them know what happened, gets a pass to skip a couple of her classes so that she can stay at home and look after you for a couple of days. She helps you clean and change your wound dressing so that you don’t have to twist, or look at the little laparoscopic scars any more than you have to. She even offers to help you inject the prescribed blood thinner, but you insist on doing that yourself. It’s a way of taking back just a little bit of control after you’ve spent so much of the last 72 hours feeling helpless.
Besides, you’re usually the one doing the minding, so being minded makes you feel unbalanced.
Your manager gives you the week off to heal, tells you not to worry about the presentations and reports, commends you for the work that you were able to get done, and insists that if she sees your status active on your laptop, she’s going to have IT lock you out.
You try texting Lilah a few times, and she doesn’t answer, save to react or send lone emojis. You don’t try to call, or FaceTime. You’re not sure where you’d start if you did.
So when Lisa tells you the next day that Lilah’s at the apartment, and that she’s sitting on your unit’s balcony, it’s sort of a relief.
--
You know those things are bad for you.
It sits on your tongue, but you hold it there. The fact that Lilah is there at all is a boon, so you do your best to pointedly ignore the smoke curling from the end of her cigarette.
“I thought you were gonna die, you know?”
It cracks the air open, splits you down the middle, but Lilah doesn’t stop there:
“I’d never seen you like that. My superhero of a sister, on the floor, just…Laid out. When Lisa was getting into the ambulance with you and I stayed to grab some stuff like you asked, I was just like, on autopilot. Clothes, medication, phone, keys. The important shit, you know? And then I got to the wrong hospital and Lisa called, and I was like ‘well, shit. I’m not gonna get to say goodbye.’ And then you were in surgery, and then you were out, and then you woke up,” Her voice lilts with a hysterical little laugh, “And your first question was where your fucking work laptop was, and that was when I remembered that you asked for it. And I was like ‘well fuck. I fucked up again.’” Lilah quiets as she takes another drag from the cigarette, but for all the comments buzzing against your lips, you wait.
“You know what I think?” She exhales, “What this was? God or the universe, or fucking whatever—it’s telling you to slow down.” She turns her head to look at you finally, bloodshot gaze pinning you in place. “Because your first question coming out of major surgery should be what happened, how long was I out, what are the next steps, not where your fucking work laptop is—”
“I know.”
“Like that’s psychotic. And the worst part is you can’t even blame the meds, like, you’re just like that.”
“I know.” You pull in a deep breath, just managing not to wrinkle your nose at the scent of smoke. “I’m sorry, bean. I shouldn’t have said that—and you’re right, I can’t even blame the anesthesia.” You shift your seat a little closer, nudging her knee with yours. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“...Well, you didn’t. Your bitch-ass appendix did.”
You snort, looping your arm around Lilah’s shoulders and drawing her in.
“I love you, bean.”
Lilah sniffles as she huddles closer, tucking her head beneath your chin.
“I love you, too, generalissimo.”
--
“Saw Lilah on the way in.”
“Yeah?” You sit against the mountain of pillows still against your headboard, watch John unpack a few things from his bag onto your bed—gloves, gauze, tape, small scissors, alcohol wipes.
“Everything okay?”
“...Fine,” You concede, “She just has a shitty sister.”
You can feel John glancing toward you as you carefully wriggle out of your loose shirt, leaving you in a sports bra.
“Okay, let’s see what we have here.”
You hold carefully still as John peels back your wound dressing, leaning in to get a better look at the scars.
“How’s the pain been?”
“Fine, I guess. The gas pain in my shoulders sucks, though.”
“Yeah, that’s from the CO2 they use to inflate the abdominal cavity.”
“Hate the use of ‘cavity’ there.”
John’s lips quirk with a smile. “Wounds look good, no irritation or excessive redness.”
“Lisa’s been a very good nurse.”
“Mm.” John opens an alcohol wipe, carefully cleaning your wounds. “Has it been itchy at all?”
“Not really.”
“Good…A heating pad should help with those gas pains, by the way.”
“Okay.”
The two of you go quiet as he rebandages your wounds, then straightens. “No fever, chills?”
“Nn-nn.”
“Appetite’s back?”
“Mostly.”
“Good.” John sits on the edge of the bed, removing his gloves and dropping the old dressing and alcohol wipe into the (now cleaned) bin by your bed. “When we were in the hospital, Lisa said you were sick all day. Why’d you wait so long to come in?”
“Just…” You shrug. “I thought it was my period.”
“Your cramps are that bad?”
“They can be.”
“Yeesh,” He mutters, tucking a few supplies into his bag. “When are you due back for your check-up, remind me?”
“Friday.”
“Okay.”
The two of you fall into quiet, and when you reach out for John’s hand, he slips it warmly into yours.
“...What’d your parents say?”
You focus on the press of his palm, trace the length of a vein on the back of his hand.
“I haven’t told them yet.” Your eyes flicker to his incredulous frown, and you shake your head. “It’s kinda too late now. I mean—I’ll tell them eventually. At this point they’ll just be upset that they weren’t invited.”
“Invited?” He scoffs. “It wasn’t a birthday party.”
“You know what I mean. I should’ve told them when I was on my way to the hospital, but I didn’t, and neither did the girls, so…Now this gets to be that funny story I tell them on New Year’s Eve in two year’s time, when they’re good and buzzed and less likely to get mad at me for not telling them right when it happened.”
“Sounds like you already have it all planned out.”
“I like a plan, remember?”
John smiles, thumb sweeping across the soft of your wrist. “I remember.” It’s a moment before he hedges: “Remind me, is that why we broke up? Not enough plans?”
You sigh softly, eyes dropping to your hands. “That was some of it. Other times, I just…I felt like you were making jokes of everything, all the time, or not taking things seriously. But honestly, after the whole,” You wave toward your abdomen, “You know, how chaotic it was, how scary…I kinda get it now. Why you’re so level.”
“...Doesn’t mean I should be doing it all the time. I’m sorry if I made you feel like we couldn’t just have a serious conversation.”
You smile. “I’m sorry I was so rigid. I should’ve been more understanding.”
“Hindsight’s 20/20, huh?”
“Famously.”
John gives your hand a little squeeze. “I should let you rest.”
“Okay…Can I selfishly say that I don’t want you to leave yet?”
“Yes,” He chuckles. “Tell you what. I’ll stick around for a bit, keep close. Make sure you don’t roll over in your sleep.”
“Oh yeah? You do that for all your patients, Dr. Shen?”
“Oh, all of them.”
“You really know how to make a girl feel spesh.” John chuckles, nudging off the house shoes he’d worn inside and climbing into bed beside you, resting his hand on your hip. You tipped your head against him, relaxing into the warmth of his body as you had just a few days ago.
“Would it be selfish of me to say that I missed you a lot?” You mumbled.
“There’s that word again.”
“Hmm?”
“Selfish.” You feel John tip his head toward you. “Wanting things isn’t selfish. Neither is feeling things.”
You gnaw on your lower lip, letting your gaze drop back to his chest. He smoothes his hand over your hair, drawing you carefully closer.
“Tell you what,” He murmurs, “We’re gonna talk about this later—for now, you need your rest.”
“When are we gonna talk about it?”
“This weekend.”
“Oh?”
“Mhm. You’re gonna get clearance from Walsh to resume normal food and activity on Friday, we’re gonna get coffee and go for a nice, easy walk on Saturday—”
“I see—”
“And we’re gonna clear up all this selfish talk.”
“And then what?”
“Oh, just you wait.”
“Do I get a hint?”
John tips his head down toward you, lips brushing your forehead.
“You thought that first go-around was something? I’m gonna date the crap out of you.”
You smile. “I’d rather our dating not have anything to do with crap.”
“Or cavities?”
“Exactly—”
“Or Darth Vader—”
“Okay, now you’re pushing it.”
Tag list:
@missredherring ; @fantasticcopeaglepasta ; @massivecolorspygiant ; @blueeyesatnight ; @amneris21 ;
@ew-erin ; @youngkenobilove ; @carbonated-beverage ; @moonlightburned ; @milf-trinity ;
@millllenniawrites ; @chattychell ; @dihra-vesa ; @videogamesandpoorlifechoices ; @missswriter ;
@thembosapphicclown ; @brandyllyn ; @wildmoonflower ; @realwhoreforfictionalmen
; @mad-girl-without-a-box ; @winchestershiresauce ; @lorecraft ; @kmc1989
Natural Predators
❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎
Brendon Park x f!reader
warnings/tags: female reader. smut, biting, cursing, oral (m+f receiving), hair pulling, piv, no mention of condom (don't do that gang be safe), minor dom/sub vibes, pain kink?, so much talk of teeth (I am who I am), nickname pup (get it. shark pup. idk dont judge me you know what you’re here for), maybe size kink? idk he's big man what can i say, possibly cnc (she say’s she doesn’t want it but they have a safe word established that she never uses so she does actually want it), animal analogies. ogilvie being annoying. canon typical medical discussion, mentions of chronic illness (reader and patient).
words: girl idk a lot I was not putting this in a word doc.
Brendon Park, otherwise knows as Park the Shark to his PTMC coworkers, has a reputation. If the nickname doesn't give it away, the way he eyes everyone as if they’re prey, the snap of his jaws when someone questions his judgment, or the sheer brawn of him, does. So when people call him Shark, it’s not entirely inaccurate.
You’re heavily inclined to agree with the nickname knowing what you do about him. You've gotten to know him better than anyone else in the hospital, both professionally and personally. All by being the nice, energetic and witty ED Doctor who Park, for some reason, doesn’t bite at. Verbally, that is.
Although, when needed, that kind demeanor of yours quickly shifts into something sharp and deadly. It’s what got you the nickname of Wolf down in the ED. Cute and sweet until you see the massive paws with claws to match, the bloodied maw growling in your face.
You always meet Park where he’s at. Both of you flashing your shiny rows of teeth in violent displays but never clamping down on the other’s jugular. It became a sort of dance between the two of you. Circling to see where any weak spots are. Whenever you disagree on a case, if you don’t like how he handles himself in front of a patient or vice versa.
The second the carcass is devoured though, you two go right back to easy conversation. Something PTMC staff didn't think Brendon Park was capable of. The pictures of civility. Which is also something people didn’t know Park the Shark was capable of.
Brendon outwardly intimidates those around him. Never smiling. Never giving you a flash of those pointed canines except for when he snarls. He moves through the world proud to show off his threatening demeanor. You think it secretly gets him off.
You, on the other hand, show all your teeth in every smile. Proudly display your most lethal weapon, canines sharp and shining. It's not scary upon first glance. The way you grin as you compliment another’s work, encouraging look on your face as you guide the student doctors through a new procedure. That makes it worse. When you do snarl and dig your claws in, it makes it all the more horrifying seeing the shift. How quickly you go from that sweet, docile, belly up puppy to a violent, raging, snapping dog.
Everyone sees Park as an ominous figure, it’s all he offers them a glimpse of. It's all they've come to expect. So they act accordingly. Everyone has been in the jaws of the Shark before and don't plan to find themselves back in it. Most people only hear stories of your lethal side. It’s enough for them to never want to see it, to never want to feel your teeth in their neck.
Ogilvie though, must not give a shit as he tries to take over presenting your patient to the infamous Park the Shark, his voice cutting off yours. You're in the middle of discussing next steps with Robby, preparing to give Park the rundown.
“Dr. Park!” Ogilvie is chomping at the bit to impress the man. “Patient is a 49 year old female, dislocated clavicle with a severe fracture to the ulnar and radius. Claims to have complex connective tissue disord-”
“Is this your patient?” Park cuts him off, tone short and annoyed like he’s already done with the conversation. He is.
“I’m on the case, yes, but-” Ogilvie pauses. Hesitant. Realizing his slip-up. Park raises his eyebrows as if to say “but?”
“But I’m the lead.” You cut in smoothly. Sharper than you usually are. Ogilvie senses it immediately. Stiffening in his place as if it will make you forget he’s here.
“Then why don’t you let her present me the case? I didn’t realize incompetence got you through med school nowadays.” He doesn’t bother to give Ogilvie as much as a side glance, eyes focused entirely on the scans in front of him.
You don’t hesitate to take over presenting. “49 year old female patient with a dislocated clavicle and multiple fractures to both radius and ulnar. Presenting with severe pain. She's unable to move her fingers, has lack of feeling below the elbow.”
Park begins to softly touch at the patients arm, assessing the damage while you continue.
“Mrs. Henderson has a complex connective tissue disorder, hypermobile Ehlers Danlos specifically." A glare directed at Ogilvie by you. "This presents more of an issue as she has a history of clavicle dislocation and asked us to not address it with surgery.”
You gave Mrs. Henderson nitrous oxide about 20 minutes ago. Wanting to help ease her pain but knowing Park likes patients conscious to assess their injury when possible. The gas leaves her loopy and slightly out of it, conscious but not fully aware.
Park asks, “Why no fixing the collarbone?”
“She’s had it dislocate multiple times previously and doesn’t want a plate put in because she’s been advised that it won't guarantee no more dislocations. She can handle the pain of one collarbone dislocated. Not two.” You recount. Before letting her fall into the soft lull of pain medicine, you took the time to understand her wishes and reasoning.
Park looks back up at you then. Eyes moving away from his hands that were feeling over the patient’s swollen flesh. To anyone else it would’ve seemed like he was thinking, but you know better. So does he.
He knows why you’re so interested in leading this case. Knows that you of all people understand the gaslighting that comes with connective tissue disorder. Months ago you’d explained to him your own condition, exposing your vulnerability to a predator. It's one of the things that made you so ferocious about a patient's wishes and lived experience. God help anyone who came between you and patient advocacy.
So right now, God should help Ogilvie as he opens his mouth to say the dumbest thing you think he's said yet.
“But it makes more sense to do the collarbone plate while we’re in there. Dr. Park I’d love to scrub in, I’ve never seen one done before.”
The room goes silent as the atmosphere shifts. Robby takes a step closer to the wall, leaning against it. Nurses and other doctors find anything to do other than look at the scene in front of them. They're all aware of the beast Ogilvie just woke up.
The only people who don’t look away are Ogilvie and Park. The former because he doesn’t realize the mistake he’s made and the latter because he knows he’s about to see something that’ll fuel his wet dreams for months.
“Dr. Ogilvie, do you have a hearing impairment or is your brain just so full of self centered thoughts that you can't hear anyone other than yourself?” You ask, brows furrowed in curiosity.
Ogilvie stares, unsure of what to say. You push on. "I'm genuinely curious as it affects my teaching you. Answer." You know the answer. Everyone in this room knows the answer. The ED has protocols and systems to help hearing impaired staff. Ogilvie isn't one of those staff members.
He's meek, glancing around trying to catch someone's eye. Decipher the situation. Get help. Something. "No."
“Then I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but this is my patient. You have no right trying to present the case to an attending without my explicit approval. Quite frankly, you don’t have the right to even touch the patient unless I say so.” Ogilvie gulps as he watches you. You’re seething. Anger barely keeping itself contained, pressing against the seams of your composure.
“The patient explained her wishes to us and we do everything in our power to respect those wishes. We don’t just do whatever’s easier. If you want easy I suggest you go twiddle your thumbs across the street in the park where that overinflated ego you’re dragging around like a limp parachute won’t be a trip hazard for the rest of us.”
Robby sighs from the wall, hand on his forehead. He knows this has been a long time coming for almost everyone who’s interacted with the new med student. The only reason he isn’t stopping you is because he knows Ogilvie needs a reality check before he kills someone. Who better to teach him submission than the Wolf?
“You are not special for putting in hard work. Everyone in this room has worked their ass off to be here. Do not discredit their efforts, my efforts by assuming superiority over us and trying to slack off and do the easy thing. This is someone's life. Their autonomy. Their body and choices."
You’re not yelling, your voice barely raising in volume as you reprimand him. That makes it all the more threatening. "The next time you want to try and play alpha and disregard my patient’s clearly stated wishes and consent, I suggest you remember who the fuck you’re talking to.”
Park has to remind himself he’s in public, with a patient, as he starts to feel blood rushing to places it shouldn’t be. The way your words cut deep and the rise and fall of your chest consuming his attention.
Ogilvie stands there gaping, mouth opening and closing like a fish. “You can’t-”
“Can’t what? Reprimand my student for trying to perform a procedure on a patient that they didn’t consent to and that isn’t medically necessary?" Your eyebrows shoot up, smug look on your face as you ask, "Who do you think the board will favor? You and your failed attempt at dominance or me and not getting sued for inexcusable patient care?”
Park’s voice cuts in, steadier than he feels watching your successful attempt at dominance. “I know who I’m vouching for.” There's a faint smirk on his face when he looks at you.
Ogilvie puts his head down, nodding and looking like he’s about to vomit. “You’re right, Doctor. I apologize.”
He sounds sincere enough, so you accept it and move on. You're certain he could make a good doctor, he just needs to get over that god complex of his and listen. As fun as it might be, berating him more will only lead him to shutdown. He isn't your first student like this and he won't be the last.
Ogilvie almost gets whiplash from how quickly you’ve gone back to being a gentle mentor. Explaining how you adjust based on vitals and scans in this scenario. Showing him how to prep the patient with a compliment and a “good job”. He wonders if he accidentally inhaled some of that nitrous oxide and hallucinated the last five minutes.
Before he leaves the room to assist McKay with another patient, Park stops Ogilvie with a hand on his arm. “If you ever disrespect your superior like that again, you’ll have a lot more to worry about than her just chewing your ass out.” This time, Park does flash his teeth. Not with one of those blinding smiles he gives you when no one is looking. With a look of distaste as he delivers the vague threat to Ogilvie. The ambiguousness makes it scarier.
Risking a glance at Park through the clear Trauma doors, you find him already looking at you. His eyes burning your skin before he walks away.
Hands ripping off the bloodied gloves and scrub gown, you check the board. Every patient is being seen and chairs is somewhat under control for once. Which means you get to take five minutes for yourself to pee without rushing for the first time today. Or all week. As you walk to the staff bathrooms, you think back on your first month at the PTMC.
Your coworkers came to the assumption that Park doesn't bite at you because the first time he did, you bit back. Harder. Deeper.
He tried to question your call on a pediatrics case and began to make passive aggressive comments about your skills. A warning bite. A challenge. So you went for blood.
You said nothing in front of the patient, not wanting to add more stress onto the young boy's already bad day. The second you cleared those curtains though, you asked Park to take a minute and speak with you. He barely acknowledged your request and began to brush you off. So you grabbed him by his massive bicep and dragged him behind you to a less crowded hallway. You can still recall the way your fingers unconsciously dug into the muscle.
You figured the hallway would be away from prying eyes and ears. But if there was anything the PTMC emergency department staff liked more than their jobs, it's gossip. Princess saw you dragging the large, brutish man behind you and immediately started smacking Perlah's arm to get her attention. When they subtly moved to the end corner of the hallway to listen in, their jaws nearly dropped at what they were hearing.
"You made a bad call-" Park's usual short tone, this time more heated.
"Fuck you." Their jaws did drop at that. "My call was perfectly within reason and it was what's best for the patient. You just don’t like the fact that it wasn't your call. That you didn't think of it first." The anger was evident in your voice. Peeking around the corner they see you standing no more than 5 inches from Park, forefinger stabbing into his chest.
"But that's not the point right now. The point is that you belittled me in front of a patient. You didn't question my medical choices, you questioned my person. There's a very big difference there. One that I’d imagine a man who is so full of himself because of his big brains and biceps would be able to notice."
Park scoffs at that, mouth ready to retort. "Who do yo-"
"I'm not done. Don't interrupt me."
Perlah is confident she has never seen Park shut his mouth the way he just did. So quickly and forcefully Princess thinks she heard it.
"I am more than happy to hear professional criticism but what you're doing is being a dick. If that's what you need to do to get by with the fact that you're so clearly lacking in other departments, then be my fuckin' guest. But don't you dare ever pull that bullshit with me again." You give him a once over, taking him in as he's almost pressed against the wall by your smaller frame.
"I know how good of a doctor I am and I don't need to make people feel like shit to prove it. Maybe if you got over whatever macho, hero complex you have, you'd be a fun guy to be around. Be sure to let me know if that ever happens." Your chest is heaving, out of breath from you verbal lashing. Face set in determination while he scowls at you. Not backing down.
"Now can we make nice or are we going to stay at each other's throats for the rest of our employment?"
Perlah and Princess are in shock at the scene in front of them. There's no way the entire hospital won't have had this recounted to them word for word by the end of the day.
Park's crossed his arms over his chest, looking down at you like he's ready to rip your head off. The bystanders have half a mind to try and save you from what they know is about to come. He opens his mouth and they prepare for what they know is going to be a bloodbath.
"May I speak now?"
What. The. Fuck.
You nod. "Yes, I'm done."
He starts. “If I don't agree with your medical opinion I'm not going to hold my tongue."
"Never asked you to." You quip.
"Good. I won’t."
"Good."
There's a long stretch of silence where neither of you say anything. Simply standing there looking at each other, both still coming down from the fuming anger that's trying to dissipate from your bodies.
Taking a step backwards, you make space so Park can leave. He takes a step forward, closer than you had gotten seconds ago and leans down to whisper in your ear, voice low and gravely. "Trust me, sweetheart, I'm not compensating for anything."
You don't say anything, only gasp lightly at the comment. The brush of his breath against your cheek making your heart race. Perlah and Princess couldn't hear what he said. His voice quiet enough for only your ears to pick up.
They do hear him bellow out as he walks away, not even turning back to look at you. "You're welcome to figure that out for yourself."
Rushing back to the nurses station, they conversed about the interaction in hushed whispers. And by end of day, everyone knew of the way you chewed out Park the Shark in a hallway. It's when the nickname Wolf started being thrown around.
Based off of that interaction, it gave some people the idea that Park respected you for your confidence. That you standing up for yourself so brazenly earned you some of his esteem. Which is partially true.
When someone else tried their luck with that method, it unfortunately didn't turn out the same way. Whitaker was the unfortunate sacrifice that allowed everyone to figure that out.
Maybe the way your lips quirk up at the memory of Dennis looking like the shell-shocked solider meme after learning that is a bit evil. You have to pee too much to care. Course headed for the staff bathrooms by the on-call rooms, you're quickly dragged into an empty on-call room and away from your bladder's salvation.
"What the fuck man!" You don't even turn to look and see who it is. Eyes still wistfully looking towards the bathroom that's being hidden from sight by the closing of the door.
It only takes a second for you to know who it is. The scent of his cologne, the familiar feeling of his hand on your arm, the warmth you dream about. Brendon.
"Is that any way to greet your superior?" You can hear the smirk in his voice.
"You're not my superior. You just work superiorly." He's technically got no rank over you. But he does have a fancy office upstairs above your department.
"I do a lot of my best work there, don't I?" He teases, hands moving to grab your hips as his face goes into your neck from behind. Laughing, you lean back into his warm body and the feeling of him kissing your shoulder.
"Perv."
"Good work with that hypermobile patient." His lips brush your neck, not trying to start anything but unable to hold himself back from getting a taste of your skin. The moment is incredibly sweet. Or it would be if not for your bladder.
"I'm going to piss on you."
Brendon pulls away quickly at that, turning your body to face him.
"Excuse me?"
"I haven't had a chance to pee since this morning and I feel like I'm about to burst." You whine.
Smiling he rolls his eyes as he opens the door, pushing you out towards the bathroom. Looking up and down the hallway to make sure no one is out there, he follows. "I'll see you at home."
Because that's the thing, Doctor Park the Shark does bite at you. When no one else is around. Physically.
Walking into Brendon’s house you find him in the kitchen.
“Honey, I’m home.” You call dramatically.
Something else that would send your coworkers brains reeling, Park the Shark is funny.
“How was your day at the potato factory?” He muses, not looking up from the vegetable he’s chopping. You’re not even sure what started this bit of yours, but it’s entertaining nonetheless.
“Long and horrible. The factory is falling into disarray.” He hums as if you’re recounting a serious topic and not some bullshit.
Wrapping your arms around his waist from behind, you appreciate the feeling of his strong core beneath your hands. “I got accosted in an on-call room by a coworker too. I might need you to beat them up for me. He tried to make me pee my pants.”
“Oh, is that so? Not what I heard happened.”
You busy yourself with placing kisses on his neck and jaw, leaning up to reach the exposed skin. After you make a noise of acknowledgement, he continues.
“I heard that you yelled at some innocent kid and jumped your boyfriend’s bones in the on-call room.”
Pulling away, you smack at his back knowing it wouldn’t hurt him (it’s a lot more gentle than you normally are) and gasp in offense.
“Ogilvie is nowhere near being an innocent kid. He’s been an arrogant asshole since he got there and someone needed to say something.” You defend.
Brendon places down the knife and turns to you, amused look on his face as you ramble on. “As for jumping my boyfriend’s bones? Yuck. Ew. I’m disgusted at the implication.”
“Oh?” He raises his brows.
Crossing your arms over your chest and rest your weight in one hip. Brendon’s eyes drop down at the movement. “I had to pee, I was sweaty and stinky from having to do CPR not even 20 minutes beforehand and we were at work.” You challenge.
Eyes slowly dragging back up to your face, Brendon challenges, “So?” He looks too damn hot for his own good.
That shouldn’t make heat start building in your stomach the way it does when you’re trying to act mad. Rolling your eyes, you stomp away. “I’m showering!”
“I don’t get a kiss from my stinky girlfriend?” He calls out after you.
Flipping him off, you hear his laugh follow you into the bathroom. It wraps around you while you shower. Plays on a loop in your head as you dress in a pair of shorts from the drawer he cleared out for you months ago and one of his t-shirts.
Walking back into the kitchen, he’s facing the stove. Hands slowly mixing ingredients and making sure nothing burns in his scrubs. They look good on him, his large muscles and bulk filling out every crevice in the fabric.
“I’ll watch this so you can go shower.”
It’s the routine at this point. He starts dinner and lets you shower, then you finish and plate while he takes his own.
“Thanks.” Placing a quick kiss on your cheek he rushes off, knowing better than to try and push his luck when he’s still in scrubs and you’re freshly clean. It doesn’t stop the hungry way his eyes roam over you before he turns. Mouth upturned in a way that tells you he’s going to be trouble.
As you’re putting the last of the dishes in the cabinet, freshly washed and dried, Brendon comes up behind you. His position similar to the one he had you in earlier in the on-call room. This time his hands slide under your shirt and begin to feel the bare skin beneath it. You can smell his soap and the faint lingering of damp heat on him. The scent pressing into your skin with his fingers.
“Dinner will get cold.” You reason as his hands begin to work their way up. Claiming more and more expanse until they cup your breasts.
“I’m not hungry.” He argues, mouth focusing on the soft spot behind your ear, teeth grazing the sensitive skin.
You let your head fall back against his shoulder, hand coming up to grip at his hair as you sigh. “I am, though.”
You’re torn. The on-call room stunt he pulled has had you fantasizing about this all day, recounting the heated look in his eyes from outside the Trauma room. But you also haven’t eaten since lunch and the food he made smells amazing.
“I’ll heat it up after and feed it to you by hand while you’re naked in bed.”
Decision made.
“What about you? Don’t you need to eat?” You ask. Unable to get rid of the urge to take care of him. Not sure of when he’d last had a chance to feed himself.
“Trust me, I’ll be eating.” The comment makes you laugh, your hand tightening its grip on his hair as you feel his teeth push into your skin.
Mouth open in a gasp, your knees start to weaken when you feel Brendon’s canines sink into the flesh of your shoulder. Not too hard, certainly not compared to some bites he’s left before, but enough to make your brain go fuzzy.
Kissing up your neck, he turns you with hands on your waist to find purchase on your mouth. There’s no hesitance to grant him access, letting his tongue brush into your mouth and bring the heat of him with it.
Your hands dig in to anything and everything they can. The hair at the base of his neck. His biceps and forearms as they wrap around you. The firm line of muscle on his stomach that leads down to his gorgeous thighs.
As the kiss deepens, one of those gorgeous thighs pushes its way between your legs. He’s so broad and massive compared to you you’re practically sitting on him like this.
The pressure of his thigh against your core has you breaking from the kiss to catch your breath. His large hands rock your hips as he taunts.
“Someone should really teach you not to speak to your superior like you did today.” Brendon’s voice is low in your ear, mouth brushing the shell of it before gently nipping at the cartilage.
Taking a moment to clear the fog in your brain that he’s creating, you decide play coy. “I have no idea what you mean. I’m the picture of innocence.” Batting your eyelashes, you look up at him sweetly.
You feel him twitch where he’s pressed against your hips as he cups your face with one of those giant hands of his.
“Not sure that’s the word I’d use.” Brendon’s voice is deeper, almost breathless as he leans in to reconnect your mouths.
Not wanting to pull away from each other, you stumblingly make your way to the bedroom. Not without a few pitstops against a wall or two, though.
With the backs of your knees against the mattress, Brendon wastes no time in sliding his hand underneath your shirt to pull it off. Leaning down, he kisses at your chest until he reaches your nipple, the other being covered by his hand.
Running your fingers through his hair, you reach your hands down the neck of his shirt to scratch up his back. His resulting groan vibrates through your chest from where he’s switched to offer the same attention with his mouth to your other nipple.
“Off.” You plead, hands dragging him up to paw at his shirt.
Complying, you’re graced with the sight of his bare chest, hands immediately running over the newly exposed skin. Thumbs digging into the muscle over his chest and shoulders. You’ve seen him naked plenty, but you never tire of the sight.
Trailing down the front of his chest, your hands take special appreciation of his v-line. It’s always made your brain melt in the best way possible. The sharp cut of muscle and faint trail of hair that gets exposed to you when he shifts the right way. The sight of it like this that only you get to see. It makes your mouth water.
Fingers sliding beneath the waistband of his shorts and boxers, you begin to slowly peel them down. Looking up Brendon gives you a faint nod, so you speed up your movements. Finally having him completely bare before you, you drop to your knees.
He’s already hard as you wrap your hand around the base of him while you bring your tongue out to gently lick at his tip. Lips pursing around him, Brendon curses from above you, his hands gently scooping your hair away from your face.
The taste of him drives you crazy, mind forgetting anything but the feeling of him against your tongue. Taking him as deep as you can, you hear him groaning as his hold on your hair tightens. When you swallow around him, he lets out a sharp hiss.
Using his grip, he pulls you off, a thick string of spit connecting your lips to his tip. "C'mere."
Big hands immediately pull you up, pushing you onto the bed as he places himself above you. He's so big. His body caging you beneath him. His arm bracing his weight beside your head shows off his bicep, the veins bulging down his forearm. It makes drool pool in your mouth with your desire to lick. So you do.
Turning your head, you drag your tongue across the skin, letting your teeth scrape gently with little kisses. The question in it is evident when your eyes flutter open to look at his, gaze searching. Free hand coming down to grab your throat, he pulls you up to meet his mouth in another sloppy kiss.
"Do your worst, pup."
That stupid fucking nickname shouldn't have you clenching around nothing like it does.
It's something people whispered about you when they noticed how lax Brendon was with you. Saying you were his shark pup. Like he was taking you under his wing. Whenever you heard someone refer to you as such it made you roll your eyes. But when Park first heard it, he just looked at you smugly and started using the name himself.
In public. At work.
Using it to call you across the room. After praising your work. When he was casually talking to you. You hate the name, think it's stupid and lame and inaccurate. Inappropriate.
But the way he says it, voice low and teasing. The other times he says it when you’re not at work…maybe it's grown on you a bit. It still pisses you off though.
In retaliation you let your teeth sink into his forearm. The muscle firm and delicious in your mouth. Feeling the smooth skin and slight prickle of his hair in your tongue. Brendon’s jaw clenches at the feeling. You have a habit of always clamping down a bit harder than him. He can take it.
"Sure you can handle my worst?" You challenge.
For the most part, Brendon takes control in the bedroom. It’s not without a fight. You don’t just willingly submit and give into whatever he wants. Even if you want the same things. You make him work for it, fight tooth and nail before giving in. Even then, you still like to make it difficult.
Your favorite moments are when he gets so fed up with it he pushes you down into the mattress with his entire body weight and uses his fingers in your mouth to silence you while he makes you cry out over and over and over.
There are also some magical times when you outlast him and have him pliant under your touch. He doesn’t admit how much he likes those times.
Leaning back on his haunches, he grabs at your shorts to pull them down. The action leaves you bare except for your underwear. "I can take anything you give me."
"Funny. I was gonna say the same thing."
Smirking, you reach your hand out to stroke him, thumb pressing down on his slit. His hips stutter forward into the feeling and his the muscle in his jaw ticks.
Running his hands up your thighs, he stops just short of your underwear. He looks up at you, challenge in his eyes. Your hand doesn’t stop its pace, languidly stroking him.
His warm fingertips brush just underneath the seam of your underwear, right over your hipbones. The touch makes your breathing pick up, antsy to feel him where you want him. It’s never that easy though.
Not when you have two apex predators fighting for dominance.
Smoothing over your skin, he watches you pull your hand back before relaxing into the mattress. Arms behind your head as if you were sunning at the beach. As if his hands weren’t less than two inches away from your soaked core.
Brendon moves the lazy drag of his finger closer and closer until he’s barely ghosting over where you want him. Cotton dampening even more when his fingers press just barely into your clit. Fingers hooking in the waistband of your underwear, he drags them down your legs before spreading you out.
You keep yourself relaxed on the mattress. Trying your best to seem uninterested despite the wetness seeping from your hole giving you away. Even going so far as to sigh out and close your eyes like you’re bored. That’s the final straw.
Bending down, you feel Brendon’s breath fanning over your exposed core as he says, “Hey, baby?”
Disarming. Luring. Setting the trap.
Humming, you casually lean onto your elbows to look down at him. The movements slow and drawn out as if it pains you to even bother moving.
The snare pulls taunt.
You answer boredly. “Wha-”
The second you meet his eyes, open your mouth to reply, he’s digging his teeth into the sensitive flesh of your inner thigh and pushing a thick finger inside you.
Your words are cut off at the feeling, head thrown back with a curse at the pleasure.
“Fuck.”
Brendon often makes comments about how his hands are his livelihood. Times like this, you think they’re your livelihood, unsure how you existed so long without feeling his hands on your body.
Curling his finger how he knows you like, he releases the skin of your thigh from his teeth, moving instead to sloppily mouth at your clit. Adding another one of his fingers, you keen into him, hands coming down to hold at the back of his head.
Moaning his name out, you can feel his smirk against you. Any other time you’d pinch him for being so cocky, right now you’re lost in the feeling of him working you closer to that beautiful edge. The most you can do is dig your nails into his scalp as you tug at his hair.
He feels you clenching tighter around his fingers and doubles down, sucking in place of the long stripes he’d been licking into you. The gush of wetness that meets his tongue tells him it’s working exactly how he’d hoped.
Your breathing starts to falter, muscles beginning to shake. He knows your body almost better than you do. You’re on the edge, barely holding on. When you feel yourself tipping over, your back arches with a cry of his name body tensing in anticipation.
He pulls back abruptly, taking with him your release. Asshole.
“Fuck you.” You whine, not even bothering to look at him, hands coming to cover your face in frustration.
Crawling up your body, he pulls your hands away from your face. Cradling them, placing a soft kiss to each wrist before holding them down against the bed in one of his own. Gently kissing your lips, he muses. “I plan to.”
Lining himself up he pushes in slow. Giving you time to adjust and feel every delicious inch of him slide in. His grip on your wrists tightens for a moment, muscles flexing as he breathes through the feeling of your tightness around him.
No matter how many times he sheaths himself inside your warmth, he can never get used to the feeling. He doesn’t know what it is, you drive him crazy every time.
When he’s flush against your pelvis, you pant at the feeling of fullness. You can never get enough of it. The weight of him on top of you. The ache in your hips as they spread wide to accommodate his large frame. Light pricklings of his happy trail and hair on your sensitive skin. The feeling of him so deep inside you that you can hardly breathe.
Bucking up into him, you try and get him to move, gently urging him with your hips. He’s steady above you. Staying still and looking down at you with that intense gaze that makes you bear down around him.
Brendon stays like that, unmoving atop you while you try and rock yourself into him, silently begging him to move. Minutes pass and you’re starting to feel deranged. Rabid.
You try and pull your hands free, but he’s not letting up, pressing more weight into your wrists to keep them pinned. You try and kick your legs, but the wide stretch they’re in makes it difficult. When you do manage to get a knee into his side, he just grabs it with his free hand and holds it still.
All his weight is being supported by the press of his knees in the bed and the grip on your wrists. The position makes him push deeper into you and the whine that comes out of your mouth is pathetic.
You’ve sounded desperate before. This is just sad. He looks at you with a sadistic grin on his face, waiting for you to say it. Waiting for you to submit. Show your belly. Expose your neck.
Your gums ache, the desire to sink your teeth into him so strong it hurts. There’s nowhere for you to go, he’s got you trapped completely beneath him. If you said the word, he’d be off you instantly, retreating and soothing you with gentle hands. Buttermuffin.
You don’t want that though. You want him to stay right here. Pushing you, forcing you into submission.
He coos at you, “C’mon sweetheart. Don’t you want it?”
He’s trying to ease you into it, make it less humiliating for you. Out of anyone he knows how hard it can be to be vulnerable, to give yourself up to someone else’s hold. No matter how much he loves watching you fight against it, see the way you thrash and snap at him with all your might, he still has some kindness in him to make it less humbling. Sometimes.
“No.” You snarl at him. Not wanting to give in. Trying to push him off you with your hips. It’s futile. You’re not even making a true effort.
“No?” He questions, tilting his head. Not in the cute way puppies do when they’re confused. In a deeply predatory manner, like he’s sizing up the kill. “So you don’t want this?” He mocks confusion before slowly dragging himself out and pushing back in just as slow.
“No.” You groan. But the way your body sucks him back in admits the truth. The heaving breaths you started taking the second he began to move speak volumes. The way you’re not saying it, Buttermuffin, tells him everything he needs to know.
“So, you don’t want me to do this then?” He pushes the knee he claimed up towards your head, the stretch in your thigh making you hiss as he grinds into you. Making you feel him so much deeper.
Your head smacks against the pillow beneath it and you let out a quiet curse, desperate to feel the drag of him. It’s been at least ten minutes like this, maybe three hours since he slid into you, you’re not sure. Time stopped mattering when you felt him where he belongs.
“Just-”, you stop. Throat tightening around the words even though you know they’re going to be your release. “Just fuck me.”
Brendon’s mouth quirks up at that, just slightly. His hand moves from the crook of your knee up to your jaw, thumb brushing your bottom lip. He’s staring at you with brows raised. Waiting. You know what he wants.
It’s a struggle to get it out of your throat, so he helps you. Big hand sliding down to rest over the delicate skin, gently pressing into the muscles on either side of your neck. It’s not enough to cut off oxygen or blood flow but it’s enough that he feels the wetness around him increase while your walls clench down involuntarily.
“Say it.” He taunts, fingers squeezing to prove a point.
You’re delirious now, eyes blurring and mouth falling slack. You want him. No matter how much you hate saying it. No matter how demeaning it feels. There’s nothing you’ve ever wanted more than him. You know he loves you. That he feels the same way. That he’d sooner walk through hell than not worship you. So you give in.
“Please.” It’s quiet, meek. More of a whimper than a word. On a different night, he’d be meaner. Make you say it louder. Over and over again. But not tonight.
Tonight, he smiles wickedly, giving you no time to prepare as he starts a brutal pace. Each time he slides home it’s deep. So deep, you feel like your choking on it, throat constricting on an exhale with each thrust.
You can’t speak, you don’t even know what you’d say. You’re not sure your mouth even works right now for anything other than moans and whines. Your brain certainly isn’t working.
Brendon drops his face to yours. Placing sweet kisses over your cheeks, down your jaw and neck as he destroys you. Breaks you apart and turns you into something better.
Fingers clenching, you want to grab at him. To feel his warm skin that you’re sure is damp with effort beneath your hands. He doesn’t give you the ability to, hand still keeping yours planted to the mattress. Keeping you restrained and open for him to do whatever he wants.
He does give you something better through, placing his neck in front of your mouth. You don’t know if he did it on purpose or not, but you’re taking the opportunity.
He’s groaning above you. From the occasional stutter in his movements, the feeling of his dick twitching inside you, you know he’s close. Not an issue, considering you’re right there with him.
Leaning up to close the small gap between him and your mouth, you bite down on the juncture where his neck meets shoulder. Teeth sinking into the firm muscle, feeling it jump beneath your tongue. Brendon moans out at the sting, the sound causing you to let out your own needy moan.
When your teeth dig in deeper, he tightens his grip on your knee and angles his head to nip at your bicep. When you feel his teeth on you, it brings you that much closer to the edge. Delirium sets in as you begin to beg. “Please, please, please, please.” Over and over with a whine, tears forming in your eyes from how badly you want it.
Anyone else would think you’re begging for release, but Brendon knows better. Leaning down to push his face into your neck, he saves you the embarrassment of making a comment about your pleading. Letting go of your knee he positions his arm in a way that your teeth can make their way back into his flesh.
The second his teeth begin to sink into your neck, you do the same to his forearm. The sensation has you tightening around him so much it’s hard for him to keep his thrusting steady. Hard for him to push back inside the slick heat of your core.
Sensing your incoming release, from the increased pressure of your teeth on his arm and the tightening of your walls, he fully bites down on your neck. That does it for you. The pain of his sharp canines. The overwhelming presence of him everywhere. His skin between your teeth. The feeling of consuming each other.
Groaning into his muscular forearm clamped between your teeth, your walls spasm around him. The pleasure making everything fuzzy, warmth flooding your body as your eyes unfocus.
You have to release him from your jaws to pant, trying to catch your breath and not pass out at the intense feeling taking over your body. Brendon loses himself in the feeling of your body sucking him in and follows after you. The added heat of his release only prolonging your high.
There’s nothing but the sound of breathing for a while. Minds catching up and body’s relaxing. Releasing your hands, Brendon gently massages the muscles of your shoulders and arms as he helps guide them back down.
His hands go to your hips next, digging into the flesh to soothe your muscles as he slowly pulls himself from you. Helping ease the ache as you readjust to a less spread out position. He’s mindful of the way your joints crack and pop back into place.
Brendon’s face twists in pain at a particularly loud pop, muttering a small apology. It doesn’t matter how many times you assure him it’s fine, that it’s worth it to be with him, he still feels guilty.
After another quick shower, this time together, he keeps true to his promise. Hand feeding you while you both lounge naked in bed.
Well, he’s naked. You’ve taken one of his massive button ups to keep you warm. Brendon complained, saying he was all you needed to keep warm but compromise was made. The buttons were left open.
“You think anyone knows we’re together?” You wonder aloud, mouth still finishing a bite of the delicious dinner he’d made.
“No way.” Comes his easy reply. “They all know you’re too good for me.” He places a kiss on your bare hip, looking up at you with a softness in his eyes that warms your chest.
“Or that you are way too hot to go for someone like me.” You reason. The soft kiss on your hip turns into a playful nip before he shakes his head.
“No way.” It’s the same reply. Different intensity now. You stare at each other for a long moment, seeing who goes belly up first. This time, he’s the one to submit. “I love you.”
Running your fingers through his hair, you brush your thumb over his cheek and he leans into the touch. “I love you too, my big, scary shark.”
Placing a kiss to your palm, you both laugh and finish eating. Then you lie tangled in each other, skin pressed together tightly. Two natural predators sharing space.
꒰ mdni ˎ you ate gojo's last pudding ; now you have to make it up to him ✧˖ 𐦯
🍮 ୧ ‧₊ gojo's annoyed at you... you can tell. maybe you deserve it... you did eat the last pudding of his but you had a craving and you didn't want to have to leave the house but now he's sulking and doing his best to stay annoyed with you.
it's the longest he's gone without breaking, a full hour having gone by where he's pretending you don't exist. grumpily watching the tv while you sit close by and feel guilty. not that guilty though, not guilty enough to apologise more than once.
he eats your treats all the time and you don't say anything about it, though to be fair to him he does replace what he eats... for the most part.
you don’t like when he’s cranky, you’re not great at sitting idly by when you know you’ve upset someone. lucky for you, you have a fool proof plan to distract him into forgiving you.
"satoru," calling to him softly.
he doesn't look at you and you shuffle in closer, still he doesn't turn to you. not until he sees the movement out the corner of his eye. you've lifted your shirt to flash him, tits on full display as a peace offering.
"is this your way of trying to make it up to me?" he asks like he's unimpressed but he's staring without shame.
your head tilts at him, "is it working?"
"no." he's still staring. he's also moved in a little closer.
"then i guess not," you shrug, going to pull your top back down.
"wait, wait," holding up a hand to stop you, "give it a little longer and it might."
"no," sighing, "you're right, there's just no making it up to you. i shouldn't have eaten the last pudding."
gojo's officially not listening, hands on your tits and groping at you. face coming down to nuzzle between them, leaving soft pecks and small licks to your skin. "uh huh," he hums offhandedly.
going to say something and cut off by a moan, his finger and thumb playing with your nipple. fondling you happily, trailing his mouth to the peak of your breast and taking your nipple in. tongue flicking against the sensitive bud to make you twitch. he's enjoying himself immensely.
you thread your fingers into his hair and pull him back, "do you forgive me?"
he leans his head against your sternum, smiling up at you, "tell you what," he grins wider, mischievous, "if you let me eat you, i'll think about accepting your apology."
the early morning light streams through the curtains and guides abbot’s path into your shared bedroom. you’re sprawled out on the bed, blankets kicked off around your feet. abbot’s careful not to wake you as he potters around the room, and it’s only when the bed dips with his weight that you stir.
you find him removing his prosthetic, a sleepy smile coming to your face at the fact that he’s finally home from his shift, “how was it, babe?”
your sleepy voice makes him turn to look at you, and he brushes some of your hair away from your face. he takes a moment to admire you, unable to compute how lucky he is to come home to you.
“the usual,” he responds, sinking further into the bed and groaning softly when his back hits the mattress. “friday night antics.”
you hum, stroking a hand through his greying curls, “i have pilates in an hour. want me to save you some breakfast?”
“stay,” he gently holds your arm, keeping you close. “sleep in with me.”
“jack,” you laugh softly as he buries his face into your neck. “i paid for this class already. it’s a cancellation fee if i don’t go.”
“so? i’ll pay for it. besides, the workout i’ll give you later is way better than anything pilates can do.”
your laugh rings out around the room and jack considers himself the luckiest man alive.
