this is just a continuation of the last conversation! i’m still just feeling out the characters and the dynamics so the next part will have a few more people 😈 but i’m excited to add some plot soon! and the reader’s nickname is ghost but we will add more onto that later 😛 thank you guys for liking my last post i’m super pumped i’m also willing to take suggestions and criticism if you have any!! as much as this is for fun i do want to put good work out into the world! thank you for reading it is so appreciated!
Not all of the people reading your x reader fics have white skin
Just a gentle reminder before you write characteristics that assume whiteness and exclude your black/indigenous/poc supporters-specifically in 'x reader' works.
I love and appreciate writers, but this is a recurring avoidable issue (going on for decades now).
"your dusky pink nipples" "your face turned just as red as his" "he could see the blush on your face" “your cheeks furiously blushed” “your ears burn bright red” “The look in your reddened face” “your knuckles white with effort” “bruised purple against your light skin”
Describing the physical feeling instead of the visual change helps include your readers while also elevating your writing IMO.
Anyone can say "Your cheeks turned red with embarrassment" or "Your face flushed" but wouldn't you rather say "A burning heat rushed across your face, from your neck to the tip of your nose, prickling right underneath the surface. You look anywhere but him, hoping your newfound interest in the buildings ceiling tiles will ease the fire tightening beneath your skin" And instead of the other character pointing out that the readers face is red, they can point out the obvious flustered facial expression/body language.
If you want your reader insert to have white/fairskin, then just label them white!reader or put the mention in the warnings/summary.
↪I have reached out to writers I favored/supported before and sometimes I have been met with severe hostility and defensiveness. I often wonder if people are doing this purposefully or for some reason think only white people read their fanfics (?)-if that's the case then be upfront and label your reader inserts as white!reader or something PLEASE. It’s gotten to the point where I feel like black women and other POC aren’t wanted or considered in these fandoms because it comes off like that in your writing. If you need a different motivation, just know you're missing out on more interactions, reblogs, and a bigger reader base. I don’t know why white is the default for so many writers in unspecified x reader/reader insert fics-the people on your blog following, reading, and supporting you aren’t all white and fair-skinned.
I am not talking about OC fics or fics where race/skintone is x specified in summary or warnings. This is specifically about unspecified "x reader" where whiteness is assumed as the default
Put in the comments good replacements for writers to use!
All my stories are R18. I write smut, and I may touch sensitive topics or topics that are not intended to be read by minors.
YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN CONTENT CONSUMPTIONS.
Masterlist
Pairing: Bucky Barnes x F!Reader / Frank Langdon x F!Reader | Bucky Barnes x The Pitt Crossover.
Warning/Tags: Smut, Angst, Mention of medical STRONG inaccuracies, mention of drug addiction, bloody details, everyone just needs therapy and probably one or two hugs. No happy ending, we will get over it, I promise.
Word count: ~3.3k
Summary: After Bucky ends things with you and you get injured on a mission, you meet someone who might be the one to help you forget.
Author's Note: THIS IS FOR MY LANGOND AND BUCKY GIRLS!
So, I wanna issue an apology for taking this long with this one. I was too afraid to mess things up with medical jargon. This could have been longer, but I wanted it finally out of my chest. If I make no sense, blame my ovulation.
Also, and as always, thanks to my beloved @kileyking and @herejustforbuckybarnes for betareading and proofreading.
The bullet ripped through your tactical gear. A burning feeling spread through the bleeding hole.
Voices blurred. Someone shouted your name. You couldn’t tell who. Your hands came away wet when you tried to push yourself up, and the last thing you saw was Bucky running toward you.
It felt nice to think he was going to be the last thing your eyes locked on before dying.
‘Such a drama queen,’ you thought. Not even in a moment like this would you let yourself feel something.
And, for sure, not after you finally displayed your strong feelings towards Bucky, only to have him dismiss you.
It was not out of nowhere.
The situationship with Bucky became a thing, maybe, after the third time you got stranded in a foreign location, and the cold was enough to make you willing to share a sleeping bag.
He was trying to keep you warm—your lips were almost fading purple, while his whole body just radiated waves of heat.
“Serum perks,” He joked, “Just come here.”
The first minutes were fine, until you felt his growing bulge. It didn’t help that you were getting soaking wet through your panties, too.
But how can two… people this unstable ask for sex relief?
“Buck…” You mumbled, trying to sound even polite. He swallowed. Really trying not to acknowledge his growing problem.
And not even two minutes later, he was pulling down your joggers while he freed his shaft to line it up with your slit.
His strong hands were holding your thighs apart, thrusting, mumbling a ‘god’s sake’ every time he felt he was losing control.
How his hands now squeezed your hips—the sleeping bag felt tighter, restraining, but it was the only thing that helped maintain the heat your bodies radiated.
Through your mind all those memories replayed over and over again while you fainted.
The way Bucky would hold you through your orgasms.
How his cock would stretch you open with closed eyes while you clutched whatever remaining clothes he still had on him.
You could even remember the very first time he dragged you out of a mission to bend you over a table in an abandoned warehouse to pleasure you in a quickie. His whisper pleadings in your ear, telling you to hold on a little longer, just because he needed to deal with Walker after coming back.
He didn’t really want to admit that he was catching feelings. And you were head over heels basically from the first time he pulled you flush against his chest and slid into your cunt carefully.
How he would sneak into your room so you could have some stolen moments together—waking up with him tangled between your legs. How his perfume lingered for hours even after taking a shower, because now most of your clothes and bedding smelled like him.
You had become reckless—almost got Yelena injured, you forgot to retrieve some guns—and that earned the whole team a two-hour scolding from Val, and that was it.
“We can’t keep doing this,” Bucky said after the tug sound of his tactical vest falling from his shoulders to the floor.
“Bucky, I know—I’m sorry. I just need to lock in. This is not going to happen again.” You said, stopping on your tracks to look at him.
"This is not happening again because we are not having anything else from now on.”
“Wait, but I thought…”
“This was a mistake. I should never have let your feelings get in the way.”
“My feelings?!” You snapped at him, “My feelings, Barnes? And what about you coming to my room at midnight? Or when you asked me to stay with you a little longer for the night?”
“You’re being reckless!”
“And since when do you care?!” You shouted back.
“Since we put Yelena at risk.”
“My bad, Sergeant Barnes.” You took your vest and walked away from the living room.
That was the last conversation you both had before this mission.
It was supposed to be something easy.
Dear Lord, It was Pittsburgh. It had to be easy. You shouldn’t be dying in fucking Pittsburgh.
The bright light hurt your eyes. Harsh, white, clinical—the type that gives you a headache immediately. The smell of antiseptic, alcohol, and metal was also lingering.
Your chest was still burning, your legs were numb, not sure if it was anesthesia, you didn’t have them anymore, or it was just the outcome for the amount of time you had been in the hospital bed.
The monitor next to your bed started to beep, probably because of your sudden moves. You tried to stand up fast, but every inch of your body hurt immediately.
“Wow, wow. Take it easy.” A strong man held you steady. His stern and raspy voice made you stop.
You tilted your head up, blinking to blur the white light from your sight.
Dark hair, slightly messy like he’d been running his hands through it. Tired eyes, but focused—really focused—on you, like you were the only thing in the room that mattered. Scrubs, a badge you couldn't quite read yet, sleeves rolled just enough to show steady hands.
“Huh, the soldier thing was not a joke.” He tries to joke, “You’re already trying to stand up. That’s—good.”
“Where am I?” You mumbled, and he got you back to your initial position.
“Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center,” he said while he read through your chart, “You took a bullet—upper abdomen. Lost a fair amount of blood, but your surgery went as well as it could.”
“How… long?”
“Your—partners? Brought you in, broad blond, small but fierce blonde, and a stern brunette.”
Walker, Yelena, and Bucky.
You nodded.
“I’m Dr. Langdon,” He tugged his tablet on his chest, “and you’re lucky you were near.”
You twitched a smile, “Lucky.”
You stared at him, you don’t want to admit it. But if you weren’t paying attention, you could get him confused with Bucky.
Not like twins.
Something more unsettling.
“Get some rest, I’m sure someone will come to see you soon.”
Some hours later, he appears.
Still the same clothes, your blood still staining his vest. He’s leaning on the doorframe, “You’re awake.”
“You made it.”
“Disappointed much?” You rasp.
He sighs, trying to ignore the fact. Then, Dr. Langdon comes in.
“Got some rest?” He takes his stethoscope from his neck and places it on your chest.
“And, who are you?” Bucky doesn’t even try not to sound harsh.
“Dr. Langdon, I’m in charge of her case.” He mumbles, still trying to catch your heart rate, “Sounds much better.”
Bucky nods, “When can she leave? She’s been here for three days. Long enough for someone like her to heal.”
“She went under a major surgery. As long as her body needs.”
Your heart beat rockets, Langdon notices it.
“Mister—”
“Barnes.”
“Mr. Barnes, could you do us the favor of waiting outside the room?”
“Isn’t she supposed to be with someone every time a doctor is checking on her?”
“She’s not a minor, and as you can see she’s not unconscious.” Langdon barks, Bucky mumbles something under his breath, and walks away.
“Do you want us to ban him from coming in?” He mumbles, leaning on a more personal space.
“Oh, no. It’s fine. He’s just… grumpy…”
“Quite a guy to work with.”
You shrug.
“Well, I’ll be checking on you before I leave for the night, but let’s hope you have some rest—”
“Thank you, Dr. Langdon.”
“You can call me Frank.”
When he walks out, Bucky is there waiting.
“Mr. Barnes, she’s free to have a conversation—”
They stand next to each other. That earns them some glares. Dana, the Chief Nurse, notices everything.
She’s been noticing how Langdon takes more time with you. How, after hours, he would sit next to you waiting for you to wake up.
Recovery is slow.
Pain comes in waves. So does boredom. Sometimes, someone brings you something to get less bored, but the hospital bed is getting uncomfortable.
But Langdon becomes a constant. He checks on you more often than necessary. You notice. You don’t call him out on it.
Conversations start small.
“How’s pain today?”
“Manageable.”
“Are you sure you don’t want some painkillers?”
“Not at all.”
“Wise but sadistic.”
You chuckle, you try not to pay much attention to what he means.
You learn he works too many hours. That he drinks bad coffee and avoids talking about himself unless pressed.
You learn the way his shoulders tense when he thinks no one’s looking,, and his deep ocean blue eyes are always lurking around.
You also learn the subtle signs—restlessness, distraction, something just beneath the surface.
You feel fine around him. Somehow, safe. He takes care of you, and the rest of the staff learns how he likes things to be done around you.
Unfortunately, Bucky learns it too.
He quickly learns that Langdon takes longer with you than with other patients, and you notice how his shoulder tenses every time Langdon comes into the hospital room.
Bucky hates the way you giggle when he’s around, the way you flush every time he tries to find your cardiac rhythm.
“Don’t you have more patients to check up on?”
“Already did. She’s my last before leaving.” He doesn’t even dignify Bucky’s presence by looking at him. “How are you feeling?" He mumbles at you.
“Much better, Frank.”
Bucky scoffs as soon as he hears you calling him by his first name.
“Let’s hope you can leave by tomorrow. I will check your last labs, and that will tell us everything we need to know about you.”
You catch it immediately. He’s flirting.
And, fuck. If you love it.
Bucky groans and leaves the room.
The day you are discharged, Bucky, Bob, and Yelena are there.
They are waiting for you outside while Langdon is writing down some instructions to follow in your lengthy discharge paperwork.
But you notice he takes longer.
Just a second longer.
“Nice meeting you, Frank.”
Your name slips with a flirt hint.
“Nice meeting you, too, superhero. Take care of yourself.”
They take you out in a wheelchair, Bob is pushing it while Yelena is rambling about how Alexei and John were running a bet pool about your life expectancy.
You turn around and see him charting on a computer, and then the paper in your hands weighs.
His phone number.
‘In case you need some assistance.’
You chuckle and fold the paper in your hands.
The first time you see him, it’s just for a coffee. You took a trip to Pittsburgh.
It’s late at night, after an easy shift. You’re still not on the field, and you haven’t been fully cleared to go take some missions.
His hand lingered just a second more than necessary when passing you your cup; you missed his touch.
The way his strong and skinny fingers touched you a lot of times back in the hospital didn’t feel the same now. This time was intimate; he wanted to give a message. And you were receiving it.
That coffee dates become late dinners in his house, staying at his house because it’s late to take the trip or take a plane—then non-stop texting, and before you could wrap your mind around the idea that you’re hooking up with the doctor who saved your life weeks ago.
You learn he’s going through a divorce. He never discloses the reason behind it, but you understand his reasons behind the secrecy.
The first time you’re together feels unreal.
He’s kneeling in front of you, your ass on the edge of his bed, his tongue is stroking from your ass to your clit, circling slowly and painfully delicious. His fingers wanders on your entrance while you drown his hand with your arousal.
This feels different.
It is not a safe house in Russia while you are stranded.
It is clearly not your bed, since it is the farthest, and your noise wouldn’t be heard by the rest of the team.
And this is for sure, not Bucky.
Langdon took his time with you.
From a make-up session on his couch, you're dry humping him, grinding your hips to make you feel better against his bulge—to him eating you out like he’s starving.
Tongue wetting your slit, fingers working you languidly.
Then—his cock. Pink, leaking, somehow delicious.
He is stroking himself, jerking. Looking directly at you.
“Can I?” You nod, and he immediately sinks on you.
His cock is big; you can feel every inch of it filling you up. His fingers are now tracing circles on your nipples while his blue eyes are locked in yours.
And you don’t want to admit it.
But those same blue eyes have fucked you too many times before, just in a different person.
The way he looks at you is the same way Bucky did it many times.
And you feel a pang in your chest.
“Hey, hey—look at me. Are you okay? You dozed off,” he stops his moves, and you roll back your eyes with the sudden stop.
“I’m fine—it was too much.”
“Need for me to stop?” He asks, stopping any touch he is giving you.
“No!” You cry out, “Please, Frank. Don’t stop.”
He smiles as he towers over you. His lips find yours while he starts thrusting again.
When you both reach your peak, he falls on your body, both chests heaving, breathing unevenly, he is still twitching inside of you, and you just let yourself enjoy that moment.
You were training on the compound when Mel came running to you. Her worried eyebrows gave you all the information you needed.
She is never this worried.
If it were Bob, Alexei, or John—nothing that a bail couldn’t fix. Yelena Or Ava? Probably just got into a bar fight.
But she was worried sick.
“Bucky assaulted a medical staff—”
“He fucking did what—”
You know exactly what is going on, and you don’t want to admit it. But Bucky had been giving you warnings.
He saw how much time you spent out of The Watch Tower now, how you now spend time going out for days, and how you would come back with an occasional love bite that you tried to hide with makeup, but a rough sparring, a hard training, or a bad application of makeup will take it off immediately.
“So, how’s your little thing going with your doctor?”
“He’s not my doctor, and we are doing fine.”
“Oh, so how do you call someone who helps you heal, works in a hospital, and was in charge of your case?”
You sigh, “Bucky… if I’m not mistaken, you ended things—not me. I’m just living my life.”
“So, you go and fuck the first man who comes your way?”
“Well, at least he cares!” You shout—offended.
“He’s a fucking addict!” Bucky snaps back.
You freeze for a second.
“He’s an addict. He’s been stealing pills from his precious hospital—and what would happen if someone goes and rats on him?”
You stop and look at him, “Let me be clear with something, Barnes. This is the first and last time that you stick your nose into my business. What I do, or who I do, it’s only my business. You don’t get to fuck me, decide it’s not worth it, just to leave me and then try to play the hero with me.”
And now here you are, driving to the police station in Pittsburgh.
Mel is talking on the phone while you drive like a bat out of hell, and in the back seat, Yelena is trying to look nonchalant, but she’s livid. She just added one plus one and came to the right conclusion.
When you arrive, Mel goes directly to the deputy and asks for Bucky; you do the same, but ask for Langdon.
They take you both to different rooms.
Langdon is sitting in a waiting room. He looks terrible.
“Frank…” You mumble, and he gets startled.
“I thought you were going to check on him.”
“Our Mel is already on that. I came here to check how you were doing.”
You lift his face and see the bleeding nose, a swollen eye that soon enough will be a black eye, and a deep cut on his lip. Bucky went hard on him.
“Do you want to tell me what happened?”
“He came to threaten me. Ending things with you, or he was going to tell on me.”
You then remember.
The conversation about the opioids.
Your world starts to spin around faster. You’re getting dizzy.
It’s not even about the stealing, not even the addiction per se.
But you’re tired.
Tired of having things with complicated men.
“Is it true?”
“It is.”
“For how long?”
“I’ve stopped as soon as we met. I—”
Tired of being someone else’s savior.
“If you wanna press charges is on you. We are over.”
You stand up.
“Wait, please. Hear me out.” Langdon stands up, and you stop him.
“I don’t need to hear anything. I’m done, Frank. Everything. You. Me. I’m tired.”
“Wait—are you getting back with him?”
You chuckle.
“No. We are bailing his ass out, because it turns out that we are all pariahs that need to be watched and work for the fucking government, but I’m not getting back with him.”
“Then, why are you breaking up with me?”
“Because I don’t want to be the reason you get well, because if something happens, I’m going to be the reason that you relapse, and I’m tired of being held responsible for things that are out of my hands.”
“Oh, but coincidentally, you’re still going to work with him.”
“I have to, ‘mkay? I have to. That’s not my fault. I don’t have any other option, and I’m not going to become a fucking government liability just because you’re insecure that I go back to someone who was not even something official.”
Walking outside of the waiting room area, you find Mel still on the phone, Yelena scolding Bucky, but he’s anything but paying attention.
When he sees you, he dismisses Yelena and walks immediately towards you.
“Really? I’m the one behind bars, and you go to see him first?”
“Shut up, Barnes.” You mumble under your breath.
But he takes your arm, and even against your wishes, you feel that sparkle.
That sparkle that you always felt every time he touched you, but you yank your hand from his grip.
“Are we leaving?” You look at Mel, and she nods.
“Oh, what? We are not waiting for your boyfriend to finish with the paperwork?”
You sigh and don’t ever answer. When you start walking to the car, Bucky pulls you to the side.
“We are not done, we are talking.” He towers over you.
“No, definitely we are done.” You lock eyes with him, “You came all the way here to bail me out and then don’t talk to me?” He snaps.
“Barnes, cut me some slack. It was either me or fucking Val. Mel did you a solid.” You sigh.
“Please, just give me a chance to talk. Let me explain myself.”
“I don’t need it nor want it.”
“Why not? Oh, right. Your doctor boyfriend probably gave you an ultimatum about either him or me.”
“I’m done with everyone. I’m done with you, I’m definitely done with him. I’m tired of just bringing idiot men to my life who don’t know how to behave and expect me to accept whatever thing they want to toss my way as if they were fucking prizes.”
You stroke your face with your hands, trying to find some kind of relief.
“We are done, Barnes. I’m going to find a loophole on this whole thing, and I’m gonna leave this shitty place.”
“Just like that?”
“I hope so.”
You tried not to look back.
You had avoided Langdon’s blue eyes—and you are sure you need to avoid Bucky’s blue eyes too.
General taglist: @maplesyrizzup @wickedfun9 @herejustforbuckybarnes @w1nter-fairy @sassandscribbles @globetrotter28 @buckysouvenir @singulartoast @buckybsdoll @mathcat345 @elliestwoleftfingerss @biaswreckedbybuckybarnes @phoenix-in-writing @onyx8514 @shitbewild @idkbeautiful @misswhiddless @buckybarneswife08 @beefybuckyplease +add yourself to my tag list!
was messing around on a text app and thought it would be fun to post. it might be a little out of character and idk if I really wanna go anywhere with this yet but again just posting for fun 😛😛😛
warnings: none! reader & victoria are the same age, and r both hilarious LMAO
note: hiii! i’m so sorry for lowkey going m.i.a…finals r kicking my ass😒 BUT HAPPY PITT S2 FINALE DAY! here’s a little something dedicated to my baby victoria javadi! also lmk if i should start adding reaction pics…i didn’t do it this time but i was considering it…
warnings: age gap ofc, some sugar mommy tendencies… use of pet names (honey, baby, sweet girl), suggestive. MDNI!!!!!!
note: as promised by my recent poll, here it is! i did NOT realize yall loved al hashimi so much but i am SO excited to write for her!! my first smau so lmk what u think :)
Pairing: Jack Abbot x ex wife!reader Word Count: 5.1k
Description: Years after your separation, life throws you back into Jack Abbot’s orbit in the worst way possible, carrying a devastating diagnosis that could be the reason your marriage fell apart in the first place: a tumor that may had erased the part of you that fell in love with him all those years back. And he’s not ready to lose you twice.
Tags/Warnings: Ex!wife reader, no specific age, ANGST, hurt/comfort (trust), talks about divorce, reader has big ex wifey energy, resulting in a bitter Jack, mentions of a tumor in the head and seizures but the medical aspect is very superficial, bad prognosis, suggestive comments and couple’s banter.
Note: This is the result of angsty thoughts invading my head at 2 am, so enjoy (it gets better trust) 🤍
Masterlist
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout The Great War.
There was a time where you believed you were tied to Jack Abbot by an invisible string.
Despite the crazy life he’d chosen, the long hours, the abrupt calls that took him away from you, the terrors of nightmares and traumas you couldn’t take away from him, you’d managed to love him through it all.
You loved him through the military years, and the consequences he carried home. Through the transition of losing a part of himself, and made sure that what was left wasn’t damaged by it. Loved him through the process of going back to emergency medicine. Through the night shifts and the missed holidays and anniversaries.
You loved him when his haircolor changed like the seasons. You loved the man in uniform and the man in scrubs and the man who sometimes came home too tired to even speak.
You loved and loved and loved him until…something snapped.
You…started calling him out more. For the hours and the absence and for the way he could be right there and still feel a thousand miles away. And Jack, who had spent most of his life learning how to stay calm under pressure, tried to be patient. Tried to love you through the sharpness, just like you’d loved him through his, even if he didn’t understand where yours was coming from.
He tried and tried and tried until…the invisible string between you snapped in pieces he couldn’t tie back together.
Time passed, and none of you survived the war you’d started in your own home. So you left. Sent out divorce papers that you never signed. You didn’t understand why back then, but now…you kind of do.
You take a deep breath as the ambulance bay doors slide open in front of you. People who take this entrance are usually bleeding, or screaming, or being rolled in on a stretcher, but you walk in with your head high and a pep on your step. Cashmere coat on, boots clicking the floor, a purse perched on your shoulder.
Seeing the ED after all these years hits you like a deja vu. From bringing Jack something he forgot in the middle of the night, to showing up at the ass crack of dawn still half asleep but smiling, waiting for him to finish charting so you could eat something together. Your memories are a little fuzzy these days, but there was a time where you knew this place almost as well as he did.
You reach the nurse’s station with a small smile on your face, only for it to widen when the face behind is not the one you expected.
“Well, what do we have here?” You say, coming to stop in front of her.
Dana looks up from the papers she’s holding, and her eyes go wide for a second. The look of surprise gets quickly replaced by one of her signature smirks, placing one hand on her hip.
“Well, I could ask the same damn thing, darling,” she says, amused.
That makes you laugh, and Dana’s face lightens up. Because despite everything, despite the years, despite the absence, you always had a soft spot for each other.
“I thought Lena was on the night shift,” you tease. Dana sets the papers down and huffs, looking at you through her glasses.
“Please. It’s not weird to see me covering someone for the right price,” she says, not being subtle about looking up and down at you. “Now what is strange as hell, is seeing you walk in here after all this time.”
“Why? I’m just here to see my hubby,” you say casually. “Is it a quiet night, or do I have to wait like the good old days?” You ask, feigning innocence with a single shoulder shrug.
“Oh, don’t you start! don’t you jinx my shift like that,” she says, almost offended, making you laugh harder. She narrows her eyes at you playfully, shaking her head. “You evil, evil woman.”
“So I’ve been told,” you snicker, checking something on your nails. “It’s good to see you, Dana,” you add after a moment, and she pretends not to notice the way you pick on the skin of your thumb.
“You too, hun,” she says fondly, trying to search for your eyes. “Now, are you going to tell me what brings you to my ED or do I have to waterboard it out of you?”
Before you can think of a way to evade the question, you hear a voice behind you that makes everything inside you stop.
“Let me know when the labs are back, Mateo.”
You turn to the source, and for a moment you can’t control the look on your face when your eyes land on him. Jack Abbot is walking out of Trauma Two with a nurse, too focused on pulling off his gloves to realize you’re standing frozen by the nurse’s station. You clear your throat and straighten up quickly, putting on that nonchalance mask back on again as Dana just smiles to herself.
Jack’s head finally snaps up and his mouth opens, probably ready to tell something to Dana, but stops dead in his tracks when he sees you there. He doesn't have a good time controlling his emotions either. He blinks a few times to make sure he’s seeing right, and that you’re not a cruel product of his imagination. It’s too early in the shift for that.
But you’re there. You are there. Wait–you’re there?
The confusion quickly gets replaced by anger. It’s been a long time. Three years of nothing, and this is how you show up? Looking polished, composed, infuriatingly beautiful, like you didn’t leave a hole in his chest he was never able to stitch back together.
“Are you lost?” The words coming out his mouth are sharper than he expected, but the coldness is familiar to you.
“Jack,” you say, forcing a plastic smile and tilting your head. “Is that the way to greet your wife?”
“My wife…” Jack mutters with an incredulous laugh.
He looks at Dana all scandalized, offended. She just shrugs unimpressed, not interested in getting involved in whatever messy drama is about to unfold.
She will totally watch, though.
“If you’re here to tell me you finally signed the papers, then you wasted a whole trip. You could've just mailed them,” he says sharply, too blinded to notice the way your smile faltered at that.
“I’m not here for that,” you say, holding tighter to the bag on your shoulder. “There’s-”
“You know you’re not supposed to walk in through the ambulance bay unless you’re dying,” he continues, before giving you a head to toe assessing look that ends with a bitter huff. “And by the looks of it, seems like the devil has taken care of his own.”
You chuckle, because it’s the only thing you can do at this point. Because if anyone in the world has earned the right to call you a devil, it’s Jack.
For the last year of your marriage. For every sharp word, every time you didn’t want to listen, every fight that left him standing there wondering when loving each other had become something exhausting instead of home. For the way you ended things. For how you walked away and never came back.
“Dr.Abbot?” A male voice coming from the trauma room breaks the tense moment between you.
You look at the doctor, one you remember seeing last as a first year resident, trailing behind your husband with a notepad and an iced coffee in hand. You can’t recall his name, but he looks like he got his attending position after all.
Jack turns to him, “I’ll be there in a second, Shen,” he says gently, then back to you, more impatient, “I’m busy. So if you’re done making your little grand entrance, you can leave the same way you came in. You seem to be pretty good at it.”
The way he talks to you shouldn't hurt this much. You deserve it, for how unkind you were with him in the first place. For how badly you hurt him. For how you ran his endless patience thin. Now, in hindsight, there are many things you wish were different.
But wishing won’t make the medical records in your purse change. And even though you’ve earned every blow he throws at you, you still square your shoulders. Shrug it off like it doesn't matter. Because it doesn't matter.
“I’m not leaving until I speak to you…privately,” you say, turning back to Dana with a smile. “Break room’s still the same way, right?”
“Down the hall to the left, sweetheart,” she says, shaking her head with a chuckle.
You blow her a playful kiss as gratitude, one she pretends to dodge, rolling her eyes playfully as she walks away to continue with her duties. You round the nurse’s station, and walk straight past Jack, close enough that the heavy fabric of your coat almost brushes his arm, but it’s your scent that hits him like a punch to the stomach.
Your perfume. The perfume. The one you wore to all your dates, the one you married him with, and the one he had to scrub off his clothes like a toxic chemical when he talked himself into getting you out of his head after you left.
Dammit.
He sees you stroll to the break room with that sway of your hips that used to keep him up at night, trying to gather the courage to invite you out when you first met. Fucking dammit. You ruined his life. You keep doing it.
“Dr. Abbot!” Shen calls again, a little sharper even for him.
Jack sighs deeply, turning defeated to the trauma room, as the same question pounds his head over and over again.
What on earth could you possibly want?
The second you shut the door of the break room and you’re alone again, your shoulders sag and the mask slips right off. The exhaustion in your bones makes you take a seat as soon as you see it, placing your bag on the chair next to you and pulling out the black folder you’ve been carrying around for months. You place it on the table, and look away as if that would change the contents of it.
Your eyes meet your reflection on the microwave sitting on the counter, and you can’t help the sigh that leaves your lips. You did well making yourself look like the ex wife who’s thriving and has her life together.
What a joke.
You slump back into your chair, and wait.
Jack makes you wait a long time. You figure it’s his petty way of getting back at you somehow, or maybe he’s just trying to ease off his anger before he walks in. But hey, at least you were able to reassemble yourself. By the time he walks in, you’re sitting at the table with your legs crossed neatly, coat still on, folder placed in front of you. Composed enough to make him think that this is still some kind of performance.
You hate that your brain keeps telling you to push more. To make him snap. The string has been broken for a while. Why do you still feel the need to pull?
Jack doesn’t sit, even if his leg would thank him for it, he just stands with his arms crossed over his chest, looking at you impatiently.
“What, you’re not joining me?” You tease, pushing open the chair across from you with your boot.
“I’m not staying long,” he says flatly, ignoring the seat. “So whatever this is, start talking.”
You hum in feign amusement, leaning back a little. “Why? Seems like a quiet night for me.”
Jack closes his eyes, shaking his head, thinking about every single self regulation method his therapist had taught him. Five things you can see, four things you can–
“Relax,” you say.
Wow. How didn’t he think of that? Could've saved him thousands in therapy.
He realizes the only way to get this over with, is getting it over with. So he opens his eyes, and this time they land straight on the folder in front of you. Whatever restraint he was trying to hold on to, spills out in a humorless laugh.
“What is that?” He nods to it, “A list of what you want to keep?”
“Jack, that’s not–”
“I already told my lawyer you can keep everything,” he says anyways, letting the words spill, because he’s been bleeding over this for years and he’s sure as hell not stopping now. “The house. The cars. Even the goddamn bedsheets. You can keep it all, I don’t want any of it,” he says calmly, like he isn't still losing sleep over it every day. “I moved out a while ago anyway, it doesn’t mean anything to me.”
It gets harder to keep your resolve, especially with the sharp pain throbbing in your head. But of course he doesn’t want it. Why would he want the remnants of a home you poisoned? A marriage you turned sharp and miserable and impossible to hold together?
A lump forms in the back of your throat, but you swallow it down like every bad news you’ve heard over the course of the last months.
“It’s not about the divorce, I already told you that,” you say quietly.
Jack just stares at you, exasperated. Every second you’re in front of him burns his insides. Every second you share the same oxygen he can’t breathe. Every second of your presence is just a reminder of the greatest thing he’s fucked up in his life.
You just pick up the folder and hold it out to him. He hesitates at first, but you have no bitchy remarks left on you. The faster you get it over with, the faster it will all be over, so you shake it for him to take it, until he finally does.
Your gaze stays on him as he flips through the papers inside; lab results, endless consult notes, imaging reports. The annoyance doesn’t disappear right away, but his salt and pepper brows furrow together as his brain catches up with what he’s reading. He digs for the actual CT, and comes across a series of images that back up everything the reports say.
He instinctively steps closer to the chair, eyes still fixed on the papers, sitting down mindlessly as he spreads everything on the table. The only thing he can focus on is your name printed on every paper. Abbot here, Abbot there. When he finally looks up at you, all the color has drained from his face.
“What is this?” He asks. Because what the fuck kind of bad joke is this.
“Well,” you clear your throat, crossing your arms over your chest, “you did say I shouldn’t walk in through the ambulance bay if I wasn’t dying.”
“This isn’t funny,” he says, frustrated. God, you forgot how intense his eye contact was. “What is this? How–when did this happen?”
You play with your fingers on your lap, and sigh, “Ten months ago, I…I had a seizure at work,” you say softly, forcing yourself to keep going. “They did the scans, and it–it didn’t take long to find it.”
It.
Jack stares at it on the CT, then his eyes drift to the reports. Mass. Tumor. Inoperable. Terms that have always been technical to him, medical, now seem like the cruelest words ever written by man.
“I’ve seen a couple of neurosurgeons,” you continue, “and they all came to the same conclusion–”
“No.”
“Jack, they said they can’t take it out–”
“No,” he cuts you off sharply, shaking his head. “That’s not–I don’t agree.”
“You don’t have to agree,” you don’t raise your voice, just smile sadly. It’s something you’ve been telling yourself over and over. “Guess the devil doesn’t look after their own in the end.”
“Stop, don’t…” Jack sighs, dropping the papers just to run his hands roughly across his face. “I didn’t mean that–fuck. I didn’t mean any of that–”
You haven’t even gotten through the worst of it, and you’re already exhausted. God, these timebombs suck your energy right off. You reach for the water bottle on your purse, and drink away the premature grief building in your throat.
Jack watches you carefully, and for the first time since he saw you again, he allows himself to see past the veil of hate he’d tried to see you through. He sees the crack in your smile, the shadows under your eyes, the real strain and exhaustion you can’t quite dress up with a fancy coat.
He sees he wasn’t there to hold you through it.
“Why didn't you call me?” He asks, and you fear it’s the most devastated you’ve ever heard him.
You sigh, and set the bottle down. Because how do you even explain that? What even was it? Pride? Shame? Guilt? Love?
Fear.
How do you tell the man you wrecked that you did think of him first? That even after years apart, even after every awful thing, he was the first person you needed when the ground fell out from under your feet?
“I didn’t want to bother you,” you admit.
I was scared.
“Bother me?”
“After everything that happened, I thought…I thought I should solve it on my own,” you shrug.
I didn’t think I deserved your help.
“You didn’t think that your husband, a doctor, would want to ‘solve it’??” he snaps. Offended, yes. Furious, yes. But underneath all of it…it’s the hurt that speaks.
“You’re not a neurosurgeon,” you laugh bitterly, more defensive than you want to. “Your opinion is not gonna change–”
“It’s not just my opinion!” He says, standing up because his frustration is going to make him burst if he stays still. “It’s–it’s me being there. You went through all of this alone.”
The only sounds in the room are both your heavy breaths. You keep your rigid posture, even if every part inside of you is breaking. Jack runs his hand through his curls, once, twice, then tugs a little on the third time.
“Jack…” you call out softly, but he doesn’t look at you. His gaze darts to other five things he can see, hands on his hips as he grounds himself. “I’m not here to fight. And I’m not here for you to solve it…there’s just something I wanted to talk about.”
He finishes his little exercise and looks at you again, bracing himself for an impact he’s not sure if he can take. You know he can’t. So you take another deep breath before speaking.
“The doctors said the tumor is in an area that affects behavior. Like my moods and personality. They said it may have been growing for years.”
There’s a tremble in Jack’s lower lip that makes you hesitate, you know he already knows what it means, yet you keep going.
“They think it might explain why I was so…particular these last few years,” you let out a broken little laugh, shaking your head quickly to try to fight the tears prickling your eyes. “I know it’s not an excuse, maybe it wasn’t that,” you sniffle, wiping your cheeks angrily. “Maybe I was just a bitch.”
“Hey–no, honey, don’t say that,” he says, the endearment falling out of his lips so naturally.
Jack doesn’t think twice to step closer and drop to one knee in front of you, groaning at this prosthetic but still reaching for your hands on your lap. You try to retreat back so fast your chair screeches against the floor, but he doesn’t let you pull back, instead he interlocks his fingers with yours, almost hissing at how cold you are.
You shake your head, tears flooding your cheeks now. “Don’t–don’t speak to me like that, you can still be mad at me,” you sob, but he keeps his warm grip firm. “You have every right to be, I was so mean to you, Jack. I snapped at you for everything. I made you feel like you were always doing something wrong. I turned our house into somewhere awful and I knew you were trying, and I kept pushing anyway.”
He has tears in his eyes now too, but he lets you get it out of your system. Lets the years of regret spill out of you all at once, god knows his therapist has heard him many times.
“Jack you’d come home exhausted and I’d always find something else to pick apart. Something else to be angry about. And you looked at me like you didn’t recognize me anymore, and I hated it because I thought you were wrong. Even then. I knew I was hurting you and I kept doing it. I made you carry all of it. So maybe now I deserve to carry all of this alone.”
There it is. Jack breaks completely at your confession. His hand comes up to cup your cheek, catching the tears that won’t stop coming.
“Sweetheart…you should’ve called me,” he says again, but he’s not angry this time. He’s grieving. “You should’ve called me.”
“I know.”
“You should not have done this by yourself.”
“I know,” you cry out, he just keeps caressing your cheek with his thumb. “My–my memory is not the best now and I just…I needed to tell you I was sorry while I still could.”
You try to smile through the tears, you really do, but he looks so frightened. So wrecked. Your hands fly to his wrists now, clinging instead of pulling away.
“I’m scared, Jack,” you confess.
He remembers you saying that on a holiday when he hauled you up deep into the sea, just so he could hold you in his arms. He remembers you saying that when he put on a horror movie just so you could hide behind his biceps. He remembers you saying that before trying a new dish at your favorite diner instead of the usual you ordered.
All those times were said with a laugh, or a cheeky smile. But this? This is pure, unadulterated fear. He is scared. He’s terrified. So he does what he always did best: hold you.
He lifts himself up just enough to wrap his arms around you. You let yourself go instinctively, realizing how much you’ve needed this the past few months. He holds you so tight, so desperate, one hand cradling the back of your head, the other rubbing your back. You bury your face in his neck and sob. You feel the way Jack shifts, pressing his lips to your hair while he whispers sweet nothings.
“I’m here. I’m here, honey. I got you.”
“I don’t–”
“Don’t tell me what you deserve right now.”
That makes you cry harder. He rocks you a few times, just like he used to on the worst nights. Just like he always vowed to.
“I loved you through all of it,” he confesses. “Even when I was angry. Even when I thought you hated me. I never stopped. I never stopped.”
“I’m so sorry,” you sniffle.
“I know, honey, I know.”
“I loved you the whole time too, I swear,” you keep going. “That’s why–that’s why I never signed the papers. My heart didn’t want to let you go. It never did.”
“It’s okay–“
“No it’s not.”
“But it is,” he insists. Firm and honest. “You were sick, and I should’ve known. I should’ve seen something–“
“No. Don’t blame yourself for this too,” pulling yourself apart from him enough to look into those beautiful hazel eyes. “Leave the regretting to me.”
“Sweetheart–“
“Jack.” You narrow your eyes at him, and it brings him back to all those times you won even the most pointless of arguments with just one look.
He huffs a teary laugh, dropping his head in defeat. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay,” he says, lifting his head again. There’s a new spark in his eye trying to make its way past the previous devastation. “Then you leave the rest to me.”
You look at him, eyebrows furrowed, but he just pushes a strand of hair from your face.
“I’m getting you admitted here,” he says, you immediately tense, but he speaks before you can refuse. “No, listen to me. We have some of the best neurosurgeons in the country connected to this hospital. I am going to pull every string I have, call in every favor I can, and get every set of eyes possible on this.”
“I can’t do this again,” you shake your head.
“Yes, you can.”
“I’ve already seen so many people, Jack. I’ve heard it all. I’ve made peace with it.”
“No you haven’t, and that’s okay. You came here because some part of you knew I would never let this go. So don’t ask me to. It’s offensive, honey.”
Well shit. Seems like your husband of years seems to actually know you better than you know yourself.
“I’ve accepted it, Jack. Memento mori.”
Liar liar pants on fire.
He grins. “Then I guess we’re both liars.”
You look at him confused, but he just sighs.
“I told you I moved out…but I didn’t,” he admits. “I still live in the house I built for you. I still sleep in our bed, on my side of course, cause I know you never liked the way I dipped your side of the mattress,” he laughs at the memory, making you smile. “Your books are still on the nightstand. I never moved them.”
You imagine all the things he never brought himself to move. The way time stopped running in a house that was once filled with laughter and love. So much love. Jack just does a helpless shrug.
“You left…but you never really left me.”
Yeah. That’ll do it. You’re crying again before you even realize it. Your hands go to cover your face, but he intercepts them midway.
“No, no, honey. No more hiding from me,” he says, so softly it doesn’t exactly help your situation. “We’re in this together now.”
You nod, his thumbs reach out to dry your tears.
“I know I’m not the type of surgeon you need. I know I can’t fix this with my own hands. But I’m still a doctor,” he explains softly. “And most importantly…I’m still your husband. So I will be damned if I don’t do everything in my power to figure this out. We are going to try. Oh honey we are going to ask questions. We are going to make the smartest people in every room look at this until they are sick of seeing my face.”
That makes you laugh. He delights at the sound.
“Jack…”
“I know you’re tired, my love,” he continues, his voice turning even softer. “I know you’re scared. I know you’ve been carrying this by yourself for too long and the idea of starting over with new doctors makes you want to crawl out of your skin. But you do not get to give up before I even get a chance to fight for you.”
The weight in your chest that has been dragging you down lately eases, if only a little, letting you breathe. Maybe he’s right. Maybe all of this would’ve been easier if he’d known from the start. Maybe it can be easier now. Even if he can’t solve it…you’ll let him try.
“Okay,” you whisper.
“Okay,” he nods. “You’re coming home with me tonight, and we’ll deal with this in the morning. We’ll start here, and if it doesn’t work there’s always New York, I can cash a few favors in Washington too–“
“But your job–“
“Can wait,” he states without hesitation. “Sweetheart, I've been here for a long time, and I’m going to use that to my advantage. Maybe it’s time for my sabbatical, yeah? That way I can take you everywhere you need to be. Wouldn’t you like that?”
“…a sabbatical.”
“Robby took one,” he shrugs. “Three months away and it didn’t kill him. I’m willing to take whatever time they allow me.”
“What about SWAT duty?” You push. He lets out a chuckle.
“I know you might miss the uniform–“
You slap his arm weakly.
“Alright, alright,” he throws his hands up in defeat. “Just–don’t worry about it, okay? I meant it when I said I got you, honey.”
You sigh, but it’s more out of relief than anything. How you needed to hear those words. How you needed him.
“And in the meantime, you can tell me your favorite memories of us…so I can keep them safe for you while we figure this out.”
Jesus Christ. How could you have ever walked away from this man? At this point you’re gonna have to sign the papers just to marry him again.
“Jack…”
“Come on, from the hip, give me one,” he says playfully, and you know he’s not letting this go.
You tap your chin and glance away, pretending to think. Your eyes light up when a very specific memory pops into your head.
“I remember our naked yoga sessions very fondly,” you say, completely serious, but it manages to get a genuine surprised laugh from him.
“Of course you do,” he laughs, throwing his head back at the memory. He still does it, at sunrise when he’s not working, with your mat still next to his. “You always ended up bouncing on me.”
“Jack!!” You say, heat creeping up your face in a way it hasn’t in a long time.
You both laugh about it for a moment, then fall into a quiet that could never be described as awkward. Not between you. Not anymore.
“I missed this,” he says quietly, those intense hazel eyes piercing into yours. You loved those eyes. You still do. “I missed you.”
You smile sadly, cupping his face with your hands. “You missed nice me.”
“I missed my wife.”
Your heart skips a beat at that. So many years he’d called you that, until you threw it all away. Or, well, the thing in your head did? Whatever. It is what it is.
Your eyes travel all over his face. Damp lashes, tension in his jaw even if he tries to hide it with a cheeky grin, all the wrinkles time has carved into him while you were apart.
“I missed my husband,” you finally say, just as soft.
He smiles at that. You loved that smile, you still do.
“Then let me take care of you, honey.”
We can plant a memory garden
Say a solemn prayer, place a poppy in my hair
There's no morning glory, it was war, it wasn't fair
And we will never go back to that bloodshed
Thank you so much for reading 🤍 feedback is always appreciated 💋
wc: 8.9k (oof)
pairing: jack abbot x wife!reader
summary: when the doors of the pitt swing open to reveal you on the gurney, dr. jack abbot’s world shatters, forcing him to fight for two lives he didn't know were at stake.
c.warning: angst with happy ending; established relationship (married); major medical trauma; graphic depictions of injury; mentions and discussions of abortions in the past; mentions of pregnancy/pregnancy loss scare; jack abbot crashing out; mentions of car accident; near-death experience; never mind the medical accuracy or lack thereof (i tried my best but i’m still not a doctor)
a/n: this got out of control. it was supposed to be a usual 3k one-shot but then i kept writing and well here we are now. also shout out to my friend paula that helped me do all the medical research for this one so i didn’t embarrass myself with all the inaccurate doctor talk. love u girl <3
the fluorescent lights of the hospital always seem to hum a little louder when the er is quiet. it’s a sterile, buzzing vibration that grates on jack’s nerves more than the usual cacophony of sirens and shouting.
he leans against the nurse’s station, a lukewarm cup of bitter black coffee forgotten in his hand. he checks his watch. 2:14 pm. the numbers blurring slightly from sheer exhaustion. his shift was supposed to have ended hours ago, but the universe had other plans.
first, a multi-car pileup at dawn bled into a series of critical post-ops. then, every time he had tired to reach for his coat, another “one last thing” tethered him back to the floor. now, nearly ten hours into a forced double, the walls feel like they’re closing in. all he wants right now is to be through his front door, to shed the smell of antiseptic and the weight of the hospital, and to finally disappear into the quiet comfort of his home, where you were probably already waiting for him.
“it’s too quiet,” dana mutters as she organizes a stack of charts.
jack offers a ghost of a tired smile. “don’t say the ‘q’ word. you’ll jinx us.”
his mind drifts, as it often does during these rare lulls, back to you. he thinks about the way you looked when he left. half-asleep, tangled in the duvet in your hared bed, grumbling about the warmth leaving you as jack got out of the bed. he’d kissed your forehead, whispered that he’d be home by eight, in time to share breakfast with you, and headed into the belly of the beast. as he walked into the hospital, he felt a rare pang of guilt; he’d been working so many double shifts lately that your shared home felt more like a hotel.
i’ll make it up to her, he thinks. maybe he can take you out to that new sushi bar you showed him on your phone the other day. no, you’ll probably prefer thai. you’ve always loved-
the thought is cut short by the sharp, rhythmic chirp of the trauma radio. the sound like a physical blow to the silence.
“dispatch to mercy trauma, we have a level 1 activation. multiple vehicle collision, pileup on the i-579. initial reports suggest a jackknifed semi and at least six passenger vehicles. multiple red-tags. first eta is four minutes. lead bus is carrying a female, blunt force chest trauma, unstable vitals, gcs of 6.”
the er transforms in a heartbeat. the “slump” dies instantly, replaced by the practiced, frantic choreography of a trauma team who’s been through this million times.
robby, that was contrasting the lab results from one of his patients jumps into action.
“abbot, i need you in trauma. we need to get bays 1 and 2 ready. i want respiratory on standby. grab the o-neg. if this is a pileup, we’re going to be drowning in ten minutes.”
“let’s go!” jack barks, his voice dropping into that authoritative, calm register that defined him as he signals some of the residents to follow him,
the coffee is now discarded and forgotten on dana’s desk as jack pulls on a pair of gloves, the snap of latex echoing against the white, bright walls of room. here, in the chaos of trauma 1, he’s in his element. he’s dr. abbot, the man who’s used to holding the line between life and death. he feels the familiar rush of adrenaline, the narrowing of his world until only the patients matter.
“eta one minute!” someone shouts.
robby stands at the ambulance bay doors, peering through the glass. a faint rain has started. a cold, miserable drizzle that blurs the red and blue lights of the approaching sirens.
the first ambulance screeches to a halt and the back doors swing open. immediately, a paramedic jumps out, already pumping a manual respirator. “female, trapped in the driver’s side for twenty minutes. we had to use the jaws. bp is 80 over 40 and dropping. she’s trending toward traumatic arrest!”
robby’s breath catches for a fraction of a second. his eyes scan the familiar face, noticing all the blood, the cuts and bruises.
no, he thinks. please, let it not be true.
“get her to bay 1!” he orders, returning to reality as he steps forward to catch the side of the gurney as it flies past.
as robby pushes the gurney, he refuses to look at the patient’s face. but when he walks past dana’s desk, he looks devastated, and she notices. rounding her desk, she walks next to him, matching his quick step.
“i need abbot out of that room,” he says. “now.”
frowning, dana walks next to him.
“what? why?”
robby just shakes his head. “i need you to take him to trauma 2. anywhere, really. just… away from…”
but it’s already too late.
jack’s eyes are locked on the gurney, tracking the way the patient’s body jolts with every bump of the wheels, noticing the blood-soaked bandages on her chest.
“on three! one, two, three!”
the paramedics help slide the patient onto the trauma table. and it’s only then, as one of the them pulls away the oxygen mask to swap it for the hospital’s ventilator, that the world truly stops spinning.
the air leaves jack’s lungs as if he’d been punched.
“jack…” robby tries, but he doesn’t look at him. he can’t react at all.
the female with blunt force chest trauma and unstable vitals isn’t a stranger.
it’s you.
your face is ghostly pale under the smears of blood and road grime. your hair, which he’d smoothed back just hours ago in the quiet of your bedroom, is matted with glass shards. you lay limp, your chest barely moving, a hollow shell of the person he loves.
“jack?” dana’s voice comes from a distance, sharp and concerned. “jack, what are you doing? we need to intubate!”
jack abbot, the man who never flinches, who doesn’t shake under stress, no matter how hard or critical the case, now stands frozen. his hands, usually as steady as stone, are shaking so violently they seem to rattle against the metal railing of the bed.
robby glances at dana over his friend’s shoulder, shaking his head.
“no,” jack whispers, the word catching in his throat. “no, no, no…”
“okay, “robby mutters to himself. “abbot, i need you to get out. now.”
but jack still can’t react, he doesn’t even flinch when dana closes her hand around his forearm, trying to pull him out of the room.
robby pushes past him. “she’s crashing! i need a central line now! jack, get out of the way!”
robby grabs a scalpel, his movements clinical and fast. he doesn’t stop to consider who is on the table. to him, right now you are just a ‘red tag.’ he can’t allow himself to think of anything else.
right now, you can’t be the woman who has quickly become one of his closest friends, one of the main supports on his hardest days. the woman he proudly considers family, the same one he shared secrets and past anecdotes with when he came by to yours and jack’s house for dinner every month.
dana is still trying to get jack out of the room, threatening to call security on him when the attending’s weak whisper makes her stop in her tracks.
“stop,” jack rasps, his voice cracking. he lunges forward, shaking dana’s hand off, too desperate. “stop. that’s… that’s my wife.”
the room goes dead silent for a heartbeat, save for the screaming of the heart monitor. robby looks up, nothing but pity for his friend boring in them.
“jack… you can’t be in here, brother. you know the protocol.”
“i am not leaving her!” jack roars, his voice echoing off the trauma bay walls, raw and heartbroken. “my wife is dying. i am not leaving her!”
“you’re making it worse!” robby hisses back. “you’re compromised! you’re going to kill her if you don’t let us work!”
jack looks down at you. he sees the blood. he sees the way your heart rate is flickering on the screen like a dying candle. a cold, terrifying clarity suddenly washes over him. the panic doesn’t disappear, of course it doesn’t, but he forces it down into a small, dark box in the back of his mind.
he steps back slightly, chest heaving. but his hands stop shaking, the roaring in his ears slows to low hum, enough for him to hear his own thoughts again.
“fuck the protocol. i’m staying,” jack said, his voice now terrifyingly low and steady. “robby, get the chest tube. and i need 10 of epi. now!”
he doesn’t look at his colleagues as he works. he looks only at you.
“stay with me,” he whispers, so low only you could have heard it if you were awake. “don’t you dare leave me, do you hear me? stay with me.”
and so the chaos begins in the trauma bay. robby and jack, along with a couple of residents and some extra hands work together, in synchronicity.
“i need a fast exam, now!” jack’s voice cuts through the noise, steady but edged with desperation, focused on the monitors, on the jagged green lines of your heart rate, the terrifyingly low oxygen saturation. he tries not to look at you, knowing that if he did he’d see your eyes, closed and bruised, and he would shatter.
“jack, i’ve got the ultrasound,” rabby says, his voice softer now, cautious.
he moves the probe over your abdomen, eyes flicking between the small screen and your still form.
you’re so still. the woman who loves dancing in the kitchen to grainy jazz records is now buried under layers of medical plastic and blood-stained gauze.
“we’ve got internal bleeding,” robby mutters, his brow furrowing. “she’s bleeding out into her peritoneum. jack, we need to get her to or immediately.”
“wait,” jack says, eyes falling to the darkening bruise on your lower belly. “check the pelvis. i want a full sweep. if there’s a pelvic fracture we didn’t see—”
“i’m on it,” robby replies. he moves the probe lower, his movements clinical.
the room seems to go silent, though the machines are still screaming. jack watches the ultrasound screen, his mind already three steps ahead, calculating surgical approaches, estimating blood loss, praying to a god he hasn’t spoken to in years.
then, the image shifts.
robby freezes. the probe stops moving.
on the grainy, black-and-white screen, nestled deep within the shadows of your body, is a small, unmistakable flicker. a pulsing light.
jack’s breath hitched. his world, already tilted on its axis, began to spin violently.
“jack…” robby’s voice was barely a whisper. “is that…?”
“no,” jack breathes, the word a plea. “no, it can’t be.”
he grabs the probe from robby’s hand, his fingers slick with ultrasound gel. he presses it down again, his eyes wide and frantic as he searches the screen. and there it is. a gestational sac. maybe ten weeks. perhaps older. a tiny, fragile life tucked away inside the chaos of your broken body.
a life he didn’t know about. a life you hadn’t told him about.
“she’s pregnant,” robby breathes from the bedside, his hand flying to his mouth.
the realization hits jack like a physical blow to the chest. this isn’t about just you anymore. it’s about both of you. every choice he makes in the next ten minutes will not just decide the fate of his wife; it would decide the fate of their child, too.
“we can’t use the standard protocol, jack,” robby says, his voice rising in panic. “the meds we were going to use for the induction, the ct scan, the radiation…”
“i know!” jack roars, the sound raw and guttural. he drops the probe and it hits the floor with a dull thud.
the “doctor mode” he has spent years perfecting, the emotional armor he wears like a second skin, cracks wide open. the image of that tiny, flickering heartbeat burned into his retinas. he sees you then; not as a patient, not as a ‘red tag,’ but as the mother of his child, dying on a cold metal table because of a patch of ice and a moment of bad luck.
the room begins to tilt. the bright fluorescent lights turned into blinding white spots. the sound of the ventilator—hiss-click, hiss-click—is like a ticking time bomb.
“jack, look at me,” robby says, stepping into his line of sight, grabbing jack’s shoulders. “jack, you’re hyperventilating. you need to step back.”
“i… i didn’t know,” jack stammers, his legs suddenly turning to lead. “she didn’t… we couldn’t…”
he looks back at you. your face is a mask of trauma, but in his mind, he sees you the way you were hours ago when he left you cold on your shared bed. the way you smiled at him. did you know then? maybe you were waiting for dinner to tell him.
the grief and the shock collide in his chest, stealing the air from his lungs. jack’s knees buckle.
“he’s going down!” robby cries, catching him under his arms before he hits the floor.
jack doesn’t fight him. he can’t. his strength is gone, evaporated. he slumps against the wall, his head in his hands, the bloodied plastic of his blue gown crinkling as he collapses.
“get him out of here,” robby orders, his voice firm as he takes over the lead position at the bed. “now! someone, please, get him to the breakroom. i’ll take her up. i promise you, jack, i will do everything. just go!”
jack feels hands on him, a strong grip pulling him up, guiding him away from the bed. he tries to resist, tries to reach out for you, but his body simply won’t obey.
as he’s led through the swinging doors, the last thing he sees is the team swarming around you, the red light of the blood bags hanging over your head, and the ultrasound screen, displaying that tiny, flickering heart once more.
the doors click shut, leaving him in the hallway, the rapid beat of his heart a deafening roar in his ears.
he’s a doctor. he’s a husband. and now, he’s a father.
and he might lose everything before the sun went down.
jesse lets go of his arm when they arrive at the breakroom, and with a quiet “i’m sorry” and a gentle nod he leaves jack behind and returns to the room where the rest of the team is still fighting to save you.
you and the baby.
god, the mere thought raises tears to jack’s eyes.
a baby.
his baby.
biting the inside of his cheek, jack thinks of the previous times when he heard these news. of the sound of your excited, cheerful voice the first time you came up to him with a positive test.
unfortunately he also remembers your heartbroken wails as he hold you tight to his chest, both of you sitting on the bathroom floor at home. he remembers how he bit his lips, forcing himself to stay strong for you but wanting nothing more but to crumble into pieces right there.
you had stopped trying after the second miscarriage. a decision none of you wanted to made but that you needed in order to protect your own hearts and your sanity.
and now… now you’re laying on a cold, metal exam table, closer to death than you’ve ever been and jack has everything to lose.
the breakroom smells of stale coffee and industrial-strength floor cleaner. it’s a room designed for brief reprieves, for five-minute naps and hurried meals, but right now, for jack, it feel like a cage.
he seats on the edge of a vinyl chair, his elbows on his knees, staring at his hands, at dark, shiny band on his left hand.
you are pregnant. the thought keeps looping in his mind, a frantic, broken record. how could he miss it? he’s a doctor, for god’s sake. he is trained to notice the smallest shifts in physiology, the subtle cues of the human body.
he thinks back to the last few weeks; your sudden preference for tea over coffee, the way you’d been falling asleep on the couch before the 11 o’clock news. he’d chalked it up to stress, to the gray pittsburgh winter, to his own grueling schedule and the fact that he didn’t seem to have time to spare, time for you.
he closes his eyes and sees you in the kitchen three days ago, laughing at the ridiculous apron he usually wears when he cooks. you looked so vibrant, so incredibly alive. now, you have been reduced to a series of vitals on a monitor, a problem to be solved by people who don’t know the sound of your laugh or your favorite movie from your childhood.
“god, please,” he whispers into the empty room. now, jack abbot is hardly a religious man, but the silence of the hospital is demanding a sacrifice. “take me. just… don’t take them. please.”
the door creaks open and jack bolts upright, his heart hammering against his ribs. dr. robby, his best friend, his brother, stands there. he’s stripped off his bloody gown, but his scrubs are darkened with sweat. somehow, he looks older than he did twenty minutes ago.
“jack,” robby says, his voice level, cautious.
“tell me,” jack demands, his voice cracking. “please, tell me. is she… are they-”
“she’s still on the table,” robby says, stepping into the room and letting the door swing shut behind him. “we’ve stabilized the splenic bleed, and the chest tube is draining well. but jack…” robby let’s out a long, heavy sigh. “ the situation is complicated. you know the physiology as well as i do.”
jack slumps back into the chair, the “doctor” part of his brain forcing its way through the grief. he does know.
in a trauma patient, pregnancy changes everything. the blood volume increases by 50%, which means a woman can lose a massive amount of blood before her blood pressure even begins to drop. by the time you see the “crash,” it’s often too late.
“her vitals are brittle,” robby continues, leaning his back against the vending machine. “because of the pregnancy, her heart is already working overtime. and we’re struggling to keep her map high enough to perfuse the placenta without blowing out the repairs we just made.”
“and the baby?” jack asks, the word feeling foreign and heavy on his tongue.
“the fetus is roughly twelve weeks,” robby says. “at this stage, there’s no ‘saving’ the baby independently. the only way to save the pregnancy is to save the mother. but the vasopressors we’re using to keep her pressure up… they cause vasoconstriction in the uterus. we’re effectively starving the baby of oxygen to keep her brain and heart alive.”
it’s the ultimate medical catch-22. to save you, they had to risk the baby. to save the baby, they might lose you.
“the ultrasound showed some subchorionic hemorrhaging,” robby adds softly. “with the impact of the steering wheel, the placenta might be starting to detach. if that happens, she’ll bleed out from the inside faster than we can pump blood into her.”
jack buries his face in his hands. he knows the statistics. he knows that in maternal trauma, fetal demise is as high as 40-50% depending on the severity of the crash.
“i should have been there,” jack groans. “i should have driven her. she told me the brakes felt ‘soft’ last week and i told her i’d look at them on my day off. i didn’t… i didn’t look at them, robby.”
“jack, stop,” robby says firmly, walking the few steps separating him from his friend and crouching in front of him. “the police report said a semi hydroplaned across the median. it wouldn’t have mattered if she was driving a tank. don’t do this to yourself.”
jack looks up, his eyes bloodshot and raw. “how can i not?i’m the one who’s supposed to fix people. i spend twelve hours a day stitching strangers back together, and the one person who matters,” his voice breaks. “i didn’t even know she was carrying our child.”
robby sighs, his expression softening. “she’s a fighter, jack. we both know that. she’s held on this long. but i need you to stay here. if you go back in there…. i can’t worry about you too. i need to focus on them.”
“i can’t just sit here, man,” jack says, his voice rising. “i’m going crazy in this room.”
“then go to the chapel. go for a walk. or go home. but do not come back to that room,” robby warns. “i’ll send dana or jesse out when we have another update.”
as robby turns to leave, jack calls out, “wait.”
robby pauses at the door.
“the heartbeat,” jack whispers. “was it… was it still there when you left?”
robby hesitates for a fraction of a second, a beat that feels like an eternity to jack.
“it was,” robby says. “faint. but it was still there.”
and with that, the door clicks shut, leaving jack alone again.
the breakroom remains too quiet for far too long. jack paces the narrow strip of linoleum between the coffee machine and the round table, his mind a minefield of memories. he keeps seeing you in the passenger seat of his car, laughing at some stupid joke he told, the sun reflecting the stars in your eyes. he keeps thinking about the baby, whose existence had already rewritten the map of his future, even if they haven’t met yet.
then, the overhead speaker crackles. it’s a sound jack hears a dozen times a shift, a sound he usually meets with professional focus.
“code blue, trauma 1. code blue, trauma 1.”
the world doesn’t just tilt; it shatters.
trauma 1. your room.
jack is moving before his brain can even process the command. he throws open the breakroom door, the heavy wood slamming against the wall with a bang that echoes down the corridor. he doesn’t care about protocol. he doesn’t care about robby’s orders. he doesn’t care about his own career.
he runs.
the hallway feels miles long, the floor slick under his clogs. he passes a group of residents who scramble out of his way, eyes wide as they see night shift attending sprinting with a look of pure, unadulterated terror on his face.
he bursts through the double doors of the trauma bay, his lungs burning.
“jack, wait!” a nurse shouts, trying to grab his arm as he reaches the scrub sinks.
he doesn’t even look at her. he pushes the doors open with his shoulder, crashing into the room like a storm.
the scene inside is a nightmare rendered in high-definition. the rhythmic, mechanical hiss-click of the ventilator has been replaced by the frantic, high-pitched scream of the heart monitor. a flat, unwavering ekg line that slices through the air like a blade.
robby’s standing on a step-stool over your body, his hands locked, his weight throwing everything into the rhythmic compressions of your chest. crunch. crunch. the sound of ribs giving way under the pressure—a sound jack has heard a thousand times—feels like it’s his own bones that are snapping.
“jack, get out!” robby yells, not breaking his rhythm. his face is drenched in sweat, his eyes fixed on the monitor.
“what happened?” jack screams, stumbling toward the foot of the bed. “what the fuck happened?!”
“she went into v-fib, then pea,” dr. santos shouts over the noise. she was at your side, her hands pressed firmly against the left side of your abdomen, pushing your pregnant belly toward the left.
jack’s medical brain registered it instantly. in a pregnant woman in cardiac arrest, the heavy uterus compresses the inferior vena cava, blocking blood from returning to the heart. if they don’t push the baby aside, the compression robby is doing will be useless. there’s no blood to pump.
“charging to 200!” the tech shouts. “clear!”
robby jumps back. your body jolts off the table as the electricity surges through you. jack watches your hands, the same hands he loved to hold while you both were cuddling on the couch on a slow saturday, flop lifelessly back onto the sterile drape.
the line stays flat.
“again!” jack roars, stepping up to the bed, his voice raw. “increase to 300! charge it again!”
“jack, she’s lost too much blood,” robby pants, resuming compressions. “the acid-base balance is gone. her heart is too tired.”
“don’t you say that! don’t you dare say that!” jack lunges forward, grabbing the paddles from the tech’s hands. his eyes are wild, his breathing ragged. “move, robby! move!”
robby hesitates for a second, then steps aside, hands raised in surrender, letting jack take over.
jack looks down at you. this close, he can see the gray tint creeping into your skin. he can see the way the light in the room seems to be fading out of you.
“you do not leave me,” he hisses, the words a jagged prayer. “you hear me? you stay. you stay for me, and you stay for this baby. do not do this to us.”
“charged!”
“clear!” jack slams the paddles against your chest.
thump. your body arches. the monitors wail.
silence.
one second. two. three.
then, a tiny, erratic blip on the screen. then another.
“i have a rhythm!” dr. santos cries, her fingers pressed to your carotid artery. “i have a pulse! it’s weak, but it’s there!”
the room seems to exhale all at once, but the tension doesn’t break. it just shifts.
“we need to get the bleeding under control now,” robby says, his voice shaking. “jack… she can’t take another arrest. if she codes again, we won’t get her back. the fetal heart rate is in the 60s.”
robby doesn’t finish the sentence, but jack hears is loud and clear.
you’re both dying.
jack stands there, the paddles still in his hands, staring at the flickering green line of your heart. he’s covered in your blood, his gown torn, his soul laid bare in front of his entire team.
he looks at robby, and for the first time in his career, michael sees the “great jack abbot” looking utterly broken.
“save them,” jack whispers, his voice barely audible over the hum of the machines. “whatever it takes, i don’t care. just… don’t let them… save them. please.”
robby nods slowly. “we’re going to try a high-risk embolization to stop the deep pelvic bleed. it’s the only way to avoid more surgery, but the radiation… it’s dangerous for the pregnancy.”
jack looks at your stomach, then back at your face. the choice is impossible.
life or life.
“do it,” jack says, his voice hardening into a cold, desperate resolve. “save her. save my wife. we’ll deal with the rest when she wakes up.”
as they begin to prep the specialized equipment, jack doesn’t leave. he backs into the corner of the room, his back against the cold tile. he watches them work, his eyes never leaving the monitor, counting every single beat of your heart as if he could keep it moving through sheer force of will.
the icu is a different kind of purgatory than the er. in the er, death is a screaming, bloody predator you could fight with a scalpel and a shout, something loud and violent. in the icu, death is a shadow. something silent, patient, and impossible to pin down.
it’s 11:45 p.m. hours have passed since you were moved up from the er.
now you lie in the center of a web of plastic tubing and wires, the steady, rhythmic hiss-click of the ventilator the only thing keeping the room from falling into a grave-like silence. a cooling blanket draped over your legs to keep your temperature regulated, and a specialized fetal monitor strapped across your bruised abdomen, its screen showing a jagged, persistent little line
142 bpm.
jack is sitting in the hard plastic chair pulled flush against your bedside. he hasn’t changed out of his scrub bottoms, though someone forced him to put on a clean gray hoodie to cover the bloodstains on his undershirt. he looks older, tired. devastated. the harsh overhead led lights catch the new lines of exhaustion etched around his eyes.
he’s holding your hand, the only part of you that isn’t covered in bandages or sensors. your skin feels paper-thin and cold.
“i’m here,” he whispers, his voice a dry rasp. “i’m not going anywhere.”
he checks the fetal monitor. that sound, the rapid thump-thump, thump-thump of the baby’s heart, is the most beautiful and terrifying thing he has ever heard. it’s a ticking clock. every beat a miracle, but also a reminder of how much he stands to lose.
“why didn’t you tell me?” he asks softly, his thumb tracing the line of your knuckles, the stone crowning you ring finger cold and harsh against his skin.
were you scared? were you waiting for the ‘right’ moment? god, he would have given anything for that moment to have been over dinner, or in bed, or literally anywhere but on a trauma table.
he leans his forehead against the metal railing of the bed, his eyes closing.
“i went through our messages while i was waiting for you to come out of the or,” he admits, a ghost of a self-deprecating laugh escaping him. “i looked for clues. i looked for a hint. and all i found were grocery lists and you telling me to come home early because you missed me. but i didn’t come home, did i? i stayed for that extra shift. i stayed to fix people i didn’t even know while you were… you were growing a life.”
his guilt is a physical weight, a cold stone in his stomach. he’s dr. jack abbot. he’s supposed to be the one with all the answers, the one who sees the things no one else notices. but he has been blind to the most important thing in his own world.
a nurse slips into the room, her movements practiced and quiet. she checks the bags hanging from the iv pole, her eyes lingering on jack with a mixture of pity and professional concern.
“the baby’s heart rate is holding steady, dr. abbot,” she says softly, nodding toward the fetal monitor. “and her map is at 70. she’s stable for now.”
“for now,” jack repeats, the words feeling like ash. “stable is just another word for ‘waiting for the next crisis’ in this building, and you know it, claire.”
“from what i’ve heard, she’s a fighter, jack,” the nurse replies, mirroring robby’s words from earlier. “and so is the little one. i’ve seen people come back from worse.”
“not many,” jack mutters, but he squeezes your hand a little tighter.
when the nurse leaves, the silence rushes back in. jack stands up, his joints popping, and leans over you. he carefully places his hand on your stomach, right over the sensor. closing his eyes, he tries to feel through the layers of skin and muscle, trying to connect with the tiny being inside you that he had only just met through a grainy ultrasound screen.
“hey,” he whispers to your belly. “i’m your dad. i’m… i’m a bit of a mess right now, but i’m here. and i need you to do me a favor. i need you to keep fighting. i need you to give your mom a reason to wake up. because i don’t think i can do this without her. i know i can’t do this without her.”
before he can realize what’s happening, a tear escapes, tracing a hot path down his cheek and landing on the sterile white sheet.
“i’ll be better,” he promises, his voice cracking. “i’ll be home. i’ll fix the brakes. i’ll learn how to be whatever you both need me to be. just… don’t let go. please, don’t let go.”
outside, the rain continues, now heavier, fiercer. but inside the room, time remains frozen. jack abbot, the man who usually held the city’s lives in his hands, now seats back down and waits for the only life that truly matters to come back to him.
from time to time, doctors filter into the room, checking vitals, checking on jack. robby comes up from the er a couple of times to share a sympathetic smile with him, to promise that everything will be fine.
jack sighs, “i’m a doctor too, robby. you can’t lie to me.”
“and i’m your friend and i know that a bit of hope is what you need right now.”
he stays for a while, keeping jack company until his pager calls him back to action.
“shouldn’t you be home already?” jack asks. “your shift was over hours ago.”
robby only shrugs. “people need me around here.”
at that, jack’s eyes regain that teary shine. nodding, he promises robby to call him if anything changes and waves his fiend goodbye before leaning back again on the chair, his eyes fixed on the slow rise and fall of your chest.
the world doesn’t come back all at once. it returns in fragments. first, the rhythmic hiss of a machine, the smell of antiseptic, and a heavy, weighted warmth on your left hand. your eyelids feel like they had been leaded shut, but the persistent, low hum of the icu finally pulls you toward the surface of consciousness.
you groan, the sound catching in the back of your throat, dry and scratchy from the tube that has only recently been removed.
then there’s the faint scratch of a chair scraping against the floor.
“hey… hey, look at me. open your eyes, sweetheart.”
that voice. you know that voice better than your own heartbeat. it’s the same voice that whispers sweet nothings into your ear at night, the same one that you hear in your warmest dreams. except now it sounds rough, exhausted, and trembling with a hope so fragile it feels like it might shatter any moment.
you force your eyes open. the light blinding at first, a sterile white haze, but then it focuses. jack. he looks like he hasn’t slept in a week. his hair is a mess and his eyes, usually so sharp and clinical, are now swimming with tears.
“jack?” you rasp, your voice coming out as barely a breath.
“i’m here. i’m right here.” he leans over, his hand cupping your cheek with a tenderness that makes your chest ache. he kisses your forehead, his lips lingering there for a long moment as he takes a shuddering breath. “you scared the hell out of me, love.”
you try to move, but a sharp pang in your abdomen makes you wince. memories start to bleed back in. the rain, the blinding headlights, the screech of metal. you instinctively try to reach for your stomach, but your arm feels like lead.
“the… the accident… jack, i…”
“it’s over,” he whispers, his thumb stroking your temple. “you’re safe. i’ve got you.”
a few minutes pass by until the door pushes open quietly. robby walks in, followed by an ob-gyn specialist you didn’t recognize. robby looks at you, a genuine, relieved smile breaking through his professional mask.
“welcome back,” robby says, checking the monitors. “you’ve had a hell of a day, but your vitals are finally starting to behave.”
the ob-gyn, a woman with kind eyes that introduces herself as dr. pauline , steps forward. “we need to talk about why you’re feeling so much pressure in your abdomen, besides the surgical repairs.”
jack’s grip on your hand tightens. he looks at you, his expression a complicated map of wonder and fear.
“you’re pregnant, dear,” dr. pauline says softly. “about twelve weeks. the accident was severe, and the trauma to your body was significant. we had to perform some emergency procedures that were high-risk for the pregnancy, but as of twenty minutes ago, the fetal heartbeat is steady.”
the world stops right there and then.
you look from the doctor to jack, your mouth falling open. “pregnant? are you sure?”
dr. pauline nods and you have to bite your lip to keep it from trembling. jack’s grip on your hand tightens.
“it’s going to be a long road,” dr. pauline continues, her tone turning serious but encouraging. “you have a lot of healing to do. your ribs and the internal repairs, plus the blood loss. and for the baby, we’re going to have to monitor you both every hour. there’s some bruising near the placenta, so it’s going to take hard work, absolute bed rest, and a lot of time before we can say we’re completely out of the woods. but right now? right now, you’re both winning.”
“thank you, doctor,” you whisper, voice so small it makes jack’s chest squeeze. “and thank you, michael. jack told me you were the one who took care of me when i arrived.”
robby gifts you with a small, soft smile. grabbing your free hand, he gives it a squeeze.
“i’m glad i could help. but i don’t think i could’ve done it without my team. or without dr. abbot’s aid.”
that has you snapping your attention back to jack.
“you were there?” he simply nods, eyes glued to your hand, to the ring on your finger. “i thought you guys had protocols for that kind of thing.”
“we do,” says robby, nodding.
“fuck the protocol,” barks jack at the exact same time. “my wife was dying. what was i supposed to do? go home? i did what i had to.”
when your eyes finally connect with his again you see it, the utter exhaustion, but behind that there’s something more. something raw and vivid.
“i’m so sorry,” you whisper. “i’m sorry you had to see that, jack. i can’t even imagine…”
“shh…” leaning forward, jack offers you the safe space of his shoulder to cry. “what matters is that you’re alive, love. you both are.”
after the doctors finish their checks and leave the room, a heavy, comfortable silence settles over the two of you. jack doesn’t let go of your hand. he seats on the edge of the bed, staring at you as if you were a ghost that might vanish if he blinked.
“jack,” you whispered, your voice a little stronger now. but you still feel the pressure of your tears threatening to spill at any given moment.
the thought of jack having to bring you back to life, your blood covering his gloved hands… knowing that he had to find out about something you had been suspecting for a couple of weeks through a scan in a trauma room in the er…
“twelve weeks,” he says, his voice thick with his own tears. “and you didn’t… you didn’t tell me.”
there’s no accusation in his voice, only a profound, echoing confusion.
you look down at your hands, the plastic hospital bracelet stark against your skin. “i didn’t know, jack. not for sure.”
jack doesn’t speak, he holds on tight to your hand, dropping a feather like kiss on your knuckles.
“i was suspicious,” you admit, a small, tired smile tugging at the corners of your mouth. “but i told myself i was just imagining it. that my brain was playing some twisted tricks on me. but then i started feeling so tired. then there was the coffee. god, the smell of it started making me nauseous about two weeks ago. i’ve been drinking tea ever since.”
jack lets out a short, wet laugh, rubbing his face with his free hand. “i’m a doctor, i should have seen it. i should have known.”
“how could you?” you reach out, brushing a stray hair from his forehead. “we stopped looking for the signs a long time ago, jack.”
the air in the room shifts. the “last two times”, two years of hope, two positive tests that ended in heartbreak before the first trimester was even over. they were the shadows that had lived in the corners of your apartment, the reason you both had stopped talking about possible names or color palettes for the nursery. you had both quietly agreed to stop trying, to protect what was left of your hearts.
“i didn’t want to say anything until i was certain,” you whisper, tears pricking your eyes. “i couldn’t handle seeing that look on your face again if it didn’t stay. i was going to buy a test this weekend, i promise. i just… i wanted to be sure before i gave you hope again.”
jack leans down, pressing his forehead against yours. his breath hitches. “hope is all i’ve had for the last few hours, watching you on those monitors. i don’t care about the timing. i’ve got you two now. and that’s all i need.”
he moves his hand, sliding it under the hospital blanket to rest flat against your stomach. his palm is warm, steady, and large enough to cover nearly the entire area where the new life rests tucked away.
“we’re going to do the work,” he vows, his voice low. “whatever the doctors say. whatever it takes. i’m not losing either of you. we’ve fought too hard to get here.”
for the first time since the sirens started screaming hours ago, the tension in jack’s shoulders finally breaks.
you rest your head on his shoulder, the steady thump-thump of his heart syncing with yours. it isn’t the perfect, easy ending. there are months of recovery ahead and a thousand medical hurdles to jump but for now, in the quiet of the icu, the three of you are together.
“i love you,” he whispers into your hair.
“i love you too,” you breath, finally letting your eyes drift shut. “both of us.”
the transition from the icu to the step-down unit was supposed to be a victory. it has been ten days since the crash. your chest tube is out, your color is returning, and jack has finally stopped vibrating with the manic energy of a man haunted by ghosts.
but the “pitt” never let anyone relax for long.
jack is sitting in the armchair, his laptop open as he tries to catch up on charts while staying by your side. you are propped up on pillows, picking at a bowl of fruit, when a sharp, searing cramp radiates across your lower abdomen.
it isn’t like the dull ache of your healing surgical incisions. this is different. cold. deep.
“jack,” you gasp, the plastic fork clattering onto the tray.
he’s at your side before the fork hit the floor. “what is it? where’s the pain?”
“cramping. hard.” you grip his forearm, your knuckles turning white. “it feels… it feels like the last times, jack.”
the color drains from his face, but the doctor in him takes the lead before he can panic. he throws back the blankets. and there it is. a small, terrifying smear of crimson on the white sheets.
“pauline! anyone! i need a fetal doppler in here now!” jack shouts toward the hallway, his voice cracking the quiet of the ward.
minutes felt like hours. dr. pauline rushes in, her face set in a grim mask of professional focus. jack stands in the corner, his hands pressed against his mouth. unfortunately, he knows too much. he knows all the signs, just like he knows that post-traumatic subchorionic bleeds could trigger labor or a final, fatal abruption.
the room is filled with the static sound of the doppler searching.
whoosh. whoosh.
the sound of your own pulse, too fast, too frantic.
then, a silence that feels like a death sentence.
“come on,” pauline whispers, moving the probe. “come on, little one.”
thump-thump-thump-thump.
the sound burst into the room. fast, rhythmic, and stubborn.
“heart rate is 150,” pauline exhales, a visible wave of relief washing over her. “the cervix is closed. it’s a ‘threatened’ event, likely just the hematoma from the accident draining. but we are increasing your progesterone and you are on strict, absolute bed rest. no sitting up, no laptop, nothing but breathing.”
jack doesn’t move for a long time after she leaves. he just leans his head against the wall, his chest heaving. the setback lasted only ten minutes, but it had aged him a decade.
“jack,” you call his name softly, patting the free space next to you on the bed.
he walks over and sat on the edge, taking both of your hands in his. “we almost lost the light,” he whisper. “i can’t… i don’t know that i could take it if it happened again, sweetheart.”
“we didn’t lose it,” you said, pulling his hand to your cheek. “they’re still here. we’re still here.”
jack sighs with relief, nodding. he leas down to press a soft, careful kiss to your lips.
three weeks later, the air in pittsburgh finally shifts from the bitter bite of winter to the hesitant warmth of early spring.
you’re not wearing a hospital gown anymore. instead, you wear one of jack’s oversized soft hoodies and a pair of leggings, sitting in a wheelchair by the large windows of the garden pavilion. you are still weak, and your gait is a slow, painful shuffle, but today is the day the doctors, your husband included, have circled in red on the calendar.
week 14. the beginning of the second trimester. the safe zone.
jack walks into the pavilion carrying two cups of herbal tea and a small, rectangular envelope. he looks different today. he’s actually shaved, and for the first time since the night of the pileup, the haunted look in his eyes has been replaced by a quiet, steady glow.
“happy second trimester,” he says, leaning down to kiss the top of your head.
“we made it,” you breathe, looking out at the budding trees. “i honestly didn’t think we would.”
“i have something for you,” he says, sitting on the bench beside your chair. he hands you the envelope with a bright smile.
you open it with trembling fingers. inside isn’t a medical chart or a bill. it is a high-resolution 3d ultrasound from that morning’s check-up.
the image is vividly clear. you can see the curve of a tiny nose, the miniature perfection of ten fingers tucked near a chin, and the long legs that robby joked would make the kid a track star.
“look at that nose,” jack whispers, his finger tracing the print. “that’s your nose.”
“yeah. that’s your chin, though,” you laugh softly, a tear of pure, uncomplicated joy sliding down your face. “the abbot stubbornness is already visible.”
while you are still contemplating the small piece of warmth and joy that was still growing inside of you, jack reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small, velvet box. you look at him, confused.
“jack? we’re already married.”
“i know,” he says, opening the box to reveal a delicate band with a tiny, shimmering stone on top. the birthstone for the month the baby was due. “but the night of the crash, i realized i’d spent so much time being a doctor and a provider that i forgot to be a good husband. i forgot to celebrate the life we were building.”
he takes your hand, sliding the ring onto your finger next to your wedding band.
“this is a promise,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “no more double shifts when i don’t have to. no more missed dinners. from here on out, it’s the three of us.”
you lean your head back against the headrest of the wheelchair, looking from the ring to the ultrasound, and then to the man who quite literally pulled you back from the edge of the grave.
the trauma is still there, the scars on your body and the stiffness in your limbs would be reminders for a long time, but as the sun warms your skin, the angst of the past month finally begins to dissolve.
“jack?”
“yeah?”
“i think i want thai food tonight.”
jack laughs. and it’s a real, booming abbot laugh that echoes through the garden. “you heard the boss,” he whispers to your stomach. “thai it is.”
bonus
the spare bedroom at the end of the hall had spent years as a storage space for jack’s medical journals and your half-finished art projects. it had been a room of “maybe someday,” a door you both tended to keep closed, preferring to keep the bad memories on the other side.
now, six months after the rain-slicked pavement nearly took everything, the door stands wide open and the scent of paint lingers in the air. a soft, muted sage green that jack spent three weekends perfecting because he refused to let anyone else touch the walls.
you seat in the newly assembled rocking chair, your hand resting atop the prominent, solid curve of your stomach. the baby is active today, a rhythmic tapping against your ribs that feels like a secret code. you are thirty-four weeks along, a milestone that, for a long time, felt like a destination on a map you weren’t allowed to reach.
“i think the crib is slightly crooked,” jack mutters, kneeling on the floor.
he was wearing an old pittsburgh steelers t-shirt, his hair disheveled, looking less like the formidable dr. abbot of the er and more like… like you husband, who was utterly determined to defeat a piece of furniture.
“jack, it’s perfect,” you laugh softly. “the level said it’s straight. you’ve checked it four times.”
“five,” he corrects, standing up and wiping his hands on his jeans. he walks over to the crib, shaking the railing with enough force to test a bridge. “i just… i need it to be steady. everything has to be steady.”
you reach out, taking his hand and pulling him towards you. immediately, he sinks onto the ottoman at your feet, resting his head against your knees. the fierce, protective energy he carries is a byproduct of the trauma; a lingering shadow of the man who collapsed back in that trauma room. but it was softening, replaced by a deep, quiet anticipation.
“oh. i just remembered. we haven’t opened michael’s gift yet,” you say, pointing to the changing table.
sitting atop a stack of colorful onesies is a beautifully wrapped box with a heavy silver bow. next to it is a card embossed with the university of pittsburgh medical center logo.
according to jack, robby dropped it off at the nurse’s station for him to bring home.
“he said if he had to hear me talk about ‘fetal heart rate variability’ during a trauma shift one more time, he was going to quit, so he bought this to shut me up,” he said as he lay the box on the changing table the other night.
you open the card first. in robby’s cramped, hurried physician’s handwriting, it read:
to my dear friends (and my future favorite abbot),
i’ve known you two for a long time and i truly can’t think of anyone better to take care of each other. i also know that kid will be so lucky to get to call you two mom and dad. i can’t wait to meet the little one.
congratulations on the final stretch!
— robby
inside the box is a high-tech, medical-grade infant vitals monitor, the kind that synced to a smartphone. it’s exactly the kind of gift dr. robby would give: a way to keep watch even when the lights were out. underneath the monitor was a tiny, hand-knitted sweater with a small stethoscope embroidered on the pocket.
“he’s a softie,” you whisper, running your hand over the wool.
“don’t tell him i said so, but he’s the reason we’re sitting in this room,” jack said, his voice drops into that low, honest tone he saved only for you. he looks up at you, his eyes reflecting the soft nursery light. “when i saw you on that table… i forgot how to be a doctor. i forgot how to breathe. he held the line until i could find my way back.”
jack stands up and leans over you, pressing a long, lingering kiss to your forehead before moving down to press his ear against your belly. he waits, silent and still, until the baby delivers a sharp kick right against his cheek.
“hey there,” jack whispers to the bump, a grin breaking across his face. “i hear you. we’re ready for you. everything is ready.”
he stands back, surveying the room; the crib, the sage-green walls, the gift from his brother, the man who helped save your lives, and the woman who was his entire world. the angst of the pitt, the screams of the monitors, and the cold terror of the icu feel like a lifetime ago. they are just scars now. like faded, silver lines that proved they survived the storm.
“do you think the baby will like the room?” you ask.
jack wraps his arms around you from behind, his chin resting on your shoulder as you both look out at the quiet pittsburgh street below.
“she’ll love it,” jack promises.
the sun begins to set outside the window, casting a warm, golden glow over the nursery, turning the sage walls into the color of a new spring. you’re a survivor, jack is a father, and in just a few short weeks, the pitt would be nothing more than a place where jack went to work, while his real life, his whole life, waited for him right here, at home.
summary: battling mental health all your life, it's a struggle to find the good. but after working at PTMC, and meeting a certain attending, you start to see beauty in the world. based on "I've Seen It" by Olivia Dean
warnings: heavy themes of depression, mentions of a past suicide attempt, reader cuts her hand with a knife and jack thinks the worst but it was not an attempt, mentions of meds and depressive episodes, mentions of food poisoning but nothing explicit
author’s note: the ending is like, level 10000 cheese but i couldn't help it. sometimes when you're struggling with mental health, you need level 10000 cheese.
dividers by @strangergraphics | main masterlist
You stared at the couple through the window, feet planted firmly on the floor of the ED. Your head cocked to the side, eyes squinting.
The older man had his wife’s hand in both of his, walking her back to her bed with a smile on his face, not a lick of impatience was embedded in his features as she walked slowly, one foot in front of the other.
Tears misted in your eyes as you watched, completely enthralled by this elderly couple, still so madly in love after all this time.
The man kissed his wife’s head once she was back in bed.
A tear fell.
“Nice couple.”
You startled, having not noticed Jack’s presence appear next to you. You turned to look at the man next to you, the man you had come to know as a friend, then something more. Your safe place, looking straight ahead, a certain softness in his eyes as he joined you in watching the sweet couple in the window.
You didn’t say anything, just turning back to your original eyeline.
You weren’t okay, Jack knew. You hadn’t been okay for a while. You were slipping right in front of his eyes, hanging on by a hair of a thread, and he wasn’t sure what to do. You’d confided in him about your past, about the time you were submerged in so much despair that you tried to leave this earth, that your mom had to find you unconscious on your bedroom floor and you had to spend a month in a mental hospital. You told him that you had to carry that with you forever, that you still hated yourself for it, your scars served as a constant reminder of what you tried to do to yourself, and you wore long sleeves under your scrubs so no one would know.
“I’m not weak.” You had said that night after telling him everything, voice sharp but failing to hide the ache in your words.
Jack knew that, your story didn’t make him think of you any less.
But what it did do, was worry him.
Because he sees you’re not doing well, and he doesn’t know what to do.
You’re trying not to fall apart.
And all he can think to do is stand there with you.
Shoulder to shoulder, arms crossed, leaning against the counter of the nurse’s station. A million other places that both of you can be and yet you’re both here.
He could ask, ask if you’re doing okay, if you’ve eaten, or ask if there’s anything he can do for you, but as you stood, scrubs touching scrubs, he decided that would just make you walk away, and the last thing he wanted, the last thing you needed, was for you to walk away.
Your relationship with Jack was knew, you had played the “will they, won’t they” game for too long, and Jack had finally gave in one night while the two of you sat in his car with takeout after a long shift, a complete mess of feelings and confessions buried deep in both of your chests that ended with you being boyfriend and girlfriend, though Jack never really asked, thinking the titles sounded so juvenile, he just asked if you’d be his and usually settled on just calling you “his girl”.
“Sometimes it’s hard to remember.”
Jack furrowed his eyebrows, turning his head to look at you, wordlessly encouraging you to continue.
“That the world isn’t helpless.”
Jack’s expression softened.
“That there’s good in it.”
He smiled, just small, small enough for only you to notice.
“But you still remember it.”
An ache settled in your chest. The good kind of ache that was usually reserved for when Jack was extra sweet to you.
You sighed. “Yeah.”
-
You had called Jack more than you could count, leaving voicemails begging for him to come home, your voice shaking with tears and panic.
Jack could get mad, but he never ignored you like this.
He was always the first to come back after a fight, to whisper apologies and soothe your racing heart.
This fight was your worst so far. Insults cut through the air with so much force that they still haunted the oxygen surrounding you. Words that you didn’t mean pulled at your heart and things that Jack had said hung over your head as you sat alone in the kitchen, trying to self soothe but suddenly forgetting everything your therapist ever told you.
You’d tried to carry on with the night, calm down and have apology food ready for when he got home, but your hands were so shaky you ended up slicing your palm, and now you were crying on your kitchen floor with a bloody towel in your hands and blood smeared on your grey sweatshirt.
Jack was going to be so mad. That’s all you could think as you sat, feeling paralyzed, wanting to get up and clean yourself off but feeling like gravity had you tied to the floor. If you’d been in a normal headspace, maybe you’d realize that Jack was absolutely not going to be mad at you. But all you could remember as you sat in the dark of your kitchen was Jack’s face, painted with anger after you had said something hurtful, lashing out and acting on emotion from feeling cornered by your boyfriend when he’d asked you if you thought it was a good idea to up your meds.
You wished now that you could take it back. Take everything back and then maybe you wouldn’t be alone in your dark kitchen, bloody and crying while your boyfriend was basically missing. He was only concerned, looking out for what was best for you and instead you gave him your worst. Which only made you start to realize he was right.
The lights flickered on in the kitchen and you flinched, twisting your eyes shut as you adjusted to the harsh light.
How long had you been sitting on the floor?
Jack stood in the doorway, looking torn apart and exhausted.
Then his eyes widened.
“Oh my god, baby.”
Blood soaked into your sleeve, sitting on the kitchen floor in the dark, tear marks marring your cheeks, bloody knife that had clattered onto the floor.
He skidded onto his knees in front of you, a mess.
You were confused as his hands were on you, frantic, unraveling the towel as his hands shook and he cursed under his breath, tears swelling in his hazel eyes and-
Oh.
He felt like he was breathing in through shards of glass, white hot panic seared through his veins as he fumbled with the rag wrapped around your wrist.
“Jack..”
He shook his head, laser focused. He needed to see the wound, figure out how deep it was to see if he could care for you here from his go bag or if he’d have to drive you to the hospital, trying to work out how long it would take for him to get you from the kitchen, to the car, to PTMC.
“Jack.”
You peeled back the towel, revealing a slice of rad across the palm of your hand, then looked up to the kitchen counter.
Jack followed your line of sight and saw the cutting board, along with various ingredients scattered around.
“I tried to make you food so you’d have dinner when you came home…”
Jack exhaled, deflating like a balloon onto the floor, his bodyweight nearly falling on top of you.
“I was so sad and so worried and you weren’t answering and I don’t know I just kind of sat here- it wasn’t so dark when you left…”
He looked withdrawn for a moment, as if he’d just had an out of body experience and needed a moment to come back to himself.
“My phone, I-“ He swallowed. “I drove to that lookout, the one you like, and I left my phone…”
You put both hands on his face, trying to ground him back to reality.
“I went back and it was dead, I-“
He looked at you, chest heaving, looking completely wrecked, undone. His eyes were heavy with something unspoken but he was looking at you like you were the most precious thing in the world.
“I’m so sorry.”
Adorned with adoration.
With love.
He brought a hand up to cover his eyes and your heart splintered when a dry sob erupted from his chest. “Oh, my god.”
He pulled you into him in a second, no point he made could ever be worth the anxiety, the terror, he felt when he walked into the few kitchen just a few minutes ago and found his girl on the floor, crying and bloody.
“M’sorry,” you mumbled into his shoulder. “Didn’t mean to-“
“I know. I know you didn’t. I’m relieved, honey. You have no idea.”
You sniffled and nodded, burying yourself deeper into his hold.
“You were right. About my meds. I’m sorry.”
Jack didn’t respond right away, just reveling in the few moments of having you in his arms, eyes open and heart beating. Despite the anger and the chaos and the hurt, this is all that mattered.
“Okay, baby.” He whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of your head, “We’ll figure it out.”
The more you fell in love with Jack, you realized, the less you understood it. The more you started to see the good and beauty in the world, the more confused you were. How was there so much beauty, here, growing through the cracks and the blood of your messy kitchen, through this moment that started from so much anger and pain?
You’d voiced this to Jack, just a few days later.
“I don’t understand, Jack.” You were on the verge of tears.
Jack slid his hand along the skin of your neck, taking it into his gentle hold.
“Sweetheart.” He kissed the corner of your mouth and you sighed.
“I think if we all understood, it wouldn’t be so special.”
-
You watched your friends as they laughed and cleaned your bedroom for you and your heart squeezed.
Upping your meds came with a lot of complications, including feeling so tired and heavy that you couldn’t even work, and Jack was so unsure about leaving you alone, already barely sleeping during the day and barely going back to his own home so that he could be up with you, only sleeping when you slept throughout the day. Like a mother with a newborn baby.
It made you feel so childish, but you knew Jack didn’t think twice about it.
Ensuring your wellbeing was his second nature.
But he still had to work, even if you couldn’t, so he’d called your dayshift friends, and they were seriously more than happy to take on the task.
The sweet voices of Samira, Trinity and Joy filled your apartment and it brought you a lot of comfort, more than you probably liked to admit. But it also weighed you down with guilt, you could see the bags under their eyes and the pull of their tense shoulders after a long shift.
You wished then, as you watched your three friends, that you could just be normal and not babysat. You wished this was a normal night, filled with wine and takeout and stupid romcoms. But instead it was cans of Dr Pepper and cleaning and decluttering your neglected bedroom and taking turns sitting with you on the couch while you watched reruns of Grey’s Anatomy because you can’t drink on your meds and you had no appetite.
“Hey, you okay?” Samira noticed you first, standing in the doorway.
You nodded.
“Why don’t we all take a break?” Trinity suggested, noticing the downturn of your lips as you watched them, having been in your position one too many times. She could read the misplaced guilt that flashed across your face as you watched them clean your bedroom without asking anything in return.
“Wanna pick out a movie?” Joy asked once you all settled back in your living room, blankets sprawled across your laps and pillows squeezed between your bodies, Samira laid her head on your shoulder.
“I’m getting sick of grey’s anatomy, no offense, babe.”
You knew it was meant to lighten the mood, and you wanted to laugh but nothing came out, your face stuck frozen.
Trinity looked through your DVD collection, eyes raking across each title, fingers running across the spines of the DVD’s.
Your parents had instilled the idea of analog in you from a very young age, your apartment was stuffed to the brim, overflowing, with DVD’s, records and books. Endless stories of romance and friendship and adventure and heartbreak and beauty. You’d watched the same movies over and over, reread the same books and listened to the same song, letting the words seep into your skin, finding comfort in knowing how the story would end. You’ve seen it, you’ve memorized it, and still, it didn’t come naturally, you had to fight for it, you had to find it. Tread water to keep your head above, air in your lungs, just to catch a glimpse of it.
“This reminds me of that time I got really sick-“
Joy groaned, covering her face, “Oh, don’t remind me!”
Samira had gotten really terrible food poisoning, and called you for a ride to the ED, and you had just so happened to be out with Trinity, and had coincidentally run into Joy, who both insisted on accompanying you to go and take care of your friend. She was covered in sweat and grime when you got there, and you refused to take your friend to see her colleagues like that, so you threw her in the shower, washed her body, and brushed her hair, putting it into a braid to keep it out of her face. Trinity and Joy took care of the dirty clothes and cleaned the bathroom, and picked out a fresh set of clean clothes for her.
It’s how the four of you all became friends.
Trinity laughed as she picked out Princess Diaries 2, popping the disc into the DVD player.
Samira brought her hand up to hold yours, and squeezed.
“You did it for me.”
Her tone was low, spoken so only you could hear it. A comfort, a spoken answer to an unspoken question. You show up for me, and I show up for you.
Tears swelled in your eyes. You blinked, and they fell down your cheeks
-
“Hey, honey.”
It was raining out, and you hated when it rained. You didn’t want the weather to match your mood, you wanted it to life it. To do something about it.
You used to love rainy days before things got bad. Rainy days meant movies, blankets, cuddles and comfort food. They were comfort, a heavy weighted blanket.
But now, as you stared at the drops on the window that seemed to match the ones that fell onto your shirt, mocking you, you hated them. You wanted to scream at the sky to stop and shut up and leave you alone.
But you didn’t have the energy for that, so instead you stood there, staring out your window, wordless.
“It’s raining.” You said.
Jack hated how flat your voice fell, how monotone it was compared to what he was used to. He was starting to worry that maybe upping your meds wasn’t such a good idea. It seemed that your feelings, hidden deep down in your chest, were still there, the meds had just taken away the emotion of them.
“Yeah.”
He slipped his hand into yours, and his heart sank when you barely held it back.
“Come here, sweetheart.” He pulled you away from the window, trying to ignore the sharp aches in his chest at the sounds of your whimpering, not wanting to move away from the window.
He pulled you to the front door, and at this point you firmly planted your feet into the floor, pulling away from his grip.
“Trust me.” His voice was soft as his grip became firmer on you, easily pulling you through the front door despite your resisting.
The thunder rolled, miles away as the rain hit the pavement, hard and heavy while you stood on the front patio of Jack’s house, he had thought a change of scenery might help you. You felt the mist of the rain on your face and you hated to admit that it felt like a breath of fresh air.
Jack smiled as you inhaled, your eyes fluttering closed.
He stepped out off of the covered patio, letting the rain drop directly onto him. He laughed as you watched him, eyebrows furrowed, the smallest upturn on one side of your mouth.
Amused.
“Feels nice.” He said, voice raised so you could hear him over the sound of rain, arms outstretched as he dipped his head back, taking in a deep breath as the rain continued to soak his clothes. “You could join me out here, you know.”
He opened one eye so he could look at you.
You were on the edge of the patio, inching closer.
He stretched his arm out for you, his hand waiting for you to take it.
You did, and Jack immediately pulled you into him, his arms wrapped around your waist with yours locked around his neck, he lifted you up off the ground and spun you around.
You laughed.
It was short and it was small, but you laughed. And it was beautiful.
Jack set you back down, two feet on the ground, and pressed his forehead to yours, the only thing separating you being the droplets of rain soaking into your skin.
Jack nodded as his eyes met yours, a wordless understanding being spoken between the two of you. There was goodness here, falling from the sky in heavy drops and rolling through it in thunder. It was in your small laugh and Jack’s strong arms that were keeping you from falling apart. It was in the rain water soaking through your socks.
It was cold and it was uncomfortable but it was beautiful.
And maybe that was just it. Maybe the beauty and the goodness in the world wasn’t obvious. Maybe it was in the moments that weren’t so beautiful. The ugly, uncomfortable, heavy moments, where goodness grew through the cracks.
It was in the elderly couple in the ED, the old man helping his sick wife back into bed even though it took triple the amount of time it used to, and doing it with a smile because he loved her.
It was in you and Jack as you shouted at each other, so full of anger and words you didn’t mean because of the amount of care and concern he held for you.
It was in Jack, as he sputtered on the kitchen floor, hands frantic and eyes full of fear because he thought he lost you.
It was in Samira, Trinity and Joy, cleaning your room without a second thought and sitting with you in your mess because you were their friend and you’d do the same for any one of them.
It was in you. As you held so much emotion and fondness as you watched the sweet elderly couple in PTMC. As you wanted to make food for Jack when he got home to say sorry, as you were filled with guilt at his fear when he found you on the kitchen floor, doing anything you could to comfort him. As you dropped everything to help Samira, doing things that most people would find gross but you didn’t care because she was your friend and she needed help.
It wasn’t that it was hard to find or remember, it’s that you weren’t looking.
Jack’s eyes shone as he watched yours, thoughts dancing behind your pretty irises and he was patient as you worked through your thoughts, he swayed you back and forth as he waited, leaving kisses on the side of your face every few moments. A shiver ran down your spine and at this point you were completely soaked to the bone, clothes and hair sticking to your skin but you made no movements to unravel from Jack and go back inside.
“I love you. So much.”
His voice wobbled as he took your hand and held it to his chest. His voice was soft but entirely serious as he looked at you. You, who held his heart. He pressed his lips to yours, gentle, cautious.
You pulled away, rolling your lips into your mouth. “I’ve been missing it.”
Your voice was hardly a whisper.
Jack shook his head.
“Not missing it, sweet girl. You have it in you, just gotta remember to look.”
Could you do a fic with Jack abbot and the fluff prompt “I just want you safe”? With a nurse that works in the Pitt! We all know how dangerous being a nurse can be
bad company jack abbot x f!nurse!reader
getting stabbed at work isn’t ideal, thankfully it’s just an unused iv needle, not so thankfully, jack reacts badly.
jack abbot x f!reader
wc. idk im sorry it’s not long tho
rating. 18+
synopsis. you’ve done a million iv’s, more than all the doctors combined. however it just takes one patient with an aggressive streak to mess up a nice day
tags/warnings.MDNI, blood, needles, medical inaccuracies, patient assaults nurse, injury, jack gets a little violent, reader cries, fluff, yearning, protective!jack, angry jack, jack just wants you to be okay, readers a nurse, female reader, she/her pronouns, female anatomy
requested? yes
“i’ve been in this room 3 hours.” the man laying before you grumbles. you nod absentmindedly, trying to acknowledge the man’s feelings while remaining neutral.
“i’m aware sir, and i’m sorry.” you’re not sure what else to say. as a nurse, you’ve experienced your fair share of rude, entitled patients. you usually make an allowance for them. tell yourself they’re in pain, they’ve been waiting hours. even if they’re being unreasonable, you stay pleasant.
the man just mutters something under his breath before shifting his weight so he’s closer to the edge of the bed where your stool is.
“it’s unreasonable.” you nod again, placing tubing on the table beside the bed. the sweat on the pads of your fingers stick to the latex of your gloves.
“i agree.”
“and now i need an iv?” for the third time, you nod.
“yes, did dr abbot explain this process to you?”
the man squints like he’s trying to place a name to a face, “uh, yeah.”
“alright well, which arm would you prefer?” the man glances down, seemingly conflicted before rolling up his right sleeve. you can tell it’s his default arm for blood drawls and such, especially with how the vein protrudes.
“great, you’ll receive fluids through here, and what makes it convenient is we can also use it to draw any blood we may need from you.” your explanation is simple but easy for the regular person to understand, a sentence you’ve given to so many patients you can’t even remember all the faces of. you smile at the man as you rip open a sterile package of an alcohol wipe, rubbing firm circles on the crease of his arm.
“how long until those tests, the ones that um-,”
“dr abbot.”
“yeah, when do i get those? i need to get back to work.” you level him with a look of confusion.
“sir you have a head injury, you’ll have to be on observation for several more hours,” you speak as though he could be set off any moment, noticing the way his jaw clenches and his nostrils flare, “however we can get you some water, juice, a snack if you’re hungry?”
now you’re placating against the tidal wave of slow boiling frustration you feel beginning to radiate from the man.
“can we cut that time in half?” he breathes out, like he’s trying to soothe his annoyance, you appreciate it despite the anxious coil wrapping around your stomach. you know how fast things can escalate, you’ve experienced it first hand. just be polite, keep him calm.
“that would have to be a question for the doctor, i’m sorr-,”
“yeah bullshit,” you’re taken aback, visibly shocked at the sudden change in language from the man, “if you’d been in here 3 hours ago, i’d be home by now.”
you want to scoff, but the professional in you swallows it down to instead respond with a tight lipped smile.
“i’m very sorry about that,” you breath, “if you let me get this iv in i’ll try to hurry this whole process up.” you say that like you can control any of this, but if it relaxes the man, you’ve done the best you can.
“fine.” you think its settled, you think he’s realized he’s being unreasonable and will now act decent.
the man is still for a minute as he lays back down and you hold the needle intended for him at an angle. a million times, you must’ve done this a million times. but as the needle is inches from pale skin, the man lunges, hands out, pushing, one flies up into yours, knocking into your palm and lower arm so harshly you’re set backwards to the wall.
then he’s screaming, how you didn’t tell him you were about to use the needle, how big the needle is, asking how incompetent you could possibly be. you’re stunned, maybe by the force of the push, maybe because he just put his hands on you and you can’t even figure out what you do wrong.
there’s an echoing clink of metal rings as the curtain behind the open glass door he’s shoved aside.
“what in the fuck.” there’s a familiar drawl to the voice, one you’ve heard at the softest of times, whispering sweet words into your ears at the early hours of dawn, it’s different, now twisted and enraged.
you’re wobbling to a stand as a pair of hands steady you from the side. shen.
“woah, hey-,” ellis’s voice joins the party, panicked and as shoes squeak across the waxed floor, breathing heavy and you realize the man is still yelling and pointing at you when suddenly there’s this noise like a shuffle, your gaze shoots up.
your eyes are wide as you eyes fall on the patient right in time for his body to be thrown backwards, slamming into the wall behind him. that seems to shut him up.
jack approaches, fists clenched.
“you like that being done to you? nah, didn’t think so,” you should be worried about the fact that he’s just physically assaulted a patient who already has a head injury, however all you manage is a awkward wince as you raise your hand, “parker, get security in here, now.”
“ow, geez,” shen comments from his place still keeping you on your feet, even though you’re no longer dizzy, “blessings of this job i guess.”
your once normal hand is now skewed, a 20 gauge needle protruding from the middle of your still gloved palm. the little pink plastic at the end mocking you.
“jesus,” jack is rounding the bed, ignoring the complaints from the patient now slumped against the floor, “does it hurt?”
he discreetly shoos shen away, but you don’t miss the way he steps into his place, eyes on yours as he angles your chin up to meet his.
“um, is it weird to say not really?” you try to laugh, attempting to lighten the mood. jack doesn’t crack a smile, although you don’t miss the way his eyes soften considerably. the patient groans, throaty and irritated as security steps into the room with ellis, her arms crossed.
“you’ve got this?” jack doesn’t turn back for her to know he’s speaking to her.
“oh yeah.” her eyes pan to the man on the ground, expression hard. you can hear security and shen hauling the man to his feet as jack guides you from the room, practically blocking the entire view of your attacker.
lena exchanges a look with jack as he brings you into an empty patient room.
“scale of one to ten?” as you sit on the edge of the cot, face a tad pinched as the dull ache in your hand begins to set in.
you hum, thinking.
“solid 2,” you grin up at jack who’s already grabbed all the necessary supplies to help you, “this could’ve been so much worse if i’d already stuck him.”
you knew you weren’t the only one who had a fear of dirty needles, and thankfully, you’d gotten lucky this time.
“i don’t want to think about worse, this shouldn’t have happened to begin with.” and he’s right as he rips open some antiseptic, moving to sit before you.
“it happens.” you shrug.
“well, it shouldn’t.” jack responds, voice sharp despite the look of defeat on his features. you want to pull him in, settling for placing your non injured hand in his knee. his hand clasps over yours, its larger, more callused.
“i just want you safe.” his eyes meet yours, words coming out with breath you worry that he’s been holding since he separated the patient from you.
“i’m as safe as i can be right now.” you laugh, staring at the war vet across from you. his lips curve up at that, head tilting back it that cocky jack way.
“damn straight.” he says it like a promise you, and you believe him.
A/N sorry it’s so short. i’ve been so busy but i still want to get some fics out, also happy valentine’s day 💋
Link to Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9
Status: Complete *sobs*
Word Count: 3.5k
Author's Note: This is so bittersweet for me. Thank you to everyone who gave this little fic a chance. I hope you'll stick around for the Jack story that's coming next. <3
A03 Link: Something in the Orange
Song for Part 10: Something Beautiful by Jacob Banks
58 days, 1,401 hours, 84,060 minutes.
It amazes you how much time has started to matter, how attuned you’ve become to the ticking of the second-hand on the clock on the wall in your office, to the digital slip of the minutes on the screen of your phone. They pass slowly at first, moments stretching longer than they have any right to, each one filling with a bubble of hope that bursts as the minute passes without hearing from him only to repeat over, and over, and over.
You didn’t know that silence could be so loud.
After your weekend back home in Boston - filled with sappy rom-coms and bottomless glasses of wine and hugs and tears - you’d carried the love of your brother and his partner with you back to Pittsburgh, wrapping it around you like a shield in an effort to stave off the pain that you knew would come as a result of re-entering Robby’s orbit without being able to reach for him.
It wasn’t enough.
There were pieces of him everywhere - in every restaurant you’d picked up takeout from, on every park bench you walked by, in the sound of every motorcycle passing by on the street below your apartment. You can’t escape him, constantly torn between not wanting to and wishing you’d never met him in the first place because it fucking hurts, always, all the time, the ache of his absence a persistent and unwelcome companion. You wear his t-shirt and hoodie so often the fabric finally relinquishes the woodsy citrus scent of him and that loss only serves as another reminder of the relentless march of time.
It’s harder, the not knowing. Living in a state of limbo, unsure whether you should be hoping to stay or preparing to leave, carves channels of chaos through your mind: one minute you’re determined to reach out and let him know you’re still there, still waiting, the next determined to keep your distance to allow him whatever space he needs. The never-ending vacillation feels like a gradual descent into insanity.
You bury yourself in work, shifting your arrival to and departure from the hospital each day just slightly to avoid any chance encounter in the parking lot. Your heart pounds every time you pass by his bike, but as it gets colder that reminder of him vanishes, too. You’re not sure if that counts as a blessing or a curse.
Jack checks on you every week, graciously passing inconspicuous updates on Robby so you never have to ask, and it’s the only thing that keeps you from going over that edge. You know it’s his way of taking care of both of you, and you’re forever grateful to him for it. He tells you that Robby’s been going to therapy regularly, and you pray that it’s helping him.
You text Robby one night in a moment of weakness while you’re eating Fiori’s Pizza alone on your couch, savoring the salty-sweetness of both the tomato sauce and the memory of your first date:
I had Fiori’s pizza tonight. It made me think of you.
And then you bundle up all the things you want to say - I’m sorry, I forgive you, I love you - into three final words:
I’m still here.
Minutes pass, too many of them, each one as agonizing as the last, and it isn’t until you’ve banished your phone to the other end of the couch that it pings to alert you of an incoming text message. Your heart jumps into your throat as you crawl over to grab it and see Robby’s name on the screen.
I’m okay. I hope you are, too. I just need a little more time.
You trace the words with your fingertips; they shake loose some of the weight you’ve been carrying and you feel the small, tentative tendrils of hope begin to curl through your veins. It’s somehow enough while also leaving you desperately wanting.
Enough, you tell yourself. It’s his turn, now, when and if he’s ready.
And then, after 58 days, 1,401 hours, and 84,060 minutes, you walk into your office one morning and the clock finally stops.
Sitting here on your desk is a cup of coffee bearing the logo of the shop across the street, familiar and comforting in a way that immediately sets you on edge. You approach it cautiously, noticing the notebook underneath it with a Post-It note affixed to the cover and a note in Robby’s forever hurried handwriting:
Please forgive me.
Full gravitas intended.
-Robby
With those six simple words - a verbatim replica of the note he’d left you after the first time he’d taken you out on his bike last summer - the days and hours and minutes start to fall away.
Lifting the cup to your nose, you inhale the delicious aroma of espresso and hazelnut - of course he remembered - and take a sip before setting it to the side and picking up the notebook. Flipping it open it to the first page, you begin to read:
Arrival of the living dead this morning, and an 86 year old man came in too late with respiratory failure from pneumonia. Edward. There wasn’t even any next of kin to notify. He died alone, and I was the only one around to give a shit. The interns - Santos and Whitaker - immediately turned to hunt for greener pastures. I had to teach them about the pause, why it’s important to take a moment of silence to honor the patient and life they lived. Fucking kids these days.
Robby journaled? And he left it for you? You quickly flip through the rest of the pages, the entries getting longer as they progress, spanning almost the entirety of your time apart. You sit down in your chair with the intention of immediately devouring and deciphering what he’s written, then pause at the realization that you don’t know if the message is one you’re ready to hear. This could be a goodbye, and the possibility cuts you to your core. Hesitantly, you close the cover, set it to the side of your desk, staring at it for a moment before picking it back up and shoving it into your bag.
Whatever Robby has to say, whatever fate lies in store, is going to have to wait. You almost manage to convince yourself that you’re not stalling, but you know that until you face the finality of whatever is in that notebook, you can at least pretend that there’s still hope.
You’re stuck at work late, of course, due to a meeting that ran over regarding hiring additional attending physician support for the Emergency Department; it feels like a sign from the universe, but you’re not sure which way it’s pointing.
It’s raining when you finally make your way home, a little past 6pm. It’s been misting for what feels like the entirety of November and has finally turned into the kind of steady downpour that has you soaked by the time you make it back to your apartment. You quickly shower and change, pulling Robby’s hoodie out of your bag and zipping into it, then pull out the notebook, holding it as carefully as the bomb that it has every potential to be as you settle on your couch under your favorite weighted blanket. With trembling fingers, you open the cover, take steadying breath, and begin to read.
The words he’d written transport you, offering you a glimpse into the life he’s lived over the weeks you’ve spent without him. You knew he had started seeing Caleb, but witnessing the effect of his efforts in those sessions as his writing becomes lengthier and more introspective with each entry is nothing short of breathtaking.
When you recognize a few pages in that he’s started writing to you, your heart starts to ache inside of your chest.
You devour his words, tucking them deep inside of you, because regardless of what comes next, they’re proof that, for at least a little while, you mattered to him. And then, too quickly, you’ve reached the last entry:
Do you remember that August night in Allegheny Park, the one where we shared Bánh Mì and you almost choked on it when I told you that my childhood crush was Maid Marian from Disney’s Robin Hood? You laughed so hard and so loud that the people walking by smiled with you. Your joy is effervescent; it permeates everything around you, and it infiltrated the deepest parts of me, too, in a way that I had long ago stopped thinking was even possible. I didn’t want the darkness I carry inside to extinguish any of that light. I should have known that light trumps darkness every time.
A soft knock at your front door pulls you back into the present. You frown, wondering who it could be, and extricate yourself from your nest of blankets to pad across your living room and down the hallway to your door. When you glance through the peephole, your entire world shifts on its axis.
Robby.
Your body moves before your brain can catch up and you flip open the deadbolt and throw open the door. He’s soaked from the rain; it runs in rivulets down his face, and he’s trembling slightly, though you’re not convinced it’s entirely from the cold. His eyes search yours for a moment, unsure, full of hope and trepidation and longing, mirroring our own.
“Hi,” he says softly, cautiously. Now that he’s here, you hate the distance between you, are desperate to close it in every way possible. Without a word, you stand back from the entrance, inviting him inside; he steps in, and you close the door behind him, bracing a hand against it, bracing yourself for whatever is about to come. You can feel his presence behind you, radiating heat despite the damp, and his hand brushes your shoulder gently, hesitantly. You take a deep breath to steel yourself, then turn and face him, and his hand drops back to his side.
“You’re soaked,” you finally say. It feels like the safest place to start.
Robby glances down at his rain-soaked scrubs and jacket, shrugs and huffs out a laugh. “Yeah. I’ve been standing outside for the better part of half an hour trying to work up the courage to come in.”
“Jesus, you must be freezing. Come on,” you say, moving past him carefully, intending to grab his clothes that you’ve been hoarding so that he can change, but his cold fingers wrap around your wrist, stopping you in your tracks.
“Wait.”
You glance down at his hand, then back up at him; he releases you immediately and steps back, shoving his hands into the pocket of his scrubs, and your throat constricts, tears building behind your eyes, wondering why he so clearly doesn’t want to touch you.
“I’ve been doing a lot of that.” It comes out before you can stop it, sharper than you intend it to be.
“I know,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry,” you sigh. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
“I deserve it.” You catch the slight clench and release of his jaw, like he’s trying to hold back the words he wants to say. You chew on your bottom lip in an effort to do the same.
A beat passes.
“I need you to tell me why you’re here,” you blurt out, because you have to know the end of the conversation before it begins so you can find the strength you may need to face it.
“Still so impatient.” He wipes futilely at the water droplets trailing down his face and half-smiles in that way that feels both foreign after all this time and yet still achingly familiar.
You cross your arms, the only defense mechanism you have left to hold yourself together in that moment. Its killing you inside, the not knowing. “Robby-“
“Wait. Please, if that’s okay. Let me get this out,” he pleads, shifting on his feet for a moment, considering his words, and you concede.
“I wasn’t okay. I’m not okay. This… the work I do…” He gestures vaguely with one hand and sighs heavily. “It stays with me. It weighs on me, and I haven’t - I don’t - handle it well, and I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize for that, Robby. It’s okay to not be okay. But you pushed me out - literally pushed me away - and I was so scared for you, and it’s been months-“
“I’m here because I miss you,” he interrupts you. “I’ve missed you since that moment I pushed you out the door, and I’m sorry, I am so fucking sorry, but I’m also glad that that it happened.” He runs a hand across his face and sighs. “I just wish I would have handled it differently. I wish I would have let you in.”
He lifts a hand, hesitant and slow, to cup your jaw, his thumb smoothing across your cheek, and you close your eyes, leaning into his touch as the tightness you’ve been carrying in your chest for the past few months finally starting to ease.
“I should have let you in,” he finishes softly.
When you open your eyes, he’s staring at you intently, cautiously, still unsure.
“Is that why you left me your journal?”
He nods. “I wanted you to know all the things I’ve been too scared, too ashamed to say. I’m still seeing Caleb, and it’s helping, I think. I wanted you to know that I’m broken, but I’m trying not to be.”
You try to consider your response carefully, but you know deep down there was never any other way for this to go. Not for you.
“I don’t need you to not be broken, Robby. I just need you.”
You watch the tension in his shoulders release immediately.
“I tried to wait, the way you’ve waited for me. I wanted to give you time to read all that I’ve written to you, to give you time to process, to decide, but once I was finally ready, I was so scared I was going to be too late,” he murmurs, his thumb moving to ghost across your lips. Your breath catches in your throat; there’s still so much to say, but now you know you will have the time to say it, and his hand is freezing.
“You need to get out of those scrubs. Come on,” you insist, tugging him down the hall to your bathroom, releasing his hand to start the shower and set the temperature just to the edge of scalding.
“I still have some of your clothes. I’ll grab them for you while you warm up.” You turn to leave the room, but then his hand is on your wrist again, pulling you back, and this time, he doesn’t let go.
“Hey,” he rasps softly. “Come here.”
You allow him to pull you into his frame and he tucks you against him and wraps his arms around you tightly. You shiver against the cold wetness of his jacket but cling to him nonetheless because you’d forgotten, somehow, how being close to him always felt like coming home, and now that you’ve remembered, you’re incapable of letting go. It isn’t until then that the tears finally come.
“Fuck, sweetheart, please don’t cry,” he murmurs against your temple, his beard scratching your cheek. You’re unable to form words around your sobs, so you burrow deeper into his chest, clutch tighter at his jacket, and try not to drown in the relief that’s washing over you in waves.
“I didn’t know. I didn’t know if I’d ever have this, have you, again,” you finally manage to choke out, and he leans back slightly, taking your chin between his thumb and forefingers, his brown eyes anchoring your own.
“I’m here now. I’m not going anywhere,” he promises, and you shiver at the combination of the weight of his words and the damp chill that’s seeped into your own sweatshirt. He clocks it immediately and gently extricates himself from you to unzip his jacket and peel off his scrub top, tossing them both onto the floor. He leans over and starts to lift the hem of your sweatshirt, then hesitates.
“Is this okay?” he asks.
You nod, your throat still thick with tears, and lift your arms to allow him to tug it up and over your head. He tests the water next, adjusts the temperature, then leans over to help you out of your sweatpants and gently guides you over the edge of the tub, releasing his grip on you only long enough for to tug off his scrub bottoms and step in behind you. He wraps his arms around you again, and you nuzzle against his chest, finally relaxing, your tears diminishing into hiccups as the warm water and billowing steam banish any remaining traces of cold.
You pull back slightly to look up at him. “I missed you, too, Robby.”
He presses his forehead to yours and you reach up to cup his face in your hands, gently stroking the edges of his beard before leaning in to kiss him. He’s gentle at first, chaste, still unsure, but you bite at his lower lip, impatiently demanding access, and he immediately complies, groaning into your mouth as his tongue meets your own. You kiss him to make up for all the months of kisses that you’ve missed out on, like you’ll suffocate without him, because the truth is, you feel like it’s a possibility.
His thigh slides between your legs and you feel him then, his hard length pressing against you, and your body craves him in a way that’s beyond words. You shift your hips against his, but it’s not close enough. It will never be close enough, not until he’s inside you.
“I need you. Now,” you whisper breathlessly against his lips, demanding. It’s all the permission Robby needs.
“Hold on to me,” he directs you; you anchor your arms around his neck and he carefully lifts one of your legs, hitching it around his waist. You reach one hand between you to grasp and stroke him gently, and his breath catches in his throat as you shift forward and guide him inside of you. His mouth moves to your neck, lapping at the sensitive skin between your collarbone and jaw, and you fist your other hand in his hair as his hips shift towards yours until he’s filing you completely.
“Fuck,” he rasps, low and guttural, and you capture his mouth with yours to swallow the sound.
“That’s the idea,” you murmur against his lips and his responding chuckle rumbles deep in his chest.
He moves slowly at first as you adjust to him, careful to make sure you don’t fall, until you’re moving together, and before long, you’re dancing on the edge. He senses it in the way you start to clench around him and moves a hand between you to circle your clit with his thumb. You gasp, your teeth finding purchase against his skin.
“Robby,” you whisper breathlessly, trying desperately to hold back, to wait for him.
“Let go, sweetheart,” he murmurs, and a moment later, you find your release, coming undone around him. His hold on you tightens and his pace increases briefly, then his hips stutter and he buries his face into the crook of your neck, groaning as he follows you over the edge.
When he looks up at you, the intensity in his eyes steals your breath away, and you tilt your face up to kiss him, lazily this time, slowly, savoring the way your bodies fit together so goddamn perfectly.
And then, the hot water runs out.
“Fuck fuck fuck,” you gasp, laughing and ducking away from the spray as he frantically reaches back to shut off the water. He helps you out of the tub and gently, reverently, dries every inch of your skin before wrapping the towel around you and tucking it closed.
“I’ll grab some clothes for you,” you tell him, ducking out of the bathroom to retrieve his Steeler’s t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants from your closet. When you’re both warm and dry, he pulls you against him and kisses you again, long and slow, before pressing a chaste kiss against your forehead.
“Fiori’s?” he asks.
“You know the way to a woman’s heart,” you grin.
“I love you,” he says then, finally, quietly, simply. “I’ve loved you for a long time.”
“I love you too, Robby.”
“I can’t promise you that loving me will be easy.” His voice catches, tugging at your heart.
“I don’t need easy,” you tell him, reaching out to lace your fingers with his. “Light trumps darkness, every time.”
And in that moment, for both of you, it’s more than enough.
“you broke your arm?!” he’s staring at the purple cast on your arm like it’s an affront to his entire legacy. you huff, attempting to stifle a laugh.
“yeah, that’s why i’m her-,”
his pointer finger flies up like he has a point to make. to silence you? to emphasize his point maybe? all it does is grow your smile.
“you broke your arm,”
“dennis-,”
“and drove here?!” he looks like he’s seconds away from an aneurysm. a shade of red flushing his skin a color you’ve never seen.
“yes, because it didn’t hurt that much-,”
“most likely from adrenaline and considering i tell you over and over how much you can rely on me and just call me, no matter the reason, you drive with a broken arm?!”
“stop interrupting me!” you’re quick to shush him, never mind the way his voice has risen and you’re still in the ED. you can see it on his face, the panic, the fear, the way his tone is clipped.
his lips form a tight line, eyes red and quickly becoming increasingly glossy as his gaze falls to his shoes. it cracks something in your chest, bringing you to your feet so you can cradle one side of his face with your available hand.
“don’t-,” he stutters, soft and docile unlike seconds ago when you were sure he’d actually lose it for once, “don’t strain yourself.”
his hand comes up to cup around the back of yours, bringing your finger tips towards his lips so he can sneak in a peck. the touch tickles you, eyes finding his as you attempt to calm his still erratic breathing.
“my legs aren’t broken.” that makes dennis’s eyes fall shut, a shaky breath leaving his lips. he doesn’t want to think about the horrible image you just put in his head.
“i’m sorry that i yelled.” his eyes find yours again.
“you didn’t.”
“i didn’t mean to raise my voice.” you smile at that.
“i know.” he’s so sweet in the kisses he’s continued to press to your fingers, soft and lingering between words. a delicate touch of affection he was far too shy to share even up until recently.
“i just,” he sighs like the words hurt to think, like saying them out loud is wrong and more harmful than good, “when trinity told me you were here-,”
he pauses again, cupping your free hand in his and moving you back slightly so you can sit against the bed. he’s in his scrubs like he normally is, the fabric tight against his biceps as he grabs the stool behind him and drags it between his legs so he can lower to your level, face to face.
his brows are worried together, and you have to fight the instinctual response to run your thumb across the skin and smooth away his concern.
“she didn’t tell me what it was, just that you’d been here for awhile, because she thought i already knew.” your hand grabs at his again, pulling it into your lap as his grip tightens at your touch.
“i didn’t want to worry you,” you say it, feeling a little silly that you didn’t immediately contact your boyfriend who happened to be a doctor, and right around the corner, “i also felt a little stupid.”
“it’s such a silly injury, the least i could’ve gotten is something cool.” you attempt to lighten the mood, all it does it make this queasy look fall across dennis’s face. he pales slightly, his free hand lifting to scrub across his face while the other grips your hand in his like any second you’d disappear.
“please,” it’s muffled behind his palm, “god, don’t stay that.” he sounds like what you said has physically hurt him, like he’s bleeding across the pristine white of the hospital. your heart skips in tune with his pleading.
his hand falls, beautiful eyes landing on yours with a look of forlorn you can’t help the way your eyes widen.
“don’t say that, i never want you getting hurt,” he sounds so serious is sets something inside you aflame, “it makes me sick to think about, so please?”
you can’t promise him you’ll never get hurt again, it’s a given life comes with its fair share of hurdles. however the look his giving you makes you think maybe it’s possible. you glance at his lips, then your intertwined fingers.
you smile at him like he hasn’t spent the past half hour since finding out you were here in absolute emotional agony.
“okay, but you’ll sign my cast right?” you want to run your fingers through the curls of his growing mullet as his eyes roll. although he just stands, not for one second releasing your hand as he leans in and presses his lips to your forehead.
“of course baby.” is spoken into your skin.
A/N not proof read! just a little blurb while i work on other, longer fics
(cw: chronic pain, motor accident injuries, Blood, IV meds)
an: Hi! This is a part one, further dive into relationship in part two? I'd love your feedback on it <3 (not Beta-d just vibing)
Summery:
"Dr. Abbot used to walk into the ED fully prepared to tackle a disaster. He used a backpack to keep his hands free and clean, kept a scalpel in his pant pocket, and never once was seen bringing a drink to work -"I come in pre-caffinated". Two months ago, something changed."
Something changed about hand-offs with Abbot one night two months ago, and it hadn't changes back.
Robby is usually highly strung or dead tired by the time Jack rolls into the ED for his shift, so sometimes he doesn't catch a shifting detail about the man until it's glaring right at him. He hesitated one time before turning to the locker rooms to pack up and leave for the day, because Jack Abbot's shoulders were relaxed, uncurled. His neck and chin were leaned back instead of tensed forwards in readiness. The vet's body language used to declare him ready for crisis, brave in the face of tragedy. When did that stop?
"You good, brother?"
Jack tilted his head, turning away from scanning the overhead screen at the Hub.
"What is it, Robby?" Jack turned to him, leaning forward curiously.
The taller man rubbed at the back of his head and sighed.
"You seem.. like you're actually sleeping, or on some new medication?"
Abbot huffed, smirking and lifting a paper coffee cup to his lips.
"I am sleeping better, yes."
Robby's eyes tracked the cup as the man took a sip. A sticker labeled Foxglove Cafe caught his attention. "Did a new spot open?" He nodded towards the cup.
Jack's smirk stretched into a full smile and he stepped backwards to walk to the lockers.
"Something like that."
"Is it a secret coffee shop?"
Dr.Abbot's shoulders jumped in surprise at Shen's question coming so close to his ear while he was charting.
"Hm?" he looked at the man for a moment, then went back to the screen.
"Like a hidden gem kinda thing?"
"What're you ta- oh that," Jack saw John's eyes on the paper cup by the keyboard, "umm .."
"Because it's not on google maps or Instagram. That's how you find places, you know?" Shen added, stepping back to lean on the doorframe.
"How old do you think I am? yes I know." Jack retorted with a scoff.
"So?"
"So?" Abbot's brows furrowed in slightly bemused confusion.
"Oh goddammit." John hissed, turning sharply to walk out.
"Move your ass to west 13, Dr Shen." Jack yelled after the resident, chuckling quietly.
Dr. Abbot used to walk into the ED fully prepared to tackle a disaster. He used a backpack to keep his hands free and clean, kept a scalpel in his pant pocket, and never once was seen bringing a drink to work -"I come in pre-caffinated". Langdon had looked up Foxglove Cafe repeatedly every other day in hopes that the cafe decided to exist on the internet. Apparently the question circled through the night shift all the way to the day shift, and curiosity had dug it's claws.
At first it was as simple as oh i wonder what he's drinking, but when Dr.abbot evaded answering, it became what secret is he keeping then wtf, that shop name doesn't exist.
"Maybe it's an old cup?" Mel suggested, settling across from him in the staff lounge.
"I was gonna say that too," Frank countered, "but it's been two weeks, a paper cup would've shriveled up or turned to dust."
"Maybe just ask him?" She looked up at him innocently.
"He won't answer directly and working in the ED always gives him an out-"
"See!" Langdon snapped, rushing out of the lounge chair towards the bay.
Dr. King thought it was funny how hung-up everyone was about Dr.Abbot's new habit.
The way she saw it, everyone develops and drops habits throughout their lives. As uncommon as it is to see, older men can also pickup habits or find comfort in new things. New routines. But everyone forgot that when the older man in question had such a mysterious, elusive persona.
When she settled on the bench by the lockers with her backpack open in her lap, it was end of day shift and her sister was already calling.
"'Evening, Dr King."
Looking up at Dr.Abbot's arrival, Mel greeted him back as he opened his locker, a large coffee cup in his other hand.
"It's a fake sticker right?" She chanced a confrontation.
"Hm?"
"My sister had the same one but with an Arum Lily instead. She's a regular." Mel smiled up at him, a flicker of mischief in her eyes.
Jack Abbot snorted, shaking his head, and closed his locker.
"Don't tell anyone," Squinting his eyes at her with a small smirk, "but you're my favorite."
It had been a series of strange decisions that led to this weird prank that Jack has been pulling on the ED for the past few months. It's one of those too subtle tricks that only cause utter confusion or inconvenience. These are Jack's favorite kind, yours too.
You had been running your bookstore for two years when Mrs Brisby discovered it. She was in her 60s, and a quick-witted conversationalist, so she became a friend in two visits. To accommodate her age, achy knees, and her tendency to stay for hours to chat, you set up a seating area and made it as comfortable as you could, with throw blankets, a footrest, and a spare cane leaning against the wall.
This opened up the chain of events that led you to offer "exclusive to regulars" drinks. Mrs Brisby was going to have to have her tea, but you didn't want the bookstore to turn into a Cafe- you didn't have the staff for that, and you liked the slow pace you were at.
So you made her and yourself drinks in white paper cups with a random sticker on them.
This made it seem like you bought your drinks from another spot, and so the bookstore pace of customers remained comfortable. That is until Dex and his brother Eugene, also regulars, asked the right questions. 12 Year old Dex was always smarter than given credit for, and he was the one that told you a consistant sticker design made more sense. So you bought plastic cups for his cold drinks.
By that point, the whole thing was a giggle-inducing, fun secret between your friends. Something to be sneaky about with no consequences. A variety of ingredients accumulated in the backroom, along with an ice machine and a discovery set of coffee flavors. Making a special sticker seemed like a lot of work, but Mrs Brisby's favorite flower was the purple foxglove and it was her birthday around the time you found someone to make the logo for you. Later on, some other regulars got to feature their own favorite flowers.
This system, or scheme, remained within a tight circle, until the day you had one of your flare-up while simultaneously shattering your wrist against the pavement. The day you had the pleasure of meeting one Dr. Jack Abbot.
"Pedestrian Vs Motorcycle. Female 30s, Isolated wrist fracture splinted in scene. Minor head injury, Abrasions at forearm, right hip and thigh."
EMT Maria rattled off the the handoff report as she unbuckled the gurney from the floor of the ambulance.
"GCS 15. Vitals stable, alert and oriented. Pupils equal and reactive."
As Dr Robby helped secure the handrails upward, his gaze swept the form of the woman in question. Your hairline was sweating under bandages on your forehead. Eyes squeezed shut, you squirmed slightly as if the pain wasn't letting you still.
"Baseline?" He asked.
"Chronic neurological pain disorder, migraines, baseline hand tremor. No visible neuro changes from baseline noted."
Dr Whittaker, checking the laceration on your head, addressed you first.
"Ma'am, my name is Dr Whittaker. You're at PTMC."
"Mhm, that tracks, yeah." You mumbled, eyes still closed against the stabbing lights of the ED hallway, and scoffed, "Figures I'd get hit at 15 km/hr and the handoff is longer than 3 sentences."
Robby snorted as he picked up his penlight to check your eyes, then changed his mind when he saw the intensity of your light avoidance. "Sarcasm is a good sign."
Dana looked up from her spot behind the counter as they wheeled you in and gestured her arm to the left. "Central 8 is free, Dr Robby. You're an hour pass handoffs, by the way."
"Am I now?" He mumbled, pushing away the curtain so Perlah can set up the monitors. He leaned down to inspect your right wrist.
"Pain seems out of proportion."
"History of chronic pain?" A familiar voice came from behind him.
Robby turned to the door to see Jack Abbot walking in, fixing his stethoscope around his neck.
"Yes. Miss Y/L/N, this is Dr. Abbot. He will be handling your case for this evening." Robby said, turning to you.
Your breath was still shuttering with restraint, the IV they placed in your left hand administered pain relief too slowly. You could feel the pounding behind your eyes. The adrenaline from the accident nearly had you forget the usual terror that precedes an oncoming migraine.
"… Hi." you said in an exhale. It felt impossible to hold a conversation, but you knew they were there to help you.
Jack's eyes instantly went to the screen to check the IV content, then to your pained shifting on the bed. He reached a hand to the IV valve and increased the flow of morphine.
"Your drug baseline is higher." His murmur was softer as he neared you, trying not to risk more pain with his volume, "This tremor usual with a flare-up?"
His fingertips touched the skin on your uninjured hand after a soft "may I?", turning it over to check. The tremor running through your skin shook your fingers hard, you knew you wouldn't regain control for hours yet.
"Yeah," you whispered, a self-deprecating grin tugged your lips, "might have been the shock before, but this is all me."
Slowly, your shoulders slacked against the pillow behind you, brows unknotting with relief. Spots of stabbing pain from you wrist and leg came forward, but dulled again. Like you hadn't felt the injuries over the tsunami that is your own personal pain.
The white blur dulled suddenly from behind your eyelids and the doors slid open and shut in a swooshing sound.
"Lights are dimmed. I will check your eyes now." Dr. Abbot said, voice gentle against your throbbing temples.
Slowly, timidly, you blinked your eyes open, noticing the dampness of tears on your lashes, and turned to look at him.
"Wow," you rasped, "remind me where I am again?"
"Pittsburgh Trauma-" he cut himself off with a scoff when he noticed you eyeing his face with a smirk on your lips, "Cute."
"Exactly what I was thinking."
The genuine smile that graced his eyes and dimpled his cheeks has become one of your favorite things to see.
an: Thank you so much for reading! please comment what you think! oxoxox
you’ve worked night shift with jack for years now, so how come the one day he covers day shift for robby, you’re sitting in the waiting room with a nasty bruise on your midsection and a laceration across your cheek
jack abbot x f!reader
wc. 9k
rating. 18+
summary. jack chooses to ignore how his heart constricts when your hands brush, how your eyes meet his, especially when his fall to the wedding ring attached to a delicate, gold chain hanging right below the collar of your scrubs. however one moment can change everything and that proves true when he covers the day shift and finds you in the waiting room injured and with red, swollen eyes.
tags/warnings. MDNI protective jack abbot, afab!reader, blood, needles, inaccurate medical descriptions, mutual pining, age gap, (reader is mentioned as younger than jack), reader is referred to as “sweetheart”, resident!reader, talks of domestic violence, graphic violence, physical and emotional abuse, possible emotional affair between jack and reader, female pronouns, female anatomy
requested? no
jack abbot can remember the day he met you, just a young second year resident transferring to PMTC due to budget cuts. you were still learning, eager with a passion he used to possess, before it became routine, steady. you’d shown up with a notepad that by the end of the way hadn’t been touched once, forgotten in your locker along with a half eaten granola bar. the minor bruise on your cheek, running into a mounted cabinet you’d informed.
he knew it must’ve been difficult, suddenly tossed into a new environment, with new challenges, people who already were accustomed to each other. however he took notice in the way you didn’t waver, chin held high and shoulders back, no matter how often that night he swore he saw your bottom lip wobble. you were resilient, something he admired greatly and found himself drawn too even on the most desolate of nights.
jack could also recount the exact moment you became something more than his favorite resident and trusted colleague, something special.
he’d found himself on the roof, not yet beyond the barrier yet gripping it as if he’d cross any moment, if he decided as much. the sun had began fading into the horizon, the soft, orange glow of morning bright against the overwhelming dimness jack felt festering in his gut.
it was then that the door to the roof screeched in protest against rusty hinges as someone pushed past. a pause as jack pondered if robby had sought him out yet again.
“dr abbot.” you, with your gentle tone that threatened to tug jack over the buildings side. his mind swam, struggling against the tide.
he could hear how your shoes approached, the squeak of the soles so pristine and new. a mark of the shift last thursday when your last pair had been made a vomit mat by a young girl with the flu.
he wasn’t sure if you’d been looking for him or simply decided you wanted to watch the sunrise, maybe both if by coincidence. you appeared in his peripheral, eyes focused ahead mirroring his own watchful gaze of the city.
“tonight was rough,” you spoke, calm, in control. he appreciated that about you, your professionalism and how you knew when to put it to use, and right then he felt properly doctored. he wanted to agree, nod, although he found himself quiet, urging you silently to continue, “it’s always rough.”
if that wasn’t the truth he didn’t know what was. you hummed low in your throat, and jack swore he could sense your next move as you glanced towards the side of his face.
“dr abbot, why do you come to the roof so often?” ah, so you’d noticed, and of course you had. always so perceptive.
he kept his eyes on the horizon of buildings, willing himself to think of an answer.
“why did you become a doctor?” he answers with a question, finally tearing his eyes away from the view to take in the woman standing a few feet away. you probably felt as exhausted as you looked. eye bags heavy beneath slightly red eyes, the look you’d get when he knew you were already clocking out and bidding everyone goodbye. he’d seen the very same on his own face many years before you came into the picture.
you don’t seem bothered by his question, eyes however deviating from his to dance around, probably searching for a response. you’re always quick when a trauma comes in, firing off directions, on the go with medications, prepared and agile and ready. but he pocketed in the recess of his mind how you’d hesitate to answer questions outside of the ER, thoughtful and important, like the words you put out there mattered.
“i don’t know.” is something he isn’t expecting to hear, no life story, no long explanation of how it was your calling, all things he’s heard and respected.
and its final, your indecisive decisiveness, no bother the oxymoron. it was a tad refreshing, hearing someone so sure be just a bit unprepared for once.
jack decides he can reward your candor, sighing like giving any piece of him away will spell doom.
“sometimes i think about crossing the barrier and,” his pause means more than words could allow, a deep set line between his brows pushing together when your breathing stutters, possibly something akin to concern, “this job can get to you.”
he doesn’t have to continue for you to understand the silent storm behind his eyes, emotions you’re far too aware of.
jack watches with batted breath he doesn’t know how to exhale as you shift from one foot to other before looking back to him. you don’t look at him with pity, no, there’s something different hidden in your gaze, something that twists his stomach.
“my intern year we had a suicide attempt brought in, benzos from his aunts medicine cabinet,” you waver, lashes fluttering like you’re just now reliving the memory. your hands tuck into your colombia zip up, shoulders rising and falling like a deep breath that can’t help but be seen. you turn towards the barrier, leaning forward so that your stomach presses gently to it, “16 year old, was being physically abused by his uncle.”
jack doesn’t speak, he listens.
“they got sole custody when he was 11, parents passed in a head on collision,” its awful, and jack can tell it must’ve left a steep mark on your soul if it’s something you can recall so vividly. he’s had those patients, the ones that leave behind burn marks and cause your faith to slip just a bit further down then the last, “poor kid barely lived, all he knew was suffering.”
you sound like you did when jack first met you, the underlying fear that came with realizing lives were in your hands.
“that was my first loss as a doctor,” the light behind your eyes has dimmed just so slightly, and jack can tell you’re reliving a moment you’d long since buried. he knows because he’s been exactly where you are, it’s like looking in a mirror, “i see his face every time i fall asleep.”
it lands in jack’s chest with a dull thud, aching at the raw vulnerability in your voice, the sound of grief.
“it’s true when they say it doesn’t get any easier.” you concede, nodding towards the rising sun like it understands your plight.
silence fills the space between you and jack, a comfortable silence that stretches across the roof. where the two of you stand together, enjoying the way the morning air gradually grows warmer.
“worse if it did.” jack replies, there’s no room for interpretation in his words, just truth.
“the good cases don’t change the bad one, but they remind us why we’re doing this,” you’re sure in your words, and jack isn’t confident if you’re comforting him or just talking to keep him occupied, like if you were to stop he’d end up on the pavement, “and sometimes we just really need that reminder to cement.”
you were wise, in a way jack saw in how you spoke to patients, their families. something that not only comes with time but also from who you are as a person.
“you don’t need to talk me down,” jack speaks, his voice fatigued and quiet, “if anything, the thought of my team scraping me off the tarmac is reason enough.”
it’s morose, he can see the way your face seems to pinch at the picture he’s painted for you.
the subtle warmth of having another body near grows as you shuffle closer, shoulders a few inches away.
“maybe i ought to come up here more often.” it’s posed as an open ended idea, although jack can pick up on the finality in your voice. he finds a himself allowing the tug on his lips to pull into a smile, chin bobbing as he nods. your throat clears.
“as long as you don’t mind the company, dr abbot.”
“jack.”
“what?” your eyes scan the side of his face, searching.
jack turns to face you, that smile still lingering on his lips as he leans into the barrier.
“colleagues that hassle me this much usually call me jack.” it’s a tease on his tongue, a hint of mirth behind his gaze.
you’ve spoken his name before, when his presence has been absent, talking to lena or on the off chance dana. even in conversations with robby. although you always found yourself back at dr abbot, feeling a line you’d rather not cross unless the man himself allowed as much.
“alright,” your teeth show as you smile, light, comfortable, “as long as you follow your own advice and address me the same.”
jack holds your gaze, the two of you drenched in the hazy sunrise, simply allowing the accumulated stress to melt away from the night. he notices your free hand playing with the badge clipped to your scrub pants. the picture is of you a few months ago, wearing the same smile.
you’re nothing short of breathtaking, and jack can acknowledge that as the sun casts rays across your face. he’d noticed since the day you’d shook his hand, face hopeful. he wasn’t blind, he could see it even behind the layer of night shift grim and fatigue, the way your eyes would sparkle. he’d always considered himself a steadfast man, firm in his ideals and grateful for what he was given.
in spite of all that that held jacks self control, he found himself ready to allow you to tear down his walls. the gorgeous young doctor that cared far too much for her own good, and for some reason sought to confront a war torn veteran in his silent qualms.
“i should get going,” you pull at the last word, like you’re contemplating not heeding it and saying with jack in silence, “especially before robby pulls up on that godforsaken donor-cycle.” it’s cynical, an ill-mannered joke that pokes at the bruise of his friends habit of forgoing a helmet. he chuckles, allowing your crude attempt at humor to erode at something resembling hesitation within his chest.
“i’ll see you tomorrow, or tonight, dr-, jack.” it’s a messy sentence of corrections that cause you to huff, and if jack were to observe your mannerisms any harder he thinks he’d notice the way you seem to fluster beneath his gaze. that being said, your embarrassment is endearing to the older man.
“get some rest, knowing our luck shit will hit the fan.” he’s serious beside the way he placates it for the sole reason you’d once mentioned that thinking bad things will happen before they do is bad juju. whatever that means.
“i expect you to do the same.” you know how jack is, always worried about everyone but himself. he shakes his head like the idea of resting is humorous, casting a glance back at your departing smile as his eyes catch the way the sun reflects off something by the collar of your scrub top.
a wedding ring. precariously looped through a thin, gold chain around your neck. the diamond is quite prodigious, layered with clusters of even more diamonds. they lay on a bed of silver and gold, the band thin and delicate, a stark contrast to your dark scrub top.
jack feels something thorny lodge between his ribs, anchoring in place and refusing to adjust. his eyes watch the fine jewelry as it rustles against your movement, eyes casting up to yours in time to return the wave you send his way.
he shouldn’t be surprised, someone as kind as you, as strong willed yet soft and gentle. someone as exquisite as you were, who the day he met set the back of his neck aflame. who just now had opened his eyes to the startling realization that you weren’t simply a pretty thing he often found his eyes searching for, you were enigma. a painfully smart, beautiful woman who just kickstarted something he hadn’t felt since his late wife.
his eyes found the horizon once more, brows furrowing as his predicament seemed fully settle.
jack abbot‘s heart beat for a woman with a wedding ring around her neck. and it sunk in that while his racing pulse stuttered at the memory of your recent smile, yours raced for another.
jack knew he from that day forward he was fucked. the weeks that went by, the months continuing to grow closer to you like it wasn’t a threat to his health when you’d lean in and his lungs would fill with the sweet scent of your perfume. every time you’d save a life, your hand meeting his in a celebratory high five, your palm soft against his rough calluses.
sometimes he’d catch you out by the ambulance bay alone, simple gathering yourself as the brisk night air soothed your panicky, fried nerves. on occasion he’d join you, standing in silence as the only sound to be heard was your joint, steady deep breaths.
“this is the third time this week, i swear her conditions are progressively getting more outlandish,” dr shen commented as he placed a patient chart beside you, the binder making a dull thud as it landed. you glance towards john, brows raised in question, to which he nods. as you open the chart, your gaze roves over the pages, “purposeful?”
you hum, low in your throat. a habit you’d grown to utilize as an indication of your thoughts processing.
“seems like hypochondria, possibly munchausen, is it the same condition worsening or is it different every item?” you probe, eyes dancing across the woman’s patient file.
“we call it FDIS now, you know what that stands for?” jack. he appears from behind, arms crossing as he comes to a halt before you and shen. your head shakes, chin dipping as you find yourself slipping into an easy smile. he always knew when to teach you, however infrequent the moments arose now.
“yes, must’ve slipped my mind, sorry jack,” shen snickers as he watches the two of you, “factitious disorder imposed on self.”
“differing from..?”
“factitious disorder imposed on another, otherwise most commonly known as munchausen by proxy.” you’re proud of your knowledge, despite the flutter of heat you feel rising to your cheeks. maybe it’s the way jack is looking at you, that tired expression of his sinking into content at your answer. or maybe how shen thought your teaching moment was comical, deciding it the perfect time to obnoxiously slurp the remaining coffee water through his dunkin straw.
“this doesn’t help me.” shen speaks after a second of enjoying his beverage, one he’d been slowly sipping for the past 12 hours, something you swore took skill.
you gaze rises from jack, falling on your friend in dire need of his colleagues professional opinion on the matter.
“you’re the attending, you should know this,” your level of sass is only emboldened by the closeness you’ve accumulated with your fellow night shift staff. a tone you would have never used on either of the men in front of you if you didn’t expect their reactions by now, “or, you could question the boss.”
your chin nods up to where jack stands, his shoulders bobbing as he exhales a sound you recognize as a softly concealed chuckle. shen makes an equally exaggerated noise, dipped in exhaustion as he reaches down for the chart he’d allowed you to mull over. he tucks it under his bicep, his free hand grasping his lukewarm latte as if it’s fine porcelain.
“different condition each time.” he continues the conversation from before jack had interrupted.
“alright, next time she’s here have her speak with psych.” you conclude shen’s query, if you squint hard enough you can see how you’ve wrapped it with a nice, shiny bow, metaphorically of course. your eyes find jack’s once more, however you find his already focused on you.
shen’s lips form a solid line, inhaling through his nose like he hasn’t had a second of peace all night.
“it’s a plan. you’ll let me know if you need help with the head lac in 5?” he asks, gingerly gathering himself to see whoever is next on the board. you simply nod, a small hum leaving you as you watch the doctor make his way towards the waiting room.
you feel the sear of eyes on your profile, the shadow of jacks form falling into your line of sight, leaning against the nurses station. you decide to throw the man a bone, watching how he’s eyeing the clock.
“hot date?” your smirk is teasing, creeping further into the apples of your cheeks as his face turns to look both offended and caught off guard. then he simmers, like you’d poured ice water over his head.
“if your idea of a hot date is tossing my prosthetic across the living room and nursing a guinness.” you lean into lena’s swivel chair, already ready to tell her you were keeping it warm if she suddenly reappears with a brow raised. you can recall when you’d learned of jacks prosthetic, it was fairly soon into transferring.
a young body had lost his right leg in a head on collision, he’d been unbuckled in the front seat. you can remember the blood, the way his mothers screams were raw and painful as she arrived hand in hand with her unconscious child on a gurney. paramedics looked dour, it had been raining that day, you can recount the way your shoes slipped a few times as you raced against the trauma.
but he lived, with one less appendage than before. the kid was young, maybe too young to process fully what had happened yet not too young to understand what he was seeing when they pulled his gown up, revealing a very bandaged stump.
you’d been to the side when jack explained what would happen going forward with the boy and his mother, flipping pages of medication orders and treatment plans.
you’d seen the look on the child’s face, too small to have such an expression of desolation. then jack lifted his pant leg, exposing the titanium.
you always wished you’d remembered the joke jack had made, the advice he gave. nevertheless, you could never, nor would you wish to scrub the image of the boys grin, ear to ear and absolutely fascinated.
“hey, if he’s causing you any issues let me know, i’ll take him out back and set him straight.” you hadn’t named his prosthetic, or the second spare he had. although you decided not too long ago that treating it as if it was sentient and capable of thought made you snort. jacks eyes fluttered shut, head shaking like he had no clue how to answer or what to do with you.
“one day you’ll let that shit go and i’ll be eternally grateful,” he quips at your attempt to get him to crack a smile, something that could be fairly rare most nights, “maybe if i pawn you off to robby it’ll be a lesson you won’t forget.”
that makes your jaw drop, stuck between thinking of a jab to return or just staring him the man like he’d offended not only you but also your ancestors.
“you wouldn’t, you think any of the day residents could handle your overly sunny disposition?” it’s not really a question, more a sarcastic rebuttal to the man’s words. the fact you had met all of the day shift staff cemented in your mind they couldn’t handle it like you could, even if it sounded arrogant. you were allowed to be full of it every now and then, a healthy level of confidence was good for the soul.
“and please, i know you’re messing with me but robby is like a disappointed uncle,” you stand to approach jack, nudging the chair with your foot as you do, letting it roll back into the counter, “like that uncle you see every blue moon that doesn’t remember your name or birthday yet can tell you everything you did wrong with that intubation.” it’s a contrived explanation that makes jacks mouth curl, ignoring the way the ac hits his overheated skin and allows him to register the scent of your lotion.
“you’re a pro at intubations, think you taught me something the first time i watched you do one.” his words spill through your gut, a sense of pride following you as your cheeks grow sore from grinning, a grin that hadn’t once slipped since jack appeared.
“oh my g-, stop,” you laugh, patting a hand against the man’s shoulder as his expression mirrors yours, “if you think flattery will get you anywhere, you’re correct.” your laughter grows, like you know no one funnier than yourself. jack watches as your head tips back, your presence setting him in such an easy going stance he nearly forgets where the two of you are. he wants to join your laughter, pretend the feel and warmth of your palm against his shoulder didn’t set something in his ablaze. be jovial and normal, allow you to pull him into the serenity he’s seen you carry.
but he can still feel your touch. the way your fingertips practically burned into his scrub top, despite your poor circulation and chilly hands. it lasts, the lump in his throat he continuously swallows just to feel it rise again. maybe it’s bile, maybe he’s sick because his hands twitch at his sides like they need to caress you or he’ll die on the spot. it’s unprofessional, it’s inappropriate. he’s glad you’re still lost in your own world of lessening giggles that begin to fade into soft breaths.
“how about i buy you a guinness in a few hours and you can bring me a coffee sometime to return the favor?” you slow into the conversation once make, eyes more awake then jack swears they were when he’d seen you chatting with shen.
“surprise me, just no double shots or i’ll not just be bouncing off the walls, i’ll become the walls.” sometimes your humor confuses him, but he stays enjoying the way your words are normally silly and ill conceived.
“i can afford my own beer.”
“consider it a thanks for teaching me about FDIS.” you shrug. jacks brows pinch inward.
“you said you already knew of it.”
“alright, consider it my thanks for reminding me of information i knew prior.” maybe someone had opened a window nearby or maybe jack could just breath better around you. like a weight had been lifted and dropped from his shoulders, no longer overbearing and constantly expecting more.
“tell you what, i’ll think about it.” he responds, eyes on the way of your gaze darts to the clock behind his head.
“thinking about staying late?” late as in far into day shift. you always arrived early into the evening, however lately it seemed like you’d been staying longer as well.
jack observes the way you look apprehensive, a tight smile taking over the genuine one you’d worn seconds ago. it made his stomach twist uncomfortably, an expression upon your features he wasn’t aware you could even muster up.
“i can’t, date night.” the words land uneasy in his chest, unable to place reason for the sudden change in the air.
jack eyes the smile lines beneath your eyes, the slight purse of your lips.
“you don’t talk about him.” jack announces.
“what?”
“your husband.”
“oh, yeah,” you chuckle, a hand coming up to fiddle with your badge, “i like to keep my private life separate from work.”
it’s a common response, one jacks heard more times than he can count. professional, letting whoever’s asking know they’re prying a bit, and to mind their business. kindly.
nevertheless, something about that kind of response coming from you settles awkwardly in jack. he knew your coffee order, he knew you liked to wear a long sleeved shirt under your scrubs. he’d noticed months ago how you like gossip with shen and lena, how you were dr parker’s preferred resident, dependable in your right.
he knew what kind of women’s sanitary products you like since this one day your menstrual cycle started and you were stranded in the hospitals staff bathroom. you trusted him with that phone call, for him to bring them to you. he can picture the look on your face after you exited the bathroom, the way you avoided eye contact and sheepishly told him, ‘thanks jack, please never bring it up though’.
and yet, you wanted to keep work separate from your private life. it felt wrong that it bothered him. he respected you greatly, and you were completely in your right to set that boundary. but if jack said it didn’t sting at all, he would be lying.
“do you keep your work life private as well?” he’s prying, but it’s all he could think of to say, glancing at the patient board. you’re a doctor, more often than not you’re working, how could there not be any overlap?
you shift from one foot to the other. then you say a man’s name, clearly your husbands.
“he doesn’t like hearing about my work, even the good cases,” you pause, almost like you’re saying too much. jack finds his gaze back on you, subconsciously leaning in at the sound of your voice, “says he has enough on his mind without me adding too it.” you laugh, but something in the way you do so sounds hollow, like you’re intentionally distracting jack from how off that sounds.
his brows furrow, his mouth opens to retort about how you husband sounds a little full of it, although he’s cut off when you rush to speak.
“he’s a really good man.”
he finds it disconcerting how you felt the need to inform him of that.
a few days later jack is sitting across from robby in the park, bench cold under him, his prosthetic off to his left.
“a good man listens to how his wife’s day went.” he’s steadfast in his words, like it’s only logical. he was married once, he knew how to treat his wife, the woman he loved. to him it wasn’t even a matter of principle, he simply always wanted to.
robby nods like he’s only half listening.
“have you met him?”
“who?”
“her husband.” jack probes, hoping maybe robby had some insight he’d managed to miss. robby leans back into the back rest of the bench, the wooden beams creaking against his weight.
“i haven’t,” robby pauses like he shouldn’t continue, “i do know he works out of town often, she’s usually alone for days on end.” that definitely tracked with the little jack knew about him. and it makes him a little forlorn, thinking about you coming home from a long shift, exhausted, maybe even upset, hurt, just to be met with an unlit house and empty bed.
jack catches the way robby looks uncomfortable, like he’s keeping something else too himself.
“alright,” jack counters, watching the way robby scratches his chin, “and you know this how?” he secretly hopes the whole time you haven’t been speaking more about your life intimately with robby then him, and he hasn’t been overestimating the closeness the two of you have grown to share.
“she’s friends with some of the day shift staff, confides in cassie, dr mckay, sometimes.” robby says, and jack just nods. condensation from the beer can drips down his hand.
“listen,” jack is all ears, “all i’ll say is, she doesn’t speak very affectionately about the fella.”
“she’s spoken poorly about him?” jack leans in further, punctuating his point as his expression twists into confusion. robby shakes his head, like the idea is absurd.
“no, you know her, she’d never speak badly about anyone,” and jack has to agree with robby’s words, you weren’t the type.
“so, dr mckay told you this?” jack inquires, as causally as he can manage. robby hums, looking towards the brick walkway between them.
“i think she was concerned,” that makes jack pause, eyes locking with the man across from him. he feels a pit form in his stomach, burrowing through his muscle and bone, “just a feeling she got.”
cassie had always been good at that, especially considering her own past and patient experience.
“a feeling?” jack implores.
“i wouldn’t look too hard into it, probably just strain from him traveling often,” it makes sense, although the pit in jacks stomach hasn’t let up, in fact it’s more like a crater now, “they got married young, it happens.”
the beer in jacks hand has been completely forgotten.
something about his conversation sat with jack even after a week of trying to push it from his thoughts. even as he was watching you perform chest compressions, his gaze was far away, focused but preoccupied, much unlike him.
“stop compressions,” he spoke, the monitor droned, the room silent, “asystole, resume compressions.”
it was one of those cases where the patient was unresponsive on the scene, unsteady rhythm in the ambulance, DOA.
but there was protocol, a standard of care they had to give all patients brought in, even if the odds were against them.
sweat dotted at the back of your neck, eyes on the monitor as it remained flat, unchanged.
“alright,” you dreaded the words as they prepared to leave jacks mouth, the go ahead to stop care entirely. no matter how tired your arms felt in the moment, you never enjoyed removing your hands and accepting there was simply no more you could do, “time of death, 11:45.”
your hands pumped a few more times, fingers trembling as they then froze against the woman’s chest. your gaze moved to her face, pale, sickly against the overhead fluorescent. a sight you never got used too.
“you did good,” jack spoke as you moved away from the patient, biting at the inside of your cheek, “you always do good.”
you can’t lie and say his words don’t help the ache, he’s always been a voice of reason against the tidal wave of doubt within your subconscious. your eyes meet his, sighing heavy as the knowledge that you’re still only a few hours into your shift falls heavy against your shoulders.
“i was taught by the best,” jack can physically feel himself soften at your comment, in addition the look directed at him, “I-,”
CRASH
a metal tray goes flying, the impact of it landing on the tile floor echoes across the ED, several gasps ringing out as well as voices speaking in confusion. an apology follows, probably a med student that wasn’t paying attention to their surroundings, an accident. jack huffs a chuckle, ready to comment about interns and their lack of awareness, when his body goes cold.
you’re pressed into the wall near where you once stood, hands pressed into the drywall at your sides, fingers slightly bent like you’re trying to stay grounded. although jack is more taken aback by the expression you now wore.
your eyes are wide, wider than he’s seen even in high stress situations, aggressive patients, family, blood spraying across your front, bones sticking out where they definitely shouldn’t be. all pale in comparison to the sheer terror you now gracing your normally relaxed features.
your mouth is open, taking in deep breaths that only seem to worsen the state you’re in. jack can’t tell if you’re hyperventilating, although he’s not going to wait to find out.
he’s taking steps forward in an instant, hands out like he’s bracing, or approaching a scared, wounded animal.
he speaks your name like a question.
“what happened, talk to me,” he’s insistent in his tone, weary, like he’s going to spook you. before he can get any further you’re putting a hand to your chest like you’ve finally taken in some air, eyes fluttering shut for a second before they reopen and land on jack, “are-,”
“i’m sorry,” you speak, voice no louder than a whisper. you face is pulled in shame, running a hand across your forehead before moving to pass the man before you, “that was unprofessional, i’m sorry.”
“no, it’s okay-,” jack is quick to respond, resisting the innate urge to reach out and grab your wrist, keep your from leaving the room. but his hand clamps at his side, eyes following your form and it exits the glass doors and makes a sharp left. jack finds his back pressing into the side of the doorframe, mind racing.
you had brushed off the interaction when jack confronted you in the break room. you were startled, it happens sometimes, you were fine. all things he didn’t really believe, but he’d decide to trust you on this. you were off the next night, and you mentioned you’d been looking forward to an actual night of sleep, not just during the day or sneaking naps in the moments during the week you could. maybe you were just tired, hence the reaction.
jack didn’t cover the day shift often, especially after discovering he was more of a night owl than anything. but sometimes you have to take the hit for the sake of it, even if it means you’ll lose a few extra hours of sleep.
at least that’s mindset jack has as he walks into the doors of the ED, the smell of various people in the waiting room hitting him as well as the pungent scent of sterile products. his bag is slung over his shoulder, badge in one hand as he readies it to show to security. as he approaches ahmad, his gaze pans over all the people in chairs. he can see a myriad of visible, thankfully minor, injuries.
his heart hits a stutter as his scan lands on a pair of eyes he’s very familiar with, no, it’s just a coincidence. it’s a young woman, in casual, comfy clothes like she’d just rolled out of bed. she’s not wearing a badge, eyes trained on her phone screen and she seems to be frantically typing something.
she has a nasty head lac, a recent looking one as well. she’s holding a dripping, probably mostly melted ice pack to her head with her free hand, he can see a wince throughout her body when she presses it into the cut.
he’s seeing things, on two hours of sleep, but then she looks up, and his worries are confirmed when it’s not just any young woman, it’s you. he’s already on the move before his brain can catch up with his body.
he doesn’t bother to speak any pleasantries as he slots through a small crowd, heart beat increasingly rapidly as he grows increasingly closer to you. he can see red on your shirt collar, down the front of your shirt. it’s wrong, you’re not supposed to be in the waiting room as a case, you’re supposed to be the doctor. why haven’t you been seen yet? why are you sitting out here with your head cracked open?
his breathing is erratic as he finally stands before you, chest heaving.
your eyes pan up, suddenly wide and caught as you stare up at him. the ice pack lowers from your forehead and jack has to physically control himself and not immediately grab it from you and press it back onto the wound.
“jac-, dr abbot.” your correction stings, it feels like a set back, something he doesn’t want to think about as a storm is still raging within him.
“does lupe know you’re sitting out here?” by this point a few strangers are staring, quizzical as to the interaction they’re seeing. jack sees the way you seem to withdraw into yourself, hands finding purchase by fiddling with the zipper on your jacket.
“stand up.” it’s not a request, his voice is rough and strained, it’s a demand. one that makes you swallow so harshly jacks worries you’ll choke. his eyes soften, he takes in every bit of your appearance. it’s his turn to withdraw.
he’s on his knees in a second, ignoring the stares. he takes your bag and slides it over his shoulder where his sits, then places a gentle, hesitant hand on your knee, touch feather light.
“please, sweetheart,” you suck in a breath audibly, the exhale coming out shaky. your eyes meet his, “let me take a look at you.”
your nod is all the push he needs to stand, stepping back to allow you room to follow him. he’s silent as he walks to the double doors, badge in the air as he angles it at security. they nod, permission to enter.
jack doesn’t bother greeting dana as she flashes him a quizzical expression, eyes falling to you only to turn to concern. he’s quick to scan for an empty patient bed, leading you to one a few rooms down. as you enter the space, your gaze stays on your sneakers, ignoring how jack closes the glass door, pulls the curtain closed.
“please, sit down,” his voice is tender, softer than moments ago. you follow as he says, “can you tell me what happened?”
he starts gathering the necessary supplies from the wheeled table in the room.
his arms cross over his chest, sturdy. you shift on the bed, fingers clasping in your lap.
“i tripped going down the stairs, hit my head on the hand rail.” it’s almost absurd to jack, you’re not particularly clumsy, and most definitely not to this degree.
“uh huh,” he doesn’t sound like he believes on second of it, and you wince at he applies some pressure to the wound, he mentions you husband by name, “did he bring you here?”
he wants to ask why you’re alone, why your husband isn’t here with you, but he bites his tongue. maybe he’s out of town, that’s the only logical reason he would abandon his wife to deal with a head injury on her own. you nod.
“he doesn’t like hospitals.” so he’s home right now. while his wife is in the hospital. jack feels something in him very similar to anger begin in boil.
“he couldn’t suck it up?” he chuckles with no humor behind it, you can feel the shift in the air.
“he’s squeamish.”
“his wife has a gash across her face.” he says it with a flat tone, straight faced. pulling the gauze away from your temple, he makes a decisive noise at the back of his throat.
“well it’s no longer actively bleeding,”
“i think most of its on my shirt.” you snicker, trying to get a genuine smile out of jack. he doesn’t take the bait.
“you don’t need sutures, thankfully, does it hurt anywhere else?” god he hopes you say no, but the sheepish look on your face says otherwise.
“yeah, when i fell i smacked my side as well,” your hand rises, gripping the edge of your jacket and shirt, he can see the hesitation in your movements, and he hones in on the skin that comes into view as you lift it, “it’s just a bit tender.”
it’s a dark purple, hues of red and pink fading in at the edges. a colossal bruise, covering nearly half of your midsection. he knows there’s no signs of internal bleeding, especially considering the fact that this apparently happened hours ago, you’d be on the floor by now. his eyes shut at the thought.
as he swallows back the bile rising in his throat, you laugh, something light, he can tell it’s fake just to put him at ease again like you’d tried earlier. it still has no effect.
“you got this from a fall?” he wants to ask more, how. how would falling down a few steps land you in this condition, it made no sense. he glances at the necklace tucked into your top.
“where was your husband when this happened?” you shuffle, eyes casting towards your shoes once more.
“out.”
“and he came home and found you?”
“yep.” they’re simple answers, ones that should quell the anxiety bubbling in jacks gut. however the way you’re avoiding eye contact forces him to think otherwise.
he takes in a breath, pulling a chair from behind him to sit himself down.
“this is a serious injury. i have to ask, do you feel safe at home?” it’s wrong the way your face crumbles like he’s figured it out, just to meld into anger.
“what are you implying?” he leans back at your words.
“i’m not implying, i’m concerned-,”
“don’t be. accidents happen.” you shrug, brushing off his comments.
“seriously jack,” you sit up with a slight grimace, scooting to the edge of the bed to place a hand on his knee like it’s your first instinct. he can feel the warmth of your palm on his scrubs, the way you’re looking at him like you need him to listen, so he does. he tries his hardest to ignore your hand on him, the drying blood on your clothes, the irk in his stomach that these injuries are congruent with a fall.
you seem to notice what you’ve just done. hand yanking back like you’d been burned.
“i’m sorry. that was inappropriate.” he chooses to look past the way you sound nervous, look past the way his heart skips a beat at the sound.
“and i appreciate it, but i’m fine, i promise.”
you move to stand, although jacks own grip is applied to your shoulder, softly pushing you back where you sat. he stands, sighing.
“at least say for an hour in observation, let us run concussion protocol on you.” you can hear the strain in his voice, and you allow yourself to agree to his terms. knowing full well as a doctor, walking out of here after a brief run down isn’t how you treat a patient properly. and as of right now, you were the patient. so you just nod.
“okay. i’ll be right back.” before jack closes the door behind him, he switches the lights to dim the room, sending you a tight lipped smile. he shuts the door quietly, facing the herd of noise beyond the minuscule room he’d just been in.
“everything okay?” dana, she’s appeared from the left holding a chart. jack sends her a look before walking towards the nurses station and leaning into the counter.
“she alright?” she asks, more concerned than a second ago. jack nods, trying to convince himself more than her.
“yeah, nothing that won’t heal, it’s just,” he pauses, scrubbing his hands over his face, this isn’t how he wanted to shift to start, not because it’s messed with his day, but because now he won’t be able to think about anything but you. picture the look on your face when you saw him in the waiting room, the nervous twitch of your bottom lip when you’d laughed about your injuries, god, he couldn’t breathe properly, “it looks like the cut you’d receive from a ring.”
jack insists you take the next few days off, he’s asked for a week but you’d been vehemently against that long. robby agreed. you accepted the time to allow healing, either that or two attendings on your ass for not considering your own health above all.
and he won’t lie, everything feels different, not as lively with you around. you had brought something he hadn’t noticed the ED needed until you left with it. he was lucky to have never noticed this, considering you’d always said you’d rather be at work than bored at home alone. however you informed him you weren’t alone this time, your husband had been back since the injury than landed you in this predicament.
he tried to push down the gnawing in his stomach. you were fine, you were healing, you had someone to look after you. then why couldn’t he reason with his instinct that something was wrong.
the day you returned it was like the incident had never happened. or at least you were deciding to put it behind you, and jack would respect that decision. you worked, joked with shen and dr walsh, assisted ellis, like everything was normal. like jack couldn’t see the fading scar on your forehead of a moment he’d never be able to scrub from his brain. a situation that had been keeping him awake at night, hoping he hadn’t sent you back to the person that had done it.
but at the end of the day, that was just a suspicion. jack couldn’t act on that, it could hurt you more then intended. he had to just let it go, if you had, so could he.
towards the end of the night shift, he found himself looking for your familiar face, hoping to congratulate you on an impressive save today. lena pointed him in the last direction she’d seen you headed off too.
he found you on the roof around 7am, watching the clouds slowly travel past, the sun coming up from behind the myriad of buildings. it was brisk out, enough that goosebumps rose across his bare arms.
he watched your silhouette for a minute, framed like a painting against the orange and blues of the awakening sky.
as he began to approach, he noticed you turn slightly, clearly aware someone was now behind you.
his eyes found yours as he placed his elbows against the barrier.
“you saved that kid in 12,” he says, and although you try to act nonchalant about it, he can see the smile creeping onto your face, “it was impressive. everyone certainly thinks so.”
“it’s part of the job.” you say with a sigh, although your cheeks hurt from grinning. jack chuckles.
“without you here, we’d be at a disadvantage.”
“you really think that?” you turn to him, absolutely failing at hiding the reaction to his comment.
“i do.” he nods, watching the way you light up. he’s glad this place hasn’t taken all chunk of your soul yet, he hopes it never happens. he’ll make sure it doesn’t.
“you don’t come up here much anymore,” you say, leaning over to nudge the man with your shoulder, “i thought it would become like, our spot.”
you’re teasing him, he can tell. yet it doesn’t stop the way he feels a slight warm tickle the back of his neck.
“i don’t have any reason too anymore, i guess.”
“you guess?” you remark.
“someone very important helped me realize that.” your mouth goes dry, hands that gripped the barriers rail tightening. the jewelry around your neck feels like it’s weighing you down, it’s too heavy, it couldn’t have been this heavy the whole time, couldn’t it? you stomach does a somersault, bottom lip biting against your teeth and you bite into the flesh.
happy. you felt happy right now. overjoyed. you can’t even think of the last time you felt that way when you were at home, or on date night, your anniversary.
you breath was stolen, something illogical and tingly and just right planting itself in your lungs.
the only time these last two years you’ve felt true, unbridled elation, had been moments you’ve shared with dr abbot, jack, the man standing in front of you. looking at you like this rising sun paled in comparison to your face mere feet from his, like pulling his gaze away from you would be torturous and inhumane.
but the ring against your chest is scratching uncomfortably against your skin, tearing and putting wear on your scrub top.
“jack-,”
it’s then you notice the breeze across your body, specifically your bare arms, and where jack is now fixated on.
ice filled jacks veins.
“what is that.” it wasn’t a question, he knew what it was. a deep bruise, mottled yellow and purple, probably already a few days old. it spanned most of your forearm, and if jack squinted it kind of resembled, a handprint? his breathing picked up, he was worried his legs would give out from the sudden fuzziness taking over his brain.
your eyes moved to him, blinking with furrowed brows as you followed his eye line, down to where you’d pushed up your sleeves.
jack wanted to puke the second you frantically pulled your sleeve down, covering the injury he hadn’t noticed until today. you looked, embarrassed, for what reason? jack wasn’t sure.
“i fell.”
“bullshit.” it’s blunt and jack feels remorse only for the way you look surprised, caught off guard by his tone and abrupt language.
“excuse me?” your attempt at sounding assertive falls flat as your voice wavers. jack takes a tentative step forward.
“is he home?”
you say your husbands name in questioningly, jack nods.
“why does that matte?” you sound worried, unsure as you blink wildly, looking everywhere but jack.
“because every time you show up skittish, and hurt, it’s coincidentally when he’s in pittsburgh,” he can see the panic set in when you realize he’s noticed the pattern, the waver in you behavior. of course he’d noticed, he’s jack, “and i want to help.”
he’s pleading, face pulled in despair that he hadn’t put it all together until now. he can physically see how you’re pulling away mentally.
“why?” your voice is small, scared, trembling in a way that hurts jack in a manner he can’t articulate.
“because i care about you.” your eyes shoot up to his, wide. your mouth opens and closes, shoulders falling from their tense position.
“is that the only reason? because you care?” he’s never heard you so unsure an fragile. he would laugh at your question if the situation wasn’t so dire.
“of course that’s not the only reason.”
“then why? jack-,”
“i’d do anything for you.” that shuts you up. your mouth closing and throat bobbing like that’s the last thing you expected him to say. jack is ready for you to yell at him, tell him you have too much going on in your life, you’re married, regardless of all of that you don’t want his help, most of all you don’t want him.
your lip quivers, he catches it.
“jack, i,” you look close to tears, stumbling over your words as you pull your jacket tighter around you, a particularly chilly breeze flowing over the roof, “this isn’t-.”
you can’t seem to find the words, blinking away the accumulation of wetness in your eyes.
“let me help you.” he begs, silver curls moving against the breeze.
jacks heart cracks as you shake your head, stepping back away from him.
“no, it’s not that simple.” he knows how this works, he’s spoken to women in abusive situations with their spouse. but it feels like all that training and knowledge flies out the window the second tears begin to roll down your cheeks, your delicate skin marred with desolation.
“please-,” he reaches a hand out.
“i’m fine, leave it.” you put an end to his pleading, wiping at your tears with the back of your hand.
he says your name, in a voice so broken you pause in your retreat to the staircases door. picking up into a light jog, you ignore the second call of your name as you disappear through the threshold, back turned away and unaware of the expression of devastation now on jacks face.
what’s he doing?
he’s racing after you as his body catches up with his brain. but you’re gone, no where to be found in the ED, the upper levels, chairs, hell he even checked the woman’s restroom. as his legs carry him to the ambulance bay, he’s pulled back into reality as the spot your car was once in is now empty. a hand combs through his silver curls, stressed.
and that’s how he spends the next hour feeling. even as he clocks out, commutes home, tosses his go bag on the dining room table and tears his prosthetic off. despair, longing to see your face, hear your voice, your reassurances.
until another half hour passes and his phone rings. he lets it go to voicemail, waiting to hear the tone and whoever’s trying to get in touch with him.
but the voicemail never comes, only more incessant buzzing after a brief moment of silence. torn from his stupor, the man reaches across the couch to grab his cell, already prepared to head back to work or tell robby to fuck off.
he’s not expecting your caller id. you never call him, you exchanged numbers for emergencies, and thankfully you’d never had to use them. but it your name, clear as day. he picks up on the fourth ring, afraid the call with cut off and you won’t return it for the third time.
he brings it to his ear, ready to spew apologies, beg for a proper conversation, but all he gets out is a choked sound as a cry comes through the speaker.
he sits up, all exhaustion gone from his body in an instant.
he can hear you sniffling, saying something incoherently, than a sob. he’s frantic, listening to you blubber about something, ready to plead for you to take a deep breath and tell him what you need, when a sentence full of anguish manages to make it through your cries.
“jack, please, i need you to come get me.”
you’ve reached the end of part 1…
thank you for reading! part 2 will be linked to this post when it’s out 💋
i kind of want to start writing but i haven’t written fanfic in like 5 years so im a little nervous and i also have no ideas so i guess we will see what happens #gulp so so excited though now that i’ve actually decorated my blog!
