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summary: you have a habit of stealing things from everyone at the tower, though it looks like only one person actually ever gets anything back.
pairing: implied bob reynolds x reader, though poly!thunderbolts x reader is also acceptable. however, i did make alexei’s part more like a paternal thing—and i might’ve gotten carried away with that oops
warnings/notes: i change from past to present tense a lot here. it's like setting up the scenario with the past and then changing to present tense to settle into it, like to show that we’re now *in* that moment. sorry i know that doesn't make sense. also this got a long longer than i intended it too lol, hope you enjoy anyways :)
living with the rest of your thunderbolts team in what valentina has dubbed the “watchtower,” you’ve gotten to learn all their quirks and habits.
alexei never dumps the popcorn kernels out of his bowl before placing them in the sink; ava doesn’t throw out the food that gets stuck in sink drain because it makes her gag; john talks way too loudly over the phone—basically yelling instead of talking like a normal person; bucky forgets his arm in the goddamned dishwasher most times; yelena leaves half-empty water bottles because she forgets to finish them, and then proceeds to get a new one and the cycle repeats; bob nearly burns the tower down every time he tries to bake something for everyone, and you?
you have a bit of a bad habit of stealing everyone’s clothes and personal belongings, though it’s never on purpose.
it starts with ava.
she lends you one of her off-white long sleeves when you're on your period and crying because your comfort crewneck is nowhere to be seen. she helps you slip it on, playfully teasing as you sniffle and huff like a child.
"are you always this whiny when you're on your period?" she asks once the shirt is on. you glare at her, ready to retort when you realize just how soft and silky and warm the shirt feels on your skin. it's like it's made out of heaven's clouds. the fatigue caused by your period screams at you to just sleep now that you're wearing such a comfortable shirt, and ava notices it. "get some sleep, yeah? just don't drool on my shirt. and wash it before you give it back."
and you did. wash it, at least. you just forgot to return it to her, especially since she forgets to remind you to give it back. so it stays tucked in the drawer where the rest of your comfort clothes goes.
bucky's leather jacket was another unintentional theft. he always wore it out, and he had even let you take care of it when he gets too warm on a night out with you and the rest of the team. the next time you're out at the bar all together, he hands you the jacket and you slip it on.
several shots of tequila later, you're being carried home by bob, bucky's jacket still on you. even when he drapes you over your bed and takes your heels off, your hands cling onto the jacket as you pull it tighter over you because you refused to let it go in your drunken state.
"i'll get it back from her in the morning, it's fine." bucky says when bob flashes him an apologetic smile.
when bucky asked you about it, you told him you'd get it cleaned because your body glitter had gotten all over it. he forgot to follow up on it, and now it just hangs in your closet.
with john, it was a navy blue zip-up hoodie that was impossibly soft and warm on the inside, with hand-warming pockets and even a hidden security pocket inside. that was a bit of an intentional theft when you first saw it on him. you had even told him yourself you'd steal it from him one day, but you didn't think you'd actually get the chance to.
it was entirely his fault for leaving it in the common room, draped over the recliner chair he always sits at. you had waken up unusually early, socked-feet soundlessly meeting the floor with every step you took towards the large sofa in front of the tv. you were only in a long, over-sized t-shirt with a neckline you cut yourself, and some mini shorts you scored from a women-owned, small shop online before they could sell out.
it was always extremely cold in the morning, and so, you looked around the common room for something to keep you warm. maybe a blanket someone left over, or-
john's sweater.
the sight has you perking up and basically scrambling off the sofa to his recliner. you slip it on and instantly, it feels like being wrapped in the warmest hug you've ever known. it's heavy-weight, the inside lined with fleece, and the hem of the sweater rests just over your mid-thigh along your shirt.
when he sees you wearing it after his after-workout shower, he gawks at the sight. Before he can even yell at you to take it off, you're sinking further into the couch and zipping the zipper all the way up. "Please! I was cold and this was the only thing here! I promise I'll give it back after!"
he tares you down for a second before sighing. he walks over to the sofa, and you think he's gonna make you stand and take it off, but instead he nudges your legs off the cushions, and takes a seat beside you. "i get to change the tv then."
you didn't give it back. you stored it in your comfort drawer, right next to ava's shirt. and you know better than to wear it around the tower when john's around, and he doesn't really care enough to steal it back from you when he sees you wearing it during your period days.
with yelena, it's a hair clip she let you borrow once for an event.
“yelena!” you sing-song her name, head popping out the corner of her door while she smooths out her black slacks. “can i borrow those cute butterfly clips you have? the green ones? i feel like my hair is missing some accessories.”
she looks away from her reflection, fingers pausing in their attempt to put her earrings in so she can give you her full-attention. her eyes rake over your form. she hums, “yeah, your hair looks like it’s missing something. go for it—just don’t forget to give them back to me.”
you gasp, “i’m offended you think i’d even forget to return them!” taking the clips from her bureau, you give her cheek a swift kiss as you pass by. “i promise i’ll give them back to you!”
unlike everyone else, yelena’s already resigned herself to losing those clips the second you even came into her room. when you squeeze her shoulders, she huffs a laugh. and with a soft smile, she watches you leave, because, truthfully, she bought those clips knowing you’d one day ask for them.
with alexei, it’s a thick, warm, fur blanket he had imported over from russia. valentina wasn’t exactly happy when she saw the charge of 100,000 dollars on the team’s credit card statement—no one was. but he swore the blanket was worth it. you all thought it was bullshit, and you especially might’ve kept insinuating he had to have been scammed to pay such a high sum for a blanket.
then, it happened.
with the basket of clean laundry in your arm and propped on your hip, you walk into the common room and sit yourself down on the couch. it’s the only room in the tower with a big enough tv for you to enjoy your shows, so you figured folding your laundry here would be more enjoyable for you.
after catching a rerun of a movie and a few repeated episodes, you finished with your clothes and somehow ended up laying down on the couch. you know you’re supposed to be getting up and taking your clothes back to the room, but the couch is just so comfortable and the sun is filtering in so perfectly…
it’s not your fault you ended up falling asleep. the universe plotted against you!
after an hour, the elevator dings, and you’re still out cold.
“… no, alexei, you cannot make prison stew for dinner again. bob couldn’t even make it to the bathroom to throw it up in time!” yelena groans, rubbing her temples.
“lena, he just has a sensitive tummy, it’s okay. everybody else ate it perfectly fine!”
“that’s not true, we all-!”
“sh, sh, shh!”
alexei holds out a finger, and yelena only frowns until she follows his gaze. you’re passed out on the couch, lips slightly parted and your glasses askew on your face from laying on your side.
yelena huffs out a small laugh, but alexei softens at the sight. he quietly pads over, which is a feat in of itself, and removes your glasses from your face. he places them on the coffee table before looking over to yelena, who now stands just a few feet away.
“should we move her?” she asks, but alexei just shakes his head.
grabbing the laundry basket, he hands it over to yelena. she arches an eyebrow at him, but takes it nonetheless. “take that to her room. and bring my blanket—the expensive one. she’ll catch cold if she’s not covered up.”
and how could yelena say no?
while she’s gone, alexei just sits on his haunches and watches you sleep. he feels a stirring in his chest, an ache of nostalgia settling in his bones. he remembers, back in his hydra days, when yelena and natasha would wear themselves out playing that they’d just come inside and pass out on the couch together. melina would always grab some blankets from the hallway closet, and lay it over them. in those domestic moments, he let himself forget the mission and just pretend that he actually did have a family.
and now, he does. he has yelena back, and he has you and the rest of the team. so, he takes the blanket from yelena when she returns, and drapes it over you. he tucks you in so carefully, afraid to wake you when he just wants to make sure the cold doesn’t reach you from any gaps.
when he’s done, he can’t help but breathe out a soft laugh. he’s smiling, but there’s that sadness in his heart that’s weighing him down. he could’ve had these moments if he were a better person back then. he could’ve been a better dad to yelena.
as if she knows what he’s thinking, yelena kneels down beside him. her hand finds his, head resting on his shoulder.
—
when you wake, an hour later, you find yourself so warm and comfortable, you almost let yourself fall back asleep. until you realize the common room is way darker than you remembered it being.
with the blanket over your shoulders, and your glasses back on, you take the elevator to the floor with everyone’s rooms. you drop off the blanket on your bed and rush back out to head to the dining area. reaching it, you see everyone already setting the table.
“hey,” bob smiles, being the first one to spot you as he sets a can of soda on your placemat, “you’re awake.”
“ah! the sleeping beauty awakes! how was your sleep, huh?” alexei sets the pot of food down on the counter before walking over to you, arms spread out to envelop you in his famous bear hug. you wince, but accept it anyways. “do you like the blanket?”
“oh my god, yeah! i’m sorry for saying you were scammed. it’s like a dream-blanket, i almost didn’t get up.”
“good. it’s yours.” he pats your back, casually gifting you the blanket that's cost him the shit end of the stick with valentina like it's no big deal.
“what?” you pull away from the hug, gaping at him. yelena takes the pot to serve the food while everyone else takes their seat at the table. “a-alexei, i can’t accept that. you spent-”
“no. it’s yours, and that’s that, do you understand?” he points a finger at you, tone so parental that it makes your eyes water.
you never had that before.
so with a watery smile, you go for another hug. “thanks, alexei.”
bob’s signature navy blue crewneck is the only stolen article you wear like a badge of honor.
you forgot to bring a sweater on a trip out to get some groceries once—accompanied by bob since the rest of the team was out on some mission.
stepping out of the convenience store, the new york chill seeps deep into your bones and makes you shiver. bob, basically a human furnace due to the sentry serum, doesn’t hesitate to place the grocery bags down so he can shrug off his crewneck, and lend it to you. he doesn’t comment on the way you smile so shyly as you slip it on, or the way you can’t seem to make eye contact with him the rest of the way back home.
even when you arrived, you never once took it off. didn’t even try or think to do so. even through dinner and your movie session, not once did you change out of it.
even as you both headed to your rooms and exchanged good nights, you don’t try to give it back. bob doesn’t say anything.
he doesn’t even comment on the fact that he never gets it back. he sees it on occasion when you wear it around the tower like it’s always been yours.
in the mornings, when the morning chill is too much for you. on your daily walks to the park because the new york breeze makes you shiver otherwise. when you’re sad and need to feel connected to something, it’s on. and sometimes, when he’s gone into your room to slip in beside you because the voices get too loud, he notices you’re wearing it to sleep.
when you knock on his door with the crewneck in your arms, he frowns, confused. “what’s with that? are you giving it back?”
you scoff, trying to play off your embarrassment at his question. “jeez, you’d think i never return anything i borrow-”
“you don’t.”
“listen, it doesn’t smell like you anymore, so you’re temporarily getting it back, okay?” you rush out, shoving it into his hands. your arms are folded over your chest as you huff, eyes averted from his. which means you don’t catch the way his eyes widen and cheeks turn pink.
“oh, go-got it.” he swallows thickly, hands clenching into fists around the material. he can smell your laundry detergent and that scent that’s just so uniquely you on it. “yeah, um… yeah, i-i’ll wear it again.”
“thank youuu, bye!”
and with that, you speed-walk back to your room. bob can’t get that crewneck on any quicker as soon as you’re gone. and he finally understands why you steal everyone’s clothes. because the scent of you surrounding him is the most comfort he’s ever felt in a long time.
-
a/n: I wanted Bob’s part to be longer, and show how all the rest reacted to seeing Bob get his stuff back while everyone else’s is still stored in reader’s room, but I felt like this was already way too long </3
baby daddy!pope who does not play around when it comes to you getting some rest. at this point, you have two babies under two years old entirely his fault and your coveted naps are few and far between.
you’re in a state by the time he gets home. your sweats are low on your hips, your face is puffy from exhaustion as you bounce your youngest who’s babbling at you on your hip. your oldest is having a full blown tantrum. the screaming and crying doesn’t phase you anymore, you only turn your nose up at andrew when he comes inside still smelling like adrenaline and god knows what else after meeting with his brothers. he’s grabbing your pudgy baby out of your arms almost immediately— “go lay down, momma. i can handle ‘em.”
usually you insist that he cleans up first before handling your terrible yet adorable offspring, but you’re drained. as you walk towards the bedroom, you hear andrew approaching your almost two year old who’s still worked up into a screaming fit and throwing toys. his footsteps are light, his voice is gentle.
“what’s going on, kid? woke up and decided to put your momma through hell today? that’s not very nice— she does a lot for ya.”
you may be shattered but you still manage to allow a bashful smile to tug at your lips. he’ll for sure be getting something for being so sweet later… if you both can manage to find the time.
• when you and pope first started dating, you managed to keep your tears at bay for a good while but when he got you the prettiest flowers you’d ever seen, all hues of pink, orange, and yellow, you started bawling. you scared the shit outta him, thinking he had done something wrong, but through your teary warble you said they were perfect and you were just happy
• pope got more used to it over time, with all the cute and sweet things he did for you (getting you flowers, ordering your favorite take out, remembering your favorite snacks) almost every time he was met with tears
• you got pulled over once, only your second time, bc you were driving too close to a big semi, you started crying and didn’t even get a ticket but andrew heard your little sniffles first when you called him and your warbled voice saying his name
• you cry at videos of elderly animals, with their white powder faces and gentle eyes, you cry about videos with baby animals too, shoving your phone into andrew’s face as you wipe your tears away with the back of your hand
• pope has gotten pretty good at calming you down, his voice lowers into a gentle rasp, he’ll wrap those big arms around you and carefully bring you into his chest and let you cry as he mutters little things to help you stop crying
• sometimes he’ll tease you, if it’s something completely silly, he’ll utter a ‘cmere crybaby’ with all the love he could ever muster in his tone, you’d swat at his arm lightly, whining ‘stop’ before practically collapsing into him
• with the man comes the job and you know all about the jobs the cody’s do. it worries you to no end when pope goes out for a job, you spend the hours waiting for him biting your nails until they bleed and pacing, wiping away tears as you do all while thinking of the worst scenarios that could’ve happened
• but when andrew walks in through the door, you’re already wrapping yourself around him while weeping into his shirt, crying that you ‘were so worried for him’ and ‘this shit scares me to no end’ and ‘i thought you died!’ all for him to pet your hair and tell you everything went good and he was back in his girls arms where it’s safe 🤍
that was In Fact me soft launching gun play with pope.
it really wouldn’t cross his mind— because why would his sweet girl want that? but then he notices how you look at him while he’s cleaning his guns and doing his weekly maintenance on them. the way your eyes glaze over as he explains what to do and what not to do while handling one, the way you melt into him with little hesitation as he shows you how to hold his glock. he even goes, “you listening, sweet pea?” because you look like you’re seconds away from fully zoning out.
“yeah— ‘m listening, andy.” you squeak out.
and as he looks over your precious features while you prepare yourself to pull the trigger, he makes a mental note to maybe untuck his gun from his waistband the next time he has you underneath him.
you don’t seem to mind when he actually does. rubbing the weapon over the front of your panties, cooing when you whine and your plush thighs twitch in response. you don’t seem fearful. the idea of you trusting him so much makes his cock throb even more in his jeans.
“we gotta be quiet tonight, baby. the house is full and the last thing i need is smurf finding you in here,” he taunts, his voice is a low raspy drawl as he watches you rock your hips for any kind of friction on your aching cunt. even when it’s coming from the barrel of his gun. his gaze meets yours once he forces himself to pull it away from the growing wet spot on your pretty panties, “y’know— if you’re too noisy, ‘m gonna have to stuff this in your mouth. you don’t want that, right?”
dr. baby in the house
Jack's little daughter finds his stethoscope and decides she's going to be him to take care of him // fic directory // jack's heart problems (nsfw)
“Dada. I check.”
Jack looks up to see the toddler daughter you gave him in the doorway. There’s batter on her cheek, which makes sense considering he can smell you making pancakes from the kitchen. He has every reason to lick what you’re covered in off of you when breakfast is ready.
“What are you checking, baby—”
His heart registers what she’s holding before his brain can. The pulse of it balloons in his throat, and yeah…he’s pretty fucking ridiculous in not being able to handle what he’s looking at.
She’s clutching his stethoscope in both hands. You’d think she’s found buried treasure.
…Which she has. The thing’s a hundred and fifty bucks, and Jack’s sure he had it tucked away somewhere where she’s not supposed to be.
“I try and find Mommy one. She hide too goooddddd. I like her one. Her so pretty.”
Jack’s dangles almost to Chubby’s knees. The slick, black tubing bounces against her tiny shins.
She runs up to him with her face, full cheeks and all, completely serious. Okay. Whatever. It’s only fair she treats her unapproved act of exploration as a triumph. What’s not fair is that he can already hear your laughter coming down the hall.
Resentfully beautiful music. Fuck off, kiddo.
“I hafta check.”
“Check what?”
Chubby stares at him like he’s the stupidest fuck in the world. Which, okay. He should’ve guessed what she meant with what she’s holding.
“Your heart!”
Jack closes his eyes when she thrusts the stethoscope towards him. When he opens them, maybe five seconds later, his baby’s still holding it out.
You suddenly appear with a spatula in one hand, batter on your hands insanely lickable. Jack could roll his eyes, but he just hauls Chubby up onto his lap.
There’s a world he’s pretty fucking terrified of, one where he’s older and it didn’t take him that long to be older, sicker—a worse heart, and your daughter’s twenty and you’re so much younger than him, and there’s a life he’s pushing both of you to take care of. That world’s orbiting towards him. It’ll be here soon.
But he doesn’t think you’ll forgive him if you ruin this moment with his mental ailments, kiddo. He’ll play Doctor with the girl.
“Ms. Doctor, mind if Mommy consults?”
Chubby nods at you, and Jack puts in the earpieces for her. His mouth thins out into a smile he can’t help but wear despite the future, because he’s here now. Now is pretty fucking beautiful.
You crouch when she gets herself tangled. Jack doesn’t even know how that happened.
“Like this, baby—”
“I know, Mommy.”
“Hey, be nice.”
Jack mutters as Chubby whines with all the desperate independence that implies that she wants to do this all on her own. That might be his contribution of DNA at work. Could be yours. Stubborn nurse that ruined him the first day he met you, and now he’s a patient of your chubby, mini hybrid.
She presses the chestpiece bell to Jack’s chest way too high for her to hear a heartbeat, but she gasps anyway.
“It loud!”
“A little lower.”
Jack guides her small hand and the chestpiece bell just above his heart. He swallows.
He can see his and your Chubby stilling with all the concentration of…him. Of you. She’s hearing his body from the inside, and he watches her watching him.
She tilts her head.
How many lives did he save to deserve the one he has with you and her? Not enough.
Jack questions her quietly, because God-fuck, his voice might crack if he’s any louder.
“What’s your diagnosis, baby?”
Chubby listens to his heart for a couple more seconds.
She taps Jack’s chest.
“It say boom bum boom boom cause it love me and Mommy.”
Jack nearly swallows his tongue, because that…how the hell does she even come up with that? You laugh, and he’s betting you’re smiling so hard that it’s a pain. This is a pain. This is absurd.
“It say you need pancakes too. Mommy, I check you now. Lie down.”
This is what he’ll never deserve, but God help anyone who tries to take this away from him.
“You know, if you’re going to be on your phone at work, it better be for something more important than… ‘best drugstore mascara’?”
Jack Abbot frowns as he plucks your phone from your hand. You spin around to look at him, “I’m sorry, Dr. Abbot! I’ll get back to—“
“What does that mean?” He asks, squinting at your still-unlocked phone.
You close your mouth, “Um… that I’m apologizing? For being on my—“
“No, no.” Jack shakes his head, “Drugstore mascara. What the hell is that?”
“Do you not know what mascara is?”
“No— yes. I had a wife, of course I know what—“ Jack shuts his eye, pinching the bridge of the nose. He takes a deep breath and opens his eyes again, “I’m asking about the drugstore part.”
“You don’t know what a drugstore is.”
“No— Jesus, you’re killing me here. Drugstore mascara. What is drugstore mascara?”
“Oh,” you cock your head, crossing your arms in front of you. “Uh, it’s just cheaper. You can find it at like, you know, the drugstore.”
“Cheaper?” Jack echoes. “Is it good?”
You shrug, “Not as good as the real deal, but I’m not about to drop thirty bucks for, like, a better formula.” You look to Jack, whose face indicates absolutely zero understanding of what you’re talking about.
“Just buy the better one.”
You blink, “Did you forget the thirty dollars part or…?” Maybe you ask that question with a little more attitude than is appropriate, but it’s not like talking to your boss at work about mascara is the most professional conversation. “I’m a resident, Dr. Abbot. I’m not making the kind of cheese where I can just splurge on makeup.”
Jack nods as though he understands, but his eyes are distant. You smile at him awkwardly. Just as the sense to return to charting hits you, Jack asks, “What’s your venmo?”
“Huh?”
Jack reaches into the back pocket of his camo cargo pants. He pulls out his phone, scrolling through it casually, “Give me your venmo account.”
“Why?” You ask, not because you actually don’t know, but to beg for an out. You don’t think your heart can handle the thought of your hot attending giving you money for makeup. Just the thought makes your skin feel tight.
“Thirty bucks is nothing for me, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart. Your knees buckle.
“I can’t let you do that.”
Jack turns back to your phone, still in his grip. He searches for the venmo app, an act that should feel invasive, but you’re too flustered to think like that. He finds your account, then returns to tap at his own device.
“It was your birthday last month, right?” Jack asks. He does one final
“Uh… four months ago.” You look down at your phone, where a notification comes through, lighting up your screen.
Jack Abbot paid you $100.00 - Make-up - Your Venmo balance is now $100.00.
“Happy birthday.”
“Oh my— Dr. Abbot, this is—“
“Nope,” Jack puts his hand up, shaking his head. “Don’t want to hear it. Let me know if you need more, okay? I mean it.”
“Uh, okay, thank you,” your words come out like a question.
“Don’t mention it.”
With that, Jack is gone. You stare at the phone screen, only one thought swirling in your head.
Is Jack Abbot auditioning to be your fucking sugar daddy?
summary: you assume jack likes you until the pitt starts betting on how long it'll take him and samira to get together; jack assumes you like him until you get called into work while on a date with your coworker. turns out, all it takes is a bad bet and an even worse date for you and jack to realize how in love the two of you are. (7k)
characters: jack abbot / fem!loser!reader, trinity santos, samira mohan, nick barker, mcvadi crumbs
contents: friends to lovers, idiots in love, implied age gap, angst with a happy ending, hurt/comfort, jealousy, humor, so much flirting, cw for medical procedures, medical inaccuracies, and probably several hr violations
( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )
You make it halfway through your shift with a lighter wallet and a heavier heart than when you started it.
You can hear Princess shuffling through her stack of cash from the other side of the workstation, flaunting her winnings from a well-placed bet. You try and fail not to let it distract you as you scribble at the clipboard before you, with your heavy head propped on your clenched fist.
Charting was hard enough back when the computers were still running, back when it was easy — let alone when you have to make every single note by hand, and flit physically through a hundred different files just to cross-reference all the information.
“Is this what it was like back when you were a resident?” you’d asked Jack, when he dropped off an order slip by the filing cabinet, beside the bulky fax machine you were standing in front of and trying to tame.
He slid in beside you with a wide hand on your lower back, smelling like a dizzying mixture of sweat and musky cologne. He adjusted your labs in the tray without another word, turning it around and flipping it right-side up for you.
“Yeah, actually,” he’d nodded, dialing the proper number on the machine with his pointer finger, including the area code that you had forgotten to add. The corner of his lip flickered upward in a faint half-smirk as he joked with squinted eyes, “Back in the 1900s— when charting was done by candlelight.”
You felt your own mouth curling into a quiet smile despite yourself. “So this must feel really nostalgic for you then, huh?”
“Extremely,” he deadpanned.
“Well…” you sighed. “Got any tips for me then, old man?”
Jack exhaled a heavy breath and turned to face you while the heavy machine beeped and buzzed beside you. He tucked his hands into the front pockets of his camo pants and shrugged his broad shoulders. “Well, look at it this way— Today is gonna suck, but… That means every shift from now can’t possibly get worse than this one, right?”
“Yeah,” you scoffed. “That, or we just… keep descending into another circle of hell every day.”
Jack smiled wider at your cynicism, patting you softly on the shoulder before sauntering off the way he came. “That’s the spirit, kid.”
You still feel his hand on you even now, wide and warm over your thick black scrubs, while you trudge through the rest of your charting. You hate the effect he has on you; you hate how often he plagues your every thought. It takes a great amount of muscle memory, you find, not to accidentally jot his name down as your hand moves the pen on autopilot.
You don’t think it’d feel quite as pathetic if you thought that there might be an inkling he felt the same way about you. But now, all you are is an R4 with a stupid schoolgirl crush on her boss, and half a mental breakdown away from scribbling little hearts in her notes with his initials scrawled inside.
“You plan on getting in on this?” Santos asks in place of a greeting as she slides her swivel chair next to yours. She wears a faint smirk on her lips and a mischievous glint in her light eyes that gives you great pause.
Ink smudges on the inside of your wrist as you halt your scribbling to flash her a dubious look. “…On what?”
“Ahmad got bored after Princess won the last bet,” she tells you, reaching behind her to tighten the half-ponytail at the crown of her head. “Said the grid was too good to take down so soon, so… He started a new one.”
You scoff a dry laugh and turn away again.
“Yeah? What is it this time— Which one of us is gonna be the first to have a breakdown and quit? ‘Cause I’m pretty sure I’d win that one…”
“Close…” Trinity croons, leaning in like she’s about to tell you some sort of secret. Her eyes flit somewhere over your shoulder, in the vague direction of where Mohan stands with Jack across the room, before she confesses. “It’s about Abbot and Samira. I have it on good authority that they were getting pret-ty close in Central 4 together…”
“C-Close?” you echo on bated breath.
Your head whips over your shoulder to the other side of the workstation, where Jack and Samira exchange information about one of her patients. You hadn’t given their closeness a second thought before now. It’s like you blinked, and now the sight of them together makes you feel sick.
You hope Santos doesn’t see the hurt weighing down your features when you turn back to her. “What— What do you mean close?”
“I mean, Dr. Abbot was half naked while Samira was tending to his shoulder,” Trinity explains with a scoff and turns back to her own clipboard. “Honestly, I wouldn’t have thought anything about it until I heard her say, ‘It’s our little secret—’”
She mocks in a high-pitched voice, which sounds nothing like Samira’s, before laughing to herself.
“—Like, c’mon. You guys could at least try to be subtle about it.”
You know she expects you to start laughing with her, but you struggle to find the energy to do so now.
“Yeah…” you sigh instead, hardly audible as you struggle to speak through the sudden tightening in your chest. “Right…”
“You should go place a bet,” she tells you, half-distracted by the files before her. “You could win back the money you lost and then some.”
“With what?” you joke with a sad scoff. “The three dollars I have left to my name?”
She flashes you a deadpanned look. “If that’s all you have to lose, I think I’d take those odds.”
You figure Trinity’s right. You have nothing more to lose, in truth — not after the shit day you’ve already had, and the money you’ve already lost, and the teenage heart inside of you that’s already broken.
You finish up your charting, return the clipboard to the patient rack, and retrieve your wallet from the locker room. Because, as you see it, you’ll either leave this shift about a hundred dollars richer or with nothing at all; either totally vindicated or with a bank account just as empty as you feel on the inside.
You find Ahmad in the security room, and he flashes you a toothy grin as you slink through the doorway like a shy little storm cloud. He motions with the notepad he holds in a sun-kissed hand. “I knew you’d wanna get on the books, kid— What’d it take to convince you this time?”
“I don’t know,” you shrug with a mournful sigh. “I just… realized that I have nothing else to lose, I guess…”
Dr. Barker laughs from beside you.
“Well, that’s always the best reason to make a bet, in my experience,” he jokes with a pearly white smile, pushing the sleeves of his navy button-down up to his elbows to reveal the expanse of his tanned, scruffy forearms.
Nick Barker stands quite a few inches taller than you — which you hadn’t expected before now, since he’d spent most of his time in the E.R. sitting behind the portable radiology machine. He has to look down at you from the bridge of his broad nose from this angle, with eyes so dark they’re almost black.
He’s almost effortlessly handsome. Like, Disney prince sort of handsome. The kind of handsome that makes it impossible to look into his eyes without blushing like a schoolgirl.
“I’m normally a lot more responsible than this, but… I figured all things considered…” you trail off with a sheepish shrug.
“Yeah, you’re talkin’ to the girl who hasn’t taken a day off since I started here— Two years ago,” Ahmad scoffs. “I think you deserve to let loose every once in a while, Doc, all things considered.”
He taps you gently on the head with his notepad. You roll your eyes and reach into the pocket of your scrubs, cheeks burning under the weight of the sudden attention you’re getting.
“Just put me down for $10—” you say, but cut yourself off when Ahmad hisses through his teeth. “…What is it?”
“Minimum this time twenty,” he grimaces.
Your shoulders deflate with a sigh. “Seriously?”
“We had to up the ante this time, kid— Rules of the game.”
“Then I guess put me down for twenty…” you huff and pluck your wallet from your scrub pockets. “For… unrequited…”
“Unrequited by who?” Ahmad presses with his brows raised to his hairline.
“I don’t know. Samira, I guess,” you shrug, half-timid, ‘cause it’s not like you totally believe it either. You’re just trying to take a page out of Trinity’s book, really, and manifest something good for yourself for a change — pretending that Abbot isn’t into her in the hopes that it’ll make it somehow real.
“What?” Ahmad laughs like it’s funny. “You’re telling me you don’t believe in love?”
You flash him a solemn look in return. “I’ll start believing in something again when the systems come back up,” you answer in a monotone.
“Touche…” he nods slowly while Dr. Barker exhales a quiet laugh through his nose.
A familiar voice comes suddenly from the entrance:
“I think that is the single sanest answer I’ve heard all day,” Jack Abbot himself hums in a gritty deadpan.
You nearly break your neck with how fast your head whips over your shoulder, finding the man leaning against the doorway with his toned arms crossed over his chest and a smug smirk dancing on his lips.
Your skin prickles with a red-hot heat while your pounding heart drops to your stomach. If he wasn’t into you before, he certainly won’t be now — not with you making bets on his love life like a crazy person with nothing better to do. (Though, in many ways, that is exactly what you are.)
“Dr. Abbot…” Ahmad croons, trying to play casual despite knowing his secretive betting ring’s finally been found out. “That’s funny— We were just talking about you.”
“Robby may or may not have told me,” Jack confesses as he saunters slowly into the security room, boots heavy on the white linoleum. “Wanted me to tell him if there was something going on with Mohan and me, so he could recoup the money he lost in the last bet.”
“…Well, is there?” Nick wonders lowly.
“C’mon, Barker. Where’s the fun in that?” Jack scoffs a dry laugh, then goes strangely solemn again in a flicker. “Even though, as an attending, I think I have to say that I am very against this— I feel like this has H.R. violation written all over it.”
“Well, what Gloria doesn’t know, won’t hurt us, right?” Ahmad quips.
“I’ve been livin’ by those exact words for years, brother.”
Your hands are clammy and trembling for a reason you can’t name as you pull two crumpled bills from your wallet — a dingy, pastel Polly Pocket billfold you’ve had since you were twelve — as if you needed another reason to look any less cool in front of Jack. The pale pink interior is left glaringly empty, save for a few folded receipts and miscellaneous fortune-cookie slips.
“Wow…” you huff as you pass Ahmad the twenty. “That is all the cash I have to my name. I’m officially more broke than I was in med school— I didn’t even know that was possible.”
“I can take you out to dinner with my winnings, if you want,” Nick offers suddenly.
Your head snaps in his direction, and his eyes widen, as though surprised by his own forwardness. He swallows hard, pronounced adam’s apple bobbing in his throat, scruffy with a five o’clock shadow.
“You know, if you— if you wanna… let loose or whatever.”
Your lip flickers upward in a shy smile when Dr. Barker sighs and shakes his head to himself. A few rogue strands of dark hair fall from their gelled quaff and hang over his forehead until he pushes them back in place again.
“Sorry, that, uh…” He chuckles awkwardly at himself. “That came out weird.”
“I might be stuck in charting jail for the rest of the night, actually,” you say with an apologetic grimace, wringing your clammy fingers into knots. “Can I get back to you on that?”
“Yeah!” he blurts, a little quicker than he means to. He clears his throat and, in an octave lower, repeats himself. “Yeah. Totally. No worries.”
You dismiss yourself with a quiet smile and lack the courage to look Jack in the eye when you pass him on the way to the door. He watches you leave and waits for you to glance back at him with his heart in his throat. You never do.
Still, though, he can’t help but feel a little proud of himself; after watching you turn down the handsome radiologist every woman on this floor has been fawning over all day. He turns back around and hisses through his teeth, trying not to look as smug as he feels.
“Damn,” Jack deadpans. “That was cold, man…”
Nick’s dark eyes widen and flit wildly between the two men on either side of him. “Wait— Really?”
“Ice cold…” Ahmad affirms with a slow nod. “Girl said she’s broke, and you think she’s gonna say ‘no thanks’ to some free food? In this economy? Yeah… She’s not into you, man.”
Jack claps the solemn boy hard on the shoulder. “You win some, you lose some, kid… Don’t take it too hard.”
You forget all about the stupid bet and Nick’s offer some hours later, when Robby sticks you with Ogilvie and tells you to walk the MS4 through your canthotomy patient.
You talk aloud as you slice your scalpel through the young girl’s eye, where the socket is raging red and bulging from the pressure behind it. The boy doesn’t say a word the whole time, just holds the plastic cup where the bright crimson blood drains from the eye, and doesn’t move a muscle until it stops.
“I think that’s the closest I’ve come to puking since I started med school,” the boy confesses when it’s done, standing just over your shoulder while you fill out the patient’s med slip. “I didn’t even get that close during cadaver lab, when all of us started craving meat from the formaldehyde— I’m pretty sure five people dropped out that day alone…”
His voice trails off when Samira catches your eye, rushing by the desk with her wild curls falling from her claw clip. She wears the hard shift all over as she makes a beeline directly for Jack, planting herself ahead of the older man; so close she has to tilt her chin to meet his gaze.
Your hand freezes around the pen as you keep your eyes on the two of them, staring harder than you probably realize as you struggle to make out their conversation. Their words are drowned out by Ogilvie’s rambling, and the surrounding beep and chatter of the crowded E.R.
Mohan talks wildly with her hands and says something about “a letter,” while Jack nods along sympathetically and says something along the lines of “give me your number.”
Your chest flares with a white-hot feeling when you watch the man pass Samira his phone to plug her number into. It’s like the world has fallen out from under you and swallowed you whole, like you’re drowning in the fire of your own envy.
You’re barely seven hours on the job, and you’ve already lost all your cash — you’ll be doomed to the three-day-old leftovers in the fridge, if the newfound heartache hasn’t already snatched your appetite for the evening. That means you’ll be running on fumes tomorrow morning — still broke, still hungry, still heartbroken.
Then you remember Dr. Barker — Disney prince Dr. Barker — and his offer of dinner from earlier in the security room.
You make the terribly impulsive decision to take fate into your own hands and forget to properly dismiss yourself before dropping the finished order slip off across the room. Ogilivie is quick to follow close behind, lacking any real sense of personal space. He nearly trips over himself to keep from running into you when you freeze suddenly in place.
“You don’t have to follow me anymore,” you tell him.
“Oh… Well, then… What am I supposed to do?” the blonde boy shrugs.
“I don’t know. Do whatever you want…” you trail off and glance around the bustling work station. You spot Trinity standing at the chart rack and motion over to her. “Go help Dr. Santos with her next patient.”
The dark-haired girl turns at the sound of her name.
“Oh, please don’t—” She cuts herself off with a sigh when Ogilvie makes his way towards her anyway. “Fuck. Fine…”
You continue your trek to the other side of the crowded work station, where the portable radiology machine takes up the majority of the room. You can smell the man’s expensive, musky cologne before he ever comes into view.
“Hey, Nick…” you greet, then wince at how weird it sounds a second later. “I mean, Dr. Barker— Sorry—”
He glances up from his work at the sound of your voice. “Nick is fine,” he assures with a kind grin and a pair of chocolate-colored eyes.
You try to smile back, but your nervousness makes it look more like a grimace. “It’s not, like, totally too late for me to take you up on that offer for dinner, is it?”
“No!” he blurts with a shake of his head. “Of course not!”
“Great…” you say with a relieved sigh.
“Yeah, I’ll— I’ll text you the details later.”
“Oh. Well, you don’t…” You scrunch the bridge of your nose in a sheepish look. “You don’t have my number…”
His mouth falls softly agape with the realization. “Oh. Right. Duh.”
You smile wider despite yourself, ‘cause he’s almost as awkward as you are, which you didn’t think was possible before now — especially not for someone as pretty as he is.
You turn away and grab the nearest pen, clicking it on with your thumb before reaching for his arm. You scribble your number over the dark blue veins on his wrist with a newfound confidence — one that you never had before now, one spurred on by the man’s obvious shyness.
You feel Nick’s eyes on you when you look away, flitting wildly across your profile.
“This isn’t… This isn’t just because of the bet, is it?” he wonders with a waver in his voice.
Your brows furrow in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“You know, the whole thing you said about… losing all your money or whatever,” Dr. Barker explains with a sheepish laugh. “You’re not just going out with me for a free meal, are you?”
“Well, isn’t that kinda the point of going on dates? The free food?” you joke with a dry laugh, which fades instantly at the confused look Nick gives you in response. Your face floods with horror a second later. “I’m kidding! I’m totally kidding— Of course not.”
“Okay,…” Dr. Barker says with an awkward chuckle. “Good.”
“Good,” you echo with a sigh and rise to full height again.
“I’ll, uh— I’ll text you.”
“I’ll be waiting,” you chirp with a polite nod and a giddy grin, which ebbs the second you turn away from him. You shake your head as you slink back through the bustling emergency department, squeezing your eyes shut and murmuring under your breath in disgust, “I’ll be waiting—?”
You nearly trip over yourself when you ram suddenly into a firm body. Two calloused hands grasp gently at your elbows as you stumble backwards. You almost lose your breath when you find Jack Abbot towering over you.
“Shit… you huff. “Sorry, I— I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Where’ve you been hiding?” Jack squints. “I’ve been looking for you.”
Your shy smile fades into a disbelieving squint almost instantly; at the bitter reminder of Jack and Samira — of the seemingly intimate conversation they’d shared just minutes ago, and of the bet you know you’re bound to lose now.
“No, you weren’t,” you deadpan.
“I was,” he insists. “I feel like I always am, some way or another.”
Your chest warms at his words. You choke on the funny feeling when you force yourself to swallow it down. “I was just— walking one of the interns through a lateral canthotomy,” you stammer as you step back out of his hold.
“Gnarly,” Jack hums with a slow nod.
“Did you, uh… Did you need me for something?”
“Yeah, I have a patient over in Trauma 2— Sliced through his left hand with a circular saw,” Jack explains, staring down at you from the bridge of his nose as he crosses his strong arms over his chest. “But the crazy part is, he used his right hand to take the nail gun and—”
“Oh, my god,” you blurt before you mean to. “He tried to put his hand back on with the nail gun, didn’t he?”
“Close…” he hums with a knowing glint in his eyes. “He used the gun to fire two nails into his temple— Said he thought it would distract him from the pain in his hand. And the weird thing is, he’s walking and talking just fine.”
“Holy shit…” you mumble, wide-eyed. “Why do you always get the cool cases?”
“You can have it,” he assures you, with something soft swimming in his eyes. “That’s why I wanted to find you— so you could do it with me.”
Something about it feels way more intimate than being asked out for dinner.
You finish the rest of your shift as normal — feeling like a shell of your former self after hours of running on fumes; both excruciatingly tired and buzzing with white-hot adrenaline all at once.
The only real difference between today and every other day before this one is that, for the first time in a long, long time, you actually have plans outside of work — almost like a real human person with a social life would.
You return home after the long day, only for an hour or so, to shower and change out of your scrubs. You wash away the scent of blood, sweat, and antiseptic from your skin, and only cut your knee once when you shave your legs for the first time in weeks. You pull out a nice top, a short skirt, and a real bra from the depths of your closet. You go as far as to break out the expensive perfume that you’ve had for years, ‘cause you only use it on extra special occasions, which tend to be few and far between for you.
You feel like an entirely different person when you meet Dr. Barker at the address he’d sent you a few hours ago — a nice bar, just a few blocks down from your apartment building, that you’d been meaning to visit for years but found every excuse in the book to stay home instead. You find the man sitting alone in a far booth in the dimly lit room, sipping slowly at the beer he nurses in his hand, and feel a little like a fraud when you slide into the vinyl seat across from him.
Nick has only known you for the better part of a work shift, to be fair, not counting the handful of times you’d smiled politely in passing when you clocked out for the day. You know he’s got some version of you in his head already, like all men do — someone much cooler than you really are, someone much better at separating their work life from their personal life than you are.
You prove him wrong in record time, sharing a plate of loaded nachos between you and forgetting to eat any of it as you get too easily lost in your ramblings. You tell him of the long shift, and of the man you met with two nails in his skull, and fail to remember that not everyone can talk of blood and gore over a meal as easily as you can.
“—Honestly, I’m still surprised it didn’t hemorrhage! The X-Ray showed one of the nails was, like, half an inch away from nicking an artery,” you ramble with a giddy grin. “I pulled them out with some local anesthetic, and he was totally fine— Well, except for the hand, obviously. ‘Cause he did lose a few fingers, but… Dr. Abbot took care of that, so…”
“Did he?” Nick hums, hiding his smile behind the pint he brings to his mouth.
He thinks this must be the fifth or so time you’ve brought up the man’s name tonight alone — not that you seem to notice. He doesn’t know whether that’s supposed to make him feel better or worse.
“Yeah— I always tell him he would’ve been an amazing surgeon if he didn’t have the hand-eye coordination of, like… A half-blind sloth,” you say, then swallow hard at the playful look Nick gives you in response. “‘Cause, you know, sloths are really clumsy, and they… Sometimes mistake their own limbs for branches, so… They fall a lot…”
You trail off and reach for the glass of water at your side, becoming very suddenly self-aware of your inability to stop rambling.
“You talk about him a lot,” Nick observes with a kind smile, licking the sheen of alcohol from his lips.
“…Who?” you wonder with furrowed brows.
“Dr. Abbot.”
Your features flood with terror. “Do I?”
His broad nose scrunches with a breathy laugh. “A little bit, yeah.”
“Oh, god…” you groan and hide your face behind your hand. Nick’s laugh gets lost in the rock music playing overhead. “That’s so annoying. I’m sorry—”
Your phone glows to life as it buzzes against the wooden table it sits on. You reach over to flip it face down before you can read the message on the screen.
“I didn’t… I didn’t even notice… I’m so sorry.”
It vibrates again, twice more in quick succession.
Your stomach twists with the anticipation of what it might say.
“It’s whatever,” Dr. Barker shrugs, pushing the sleeves of his button-up to his elbows. “I get it. He’s your boss and everything, so…”
Your phone buzzes on the table once more, for longer this time, now with a phone call.
You tense, but make no move to answer it, for fear of making this more awkward than you already have — though your pretending not to hear it doesn’t make it any better.
The corner of Nick’s lip twitches into a sympathetic smile, ‘cause he can tell that you’re trying to be polite, even though you’re fidgeting at the thought of answering it. Because your friends usually only ever text you, so if someone’s calling, it’s bound to be important.
“You can get that if you need to—”
“Thank you,” you sigh before he’s properly gotten the words out, scrambling for your phone with anxious hands. “I’m so sorry. It’ll be quick, I swear. I’m sure it’s just… Fuck.”
The call ends before you can answer it.
Nick’s eyes widen at your reaction. “Everything okay?”
“It’s Parker…” you answer with your eyes trained on the blue-white screen. Your chest deflates with a heavy sigh beneath your skin-tight top. “And I know it’s serious because she despises double-texting and she just sent me four back to back, so…”
Your eyes are wet and preemptively apologetic when they dart to the man across the table, who meets the disaster of you with a tender grin.
“You gotta go back in, huh?” he squints.
“I do…” you sigh. “I’m so sorry—”
“Just make it up to me next time,” Nick shrugs, watching with kind eyes as you scramble for your phone and purse. “When I win that bet, I mean. I’ll take you out somewhere nice— We can do this for real. If you want.”
You slide out of the cracking vinyl booth with a grimace — equal parts unnerved at the idea of doing this a second time and half-surprised that Nick would even want to, after you did nothing but anxiously ramble before bailing on him out of nowhere.
“Yeah…” you waver anyway as you stand to full height again. “Yeah. Sure. Maybe.”
“Thank you again— I’d kiss you right now if I could,” Dr. Ellis tells you when you pass her in the ambulance bay, where she hurries out of the E.D. on long limbs. She calls over her shoulder, moments before she’s out of earshot. “You look hot, by the way!”
The passing reminder of what you’re showing up to work in hits you like a punch to the stomach.
The double doors of the PTMC part for you, and the air-conditioned emergency room wraps its cold fingers around every inch of your exposed skin — your shaven legs, arms, and collarbones; all of which are normally concealed by your dark scrubs and undershirts.
You can’t help but feel a bit like you’re doing the walk of shame as you race past the work station with your head bowed, barely noticing that the systems are up and running again as you go. You’re too busy trying to make yourself as small as possible on your way to the scrub dispenser down the hall.
Jack smells you before he sees you.
He gets a sudden whiff of something sweet and creamy, like whipped vanilla and fresh raspberries, something candied enough to eat. Then he looks over his shoulder, from where he’s stood at the front desk, and finds you rushing past him in a hurry. His neck nearly cracks with the strength of the double take he gives at the back of you — short skirt swishing around your thighs, tight shirt showing a sliver of your lower back. He feels a little like he’s in middle school again, going wild at the mere sight of a girl’s bare shoulder.
By the time his brain starts working again to greet you, you’ve already turned the corner.
“Whoa, gotta hot date tonight?” he hears Shen ask as you walk by.
“Just left one, more like,” you scoff.
“Damn. Poor guy,” the man quips, then laughs when you flip him off.
“…What the hell?” Jack mutters under his breath, with his eyes still trained on the empty hall you’d just disappeared down.
“What? You didn’t hear?” McKay wonders aloud, from where she’s hunched over the monitor across from him, still closing down for the day now that the ED isn’t in analog hell anymore. She peers up at him with tired blue eyes, half-hidden beneath her wild fringe. “Don’t tell Princess, but apparently, she went out with that Dr. Barker guy from radiology.”
“Oh, really?” Jack hums, nodding slowly to feign interest. He hopes the hurt flaring in his chest doesn’t show all over his face as he turns back to his computer. “Sounds fun…”
Javadi eyes him from behind McKay’s shoulder. Her dark, observant stare traces the edges of his face as she twirls the string of her lavender jacket with her pointer finger.
“Well, don’t look so upset about it, Dr. Abbot,” she jokes with a quiet laugh, half-dazed from the long day. “I have a lot riding on this bet about you and Mohan, you know—?”
Cassie flashes the younger girl a wordless look.
Victoria’s eyes go wide when they flit back to Jack’s.
“—Which I wasn’t supposed to mention in front of you…” she blurts and fakes an awkward laugh. “There is no bet, actually. I don’t know what you’re talking about…”
Jack doesn’t ease the tension by telling her that he already knows; that he has known all day. He just flashes her a half-smile and a pair of squinted eyes as he steps back from the monitor.
“Real smooth, kid…” he jokes before he walks away.
He leaves the work station and turns the corner to find you cradling a pair of black scrubs to your chest and making a beeline for the restroom nearest to the break room. He rushes on long legs to catch up with you, limping slightly from his prosthetic. You freeze at the sound of your name from his lips, echoing from down the long hall. Your skirt swishes around your thighs as you spin in place to face him.
“Hey…” Jack greets, only slightly out of breath when he towers finally over you.
Your brows lower in confusion at the sight of his flustered state, but you smile nonetheless. “Hey…?”
“How was the, uh… The date?”
“Date?” you scoff. “What date?”
“The one you had with Dr. Barker.”
His biceps strain against his scrubs when he crosses his arms over his chest, peering down at you from the bridge of his nose. Your cheeks flare instantly. You can’t help but feel like you’ve been caught, like he’s just found out you’ve been cheating on him or something — even though the two of you aren’t even together, even though it’s abundantly clear that he wants someone else.
“Well, it wasn’t— it wasn’t really a— a date,” you stammer and turn away. “It was just… dinner.”
“Right,” Jack scoffs and follows behind you the short distance to the bathroom. “Because the two of you weren’t flirting in the security room or anything.”
You huff an emotionless laugh and roll your eyes at him, even though you know he cannot see you. “Yeah, because you and Samira weren’t flirting in Central 4 this morning or anything…” you echo in a gritty monotone.
Jack catches the bathroom door before it can shut behind you. You glance over your shoulder when you hear it hit his palm. You find the man looming in the doorway with something mischievous glittering in his narrowed eyes.
“I’m trying to get changed,” you deadpan, despite the distant fluttering in your chest.
Jack passes through the threshold and lets the door shut behind him, leaving the two of you alone in the empty bathroom, where the white-blue fluorescent lights buzz overhead.
“Am I hearing things, or do you sound a little jealous?” the older man quips, glittering eyes trained on the back of you as you duck into the singular stall across the room.
It clicks shut behind you.
“Aren’t you the one who came chasing after me, Dr. Abbot?”
“Aren’t you the one who ran off from your date just to come back in?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” you laugh.
“C’mon,” Jack scoffs. “You know what.”
Your short skirt pools around your feet with a quiet thud. You step out of it and toe off your right shoe, sliding on the adjoining pant leg before slipping the sneaker back on again. You do the same for the left side, and Jack has to shake the visual of your half-naked body from his head.
“I thought we had… You know, I thought we had a thing going on…”
“A thing?” you repeat, half-muffled, as you slide your shirt over your head. You hang it over the stall before reaching for your scrub top. “I wouldn’t exactly consider flirty comments and lingering eye contact a thing.”
Jack catches a glimpse of your bare spine through the sliver in the door frame. He swallows hard and forces himself to look down at his feet.
“You say that like I don’t wish I could do more,” he tells you. “I’m an attending— I can’t just go around making moves on my residents. It’s not a good look.”
The stall door squeaks open again. You come into view, now dressed in your scrubs, and wearing a hardened scowl on your dolled-up face. “Well, that didn’t stop you from getting Samira’s number, did it?” you argue. “Or letting her patch you up this morning?”
“I gave her my number because she asked for a recommendation letter, and I told her I’d give her one,” Jack confesses, watching you with a glittering gaze as you storm past him with your clothes cradled to your chest. He makes room for you by the sink and fights back a grin while you scrub angrily at your hands. “And I was patching myself up, actually, until she walked in looking for her patient.”
“Well, how convenient…” you grumble.
Jack smiles wider. “You are jealous,” he croons.
“I am, actually,” you deadpan, with your eyes trained on the soap you suds between your fingers. Even still, you can see the man in your peripheral vision, standing in the mirror just behind you. You can feel the warmth radiating from his skin, and smell the cologne lingering on his clothes.
“So that’s why you went out with the Barker guy, huh?” Jack lilts. “You just wanted to make me jealous…”
“No, actually,” you tell him. “I went out with Nick because I figured I should probably stop chasing after a guy that obviously doesn’t want me.”
You turn off the faucet with your fist and reach for the paper towel dispenser at your side.
Jack follows your every move.
“Yeah?” he hums lowly. “And who said I didn’t want you?”
You turn around to glare at him despite the newfound heat swimming in the pit of your stomach.
“Well, I think you’ve made it pretty clear, Dr. Abbot,” you deadpan. “I don’t think the entire floor would be betting on you and Samira otherwise.”
Jack takes a daring step closer, until you have to tilt your chin to keep his gaze when he towers suddenly over you. With his hands crossed over his chest, he bows his head and tells you, “Well, I don’t want Mohan. And I don’t care about that stupid bet. Is that clear enough for you?”
Your chest warms with a familiar feeling. Your features crumple under the weight of it as you murmur sheepishly, “Okay. I’m not even trying to be funny right now, but if you’re trying to tell me that you do like me, you’re going to have to say that outright, or else my brain won’t—”
You feel his hands on you, wide and warm around the outsides of your elbows. You feel your feet stumbling on the tile, and your chest colliding with his, and then his mouth pressing against yours. You feel his chapped lips, his coarse scruff, and his exhaled breath from his nose as it fans warm over your skin.
You freeze against him, too stunned that he’s kissing you at all to remember to kiss him back.
Jack pulls away from you a dizzying second or more later. He peers down at you with a heavy gaze and smiles when he realizes you haven’t yet taken your eyes off him.
“I like you…” he tells you slowly, as though to make sure you’re really hearing him. “Are we clear now?”
You swallow hard and nod your head, licking at your kissed lips in a feeble attempt to taste him again.
“Crystal,” you quip drily.
You rise to the tips of your toes and wrench your free hand in his scrub top, with every intention of kissing him again — for real this time. You flinch in a fleeting panic when the bathroom door squeaks open a second later.
Samira slips inside, too distracted by the phone in her hand to see what she’s walking in on. You and Jack freeze against one another accordingly, as if being so still will somehow make you invisible.
The door closes behind her and muffles the never-ending chaos outside. Only when it clicks shut again does Samira look up from her phone, dark eyes wide as they flit wildly between the two of you.
“Holy shit…” she mumbles under her breath, almost as if she hadn’t meant to say it out loud at all.
You push the man away from you on instinct.
“We weren’t doing anything!” you blurt, hardly convincing in the matter.
Jack’s soft eyes cut over to you. “Real smooth,” he mumbles.
Samira’s look of shock ebbs into a giddy smile.
“I knew it!” she exclaims, voice ringing through the tiled restroom. “Ahmad looked at me like I was crazy when I put forty dollars on the two of you, but I knew I was right!”
Your brows furrow in confusion. “What are you talking about?”
“The bet,” she shrugs with a smile. “I put mine on the two of you. Which means I just got a couple hundred dollars richer, at least.”
The realization hits you like a punch to the stomach.
“Which means I just lost all of my money…”
“Well, I’m pretty sure I can spare some of my winnings. I mean, it’s only right, right?” Samira says with a pretty laugh. “You guys can go out for drinks or something special. My treat.”
It becomes suddenly very difficult to imagine yourself from five minutes ago — back when you were overcome with jealousy just by the sight of her alone — knowing now that she had been rooting for you this whole time. Jack seems to know this, too, based on the smug smile he gives you.
“This real nice of you, Mohan,” he says. “But if I’m taking my girl out for drinks on a first date, I’m gonna be the one payin’ for ‘em— No offense.”
“None taken,” she shakes her head. “Means more money for me.”
You’re still catching your breath in the meanwhile, ‘cause the newfound title has all but punched the breath from your lungs. My girl, he’d said, and god, you wanted nothing more than to be his girl.
“We should, uh—” You clear your throat when the words get stuck there. “We should probably get out of here before the others think something weird is going on…”
“Something weird is happening— The entire E.D. is betting on my love life,” Jack scoffs as he follows you out of the bathroom, where the chaos of the E.R. finds you almost instantly. “Sorry you lost, by the way. The bet, I mean…”
He catches himself nearly reaching out for your hand. He balls his own into a fist instead to fight the urge. You can see the longing to glittering in his eyes, anyway, when you turn to flash him a sheepish look in response.
“Well, I didn’t lose completely,” you lilt with a lazy shrug.
“No?” Jack hums.
“No…” you grin. “I think I won where it mattered.”
summary: when jack catches you spiraling after a taxing double shift, his worry for you spikes when he discovers that robby has been less than sympathetic with you, and that the ptmc is your only emergency contact on file. (4k)
characters: jack abbot / fem!reader, michael robinavitch, dana evans
contents: friends to lovers, angst, hurt/comfort, protective!jack, so much yearning, not proofread cw for medical inaccuracies, mentions of patient death, abuse and sexual assault, heavy talks of suicidal ideation, brief mentions of jack abbot's ptsd
( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )
The refrigerator door seals shut with a suctioned click under your trembling hand, far too quiet for all the horror it holds. The worst night of a person’s life, reduced to the evidence in the collection fridge — to labels and barcodes and detailed forms.
Two boxes lie inside when there should only be one: the kit you logged two weeks ago, which should’ve been picked up the day after, is still there. Still waiting to be seen, still waiting for someone to notice it, but still ignored all the same.
It feels like a metaphor for your own life, and it starts to strangle you before you can help it.
Because you’d spent three hours in that room with Ilana — three hours of talking her through every step, every swab, every scan — three hours of telling her how much her being there mattered. And now her kit sits there, just as forgotten as the one before, just as forgotten as you.
Something cracks.
A sob sputters from your chest before you can choke it down. Your hand shoots up to your mouth in a feeble attempt to shove it back inside. And then the door opens.
“Oh, shit—” a familiar voice calls from the doorway.
You flinch so hard your shoulder hits the fridge. You swipe your palms over your wet eyes and cheeks, rapidly scrubbing the evidence of your misery away, before turning in the direction of the masculine voice. You find Jack Abbot lingering in the threshold, eyes wide and attentive, with one weathered hand still wrapped around the silver handle.
Neither of you says a word for several long moments. It could’ve been three seconds or three years; you can’t quite be sure.
“Are you… okay?” the older man presses.
“No. Yeah. I’m—” Your voice breaks, betraying you instantly. You shake your head despite yourself. “I’m fine.”
Jack’s head lowers. His light eyes squint. He doesn’t try to argue; he just looks at you, really looks at you.
“I know I seem crazy,” you laugh through a quiet sniffle. “But I’m fine.”
He steps further inside, closing the door behind him with a soft click. The chaos of the crowded ER goes muffled in an instant.
“Did something happen?” the attending asks lowly. He’s visibly on edge from the Code Hula Hoop from earlier that day — silver head bowed to keep your gaze, strong arms crossed over the chest of his thin black tee.
“No. Nothing like that,” you assure him quickly. “It’s just… It never gets easier, you know?”
Jack’s expression shifts when you turn away to lock up the small fridge behind you. His alarm ebbs into something more sympathetic. “Yeah. I get it…” he mumbles. “Go take a breather, if you need it.”
You shake your head, dismissing the thought immediately. “Robby’s been on my ass all week about taking too much time with my patients as it is. If I don’t pick up a few before I go, he’ll—”
“I’ll deal with him,” Jack cuts in, firm but not entirely unkind. “You go take a break.”
You turn back around, looking half-shy as you cross your arms tight over the chest of your wrinkled scrubs. “I… I can’t…” you mumble.
“…You can’t?”
“I’m like a shark— if I stop swimming, I’ll die.”
Jack would’ve laughed at that if you weren’t so solemn about it; if he hadn’t remembered, in that moment, that you’ve been working since seven the evening before. Almost twenty-four hours ago. “You haven’t slept today, have you?”
“I was going to,” you tell him, a little too quickly. “And then we got all those patients from the waterslide collapse, and then the systems went down, and then Ilana came in, and…”
His brows knit together. “So you haven’t slept since you started your double?”
“No,” you shrug. “I’m just… I’m not tired.”
Jack studies you for a long moment — your wet eyes, your worry-bitten lips, your arms crossed like you’re trying to make yourself as small as possible. You wear the long day all over, along with the grief you’ve been trying to hide all day. Jack knows the signs; he’s seen them in his patients, in his staff, in himself.
It usually starts with a double, and then a patient or two that spikes the adrenaline like a triple shot of espresso. That’s when the mania sets in, the belief you don’t need sleep despite the obvious, which inevitably leads to a crash. And that’s exactly where you’re heading.
“Can I ask you something?” Jack wonders lowly, taking a slow step forward and never once taking his eyes off of you. “Something kinda… personal?”
You hesitate, brows lowered, then nod despite yourself. “Yeah?”
“Do you… Do you see someone?”
You blink owlishly at him. “See someone?”
“Yeah. You know, like a… therapist,” he clarifies. “It’s good, you know, to have someone to talk to about… all this.”
He motions vaguely all around him, to the muffled chaos outside.
“No,” you shake your head, almost amused by the thought. “I’m fine. I don’t need a therapist—”
“Everyone needs a therapist,” Jack huffs a faint laugh. “Especially the people who choose to work here. We’re all lunatics.”
“Well, I’m fine,” you shrug and look away. “It’s everything else that’s so… fucked up.”
Jack exhales hard through his nose, nodding sympathetically. “Yeah, I… I heard about Barry. And his mom. I’m sorry…”
That’s what does it. The reminder of the memory — only from earlier that morning, which you had not forgotten but had tried hard to bury anyway — does it. You feel the dam break, crumbling into nothingness under the weight of an unrelenting pressure.
“See, that’s— that’s what I’m talking about,” you start with a wet, maniacal sort of laugh. “I spend two hours coding a pre-school teacher, then another two treating her four-year-old, all while trying to get him to talk about what happened. And then I have to act like none of it fazes me, or else I’ll get that whole spiel from Robby— again. And then I do a sexual assault kit that no one will pick up because nobody gives a shit!”
Your voice rings through the quiet room.
You don’t seem to notice it, though, so Jack pretends he doesn’t either. He knows you need this, knows you’ve spent the past near twenty-four hours keeping all of this trapped inside.
“Barry’s dad won’t see the inside of a jail cell for what he did to them, and Ilana’s abuser won’t either, because the police won’t do their job— because nobody fucking cares—”
Your breath comes out sharp, like the air is being punched out through a tight chest. Your words spill from your mouth faster than you can stop them.
“And I’m supposed to help them, right? But how can I when nobody else gives a shit?”
“Hey— Hey…” Abbot coos, taking another step closer when he catches you starting to spiral. “Take a breath, kid…”
His voice is grounding. Steady, almost. A firm sort of comfort you’ve been searching for all day — a tenderness that feels like proof that you’re broken. Suddenly, you feel like you’ve said too much.
“I’m sorry,” you huff with a shake of your bowed head. “I-I have to go— I’m sorry.”
You storm past him to the door, and don’t stop when he calls your name.
Jack looms over the monitor of the now-functioning workstation.
While the rest of the PTMC scrambles to scan their paper documents into the system, Jack peruses your file. His narrowed eyes flit across the screen, searching for your emergency contact. He holds his phone in his free hand and prepares to dial the number — to tell whoever is on the other line that you need them.
Because someone did it for him once upon a time, and sometimes he thinks that’s the only reason he’s standing here now.
He’s got his thumb hovering over the green button to call when Robby catches his eye — the same way a dark black storm cloud swirling overhead would catch his eye. The older man tilts his head to glance at the overhead monitor and scratches at the grey patch in his beard.
“Who’s supposed to be overseeing the kid in pedes?”
“I’ll do it,” Jack tells him, half-distracted.
“I have a senior resident who’s supposed to be doing it,” Robby scoffs.
“I told her to take a break.”
The older man’s head snaps in his direction in an instant. His brows lower as his lip twitches into a faint smirk, looking half-offended as he crosses his arms over his chest. “And why would you do that?” he squints.
“She’s had a hard day,” Jack shrugs.
“We’ve all had a hard day,” Robby laughs. “And if we all took off because of one bad shift, none of us would be on this floor right now.”
“And if you had a little bit more basic human empathy, maybe your residents wouldn’t be falling apart, brother.”
He flashes the older man an unamused glance. Robby flinches slightly at his words, chin jerking like he feels them physically. Jack would’ve apologized for being so harsh any other time — if he hadn’t almost gotten shot today, and if he weren’t already slightly angry at Robby for mistreating you.
“Excuse me. I gotta take this,” he mumbles and brings his phone up to his ear.
Robby scoffs a quiet laugh and shakes his head as he walks off in the opposite direction.
Jack watches him go with an unblinking stare as his phone starts to ring. Once, twice, and then—
A sharp, grating chirp fills the crowded ER, swelling over the droning chatter and distant beeping. Jack’s eyes snap to the red phone on the other side of the work station, while his own stays pressed to his scruffy jaw.
Dana peers at the man over the top of her glasses. Her eyes flit from his shocked face to the ringing telephone at her side. She picks it up with a lazy hand and holds it to her ear.
“PTMC charge nurse,” she greets without taking her eyes off Jack. “You mean to call this number?”
“Yeah, I was just—” Jack clears his throat and glances at the monitor below. “This was the emergency contact on file.”
“Well, sorry to get your hopes up…”
She flashes the man a sympathetic smile before hanging up the phone.
The dial tone beeps in his ear for several long moments. He tries to guess why you would’ve made the E.D. your emergency contact — because you don’t have anyone outside of work, maybe, or because all of your closest friends work here, or because you’d want the ER to know first if something ever happened to you.
It makes his chest hurt either way.
He exhales a slow, heavy breath and shoves his phone back into his scrub pocket. He turns on his heel and makes a beeline for the stairs, hiking up to the roof despite the distant ache it puts on his prosthetic. Because he knows that’s where you are.
Because it’s where he would’ve gone, too.
“Y’know…” a familiar voice cuts through the quiet of the roof, lit only by distant streetlamps. “You’re in my spot, kid.”
You don’t turn to look at him. You’re too tired to take your eyes off the pitch-black hills rolling in the far-off distance, further away from the PTMC than you’ve been in months. Years. You get lost in your own head, and only vaguely register the sound of Jack’s nearing footsteps scuffing against the concrete rooftop.
“It’s getting pretty late…” the man continues, all casual, like you’re not standing on the very edge of the hospital roof. “If you’re hungry, there’s this DoorDash guy. Name’s Marco. He’ll trek up here for an extra ten—”
“Twenty if you want beer,” you finish for him, voice weighed down by something heavy.
“Ah…” Jack hums, closer now. “You come up here often then, huh?”
You exhale a heavy breath that he thinks is meant to be a laugh, though it comes without a usual smile. “I guess you could say that…”
He reaches the metal railing just a few feet from the ledge, where you stand on the other side, with only a thin glass pane keeping you from the roof’s edge. Even though you aren’t looking at him, you can feel him just beside you. The silken summer breeze carries the scent of his cologne as he bends at the waist to rest his elbows along the barrier between you.
“You wanna talk about it?” he wonders quietly, after a few beats of not-quite silence, filled by the sound of passing cars and chatter from the city below. “It’s good to talk about it.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” you shrug with a shake of your head. “I just… I thought I was doing some good, you know? By showing up here every day…”
“You are,” Jack insists, firm and immediate. His stare hardens as it flits across your emotionless profile, silently begging for you to look back at him. You avoid his gaze at all costs. “Those people down there— They need you. They need all of us.”
“But what’s the point?” you scoff. “If I can’t help him, then what’s the point?”
“You do help them.”
You scoff a teary laugh.
Jack burns from the inside out.
“You may not see it, kid, but I do,” he tells you. “That little boy in there— He’s still alive because of you.”
“But his mom’s not,” you argue in a detached tone of voice. The starry sky above you starts to blur as you blink back the warm tears gathering at your waterline. “And when Barry grows up, he won’t remember his mom— what she smelled like, what kinda music she liked to listen to in the car— but he’ll remember how the system failed her… Both of them…”
You trail off. Jack stays silent, letting you say all the words that have been raging in your head all day — untrue or otherwise.
“And it’s the same with Ilana, too, you know? I spent three hours with her in that room, doing something I know was triggering for her, and… for what? For the kit to sit in that fridge for two weeks because no one else gives enough of a shit to actually pick it up?”
The dull amber streetlights turn your unshed tears to gold when you finally turn to look at him. Your features are largely emotionless, fixed into the sort of automatic deadpan you train yourself to do as a doctor. But your eyes are wide and glittering with emotion despite yourself when you turn to the man beside you.
“I tricked myself into thinking I was actually doing some good for these people, but…” Your jaw clenches to stave off a sob as you shake your head at yourself. “Turns out, it’s all just… bullshit.”
The corner of Jack’s lip flickers upward into a sympathetic smile, because he knows exactly how you feel. “It’s not, kid…” he murmurs lowly.
“It is,” you insist, still stern despite the way your features crumble. “What I do in there doesn’t matter— None of this shit matters—”
Jack can sense you spiraling, can sense you about to turn away from him before you’ve even done it. He reaches out for you, catching your chin between his thumb and pointer finger to keep your eyes on his.
Your gaze flickers with surprise at first, stunned momentarily by the warmth of his touch, before it softens around the edges with something tender — as if you’d been craving this kindness all day. Your glitter irises follow Jack when he rises to full height, towering over you from the other side of the thin metal railing.
“Hey,” Jack snaps, firm but still strikingly soft with you. “You saved a life today, kid. That matters.”
Your eyes sting.
“You helped a girl through the hardest day of her life,” he continues, with a stare just as merciless as his words. “That matters, too.”
You shake your head against his calloused hand, trying and failing to repel his words. You need them more than anything, and still, you can hardly stomach them.
“The officers will pick up that kit, I promise you that. And the asshole who hurt her will pay for what he did, I promise you that, too.”
“But you can’t,” you whimper. “You can’t promise me that. You can’t promise anyone that.”
“Well, I am,” Jack says. “Because I’m gonna make sure it happens. Because I believe it— Because I believe in Barry and Ilana, just like I believe in you. And without you… If you weren’t here for them today… Who knows what would’ve happened?”
His gentle grip on your chin softens when he knows you aren’t going to turn away from him again, but he still doesn’t let you go.
“That’s the point,” Jack tells you, so softly you could cry. “That’s why it matters. That’s why we need you here, understand?”
You sniffle quietly and nod despite yourself, if only to free yourself from this suffocating moment — from Jack’s unrelenting tenderness, which you feel hardly deserving of now.
He clicks his lips against his teeth and smiles softly as he murmurs, “Yeah, I’m gonna need to hear you say it…”
Your wet eyes are stern with unsaid protest, with lashes all clumped together from unshed tears. Your voice is small and more fragile than glass as you abide him anyway. “I understand…”
“Oh, c’mon…” Jack lilts drily. “You can’t bullshit a bullshitter, kid— At least try to make it sound like you believe it.”
You roll your glassy eyes, more in embarrassment than annoyance.
Jack grins wider. “Yeah, I don’t know if you know this about me, but I can get real annoying if I need to…”
A faint smile pulls at the corners of your mouth despite yourself.
“…I understand,” you repeat, slightly steadier this time.
“Yeah…” Jack praises with a slow nod. “There we go…”
There’s a lingering beat thereafter, where you think he’s about to let go of your chin. Only he doesn’t.
And it isn’t till then that you realize how intently he’s looking at you now, with eyes heavy and glittering beneath the dim starry night. Your heart lurches in your chest when you think he might kiss you — a fleeting, irrational thought that makes your breath shudder and your mouth fall gently agape.
A sudden boom cracks suddenly through the air.
You flinch hard as a blue-pink firework crackles in a navy black sky.
“Shit…” you huff, clutching at your racing heart. “That scared me…”
Jack’s chest aches with a similar fear. He reaches for you on instinct as his own hands start to tremble.
“Here. C’mon,” he mumbles to himself, calloused hands firm on the outsides of your elbows. “Come back on this side before you give me a damn heart attack, kid…”
He assists you over the railing. You swing one leg over, and then the other, in a motion that feels practiced. Familiar. Until your left foot catches slightly on the edge, that is, and sends you stumbling into the older man’s chest.
“Whoa—“
“I got you,” Jack murmurs, steadying you with firm hands.
For a second, you’re closer than you’ve ever been. You can feel his heart racing against your palms. He can feel your breath fanning across his scruffy cheek. You can see his heavy eyes flitting wildly between yours, and again, you think he might kiss you — you want so desperately for him to kiss you.
Then the heavy door to the roof swings open, and the two of you jerk rapidly apart.
Laughter and muddled conversation come spilling out as a handful of the day shift emerges, with Donnie and Princess leading the charge, carrying a square blue cooler between them. The former smiles when he finds the two of you standing there together.
“You guys are early to the party, I see,” the man shouts over another set of booming fireworks.
“You kinda have to be when you’re the life of one,” Jack shoots back. “It’s more polite that way.”
“Here,” Princess says, handing the man a chilled beer. “Figured you could use one after getting shot today.”
“Shot at,” he corrects drily and takes the can from her grasp. “But I’m not drinking— I’m still on the clock… But she’s not.”
He turns to you, holding the beer out expectantly between you.
“I-I still have a few rounds to finish up,” you shake your head.
“I’ll do ‘em,” Jack shrugs. “You take a load off, alright? You deserve it.”
You hesitate for a moment, swallowing hard before reaching for the can with trembling hands. “…I deserve it,” you repeat under your breath, as though you were trying the words on for size.
“Yeah, you do,” Jack squints.
The can cracks faintly when you open it. You bring it to your mouth and take a slow sip, watching as the fireworks continue raining down overhead.
The day shift gathers around you at the railing with their own beers, while sparkling rainbow hues decorate the dark rooftop. You lean against the cool metal, now on the other side of it, and a little bit better than you were before.
Jack lingers just next to you, and forgets to watch the show playing overhead.
He doesn’t even realize he’s staring until you turn to look at him, eyes wide with worry.
“You’re okay, right?” you mutter sheepishly, licking the sheen of alcohol from your mouth. “It’s not too loud out here, is it? ‘Cause we can go back inside if you want.”
The corner of Jack’s mouth lifts in a smile at your concern, and at your use of ‘we.’ The warmth you put in his chest far outweighs the lingering panic settled there.
He shakes his head with a glassy-eyed gaze, “I’m right where I wanna be,” he assures in a honeyed voice.
You turn away, face flaring, and hide your smile behind your beer.
summary: you like to give abbot an extra grey hair with your flirting and barely suppressed sex jokes, and he likes to put a little extra in your swear jar. it's a win-win shift.
warnings: grumpy!abbot x sunshine!reader, also lowkey sugar!daddy!abbot, suggestive jokes, tension, flirting, one swear word, abbot trying to pretend sooo hard he’s not in love w reader ᝰ.ᐟ
wc: 2.4k (alina finally learnt how to stfu!! yay!)
You’d have the absolute audacity—and likely the entirety of your medical license—smacked clean out of you if you ever said the next thought out loud, but…it’s 4 a.m., and the night shift has settled into something almost resembling quiet.
Well, as quiet as it can get between drunk driving accidents and chest pains that turn out to be something worse than indigestion. It's like the ER is easing up on you, just for a second. Which is exactly why your brain has decided to fixate on something entirely unhelpful.
Why has Abbot been in a grump.
He’s had that small scowl all night, not quite fully formed, like it’s still deciding where to land and how hard. You’ve been watching it develop with a level of focus you would absolutely deny under oath.
In fact…you kind of hope it lands on you.
Not for any good reason. Not even a logical one. Just the same instinct that makes people watch storms roll in from too close, curious about the exact moment it tips from interesting into dangerous.
“I’m telling you,” you murmur, not looking away from your screen as you type, “it’s going to be something stupid. Like the printer.”
Diaz glances over his shoulder, checking if the subject of discussion is still there, then turns back, scribbling something down. “Nah, too easy. He’d fix the printer before he’d let it piss him off that much.”
You hum, lips pursing as you click through another tab, the system lagging enough to irritate you. “Okay, fine. Then a person. But not a big thing. Something small.”
“You, then.”
“Uh—” You pause, looking up at him, mildly offended. “Rude. He’d never snap on me.”
“No, but he gets all stiff and weird whenever you flirt with him like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, so it’s close enough.”
You cock your head to the side, narrowing your eyes at him. “I do not flirt with him.”
Diaz just raises his brows.
You glance back at your screen, suddenly very interested in whatever half-finished note is sitting there. “I’m just…friendly.”
“Sure,” he drags out smugly.
“I am.”
“Right.” He nods, entirely unconvinced, tapping his pen against the paper. “That thing you did earlier? With the ‘thank you, doctor’ and the smile?”
You frown. “That was polite.”
“That was not polite.”
“It was,” you insist, even as your fingers hover uselessly over the keyboard again. “It’s called good bedside manner.”
“Yeah,” Diaz mutters, “for the patients.”
You open your mouth to argue—fully prepared, actually—but it dies halfway out when you catch sight of Abbot heading towards the nurses’ station.
The scowl is still there.
Diaz follows your line of sight, takes one look, and immediately exhales like he’s just remembered somewhere else he absolutely needs to be. He shakes his head, already gathering his things.
“You coward,” you scoff.
“I’m not doing this.” He holds his hands up, backing away like this is a hazardous situation.
“Huh. You would if Javadi was here,” you mumble, mostly to yourself, but when Diaz pauses, you can’t help the slick little grin that melts onto your face.
“What was that?”
You don’t look at him. Just mime zipping your mouth shut, tossing the invisible key over your shoulder.
“You’re annoying.”
“I’m not annoying,” you argue easily. “Right, Dr Abbot?” you add, just as Abbot comes to a stop at the counter in front of you, earning a very clear middle finger from Diaz on his way out.
You have to tilt your head up a little to see him properly, his scowl edging into view above your monitor.
“…Am I?” you press, because apparently self-preservation is optional, ignoring the small, bright fizz of something that bubbles up every time you decide to push him just to see where the line actually is.
“Annoying?” he repeats, flipping through paperwork in his hands.
You nod once. He glances at you long enough to catch it.
"Jury's still out,” he mumbles, turning the page.
“I know you don’t mean that,” you whisper, leaning in. “It’s okay, Mateo’s gone—you don’t have to hide that I’m your favourite nurse now. No witnesses, no morale casualties.” You wave a hand airily, then reach for your hand sanitiser, squeezing a few pumps.
“Morale casualties?”
“Yup,” you reply, tilting your head like you’re weighing the gravity of the situation. “Could bring the whole floor down if they found out I’m your favourite. Women swoon for you, Doctor.” You smear the sanitiser into your hands. “Men too, I’m sure.”
He snorts, shaking his head as he walks over to the printer, feeding the documents in. “You’re ridiculous.”
“But not annoying.” You point at him, arching a brow.
“How many times have you written the same sentence?” he asks, fussing with the printer, hands gripping the edges as he looks to one side of the machine then the other.
You roll your eyes and glance back at your screen, skimming your notes, only for your stomach to dip when you realise you have, in fact, written patient’s BP is normal three separate times.
“Okay, well, in my defense—”
“You don’t have one.”
“I was just making it very clear that the patient's BP was normal,” you shrug. “Robby likes details.”
Abbot gives the printer a light smack when the paper still doesn’t budge. “Robby’s not here, and I like legible charting.”
You blink up at him slowly. “So you’re saying I should put your preferences and needs over everyone else's?" You do your very best to lace the question with something sultry, though at four in the morning you’re fairly sure the effect is somewhat dampened by the fact your concealer has absolutely creased beneath your eyes and your hair could probably be redone. You commit anyway.
Abbot chooses to ignore your attempt, his hands hovering over the printer. “Do you know how to work this fucking thing?”
“Of course I know how to work a printer, Doctor. I’m not incompetent.” You swivel in your chair to face him fully, smile widening. “...Just admit I’m your favourite.”
“I don’t have time for this.”
“Well, in that case, I think my charting could do with a little improving,” you say, turning back to your computer, smacking your gum a little louder as your finger clicks on the mouse repeatedly. “Might rewrite that blood pressure note a fourth time. Maybe fifth. Really flesh it out.”
There’s a moment of silence behind you, followed by an exhale long enough to extinguish a line of candles.
“Okay. Fine.”
You freeze mid-click, slowly pivoting your chair back to him, the gum between your teeth suddenly tasting a little too sweet.
Abbot is staring at you with an exhausted expression. The one of a man who knows exactly how negotiations should go, having probably run more tense situations than you can imagine, but who also knows he’ll cave if it comes to the right thing. Maybe he’s just good at giving in when he wants to, like a soldier choosing his battles.
“Please. You little terrorist. You’re my favourite and I need these scanned to radiology. Now.”
You grin at him, pushing yourself up from your chair with a spring in your step as you approach the printer. “Fine, fine. Scanning, coming right up.”
He moves to the side, letting you take over.
“So all you have to do is give them a little push,” you murmur, dragging out the syllables, “just enough so they fit snug. And then you make sure the frames are squeezed tight…tight enough to keep everything in place, so nothing slips out.”
He clears his throat, eyes darting around like you’ve said something scandalous, and not just given him a briefing on how to use the scanning function of the printer.
“The paper, Doctor. Get your mind out of the gutter,” you chirp, nudging the papers in and watching the machine whirl to life.
“My mind’s not in the gutter.”
“No?” You glance up at him prettily. “Oh, then you must just be deeply impressed by my ability to handle old things with such ease and efficiency.”
He shakes his head, already looking tired of you in a way that suggests he is not nearly tired enough. “You are unbelievably committed to making HR a recurring issue for me.”
“Thank you for showing me how to use a simple piece of equipment is a sufficient enough reply.”
His mouth twitches before he reins it in. “Radiology. Now. You can shred the original once it’s saved on the system.” He taps the printer once before backing away.
“Aht, aht,” you call after him, snatching the documents and setting them on the counter before rounding it and dropping back into your chair. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”
He pauses, glancing over his shoulder at you with immediate suspicion. “What now?”
You stare at him expectantly. He stares back. Then scoffs like he cannot believe he is indulging this.
“Thank you for showing me how to use a simple piece of equipment,” he repeats flatly.
“That’s very cute. I’m glad you can follow instructions. But—” You hold up one finger before bending beneath the desk and emerging with a very sparkly jar covered in rhinestones, the label aggressively pink and handwritten in looping glitter pen. “You need to pay for the f-bomb you dropped earlier.”
“We have a swear jar?”
“I have a swear jar,” you correct, giving it a proud little shake so the coins inside rattle merrily, loud and obnoxious, “and everyone in my presence has to contribute when they slip up.”
He scoffs again, folding his arms. “And who decided that?”
“Me, obviously.”
“Of course.” He nods once, like that answer somehow tells him everything he needs to know. “Lena know you’re scamming the entire ER?”
“She helped me decorate the jar,” you beam, unscrewing the cap. “Pay up, Doctor.”
He just stares at you. Then at the jar. Then back at you again like he is genuinely trying to work out whether sleep deprivation has finally pushed him into a hallucination.
“This is insane.”
“No,” you say sweetly, wiggling the jar in his direction, “this is discipline. We cannot have you running around the ER with a foul mouth, dropping f-bombs in front of vulnerable patients.” You lower your voice like you’re explaining something terribly serious to a child. “Honestly, I’m doing you a favour. Driving patient satisfaction rates up one dollar at a time.”
“Stop talking.”
“Well either pay up or give me something better to do with my mouth.”
The silence that follows is almost impressive.
Abbot looks like every thought in his head has cartoonishly slammed into the wall. His face doesn’t change, not really, but his whole body seems to lock for half a second like his brain is still trying to peel every single thought back off the surface where they’ve all just splattered at once.
You blink at him.
Then your own words catch up to you.
You like to flirt, yes—lightly, strategically, with plausible deniability. Not…whatever the hell that was. Not the sort of thing that sounds like you are actively trying to plant deeply inappropriate mental images in the mind of a man you have to see professionally every single day.
“Oh my God,” you breathe, eyes widening in horror. “I totally did not mean to say that out loud.”
His eyes are still on you, and your mouth has still not gotten the memo.
“Delete it. Delete the last ten seconds from your memory.”
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
“Well try harder. Please. I am literally begging.”
His mouth twitches. Not enough to count as a smile, but enough to let you know he is finding your humiliation far more entertaining than is medically ethical. “You’re assuming that I want to forget it.”
“Oh, that is not the correct thing to say to me right now.”
His jaw tightens imperceptibly, and it seems to hit him a fraction too late what exactly he has implied. “That came out wrong.”
“Did it?” you ask, already grinning despite your mortification, because embarrassment is temporary but the opportunity to harass him is forever. “Interesting. Because from where I’m sitting, it came out kind of perfect.”
“It didn’t.”
“It really did.” You stand back up and lean forward over the desk, placing the jar next to you. “So just to clarify, you’d actually like to keep thinking about my mouth?”
“You seem very committed,” he mutters, reaching into the pocket of his scrubs, “to seeing exactly how far you can push this before it becomes a problem for you.”
Oh.
Oh.
That shuts you up entirely.
Your mouth opens. Closes. Opens again. No sound. Not one single clever thing. Your brain, usually so eager to produce nonsense at record speed, has apparently packed its bags and fled the premises.
He watches the whole thing happen with far too much satisfaction before pulling out his wallet and flipping it open. “There,” he says, smug enough to make your eye twitch. “Peace at last.” Then he pulls out two fifty-dollar bills, folds them, and places them into your jar.
You’re silenced once again as you try to process exactly what he’s done.
“What the hell?” you blurt. “A hundred dollars? Really? Are you insane?”
His brow lifts. “You want more?”
“No. Absolutely not. I want less, actually.”
“Thank you for overpaying my swear jar after I’ve spent ten minutes sexually harassing you beside a printer is a sufficient enough answer,” he mocks dryly.
“I don’t see you complaining to HR. Matter of fact, this—“ you nod to the jar, “—looks a lot like you rewarding my behaviour.”
“Trust me, if I were rewarding your behaviour, you’d know.”
Your stomach does a humiliating somersault so violent it should probably be documented in your own chart.
He watches your face change and immediately looks far too pleased with himself. “That shut you up quicker than the money did.”
You scramble to recover, cocking your head to the side. “And what kind of behaviour would you lean towards rewarding? You know…for research purposes.”
“Getting those documents to radiology. Ensuring charting is done to the proper standard. No scheming during work hours.”
You roll your eyes and stick a finger in your mouth, mock-gagging. “Ugh, boring!”
“You asked.”
“True,” you concede, plopping back in your chair. “But I have a feeling there’s probably a much less professional answer rattling around in there that you’re not sharing.”
“I’m going to go now, okay?” he says, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Enjoy your earnings.”
“Don’t act like you won’t be back later,” you call after him, twisting your lips as your eyes follow his retreating figure.
Of course you're not wrong, because he's back exactly thirty minutes later.
jack with a chronically online younger!reader...walk with me
like you can't sleep, so obviously you reach for your phone, careful not to wake jack beside you, and open tiktok.
jack stirs a bit, eyes opening and adjusting to the bright light coming from your phone.
"jesus kid...it's the middle of the night.." he grumbles, arm coming to wrap over your waist, pulling you close to him.
you let out a little yelp, making jack smile, giving him cuteness aggression at what little it took to get a reaction out of you.
he pulls you in even closer, spooning you in a way that prevents you from being able to wriggle out of his grasp, phone discarded to the side.
jack kisses your shoulder, and you can feel his wide grin, clearly pleased with himself that he managed to get you off the damn phone, and he hums with content.
"see, isn't this better, sweetheart?" he says, while squeezing the side of your hip.
the betting pool goes crazy when you create an instagram highlight that just says:
j
javadi is the first to notice, her chronically online self, and when she flicks through the photos it’s clear that you’re soft launching a man. the back of his white t shirt as you walk down the street, your hand holding his across a table during a romantic dinner, your smiling face as you hold a gorgeous bouquet of roses. whoever this mystery man is, he’s soon to be instagram official.
all it takes is an offhand comment from javadi to whitaker for it to spread around the ED. because of course she should’ve known that whitaker would tell santos, who then tells mckay, who then tells langdon, who then tells mel and so on and so forth until it even reaches robby.
all he can do is smile because he knows you’ve been dating jack for a while now. the two of you came to dinner with him and noelle only a few days ago. he doesn’t bother to join the betting pool ahmad sets up; he doesn’t think it would be fair to rinse his poor residents for all they’re worth.
it goes on for a few more months. your coworkers try to get it out of you, to expose the mystery man who clearly has you smitten, but they repeatedly fail.
it slips out one day on shift. it’s rare you work with jack, being a day shifter and all, but your shift has overrun by about four hours and you’re not going to get to go home anytime soon. a mass casualty means the ED is lined with injured people, and handoff will not be happening tonight in this all hands on deck situation.
you’re working on a patient and you go to grab more supplies, when you collide with a firm body.
“easy, honey.” abbot places his hands on your shoulders to steady you.
there it is. honey.
javadi overhears and it clicks in her brain. she doesn’t have the time to dwell on it due to the circumstances, but she smiles softly to herself. she might not have won the bet, but she knows shen is going to be very pleased with himself.
“are you okay?” jack asks you softly, making the time in the busy nature of the ED to check on you.
“yeah, sorry,” you respond. “wasn’t watching where i was going. i’m good.”
“you got this,” he says gently, squeezing your shoulder. “see you on the other side.”
javadi watches as you admire jack working on a patient, a lovestruck smile on your face. she turns away, feeling like an intruder, but her own smile only grows.
after the shift from hell, you’re in jack’s bed and missing him terribly. he stayed for the rest of his shift, and part of you wishes he could be here to comfort you after the day you’ve had. but he’s a night shifter at heart, and you knew that when you got into this.
so you do the one thing that will bring you comfort: you scroll through your folder dedicated to photos of your relationship. when you stumble across one from the early days, you smile to yourself.
you’d only been dating for a few weeks and he’d taken you to a flower market. you’d commented on how handsome he looked, and shyly asked him if you could take a photo of him. in the photo, he’s holding your outstretched hand and beaming into the camera, sunglasses hiding his soft eyes.
you pull up the instagram app and add the photo to your highlight, the words my j positioned just above his shoulder.
your phone is immediately flooded with texts.
trinity: holy shit!!!! call me right now!!!!
dennis: happy for the two of you x
yolanda: no fucking way have you locked down jack abbot
cassie: i should have known! love looks good on you, lady!
emma: ahhhhh! the hard launch!
john: i fucking knew it
but it’s the one from javadi that makes you smile the most.
