summary: abbot offers up his house for a simple family bbq to help you out of a jam...unfortunately, neither of you are capable of keeping it simple.
warnings: smut! fingering, abbot jizzing in his pants, porn but with a lot of plot & build up, tension, inappropriate thoughts, masturbation implied & discussed, alcohol consumption, minor injury (small cut), petty abbot because he snatches r's phone, brat tamer abbot if you squint?? he likes to mock you okay???? slight angst at the end :)
wc: 9.5k
pt 2 can be found here!
Now that you’re actually standing in front of it, it’s…offensively small.
You tilt your head like that might miraculously improve the situation, like there’s some hidden angle where this becomes a perfectly reasonable barbecue and not what looks like a prop from a dollhouse garden party. As if, with enough optimism and a slight squint, the laws of physics will rearrange themselves out of sheer pity.
Because your freezer currently sits enough food to cater a mid-sized wedding.
And your patio?
A grill that could maybe handle…four sausages. Five if they’re prepared to be very close.
You exhale slowly, hands on your hips as you realise you’ve made a catastrophic, deeply public planning error. There has to be a system. A rotation. A schedule. Some kind of… grilled meat tetris.
You glance back at the freezer like it might offer solutions. It does not. It sits there, smug and overstocked.
“Okay,” you mutter to yourself. “This is fine. This is workable. People love waiting for food…People expect to wait for food.”
Except your siblings are the least patient people you know.
And just to make matters worse, a knock sounds at the door. You know it’s Abbot because he generously offered to give you a hand with the grill after you mentioned hosting your family in passing, like he had absolutely nothing better to do on a Saturday night.
Now it’s feeling less like generosity on his behalf, and more like you accidentally inviting him to a very unfortunate comedy show.
You hover for a second, hoping if you wait long enough, he’ll go away.
He doesn’t. He just knocks again.
You smooth your hands down your shorts, the denim rough enough against your palms to remind you to breathe. It’ll be fine. Everyone can just mingle in your tiny garden while they wait approximately four hours for dinner. Great. This is exactly the way to show your family how firmly you have your life together.
You make your way to the front door and pull it open to find Abbot standing there, fingers hooked around a bag you assume has something useful in it—like tongs, or maybe the competence you seem to be lacking. You’d take two of those right now.
“Hey,” you greet in a tone that reeks of desperation.
“Hi.” There’s a slight raise in his brow, like he’s already caught on that something here is…off.
“Come in.” You move to the side, gesturing him in.
He nods and walks through. You close the door behind him, your back mounting to it as you watch him take the place in, realising this is the first time he’s ever been inside.
Momentarily, you feel like you’re under an imaginary microscope, like you’ve been set out in the sun, quietly examined and a little overexposed all at once. Except there’s no microscope, no audience.
Just Abbot.
And the glass of wine you indulged in earlier, which is currently doing a fantastic job of making you feel about three degrees warmer than necessary, and significantly more aware of your own existence than you’d like.
You’re not sure what he’s going to think of your home. It’s smaller than his, you know that much without asking. It’s cluttered but in a lived in kind of way, everything has a purpose or a memory attached to it. You’d love to tell him some of those stories, walk him through it properly, if you had the time…or if you were sure he wanted to hear them.
He probably doesn’t.
And you definitely don’t have time.
“Cute place.”
“Cute?” you repeat, a smile pulling at your lips. “Is that your way of dressing up the word small?”
“No.” His gaze drifts around once more, slower this time, like he’s actually taking it in rather than passing through. Then it settles back on you. “It’s cute. Very you.”
That annoyingly lands somewhere you weren’t prepared for.
You blow air from your nose, glancing away as if the console table requires your full attention. “Right. Well I’m glad my personality translates into…square footage.”
There’s the faintest hint of amusement in his expression. “That’s not what I said.”
“That’s what I heard.”
He watches you like could argue if he wanted to, but he doesn’t.
You clear your throat, deciding you need air. And to also rip the band-aid off already, because you’ve made Abbot clear his schedule to help you out, when in reality you won’t be needing his help at all.
Unless he’s particularly skilled at dialling for takeaway.
“Anyways,” you say briskly, turning to the back door. “Let me show you what we’re working with.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
You’re absolutely blaming the glass of wine for the effect those two words have on you, trying to desperately ignore the way your brain’s decided now’s a good time to develop new problems.
You step outside first, the warm air hitting your skin, and wait for him to come up beside you. When he does—close enough to be mildly distracting—you gesture flatly towards the root of all your issues. “There she is.”
He looks.
There’s a faint pause.
“She’s, um—”
“Cute?” you supply, nudging his arm with your elbow.
“I was going to say compact.”
“It’s second hand,” you reply, because that feels like important context. Of course you were going to buy a second hand grill. Why wouldn’t you? You’d much rather spend your money on something you’ll actually get use out of. This was supposed to be a practical, sensible, one-time summer purchase.
It is now very clearly the opposite of that.
“It looked bigger before I picked it up,” you add, because his silence is doing absolutely nothing for your need to stop explaining yourself. “Please say something before I finish the bottle of wine I started.”
“I’m thinking.”
“It’s not that big of a deal, right? I’ll just do, like, ten rounds of grilling and keep everything wrapped in foil to keep it warm. It’s hot as hell out so stuff would probably stay warm enough anyway?”
He finally meets your gaze.
“...No.”
You blink. “No?”
“No.”
You stare at him, cheek caught between your teeth. “Wow. Okay. That was…very immediate.”
“You’ll have people waiting too long between rounds,” he says calmly. “Half of it will go cold. The rest will be overcooked.”
“Great.” You throw your hands up. “Just kill me now, then. Put me out of my misery.”
There’s a twitch at the corner of his mouth.
“I will never hear the end of this,” you continue, reaching for your empty wine glass and topping it up from the bottle beside it. “They don’t take me seriously enough as it is—” you take a quick sip, like it might soften the blow of what you’re about to admit, “—and they’re constantly expecting me to mess things up before I’ve even started. Perks of being the youngest, apparently. Comes with its own very specific set of stereotypes”
You glance at the grill, then back at him. “And this will absolutely prove them right.”
“Have it at my house,” he offers breezily and you almost drop your glass.
“Sorry?”
“It’ll be easier,” he explains, like he’s just suggesting you move a chair. “More space. Proper grill.”
“That would mean my entire family going to your house.”
“Yes.”
“And you being there.”
“I live there.”
You narrow your eyes. “I don’t think you realise what you’re suggesting. It’s not just my parents coming. Well, it was at first and then my siblings decided to invite themselves and I’m fairly certain their partners also got swept in without my consent.”
“And you couldn’t say no?”
You let out a disbelieving laugh. “No, absolutely not. But you can. Please say no to this.”
He doesn’t even look slightly concerned. “I’m not saying no.”
“Why not?”
“Because it solves your problem.”
“We’re not at work.” You set the wine glass down, like it might help you regain better control of the conversation and his absolute ludicrous idea. “You don’t have to solve my problems.”
He tilts his head like he’s considering that, then steps closer to the grill to give it another once-over. His fingers drag lightly over the metal bars, testing them, like there’s still a chance this thing might redeem itself under a second opinion.
It does not.
“Well,” he says, almost absently, “if it makes you feel any better, you’re rarely creating problems for me at work, so just let me give you a hand with this one.”
You stare at him, then gesture vaguely between him and the grill. “But don’t you think it’d be weird? What am I meant to say to them?”
“That we work together. That I’ve got the space and offered to host. That’s it.”
“You’re making this sound so simple,” you scoff, shaking your head.
“Because it is simple. I’m offering a solution. Take it. We’ll load up my truck with what you need and go.”
“And you don’t think they’ll assume things?” You almost cringe as the words leave your mouth, it sounds so juvenile, like something you should’ve outgrown years ago.
“Assume what?” he presses, and you don’t know if he’s genuinely not following or if the last several months have just been you reading into things he hasn’t seen nor reciprocated.
“Nothing!” you blurt out quickly, downing the rest of your wine like it might undo the last ten seconds. “I’m being stupid and I’m out of options so I guess we can have it at your house—if you’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“Great. Amazing. Perfect.” You set the glass down again, and walk past him, heading into the kitchen, because if you stay in this conversation for even a second longer, you’re not entirely convinced you'll make it through this BBQ—or your next shift with Abbot—without saying something you absolutely cannot take back.
You had texted the family group chat about the change of plans, keeping the message short, light, casual, even if your brain has refused to get on board with that narrative.
Because there are, conservatively, about a hundred reasons as to why this is a terrible idea. Reasons that all seem to be shouting over each other the longer you think about it. Starting with the fact that if there is anyone capable of turning a harmless situation into something more layered and deeply inconvenient, it’s your family.
Who are now going to be meeting Abbot.
Your boss.
Who you might be slightly crushing on.
And your earlier exchange?
Yeah. That did an excellent job of confirming that’s very much a one sided situation.
“You’re sure you don’t need me to drop by the store first?” he asks.
You’re not sure if he’s looking at you because you angled your body away from him about ten minutes ago, in a very deliberate attempt to not be distracted.
It hasn’t been working.
If anything, it’s considerably worse, because you’re now hyperaware of everything you’re trying not to look at. The way his sun-warmed arms flex as he adjusts his grip on the wheel, the sleeve of his black shirt sitting snug around his bicep. The completely unbothered way he’s driving, like this is exactly what he had planned to do with his day off.
“No.” You risk a glance at him, only to find his eyes already on you before they flick back to the road. “I pretty much emptied my fridge into the back of your truck, so we should be sorted.”
He hums like that checks out. “Alright.”
“You still haven’t changed your mind?”
He glances at you again. “About?”
You stare at him.
You’re not sure if he’s doing this on purpose, but it feels like he is. Like he’s deliberately backing you into saying things out loud. Making you name them, lay them out clearly instead of hiding behind vague gestures and half-formed sentences.
It’s incredibly annoying.
Because it has your mind drifting to…other situations where he might take the same approach. You picture him for a brief second, between your legs, the way he’d look at you expectantly, waiting until you spelled it out for him.
Like he’d make you tell him exactly what you want.
Exactly how you want it.
And look at him while you do it.
“Oh my god,” you mutter out loud, the thought hitting you all at once. You shift in your seat, pressing your thighs together like that might physically cancel your brain.
“Everything okay?”
“No. No—” you shake your head quickly, turning to the window like the outside world has suddenly become fascinating. “I think we need to stop by the store.”
“You just said you had everything.”
“Why are you asking so many questions today?” You turn to face him, and you’re pretty sure you’re glaring now, because he is officially on your last damn nerve.
“That wasn’t a question.”
You inhale slowly and manifest restraint because he doesn’t deserve you snapping at him, but he’s also been the leading cause in your rapid mental decline today. “My mistake.” You tack on a smile that feels convincing for a second before it slips, the corners of your mouth dropping almost immediately. “I’m not sure I’ve got everything for the salad, so if you wouldn’t mind stopping by the store, that’d be great.”
He laughs under his breath, turning on the indicator. “I love the customer service voice.”
“I’m not doing a customer service voice.”
“You are. It’s very polite.”
You blink at him, lips parting like you’re about to argue it, then stopping when you realise there’s probably no winning this.
“Can you stop by the store or not?” you ask instead, folding your arms across your chest.
“Of course,” he answers easily. “You’re the boss today.”
You don’t dignify that with a response, mostly because you’re too busy being relieved when he finally pulls into the car park. You need to get out of his truck that smells exactly like him and into somewhere with actual air conditioning. Not that his truck doesn't have it—it does—but he seems to be absorbing all of its effects, leaving you to slowly overheat in his general vicinity.
You unclip and fling off your seatbelt, grab your purse but pause when you catch him doing the same out of the corner of your eye.
“What’re you doing?”
“Going to the store? What’s with all the questions?”
“No you’re not,” you reply, pointing at him. “You’re staying here.”
“Am I?
“Yes.”
“And why’s that?” he questions with a lazy smirk, and you can feel yourself inching closer to just smothering him with your bag for the sake of peace and quiet.
“Because I’m the boss today.” You give him a smug, entirely fake smile before climbing out of his vehicle and shutting the door with just a little more force than usual.
You power walk to the store and once inside, head straight for the freezer section. You pull open one of the large glass doors and just stand there for a minute, relishing in the cool air.
This is exactly what you get. A direct consequence of your own poor planning, which you don’t usually do. But today, of all days, everything seems to be going from bad to worse.
Starting with your brilliant idea to save money by buying a second hand grill without actually seeing it in person first. Then not having the heart to say no to the poor old woman selling it when it turned out to be…that. Then not saying no to the ever-expanding guest list. Then not saying no to hosting this entire disaster of a night at Abbot’s house.
And now, just to round things up nicely, you can’t even seem to keep a lid on your own feelings.
You can do this, you tell yourself. You handle crises everyday at work, actual ones, where people depend on you. This? This doesn’t even come close to being half as bad as your worst shift. This is just a barbecue. All you need to do is put on your big girl pants, get through the night, and never speak of it again.
With a deep breath in, you shut the freezer door, ignoring the judgemental look from one of the workers, and try to source the supposed salad ingredients you’re missing.
By the time you’re paying, you feel calmer, like your head has finally been screwed on right, and that there’s a small chance of you getting through this night without another existential breakdown.
You try to hang on to that same thought as you make your way back to Abbot’s car, digging out a pair of sunglasses to wear for the rest of the journey. Avoiding eye contact should be significantly easier with a barrier.
“Got everything?”
“Mhm.” You keep it short as you climb back into the passenger seat and place the bag between your feet like everything is perfectly normal.
When Abbot pulls into his driveway, you realise there are a lot of firsts happening today—you’ve never been to his house before either.
You take it in as the truck slows, your gaze dragging over the place in pieces, trying not to make it obvious. You'd been right in thinking it’ll be much bigger than yours, because from the outside it looks like your place could slot neatly into a corner of his and still leave plenty of room to spare.
The house is framed with tidy hedges and a curved driveway. It’s dipped in a warm golden wash from the late sun, the light catching on the windows and casting long shadows across the patio that actually looks used.
You can almost picture him out there in the evenings. On his own, or maybe with Robby. Something cold in his hand, leaning back like he’s got nowhere else to be.
You’re already a little too curious to see the garden. He lives far enough out that it feels quiet, tucked away from everything, and the front looks well kept that you’re almost certain the back will look even better.
That’s your dream one day. To have a big stretch of green out the back that you could look out over from your bedroom window in the mornings. You imagine stepping out barefoot, the grass still damp beneath you. You’d have a little table, with mismatched chairs you tell yourself you’d replace but never do. Maybe something growing, even if it’s just herbs you’d forget to use anyway.
You think about hosting without overthinking it. People just…spreading out, drinks in hand, no one hovering awkwardly because there isn’t enough room. The kind of evenings that go on a little longer because no one is in a rush to leave.
Or just to soak up the sun on days like this.
“Ready to go?”
Abbot's voice breaks you from your daydream, and you shift in your seat like you’ve ended up somewhere you weren’t supposed to go.
“Yeah,” you clear your throat, reaching up to remove your sunglasses. “Beautiful house.”
He glances at you briefly, then back at the front of the house like he’s seeing it through your eyes. “It does the job.”
“Does it very well.”
You step out into the warm air, a light breeze slipping past you, and your attention follows Abbot as he rounds the truck. And just like that, your mind does that thing again, wandering somewhere it absolutely shouldn’t.
You picture it a little too easily for your liking, a day like today, minus the chaos. What it’d feel like coming back home from a grocery run, a truck filled with nothing in particular. The domestic bliss of unpacking, then sitting in the garden, something simple on the grill.
You can see yourself curled into him on the patio, the air dropping a few degrees, a glass of wine somewhere nearby, his hand resting absentmindedly on your waist. Maybe you’d end up in his lap, talking about nothing, or everything, it doesn’t really matter because you’d be doing it with him.
These thoughts leave your stomach sinking because that’s all they are, just the results of chemical activity moving across the brain that you’ve inconveniently grown attached to. There’s nothing real or solid behind them.
“Where do you want everything?” you ask with a huff, grabbing the grocery bag from the front seat.
Abbot doesn’t answer straight away.
You feel it before you look up, the sense of being watched. When you glance over, he’s already looking at you like he’s trying to figure something out, like he’s somehow got your pathetic little fantasy down, and is rethinking every decision that’s led him here.
Your stomach continues to drop.
“Kitchen?” you add, because silence suddenly feels like the worst possible outcome here.
He looks at you a little longer before he nods, going back to unloading his truck. “Yeah. Through there.”
You return his nod and make way to the front door, shifting the grocery bag higher on your hip. Your hand finds the handle, the same moment you realise the door’s not even unlocked.
You turn to call for him only to end up bumping straight into his chest.
“Shit—” The word slips out as you stumble, your grip tightening on the shopping bag to keep everything from spilling.
“Got you,” he says, his hand settling at your waist, steadying you before you can lose your balance. It’s a simple gesture, except your mind has that deeply irritating habit of taking simple things and turning them into something they’re not.
“Sorry,” he adds as an afterthought. “Should’ve given you the keys.”
You nod even though the apology seems misplaced, your attention snagging somewhere else entirely. On the warmth of his hand. The way it hasn’t quite moved yet. How easily it could slip under your shirt so you could feel him on your skin. Properly.
“It’s fine.” Which is both true and very much not.
His hand drops then, his focus shifting to the door and getting it open. You move to the side to give him space trying to collect yourself all over again.
“Kitchen’s just straight ahead,” he tells you, gesturing you in once the door swings open.
Inside, the house is spacious, with dark wood floors and barn-like furniture. It’s less cluttered than yours, with only a few things slightly out of place. You step in slowly, taking everything in. You’re not sure when you’ll next ever get a chance to visit, so you selfishly take a little longer to wander through, noticing the few pictures and trinkets he has scattered around.
When you reach the kitchen you place the shopping bag and your purse on the marble counter, fully intending to head back out and give Abbot a hand with the other bags, but you stall once you get a view of the garden through the glass French doors leading out from the kitchen.
Well-kept grass stretches out for what looks like miles, the edges framed with low trees and shrubs. There’s even a small greenhouse tucked to one side. It looks too tidy to be in use, but you imagine how it might look filled anyway. Further back, there’s a perfectly sized outdoor kitchen, with a large grill and enough counter space to move around comfortably.
So this is where he disappears to when he’s not at work.
“Is it okay?”
You turn a little too quickly at the sound of Abbot’s voice, like he’s caught you doing something you shouldn’t. Your brows pull together, because you’re not entirely sure what he’s asking is okay.
“The house,” he clarifies, shifting the bags in his hands like he’s suddenly aware of how that sounded. “For tonight.”
“Oh.” You glance back at the garden, then around the kitchen. “Yeah. No, it’s—” you gesture vaguely, because there are too many ways to describe it and none of them feel casual enough, “—more than okay.”
He nods once, like that’s all he needed, and moves further into the kitchen to set the bags down beside yours before he’s going out again.
You’re almost finished with the salad when the knife decides your finger might be a better addition than the cherry tomatoes. It’s so quick it almost feels hypothetical, but then the sting registers and your finger flies straight to your mouth, like that’s the only medical training you’ve managed to retain.
There’s already a metallic taste spreading across your tongue, blood pooling faster than you’d like, making you wince.
“Oh, for the love of god,” you mutter, searching for the paper towels and your brain, which might be lounging on the kitchen counter somewhere, soaking up the sun streaming in through the windows, because clearly it’s not being put to any practical use.
And just so the universe could curse you some more, you hear Abbot walking back in.
Great.
You immediately turn your back to him because he doesn’t need any more reasons to think you’re incompetent.
“Everything okay?”
“Mhm,” you hum, because you still haven’t spotted the paper towels and are stuck sucking your finger like that’s a reasonable long-term solution.
“Grill’s coming along,” he continues and you can feel him moving behind you, followed by the rip of the said paper towels. “Got it up to temperature, just needs a few more minutes before I start putting anything else on. Should all be ready in time.”
“Mm, that’s good. Thank you.” You decide to face him, and immediately regret it because you hadn’t realised how close he was. “Could I have one of those?”
You reach for the roll but he doesn’t hand it over.
“You’ve cut yourself.”
“Yes. I’ve already added it to my list of incompetencies today. It’s fine. Very minor.”
“Give me your hand.”
You hesitate, because that feels like an escalation for something you’ve just described as very minor.
“It’s really no big—”
“Give me your hand,” he repeats, reaching for your wrist.
You exhale and let it happen, relaxing your hold as he draws your hand towards him, the crimson gathering along the cut in a way that suddenly looks far more dramatic under proper light.
He tosses his used paper towels on the counter and rips a few new sheets. “Here, hold that. I’ll get you a plaster,” he instructs, pressing them against your finger before turning and disappearing down the corridor.
You stand there, listening to the sound of a cupboard door opening and then closing, something unzipping and then zipping until his footsteps make their way back to you again.
You watch the quick and efficient way he frees the plaster of its wrapper and you’re instinctively holding out your finger, letting him wrap it neatly around the cut. His thumb runs along the edges, making sure it’s properly stuck down.
“Thank you.”
He meets your eyes. “You have—” he lifts his thumb to your chin, the pad of it brushing gently along your skin “—a little blood there.”
Your mouth parts, breath catching somewhere on the way out. You feel him move closer, his touch tracing up to the corner of your mouth carefully, like he’s not sure how far he’s allowed to go, but isn’t stopping himself from finding out.
It’s nothing. You were standing there with dried blood on your chin—he’s just being kind.
But your traitorous mind immediately offers up a list of alternatives for what he could be doing with that exact same touch, and you have to physically dig the heels of your feet into your sandals to stop yourself from leaning into it.
“There.” He retracts his hand, and once again you’re mourning the loss of contact.
You nod your thanks to him and turn back to the counter, picking up the knife again so you can finish your salad. “So, is the grill behaving?” you manage, which is frankly lousy small talk considering you couldn’t care less about the grill right now.
He clears his throat. “Yeah. Heat’s holding. I’ll start with the sausages, get a good sear on them, then move them over so they don’t dry out.”
“Love a man with a plan,” you mutter out loud, which was definitely supposed to be retained as an internal thought.
Silence fills the space and you freeze, knife hovering uselessly over the cutting board. You hear some shuffling behind you, maybe him binning the paper towels and the plaster wrapper, or maybe he’s just giving you a second to realise what you’ve said.
“Good to know.”
Your phone vibrates in your back pocket, followed by a ping, and you’ve never been more grateful for technology in your life. You wipe your hand on your shorts before pulling it out, unlocking it a little too quickly.
Dad: We’re running late, honey. Hotel’s messed up our rooms…long story. Still trying to sort it with reception. Will message you when we’re on our way…
“They’re running late,” you mumble, a welcome exhale slipping out.
“I’ll hold off on the sausages. Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, just some mix up with the rooms at the hotel.” You tuck your phone away and dump the rest of the tomatoes in the bowl giving it a halfhearted stir.
“You’re putting them up in a hotel?”
“Well, yes. Should I let them pick a corner to sleep in at my house instead?”
He smiles at you and you feel some of the tension ease out of your shoulders, as though you've been waiting for permission to relax this entire time.
“I’m all done with the prep on my side, and since they’ll probably be a little while…would it be absurd if I used your shower?”
“Yes. It would be absolutely absurd.”
He’s mocking you. Funny.
“Right. I’ll just stand in your garden and hose myself down instead, shall I?”
“No complaints on my side.”
Now he’s…flirting?
“Sure. Let me just get out of these clothes—” You bring a hand down to your shorts, fingers hooking at the waistband because apparently two can play this game.
“Bathroom’s just down the hall,” he cuts in quickly.
You grin at him. “Thank you.”
“Spare towels are in the cabinet.” His hand comes up to drag across his mouth, thumb catching briefly against his stubble as he watches you bend and grab one of the tote bags on the floor with your clothes inside.
“Thanks,” you add again, more out of habit than anything else, before turning towards the hallway.
“Mm.”
The sound follows you as you walk away, and once again you’re stuck dissecting every interaction you’ve had with him today. It’s enough to give you whiplash. One minute he’s distant, the next he’s standing far too close to be friendly, touching your face like it’s nothing. You don’t know where you stand with him, and moments like this don’t exactly help.
You make your way down the hallway, your grip tightening on the tote bag as your thoughts spiral, circling the same questions with absolutely no answers.
What was that?
Does he even realise he’s doing it?
You push the bathroom door open, and step inside. For a second you just stand there, because that’s easier than thinking but that doesn’t seem to last long.
Dumping your tote bag on the counter, you turn to the shower. It’s walk-in, with enough space to move around freely, and a built-in seat tucked into one corner with handlebars nearby. There’s an overhead shower as well as a handheld one clipped to the side, which you’re immediately grateful for because you definitely don’t have time to deal with washing your hair.
After locating the towels, you strip out of your clothes and once you’re under the water, you realise you’re stuck using his shower products because you’d only planned for an outfit change, not a full reset.
Now you get to smell like him even when you’re not near him.
You’re hoping the shower washed away all your inappropriate Abbot-related thoughts along with the sweat and stress of the day. You don’t entirely trust that it has, but you dry off and get dressed regardless.
On cue, your phone pings with a message from your father to say everyone’s on their way. Just one more push and this whole shit show of an evening will be over. Easy. Completely manageable. Light work.
Before you even reach the kitchen, you can smell the grill, and when you do, you notice the dining table has already been set. Something in your chest dips a little at the sight. How he’s gone to all this effort for you and your family without questioning it twice.
You shake it off, physically, like that might dislodge the feeling before it can settle anywhere inconvenient, heading for the fridge instead. You grab two beers, popping them open against each other and follow the smell outside.
The humidity hasn’t let up. It's still the clinging type and you can already feel a new sheet of sweat forming on your skin the closer you get to the grill. Abbot has his back turned to you, one hand resting on his hip, while the other works the tongs with an ease that suggests he knows exactly what he’s doing.
He looks unfairly attractive just by doing the most mundane task—just by existing.
You slow your step without meaning to. Which is embarrassing.
You stop a few steps short, watching him, like your body’s decided this is worth savouring, and you hate that there’s something about him that manages to calm your nerves and make you feel like they’re running laps all at the same time.
There’s probably a scientific explanation for it. Some chemical imbalance, some misfiring signal in your brain that’s confused admiration with something far less convenient.
He turns to you, and you force your feet to move before you risk looking like a complete creep.
“Thought you could do with something cold,” you say, holding out the beer to him.
“Perfect timing,” he replies, reaching for it, his fingers brushing against yours. “How was the shower?”
“Necessary,” you quip, setting your beer and phone down on the counter so you can hoist yourself up onto it. It’s probably not the smartest place to settle, perched this close to the grill, but you do it anyway.
He watches as you shift into place, not even trying to be subtle about it either. His gaze dips, catching onto the strip of skin revealed by the slit of your sundress, then drags back up again like it’s something he has to consciously pull away from.
“You look nice,” is all he manages before shifting his focus back to the grill.
“Thank you. And thanks again for doing all of this. You’ve gone through so much trouble and I don’t even know where to begin in repaying you.”
He huffs at that, turning one of the sausages over with the tongs. “You don’t need to repay me.”
“Mm,” you hum, letting your foot swing idly against the cabinet, making no effort to cover up the exposed skin he was looking at earlier. “I’d like to.”
“Yeah?”
You tilt your head, watching him the way he’s been watching you, then reach for your beer and take a slow sip before answering. “Yeah.”
“You always like having the last word?”
You lower the bottle, meeting his eyes. “You asked a question, didn’t you?”
“Thought you had a problem with those today.”
You grin at him. “Think I’m over it now.”
“Is that so?”
You nod, taking another sip.
“Okay,” he drags out, setting his tongs down before ripping off a paper towel to wipe his hands with. “You want to tell me why you were acting weird in the car?”
“I can tell you exactly why I was acting weird in the car, but you’d have to tell me something first.” You’re not sure where all this bravery is coming from, certainly not the lukewarm beer acting as liquid courage.
He raises his brows with a small smile as he walks past you where you’re perched on the counter, and reaches into a cabinet beside you for a plate. “Go on. I did say you’re the boss today.”
“Why go through all this trouble?”
He opens his mouth to answer, but you stop him by lifting a finger just as he turns back towards you, a plate in hand. Your finger hovers somewhere between his chest and the idea of touching him, and his eyes drop again, predictably, to the stretch of bare skin where your thigh is exposed, right between where he’s standing.
“I don’t want the same answer as earlier,” you add, lowering your hand, your knees parting just a little wider without making it obvious. “Because it’s bullshit.”
For a moment he doesn’t respond, but you’re not panicking. It's probably because you can tell you’ve nudged something, pressed a spot he’d probably rather you didn’t find.
He takes a step closer.
You feel the plate before you register what he’s doing. The cold edge of it presses lightly against your thigh, a contrast that makes your breath catch before you can smooth it out. Your skin warms it up almost instantly, but that’s not what holds your attention.
It’s his hand. Still there. Still keeping the plate pressed to you.
“Bullshit?”
You swallow, which is annoying, because you hadn’t planned on that being noticeable. You gather what’s left of your composure and try again, aiming for even. Landing somewhere just adjacent. “Yeah.”
“Then ask properly.”
Your hands stay braced on the edge of the counter, your knees now parted enough to fit him in between them perfectly, the plate still pressed to your thigh.
You let out a slow breath, trying to unknot your fuzzy thoughts, but it’s harder than it should be with him this close.
“Ask properly,” he says again, softer this time, like he's not in a rush for you to answer.
You glance down at where the plate meets your thigh, and catch the way his other free hand comes to rest on your knee. You feel your whole body light up at his touch, something fluttering low in your stomach and spreading out from there before you can do anything about it.
“Why,” you start, your voice wavering, “are you doing all of this…for me?”
He removes the plate, setting it beside you, both of his hands coming to rest on your knees.
“You think I do things I don’t want to do?”
You swallow again, forcing yourself to hold his gaze. “No.”
“Then that’s your answer.”
“That’s not an answer,” you push, a little breathless now. “You can’t answer my question with a question.”
“You want me to answer it properly?”
You nod, because words have completely abandoned you at this point.
“I did it because I wanted you here.”
You don’t quite know where to file that information.
There’s no neat place for it to sit, no category your brain can quickly shove it into so you can move on and pretend this is all normal, because want is a dangerous word.
It’s not polite or distant or easily explained away. It doesn’t leave much room for interpretation, and that’s the problem. You’ve been working with interpretation all day, picking at glances and half-answers and things that could mean something or nothing depending on how brave you felt.
Your fingers press harder into the edge of the counter, and you look at him to check if he actually said it, because maybe you imagined it the same way you’ve been imagining everything else.
He’s still there, looking at you like there’s absolutely nothing for him to regret or take back.
“Not the answer you were hoping for?”
“No.” You shake your head, hands slipping from the counter to rest over his where they sit on your knees. Your fingers find his without much thought as you drag his hands up to your waist. “It’s exactly the answer I was hoping for.”
Abbot’s grip tightens, tongue darting out to wet his bottom lip, but he doesn’t pull away. “This is a bad idea.”
“Yeah,” you murmur, not arguing it. “But I haven’t even told you what I was thinking of in the car.”
“Jesus,” he hisses under his breath. “You should go back inside. Your family could be turning up any minute.”
“You want me to leave? I thought you wanted me here?” you press smugly.
“I need you to go inside,” he replies, more firmly now. His hands don’t leave you right away, instead they slide leisurely from your waist, down along your hips, over your thighs, until his fingers briefly press into the skin just above your knees.
Then he lets go, taking a step back like that’s going to fix anything.
Before you can come up with something smart, your phone starts vibrating against the counter.
You grab it, clearing your throat before answering. “Hi, Dad.”
“We’re outside, honey.”
“Okay,” you say lightly, sliding off the counter, taking one last look at Abbot—more specifically at his very evident hard on—before you’re tuning away. “Now coming.”
“That went well, don’t you think?” Abbot’s voice sounds behind you as you finish rinsing the glasses.
He’s right. It did go well. Suspiciously well. And you’re not entirely sure whether you’re glad or irritated with how easily he seemed to slot into your family. Objectively, it’s a good thing. In practice, it’s…inconveniant. Especially considering the way you two left things before they came over.
You’re tempted to ask what he spent so long discussing with your father outside at one point. It had gone on long enough to make you nervous. You could’ve gone out there, hovered and earwigged—you’d even considered it for a full ten seconds before deciding to pour yourself another glass of wine.
Surprisingly, no one had thrown any inconvenient questions or accusations your way. They all left thinking that Abbot is just some cool guy you work with. A totally laid-back, easy going boss…that you’ve spent the entire night thinking about screwing.
You nod, switching the tap off. “Sorry for the mess.”
“Didn’t notice one.”
“That’s because I just spent the last half hour cleaning it up.”
You turn to reach for a towel at the exact same time he steps in to place something in the sink, and just like that, you’re back in that position you seem to keep finding yourselves in, like there’s some invisible thread pulling you into the same orbit whether you mean to or not.
You hesitate for a moment, then abandon the towel altogether and wipe your hands on your dress instead, gathering the fabric as you do, letting it ride up slightly before pulling it back down, just enough to expose your cleavage more so than before.
Whatever Abbot had dumped in the sink is forgotten instantly, his attention narrowing straight down to you.
“You didn’t have to.”
“Yeah, well,” you shrug casually, “it’s the least I can do. You’ll finally be able to have your place to yourself.” You turn to reach for your phone. “I’ll call myself an Uber and be out of your hair.”
There’s a pause, giving you enough time for you to open up the app.
“Out of my hair?”
His tone makes you pause and you glance back over your shoulder.
He seems…tense.
“Well, yes Abbot. I’m not planning to crash at your place, you’ve done enough for me today.”
“Right.” He nods, but there’s an edge to the word and it has you raising your brow.
“You told me to go inside, remember? Or is that not what you want anymore?” You tilt your head. “You know, for someone who was so adamant about me asking things properly, you seem to be struggling to do the same.”
He stays silent.
“What do you want?”
Nothing.
“Huh?”
Still nothing.
You shake your head, focusing back on your phone and booking that damn Uber, because you’ve just about had it with the events of today, and dealing with a manchild is not something you’re adding to the list.
You’re halfway through entering your details when the phone is suddenly snatched right out of your grip.
“What the hell?” You look up just as Abbot slides it straight into his back pocket.
“I can’t tell you what I want, because then I won’t be able to take it back.”
“Well, that sounds like a you problem,” you shoot back, stepping towards him, reaching for your phone.
He takes a step back.
“Give it back.”
“No.”
You roll your eyes. “You’re absolutely insane.”
“And you’re not listening to me.”
“Oh, I’m listening. Loud and clear. You don’t know what you want, you won’t say what you want, and apparently now I’m being held hostage because of it.”
“That’s not what’s happening.”
“Okay,” you scoff. “Well, enjoy whatever this is.” You gesture vaguely between the two of you. “I’ll just walk home.”
His expression shifts, like he doesn’t believe you, like you’ve just told him something mildly ridiculous…which you have…because there’s no chance in hell you’re actually walking back.
“You’re not walking.”
“Watch me.”
You turn away from him, but you don’t even make it half a step before his hand closes around your wrist. You barely get a second to react before he’s pulling you to him, your spine lining up flush against his front.
“Quit being such a brat,” he scolds, breath hot against your ear, his hands settling at your hips to keep you there, his groin pressed firmly against your ass.
You buck into him out of instinct. “I am not—”
One of his hands reaches for the slit of your dress, his bare fingers tracing up your thigh, slowly, like he’s giving you every chance to stop him.
You don’t. Obviously.
“You are,” he repeats, voice threading through you. “Threatening to walk out just to see if I’ll stop you.”
You let out a quiet breath, something halfway between a scoff and something far less convincing. “I don’t need you to stop me.”
His hand stills, high on your thigh now, thumb pressing in like he’s testing the truth of that. “No?”
“No.”
His grip tightens on your hip, enough to pull you back into him again, closer, if that’s even possible. “Then go.” His words don’t match what he’s doing.
You don’t move.
Not even an inch.
His thumb traces inward along your thigh absentmindedly, while your heart knocks behind your ribs.
“Funny. Could’ve sworn you were in a rush.”
You swallow, your fingers curling useless at your sides, like they’re waiting for instructions you’re not giving. “I was.”
“Yeah?” His nose brushes along your jaw. “What happened?”
“Y-you’re in the way.”
“Am I?” His hand drifts higher, the tops of his knuckles brushing along the damp spot of your panties.
Your head tips back before you can stop it.
“That doesn’t look like I’m in your way,” he murmurs, something faintly mocking tucked into it.
You exhale, shaky, annoyed at him, at yourself, at your entire nervous system. “You’re very confident for someone who didn’t even know what he wanted five minutes ago.”
“I know what I want,” he assures you. “I just don’t think we’d be able to go back from it.”
“So let’s not,” you argue weakly. You can hear it yourself, how desperate it sounds, how little conviction there is behind it. “This is just a one-off. We can pretend this never happened tomorrow.”
“Is that something you can do? Because I don’t think I can.”
“Yes, you can,” you breathe, pressing your ass into him. “I can,” you add quickly, which is actually just a bold-faced lie. You don’t think you can ever come back from this, not really—but you’d try, you would, if it meant his hand would keep inching higher instead of stopping where it is.
“Yeah?” he murmurs into your neck.
“Yes—please. I’ll even move to the day shift,” you say, half-delirious, as though that’s a completely normal bargaining chip to throw on the table. “We’ll never speak of this again.”
“Don’t do that,” he mutters, a hint of a smile in his voice now. “I need you on the night shift.” His hand finally shifts, thumb pressing against your clit through the fabric.
“Okay—okay, sorry—I’m sorry—” The words tumble out, rushed and barely coherent.
He presses a wet kiss just under your jaw, and a small, involuntary sound slips out of you in response.
“One off?” he asks in between the kisses, his voice humming against your skin.
“One off.”
His hand slips beneath the fabric, middle finger dragging through your folds, slow enough that you feel every inch of it. You can hear how wet you are—actually hear it—and feel it too, with how easily his thumb finds rhythm.
“Jesus, baby,” he breathes, the words half a laugh. “Have you been this worked up the whole day?”
You bite your lip down, unable to concentrate on anything other than the hot feeling pulling tighter in your stomach.
“I asked you a question.”
“Yes,” you hiss as he picks up the pace, making your knees buck, properly this time, your balance tipping forward before his other hand tightens at your hip, holding you in place like he anticipated it. The hard line of his cock presses into your ass, completely unignorable and more than enough to get drunk on.
“Whole day,” he repeats, like he’s piecing it all together. “Walking around like that…talking to me like nothing’s wrong. Is that why you needed that shower?”
You nod—once, then again, and again—your body answering for you, a little too eager to cooperate where your brain has checked out.
It gets worse the second he slips a finger in.
You’re that soaked that there's no resistance when he pumps it in and out of you, and you don’t manage to stop the strangled noise that slips out when he curls that same finger. Your breath doesn’t quite keep up. It stutters, trips over itself, your chest rising too fast, too shallow, like you’ve forgotten how to regulate something as basic as breathing.
Your back arches into him, your hand gripping his wrist out of desperation, and you feel it then—how saturated his wrist has gotten, slick with you, the mess of it not contained to just there but spread further down your thighs, probably all over your dress.
It's humiliating.
“Did you touch yourself in the shower?”
“N—” you start, which is ambitious of you, really, considering the circumstances.
“Liars don’t get to come,” he warns. “Did you touch yourself in there?”
“Yes.”
He tuts. “Dirty girl. I was out here trying to make sure everything was perfect for your family and you were getting yourself off in my shower.”
You want to argue with him. You really do. Something witty, something that would land clean and put you back on even ground. But there’s nothing. Nothing except your uneven breathing and pathetic whimpers you’re trying to swallow down.
“Did it feel as good as this?”
“No—fuck,” you bite out when he slips a second finger in, the stretch pulling the word straight from you. Your thighs press together out of the sheer intensity of him, but he doesn’t let that happen for long.
His foot comes in between yours, nudging them apart. “Don’t go shy on me now, baby. You still haven’t told me what you were thinking about in the car.”
Your walls clench around his fingers, pulling him in deeper, each curl pressing against that spongy spot that has you gasping for air. He thinks the fantasy in the car is the worst of it—or the shower—but he has no idea how many times you’ve thought about him like this. And feeling him get off on it too, the way his cock keeps chasing friction against you, is almost enough to tip you over on its own.
“Jack, please—” you beg, for what, you’re not sure.
“Say that again,” he breathes into your hair, voice catching slightly as he grinds into you again, pulling his fingers from inside you just to shift his attention to your swollen clit.
“Jack,” you mewl, and you hear the way he curses behind you, “I’m so c-close.”
“Yeah,” he pants, fingers picking up the pace. “Yeah, I can feel that.”
Your legs tremble, your whole body tightening, the pressure building too fast now, too much, your breath breaking completely as you clutch at him like that might hold you together. You feel his chest rise and fall against your back as he keeps bucking into you, steady in theory, less so in practise, his fingers falling into a messy pattern, too fucking slick with you to manage anything more coherent.
“M’gonna—fuck—Jack—”
“There you go. Just like that.”
He bites down on your neck and everything blurs, sound dropping out, thought following quickly behind it, your body trying to fold in on itself, like it doesn’t know where to put this feeling or how to contain it. Your thighs try to close again, tightening as your orgasm reaches its peak, your cunt pulsing through it, Abbot’s heavy breathing in your ear.
“Shit–” he exhales, his hand slowing against you, “—fuck.”
For a second, neither of you move.
Your body is still catching up, small aftershocks running through you, your grip on him loosening but not quite letting go, like you don’t trust your legs to do their job just yet.
“Shit.”
“Yes, you’ve already said that,” you whisper, leaning your head back against him as he caresses your thigh.
There’s a huff against your shoulder, an attempt at a laugh that clearly requires less energy than he actually has.
Neither of you really get the chance to come down though, because there’s a knock at the door.
You both still, unsure if either of you heard it right, until it sounds again.
“Who is that?” you ask, pulling yourself away from Abbot, your hands immediately going to your dress, smoothing it down.
“I don’t know—can you—” He pauses, shifting awkwardly behind you. “Can you get that?”
You turn to look at him, brows lifting. “Me?”
“Yes, you,” he mutters, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m not answering the door like this.”
“Like what?”
He just looks at you while you look down, lips pressing together like you’re trying very hard not to smile.
“…Right,” you concede, softer this time.
“Thank you,” he says, the sarcasm sitting heavy in it, as you tug your dress back into place and make your way towards the door.
You wipe at your forehead, still a little flushed, and swing the door open.
“Hey man—” the guy on the other side starts, stopping short when he realises who’s opened it. “Abbot around? My car won’t start and I’m late for my night shift—” he leans slightly past you, like he expects to see him.
“Uh yeah, he’s…”
You don’t even need to turn to know he’s there now.
“Yeah,” Abbot calls, voice steadier than it has any right to be. “What’s up?”
“Oh man—I didn’t mean to interrupt anything,” the guy says, glancing between the two of you, something faintly amused flickering across his face.
And only when Abbot steps up beside you, do you realise what the guy means.
He’s now shirtless, using the black skimpy t-shirt as a cover across his groin, like that somehow makes things less obvious.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Think the battery’s dead,” the guy explains, scratching the back of his neck. “It just won’t turn over.”
“Alright,” Abbot nods, dragging a hand through his hair before glancing down at himself, very briefly, like he’s just remembered. “Give me a second.”
“Yeah, yeah, no problem at all, dude. I’ll wait outside.”
You close the door, not fully, but enough to block your conversation from prying ears.
“...I’ll book that Uber now… if I can have my phone?” You hold your hand out expectantly.
There’s a pause.
“...Right.”
You raise your brows, just as he pulls your phone out from his back pocket, placing it in your palm slowly.
“You could stay,” he suggests hesitantly, because he knows better.
Your fingers close around the device. “That’s not what we agreed on, remember?” you reply, trying to keep your tone light. “It’s a one off.”
Something shifts in his expression, and you feel the slight drop in your stomach, like something’s been pulled out from under you just as quickly as it appeared.
“Yeah…One off.”
You nod like that’s the end of it, pretending you’re not feeling a little hollow. “Take your time,” you add, stepping back. “I’ll let myself out.”
He stays where he is for a moment, just watching you, before he finally reaches for the door, leaving you standing in his home, probably for the last time.
And you already hate this arrangement, this promise you both talked yourselves into, because it doesn’t feel like a ‘one off.’ Not when your body still feels like his hands are on it, not when you can still smell him on your skin, not when you’re still standing here in his space—thinking about how easily he asked you to stay.
Synopsis: Shen needs saving, you're sleep deprived and suffering an unrequited crush, and Abbot wishes he had never asked.
Notes: reader and shen are reaching critical, sleep deprivation induced levels of stupidity during the first part of this fic. Jack is kind of messy in this, flirting with reader while thinking she's in a relationship. writing for this man stresses me so much. sorta kinda proofread.
"Who do you think I'm going to have to blow to get two separate people to cover the weekend shift next week?"
You're too tired to be embarrassed by the snort that leaves your body when you laugh at Shen's question.
It's two hours from end of shift and you're bordering on delirious. You're not sure what it is about tonight, but it has drained every ounce of energy you walked in with.
Shen is leaning against the counter behind your computer, chewing on the plastic straw of his long gone iced coffee while he stares wistfully at next weeks calendar.
"Just blowing someone might not cover it," You giggle. "You might have to go full wine and dine if you want two people covering on a holiday weekend."
"Why do you need two people to cover one shift?"
That wakes you up immediately.
You somehow failed to notice Abbot walk up behind you, now standing so close you can feel the his heat radiating against your back.
It would usually be a comforting feeling, the thing you think about to fall asleep at night. But right now, the heat rushing to your cheeks has nothing to do with a crush and everything to do with being caught.
The night shift keeps a fairly open policy, but as much as you all love him, at the end of the day Abbot isyour boss, so there are a select few things that are kept from him for the good of everybody. And one of those things is the very secret relationship between Shen and Javadi. There's nothing in the hospital rules saying they can't date, but life is a bit easier for everyone when the general surgery consult isn't the mother of your fellow attending's much younger girlfriend.
"What're you talking about?" Shen asks, faking confusion so well you're not actually sure if it is entirely faked.
"You just said you need two people to cover your shift this weekend," Abbot repeats. "Just because you're an attending now doesn't mean two doctors need to cover you."
"Oh, right," Shen nods. "It's just that I'm taking my girlfriend home to meet my parents this weekend."
He shoots you a look that makes it seem like he thinks that explanation somehow saved his ass.
"You're dating someone in the ER?" Abbot asks, sounding uncharacteristically scandalized.
If you weren't currently stuck between Abbot and the desk, you'd be making a very swift exit right now.
"Who told you?"
"You just did," You can already imagine the look on Abbot's face right now; brows furrowed, eyes squinting, mouth slightly open as he wonders how hard Shen must've hit his head before this conversation. "You're taking your girlfriend home for the weekend and you need two separate shifts covered. That means that whoever your girlfriend is, works here."
If only this shift had dulled Abbot mind as much as it had yours and Shen's.
"Yup," You blurt out, far too quickly and loudly. "She does work here, because she is… me."
What the absolute fuck is wrong with you.
You could've thrown out a completely made up name, said they were a nurse from day shift that Abbot's never met, but no, you said me.
"Yep," Shen clears his throat, looking at you like you've grown three heads. "We've been seeing each other for while, decided to keep it on the down-low so work didn't get awkward."
"You've been seeing each other?" Abbot asks, his tone giving away nothing, but you're too scared to turn around and face him. His gaze is so heavy on the back of your neck it feels like you're sinking.
"Yeah." You nod.
"Uh-huh." Shen nods back, and you can see him fighting a smile.
"Were you every going to mention this to me? Because I don't know if you guys have forgotten, but I am your boss."
At that you frown. Abbot almost never pulls the boss card on you guys, even when he probably should.
"Technically you're only her boss," Shen clarifies, pointing down at you. "But I get what you mean."
You want to stab him with a scalpel for throwing you under the bus, but good fake girlfriends don't stab their fake boyfriends while lying to their boss.
"John wanted to keep it a secret so I wouldn't be treated differently," Your turn slowly, peering up at Abbot through your lashes in a way you hope makes you seem too sweet to be reprimanded. "We've seen it happen before, a woman starts dating a coworker and suddenly they're not a fellow doctor anymore, just someone's girlfriend."
True as they are, they're not your words, they're Javadi's. It's the exact explanation she'd given you when you'd caught her car in the parking lot of Shen's apartment complex. You like to think you work with good people, but especially as a med student, respect as a female doctor is hard to earn.
Abbot's head jerks at your words, almost like you've slapped him. He doesn't say anything for a moment, just stares into your eyes, clearly searching for something and not finding it.
"Okay," He nods, suddenly unable to meet your eyes. "Cool. Just make sure you run everything by HR, I don't want any kind of legal drama getting in the way of, y'know, saving lives."
Abbot walks away before either of you can say anything else.
"I'm so sorry," You turn back to Shen, mortification clear on your face. "Why did I do that?!"
"I was just about to ask," He laughs. "You kind of saved my ass though."
"Kind of?" You scoff. "I just lied straight to Abbot's face about being your girlfriend."
The words taste sour in your mouth. You have never lied to Abbot, like ever. He's one of the few people you've seen on a regular bases for the past four years. You talk to each other about almost anything, and you'd like the think that makes you at least friends—even if you wish it could be more.
A lie this big and stupid isn't going to last long, not when Abbot knows the two of you so well.
"That's true," Shen says, seeming already over the drama of the situation. "Let me pay you back. What do you want?"
"Pay me back?" You laugh. "What, like I'm a hooker?"
"A hooker who's also a kick-ass emergency medicine doctor."
"You're sick in the head." You let out an incredulous laugh.
"Seriously though, what do you want?"
You think for a moment, fiddling with the worn edge of your badge.
"Your Costco membership," You settle. "Whenever, wherever. You will go shopping with me every time, and buy me the occasional piece of pizza when the mood strikes me."
"That's it?" He asks, seemingly underwhelmed. "I expected worse."
"I'm going easy on you."
"I'll take it."
An entire week passes before Abbot brings it up again.
You're less than sixty seconds post code, still gowned and gloved as you watch the patient be rolled to the ICU.
"Did you genuinely think I would treat you differently?"
Abbot is standing in front of you, jaw clenched, posture tense, eyes completely unreadable.
You're confused until you remember the intricate lie you'd caught yourself in. According to him, you're supposed to leave for spend a romantic weekend getaway with Shen and his parents tomorrow. If only he knew you'd be spending the entire weekend third wheeling him and Javadi.
"It wasn't you specifically, it was everybody, and god knows the nurses are always listening." You try to laugh it off, but it falls flat. "You're a good guy, Abbot. I know you'd treat me the same, and I'm sorry if us keeping it a secret hurt you."
And I'm especially sorry about the fact that I'm still lying to you.
"You're one of the best doctors in this place," He says, so obviously avoiding addressing your apology it hurts. "If anyone let something as stupid as a relationship blind them to that, they're not worth your time."
"Thank you, Abbot." You offer him a weak smile.
"I'm sorry if I'm overstepping, but Shen is a coward for keeping you hidden," Jack takes a couple steps forward, crowding you so he's the only thing you can register. "You deserve someone who's proud to be yours, who's not afraid of having to put a couple people in their place so you can get the respect you deserve."
You're not sure you can breathe.
"Jack…"
"GSW to the chest, two minutes out."
He's out the door in a blink.
"Hey, sister wife."
Victoria is sitting in the passenger seat of John's car, window rolled down and her chin propped up on her hand as she watches you exit your apartment building with a teasing smile.
In a shocking turn of events, she had found the entire panicked coverup hilarious.
"You're the worst," You laugh, collapsing into the backseat. "I just want to get this weekend over with."
"You're not excited to be reunited with Mama and Papa Shen?" John asks, watching you in the rear view mirror.
"I, for one, am really glad you're coming," Victoria says, turning in her seat look at you like a kicked puppy. "You being there will take some of the attention off of me."
"They're going to love you, Victoria," You assure with a hand on her shoulder. "I promise."
She turns back in her seat, and you can't fight the smile on your face when you see John reach for her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
You look away when you feel your phone buzz in your purse.
I think one of your sweaters is in my truck.
It's from Abbot.
Which one?
You can't think of any sweaters missing from your closet, but who knows.
It's dark green.
Just looks like a regular hoodie
You shake your head.
Your attention to detail is astounding.
It's probably mine, but are you telling me you don't spend your days off going on dates with beautiful women who leave carefully forgotten sweaters in your car so you'll call again?
It's meant to be a joke, a call back to a dating coach you two had treated during a shift a million years ago, but his response knocks the air out of your lungs.
You're the only beautiful woman who's ever in my car.
"I never should've said any of that to you."
You're both in the alleyway behind the bar, a bit drunk and both desperately to breathe air the doesn't reek of booze and cigarettes.
Abbot is leaning against the back of the building, arms crossed like a bouncer just waiting to catch someone with a fake ID. You're in front of him, kicking a pebble around in circles so you don't stare at how good his arms look in a black t-shirt.
"What're you talking about?" You remember it so clearly; the smell of his cologne, the mint on his breath from the gum he'd been chewing when he'd cornered you in the trauma room. The text he'd sent the next morning
You deserve someone who's proud to be yours. You're the only beautiful woman who's ever in my car.
"What I said to you in the trauma room, and then that text," Jack says, crushing your hopes that he'd just drop it. "I was out of line, way out of line."
"It's okay."
You're obviously not going to tell him this, but those moment had been playing on a loop in your mind every day since. You'd never seen him look at you like that before, or even talk to you like that.
"No it's not. You're with Shen, and—"
"I'm serious, Jack. It's fine."
"But it's not—"
"Jack, you don't need to say anything."
"Can you just let me apologize?"
"No," You can't control the way the words burst out of you. "There's nothing to apologize for because I'm not with Shen!"
The noise of the city seems to quiet the moment the words exit your mouth, leaving you in a painful silence with Abbot staring holes through you.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that we've been lying to you," You say, a bit braver with the alcohol in your system. "Shen and I are—and have only ever been—friends. It was a lie."
"You expect me to believe that?" Jack asks. "He took you home to meet his parents!"
"He took Javadi home to meet his parents!" You blurt out. "They've been sneaking around for months. I fell on the sword for them so Javadi's parents wouldn't find out, and John wouldn't receive a reprimand for screwing a med student. I spent that entire weekend third wheeling them, and thinking about how terrible it makes me feel to lie to you."
The truth hangs heavy in the air, but you're the lightest you've felt in months.
Jack is only staring at you, hands braced on his hips as the many stages of grief seem to run through his system at once.
"You're not with Shen?" He clarifies, taking a step towards you. "In any capacity?"
"None whatsoever," You nod. "Unless you consider me using this to blackmail him into giving me free use of his Costco membership "together'."
"Shen is with Javadi?" He asks again, taking another step forward that puts the two of you toe to toe. "And not with you?"
"Do you need to see it in writing?" You tease, but your voice wavers. "We're not together."
"You're single." It's not a question anymore, it's a fact. "Completely and utterly unattached to any man."
No, because I've been in love with you since we met.
"Yes."
He nods. Once. Twice. You're so close together your foreheads almost bump with each frantic jerk.
"Thank fucking Christ."
His lips are on yours before you can even form a proper thought, hands grasping desperately at whatever part of you they can reach. One at your waist, clutching at the fabric of your shirt, and the other buried in your hair, keeping you right where he wants you.
It's overwhelming in the perfect way. Everything is him, the feel of his hands, the taste of his tongue in your mouth, the smell of his cologne mixed with the scent of his skin that you could only describe as purely Jack.
He nips at your bottom lip, pulling it with his teeth as he disconnects from the kiss entirely. A handful of quick kisses are pressed to your face, your nose, both cheeks, your chin, the spot between your brows that always creases when you're mad. It's as if he's following a map, a route he carefully planned out years ago that he's just been waiting for the opportunity to take.
"Jack," You murmur, and he presses another kiss to your lips. "What're you doing?"
"You want me to stop?" He asks, lips wandering down from your chin to your jaw. "I can stop."
"No," You breathe out, a moan half caught in your throat. "But I'm a bit—fuck—confused."
He sucks a mark against the spot just below your ear that makes your knees weak, but he's there to keep you stable, a hand sneaking below your shirt to press against the bare skin of your back.
"What's there to be confused about?" He asks, pulling back to look at you with a small frown.
"You treat me like I'm just a friend, all the time, and then you think Shen and I are together and suddenly your—" You cut yourself off with a sigh. "I'm in no way upset about… whatever is happening right now, but from my perspective it's just doesn't make sense."
"Doesn't make sense?" He repeats with an laugh. "You are the thing that gets me out of bed in the morning. I spend every precious moment of downtime on shift talking to you, watching you, thinking about you. I memorized your glove size on your first shift, I do everything I can to keep you away from young patients in critical condition because I hate how upset they make you, and even more than that, I hate that there's nothing I can to to keep you away from everything bad in that place while respecting the fact that you chose to be there. Everything tiny thing I do in a day, I do thinking about you."
You suddenly feel light headed, as if the ground has been taken out from beneath your feet and everything tipped upside down.
"Were you ever going to say something?" It's the only thing you can think to ask.
"It never seemed like the right thing to do," He admits, wiping the tear you hadn't even noticed slip from your eye. "You're always working so hard to be the best doctor you can be, I didn't want to get in the way of that, not when I know how important this job is to you. And when I thought you were with Shen, you seemed happy, y'know? I would be an asshole to tell you then, because I would be doing it selfishly, not because I thought it was what you wanted."
"Even if you thought I'd be happier with you?"
"I know you'd be happier with me," He strokes a thumb over your cheekbone, a small smile tugging at his lips. "But that's not the point."
"We're both so stupid," You shake your head. "I've been embarrassingly in love with you for years, but for some reason I thought you'd never see me that way."
"It's the only way I've ever seen you," He whispers it like it's a secret meant only for you. "You were so brilliant from day one, I just wanted to be in your life in whatever way you'd have me."
"You should've said something," You let out a wet laugh, untangling your fingers from his shirt to wipe the tears from your face. "It would've saved us a lot of trouble."
"I don't mind taking the scenic route," He jokes, pressing another chaste kiss to your lips. "Especially if it leads to this."
Katsuki’s attention slides from the television screen, back to your face. You don’t miss the way subtle way his gaze traces your kiss-swollen lips before his eyes find yours.
“Do what?” he asks gruffly, brow raised even as he’s already leaning back in, hand sliding along your jaw to cup your cheek.
“That,” you say against the pad of the thumb that’s pressed to your bottom lip.
He drags his thumb to the corner of your mouth, hooks it there for a beat before cupping your face with both hands.
His lips are warm when they meet yours. The press of them is soft. He nips at your lip before muttering against your mouth, “Kiss you?”
Katsuki’s nose slots against the side of yours, and he kisses you again.
“You always hold my face,” you tell him.
Thumbs stroke your cheeks, a caress so soft for hands like his. He huffs, his pointer finger nestling in behind your earlobe. Sometimes you wonder if anyone would believe how affectionate Bakugou Katsuki is.
“And?” he breathes out, the tender way he’s holding you and the slant of his mouth over yours entirely at odds with the unconvincing thread of annoyance laced in his tone.
“It’s cute,” you tell him, the corners of your mouth tipping upward into a grin.
The couch cushions press into your shoulder blades as Katsuki eases you downward, climbs on top of you, eyes never leaving yours.
“Cute?” he parrots, like he’s not still cupping your face like a porcelain teacup.
You shrug, turning your head to the side just enough to kiss his thumb, letting it slip in past the seam of your mouth. He exhales.
“Are you complaining?” he asks.
You smile, and then you bite down. Gently. Your tongue flicks against the tip.
Katsuki groans, and he takes his time sliding his thumb over the slick, smooth surface of your teeth before he leans in, lips crashing back into yours.
𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 5.7k
𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: johnny storm x fem!reader
𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: fluff
𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: He's met every hero in New York. Still, none have vanished on him quite so frustratingly—or so fascinatingly—as the mysterious, lightning-fast vigilante saving the city without any of the credit. Now, if he could just get you to stop running long enough to ask you out, that'd be great.
: ̗̀➛ 𝐧𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐠𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 / 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐥 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 / 𝐢𝐧𝐛𝐨𝐱
𝐚/𝐧: i won't lie i don't even know if the fantastic four do patrols but for the sake of this fic they do, might write a part II depending on engagement
New York City is lousy with heroes. Johnny Storm could’ve written the damn directory, complete with snarky footnotes on who hogs the pizza after a brawl and who’s a total diva in a firefight. He’d traded punches with thunder gods, riffed with billionaires in clanking iron suits, and once watched a web-slinger swing off with his last chimichanga. You see a lot of weird before your first cup of coffee in this line of work. You learn to roll with it.
He was on a lazy patrol, the kind that was more about the feeling of flight than any actual crime-fighting. He was painting the sky with his exhaust, a lazy cursive script of smoke and flame, letting the city’s chaotic symphony wash over him—a relentless blend of sirens, cab horns, distant shouts, and the perennial, gravel-voiced prophet on 45th forever yelling about the end times. It was white noise, a lullaby he knew by heart.
Then he saw it. A flicker of wrongness. Not the loud, obvious wrongness of a bank heist, but a subtle, silent tear in the fabric of a grimy alleyway below. It was a predator’s stillness where there should be frantic motion. Instinct cut his thrusters before his brain had fully processed it.
The Human Torch hung in the air, a silent star, and looked down.
And saw a ghost. Or an angel. Or maybe the most beautiful collision of both he could ever imagine.
It was over in a heartbeat, a masterclass in brutal efficiency. One second, some lowlife built like a fridge was winding up to redecorate the pavement with some scrawny kid’s face. The next, the world snapped into fast-forward. The punch was caught in a grip that didn't just stop it, but seemed to absorb its energy. The kid was suddenly ten feet away, shoved to safety with a gentle precision that defied the scene's violence. The would-be thug was spun around with such effortless torque that he pirouetted like a dog chasing its own tail, utterly bewildered before he even felt the pain.
The figure at the centre of it all was a blur of shadow and grace. Dark fabric whipping around a form of lethal elegance, every movement so fluid and economical it made Spider-Man’s acrobatics look like a vaudeville act. A phantom limb here, a shift of weight there—a perfect, violent dance.
No gaudy branding. No quippy one-liners. No noise at all. Just… devastating, impossible perfection.
And then, as if the universe had simply deleted the frame, poof. Vanished. The alley was just an alley again, leaving only a dazed criminal and a saved kid blinking in the sudden stillness.
Johnny’s jaw was practically unhinged. He could feel the cool city air whistling over his teeth. A slow, goofy, utterly dumbstruck smile spread across his face, a complete contrast to the fiery corona that wreathed his head.
“Well,” he muttered to himself, the sound a whisper swallowed by the hum of his own power. He dipped lower, as if he could find a trace of in the empty air. “Hello, mystery girl.”
The city, for the first time in years, had just gotten a whole lot bigger. And a whole lot more interesting.
Then it happened again. And again. And again.
It was never on the news. Never in the patrolled sectors. It was in the blurry, peripheral corners of the city he usually only flew over.
A bank robbery downtown—not the fancy Vault on 5th, but a grimy branch tucked between a bodega and a pawn shop. Silent alarms were tripped, glass was shattered by the butt of a rifle, and then you were just there. A streak of shadow and impossible motion in the security footage he’d later badger the cops for, placing yourself between the gunmen and the huddled hostages with a terrifying, silent certainty.
A collapsing scaffold in Midtown—the groan of overstressed steel a split-second before the screams ripped through the air. Johnny was three blocks away, but he saw the cloud of dust billow up. He shot toward it, a comet of panic, only to arrive and find it… over. Workers were standing dazed on the sidewalk, coughing in the chalky air, pointing at a blur of colour they couldn’t describe. You’d yanked them clear, not a moment to spare, before the first girder had even finished its deadly sigh toward the pavement.
Then the runaway subway car on the 7 line (seriously, who even had that kind of bad luck?). The brakes were screeching a metallic, dying animal wail that echoed up through the grates. He’d dove down the tunnel entrance, lighting the dank darkness with his own fire, and for a single, heart-stopping half-heartbeat, he saw you. Not a blur. You. Planted on the roof of the careening machine, boots skidding against the steel as you fought for purchase, a silhouette of defiant grace against the storm of sparks flying from the wheels. Then you were gone, vanished into a service hatch or a shadow—he couldn’t tell, the tunnel swallowing the evidence whole.
Every time, he’d touch down, his flames guttering out at his feet with a frustrated hiss. His pulse would be hammering, a wild, frantic rhythm that had nothing to do with the adrenaline of a fight and everything to do with the chase. The thrill of the almost-catch.
And every time, he was left with nothing but the aftermath. Startled civilians babbling about a "streak" or a "gust of wind." Groaning criminals zip-tied by cops, complaining about a "ghost" that dislocated their shoulders. The evidence was always the same: frustratingly ethereal. A scuff mark on the asphalt too precise, too angled to be random. A gust of wind down in the subway that smelled of rain and concrete, but didn't match the stagnant, oily air. The lingering, electric scent of ozone—or was that just his own superheated imagination begging for a clue?
And every damn time, you slipped through his fingers like smoke.
It was exhilarating. It was intriguing.
It was completely and utterly maddening.
Johnny Storm, the man who’d faced down alien warlords and lived to crack jokes about it on late-night TV, was now this close to dedicating a spreadsheet to petty crime scenes. He was considering a personal, one-man stakeout operation that would make even the most paranoid SHIELD agent blush.
It was becoming a problem. A noticeable one.
Sue had started giving him the look over her morning coffee—a specific blend of older-sister suspicion and psychic-wife concern that could curdle milk. “You’re quiet,” she’d said that morning, the words a carefully laid trap. “Everything okay?” Reed, ever the oblivious genius, had asked him—twice—if his increased patrol frequency was “for a new set of observational data on metropolitan crisis response.” (Which, rude. And also, a little too on the nose.) Even Ben had gruffly pointed out over a game of poker that Johnny was “mopin’ around the tower like a kid who lost his favourite toy,” which was both insultingly accurate and a clear fold on Ben’s part.
But the worst part? The absolute, most humiliating kicker?
He dreamed about it.
Not the noble, heroic saves. Not the grateful faces of civilians. His subconscious, it seemed, was far less altruistic. It was all sensation: the heat of his own flames licking against his skin, the wind screaming a single, endless note in his ears. A chase, frantic and endless, through a cityscape of melting steel and glass. And a laugh—a laugh he’d never even heard, but his dream-mind had conjured one for you anyway—light and sharp and echoing, always just a half-second out of reach.
He’d wake up with his sheets tangled into a sweaty knot, his chest heaving like he’d just run a marathon, and his stupid, traitorous brain already whispering the same addictive promise: Next time. Next time you’ll catch her.
And the absolute, gut-punching truth of it is simple: he isn’t used to being the one left in the dust.
He’s the Human Torch, for crying out loud—speed, charm, and a flair for the dramatic so bright it could power Times Square are his entire brand. He’s the guy who makes grand entrances through skylights, who leaves crowds gaping and cameras flashing, who turns heads on five continents without even trying. He’s fire incarnate—literally—and the world has never been shy about watching him burn. He’s the spectacle. The main event.
But you? You don’t even stick around for the opening act. You don’t wait for the applause. You don't even seem to realize there's an audience. He could be hovering right there, flames dancing, ready to deliver a perfectly crafted quip, and you’d be gone before the first syllable left his lips. Poof. Leaving him talking to an empty alley, the echo of his own voice feeling stupid and hollow.
And it is absolutely, one hundred percent, killing him.
Because Johnny Storm can’t stop thinking about you.
It’s an obsession that’s taken root deep in his ribs, a constant, buzzing hum under his skin. It isn’t just the way you move—though god, the way you move—like gravity’s a mild suggestion you occasionally deign to follow, like the air itself parts for you just to keep from being rude. It isn’t just the maddening glimpse of your face he’s caught: the way his stupid, perfect memory has seared the image of how your eyes must crinkle at the corners when you smile (he’s seen it, once, a flash of warm, unguarded light in the split-second before you edited yourself out of existence).
No, it’s the profound, infuriating, utterly captivating mystery of you. The way you operate with a quiet competence that doesn't need a spotlight to validate it. The way you save people and vanish, not as a dramatic exit, but as a simple conclusion. Like the act of kindness itself is the entire point, something to be left behind like a found coin, with no expectation of reward. Like you’re completely, breathtakingly unaware of how extraordinary you are.
And for a guy who’s built his entire life on being seen, Johnny has never been so completely blindsided by someone who chooses to remain unseen.
Sure, he knows what you look like—or, at least, his brain has helpfully catalogued the most vital, distracting parts in high definition. The flash of your eyes, sharp and assessing even in the deep shadow of an alley. The way the corner of your mouth quirks up, a silent, private joke right before you bolt, leaving him with just the ghost of a smile. The specific, infuriatingly graceful way your hips tilt when you brace for a fight—a center of gravity that defies physics and, frankly, his ability to form coherent thought. Not that he’s paying specific attention. It’s purely tactical. Obviously.
But what is he gonna do with that? Canvas every single bodega in the five boroughs, leaning over counters smelling of stale coffee and beef patties, asking if they’ve seen a “devastatingly hot, impossibly fast, probably morally ambiguous person” buying protein bars and a side of sarcasm?
(He did, actually. Last Tuesday. Old Man Martinez in his favorite Queens haunt just wiped down the counter with a tired sigh and said, “Storm, mijo, that describes half my customers after midnight—and also, God help me, you.” It was a blow to both his ego and his investigation.)
He tries asking around. What’s the point of having a super-powered Rolodex if you can’t abuse it for personal obsessions?
It goes a little something like this:
First attempt: Peter Parker, found—of course—messing around. He’s swinging lazy, insolent figure-eights around the spire of the Chrysler Building, hanging upside down like the smug little shit he is, his reflection a distorted clown smile in the polished chrome.
"Dude, I told you, no one knows who she is," Peter says, the smirk in his voice infuriatingly audible even over the midtown traffic roar. He gives an extra little bounce on his web. "Face it, man—you’ve been demoted to damsel in distress."
Johnny, hovering with his arms crossed, feels a spark fizzle at his temple. He flips him off, a brilliant, fiery middle finger that sizzles in the afternoon air. It’s a very controlled, very mature display of restraint. "I just want to thank her. It's a professional courtesy."
Peter drops, landing light as a cat on the narrow ledge beside him, folding his arms in a perfect mirror of Johnny’s stance. "Uh-huh. And by ‘thank her,’ you mean…?"
"Shut up."
"Because if you are looking for tips on how to woo a masked vigilante—a subject in which I, sadly, have a PhD—the first lesson is not to spontaneously combust when they're within ten feet of you. It's generally considered a third-date milestone."
A tiny, embarrassed flame pops on Johnny’s shoulder. "I will light every single one of your webs on fire. I swear to god, Parker."
Peter holds up his hands in mock surrender, but the shit-eating grin under his mask is practically a physical force. "Message received, Matchstick. My lips are sealed. But my eyes? Are watching. This is better than reality TV."
Second attempt: Matt Murdock, because apparently lawyers know things, and this one specializes in the weird. Johnny finds him in the corner booth of the dive bar Matt insists is the best place to "talk shop." The air is thick with the smell of stale beer, fried onions, and the faint, metallic tang of old blood from a backroom fight that definitely didn’t happen. A single, flickering fluorescent light overhead does no one any favors.
"You’re telling me," Johnny presses, leaning so far across the sticky table he risks welding himself to it, "that you literally have super senses that can, like, hear a tear drop in Jersey, and you’ve never heard her heartbeat? Her breathing? The swish of her… I don’t know, morally ambiguous fabric? Nothing?"
Matt doesn't look at him. He never does. He just takes a slow, deliberate sip of his whiskey, the glass making a soft clink against the table. "I hear a lot of things, Mr. Storm," he says, his voice a low, calm rumble that seems to absorb the bar's chaos. "The city is a very loud place. It doesn't mean I catalogue them. And it certainly doesn't mean I share them."
Johnny’s eyes widen, a spark of hope—or desperation—igniting in his chest. The Formica tabletop under his elbows begins to heat up, releasing a faint, plastic-y odor. "Oh my god. You do know something. You’ve heard her. What is it? Is it fast? Slow? Does it sound like… I don’t know, a hummingbird? A ghost? Tell me!"
Matt’s head tilts a fraction of an inch. A faint, almost imperceptible smile touches his lips. "I know you’re about to get us kicked out of here if you don’t stop literally smoldering. You’re warping the vinyl."
Johnny slumps back in the squeaky booth with a frustrated groan, crossing his arms. A small, charred handprint is left behind on the table.
Third (and most desperate) attempt: A very unimpressed Felicia Hardy, who is, inconveniently, in the middle of liberating a ridiculously gaudy necklace from a high-tech wall safe in a penthouse that smells like old money and regret.
Johnny phases through the glass ceiling, a shower of molten droplets crystallizing at his feet. “Okay, listen, I need a female perspec—”
He doesn’t even get to finish his sentence. A throwing knife embeds itself in the wall an inch from his ear, vibrating with a lethal thwump. It’s not a warning shot; it’s punctuation.
"No."
"I didn’t even ask yet—" he splutters, the heat around him flaring in surprise.
"You’re bothering me," she says, not even looking up from the delicate lockpicking tool in her hand. The only sign of her annoyance is the subtle, irritated flick of her white ponytail. "And if I did know your little ghost—which I don’t, we don’t have a newsletter—I’d tell her to run faster. And maybe invest in some pepper spray. The fancy kind."
Johnny throws his hands up in exasperation, sending a cascade of sparks across the priceless Persian rug. A small, smoldering hole appears. "Why does everyone act like I’m the weird one here?! I’m just trying to find a… a colleague!"
Felicia finally pauses her work, turning just enough to fix him with a look of such profound, bone-deep disdain it could freeze the sun. She raises one perfectly sculpted eyebrow, her gaze flicking from his frantic expression to the new burn on the rug.
"Because you are," she states, her voice flat and final as a judge’s gavel. She turns back to the safe. "Now either make yourself useful and melt this thing, or leave me alone."
The more he almost sees you—the more you haunt the edges of his vision like a beautiful, frustrating phantom—the more it solidifies from a curiosity into a full-blown personal mission. It’s a quest, and he’s the knight errant, if the knight errant occasionally set his own cape on fire from nervous energy.
He starts taking longer, more aimless patrols, charting a flight path that loosely maps to the ghost of your appearances. He lingers in the grimy, graffiti-tagged parts of the city you seem to favor, perched on rusty fire escapes and loitering in damp alleyways that smell of garbage and damp concrete. He is, for all intents and purposes, behaving like a lovesick gargoyle with a pilot’s license. He tells himself, with the conviction of a man clinging to a very flimsy raft, that it’s totally about the professional thrill of the chase. (It is so very, very not.)
Sue, of course, sees right through him. She teases him mercilessly, a gleam in her eye that promises this will be held over his head for decades.
"Earth to Johnny," she says one evening at the kitchen island, snapping her fingers in front of his glazed-over eyes. He’d been staring at a fork for a solid minute, imagining it was a throwing knife. "You’re doing that thing again. For the third time this week."
"What thing?" he mumbles, trying to blink back into the reality where cutlery is just cutlery.
"The thing," she insists, leaning in with a wicked grin, "where you stare into the middle distance like you’re on the cover of a cheap romance novel. All you need is a billowy shirt and a heaving bosom."
Johnny sputters, a protest dying on his lips as a traitorous flush creeps up his neck, setting his ears on fire. Guilty as charged. So, so charged.
He can’t help it. His brain is a broken record, and the only song it plays is you.
Because the thing is—you aren’t just fast. You’re clever. Devastatingly, infuriatingly so.
The few times he’s gotten close—so close he can count the individual threads on your mask, so close he catches the wicked glint of your smirk in the moonlight, the way your breath hitches in a tiny, surprised gasp when he finally, finally almost corners you against a brick wall—you don’t just run. You evaporate. A shadow melting into a deeper shadow, a whisper lost in the city’s roar. You slip away like smoke, like this is all just an exquisite, tantalizing game only you know the rules to.
And damn if that doesn’t make him want to play even harder. To learn the rules, to beat you at your own game, to see that smirk turn into a real, full-blown smile meant just for him.
Who are you?
And more importantly—a question that keeps him up at night, staring at his ceiling—how the hell is he supposed to impress you when you won’t even stick around long enough for him to launch into his opening number?
He even—against every single one of his better judgments and a deep, survivalist instinct for self-preservation—considers asking Reed for help.
Because, okay, fine. Maybe he’s hit a new tier of desperate. But Reed’s a certified super-genius, right? A man who thinks in calculus and sees the world as a series of solvable equations. If anyone on the planet can crack the encrypted, beautiful mystery of you, it’s him.
It is, of course, a Big. Colossal. Mistake.
"Absolutely not," Reed states, his voice the flat, calm tone of someone stating a fundamental law of the universe. He doesn’t even look up from his latest experiment—a complex, glowing, gyroscopically spinning thingamajig that looks like it could either solve world hunger or accidentally turn them all into sentient raspberry jelly. (Johnny’s learned, through several traumatic experiences, not to ask.)
"It’s not stalking," Johnny protests, vaulting over a stack of unstable-looking textbooks to lean precariously over the cluttered workbench. He adopts what he hopes is a convincing expression of scholarly curiosity. It probably looks like he has indigestion. "It’s… a form of field-based, interdisciplinary study. Investigative admiration."
Reed finally glances up, his focus reluctantly shifting from quantum mechanics to the human disaster in his lab. One eyebrow arches so high on his forehead it might as well be in orbit. "That’s not a thing. It’s not a recognized scientific, sociological, or legal discipline."
"It could be!" Johnny insists, gesturing wildly and nearly knocking over a beaker of something that hissed ominously. "We could pioneer it! You love pioneering! Remember the Negative Zone? Good times."
"Johnny." Reed’s voice is a low warning, the kind usually followed by a lengthy lecture on lab safety and personal boundaries.
"Reed," Johnny counters, putting every ounce of his dwindling, pathetic hope into the single syllable. He pouts. It’s a good pout. It’s worked on Sue before.
It does not work on Reed Richards. The eyebrow remains in the stratosphere. The verdict is final.
Then came the fight that changed everything.
To be fair, he wasn’t losing, per se. The Human Torch doesn’t lose. He was just… temporarily recalibrating his offensive strategy in the face of overwhelming, ugly, and frankly unsportsmanlike opposition.
(Okay, fine. Maybe he’d been showboating. Just a little. There might have been a unnecessary backflip over a weaker blast. A few fiery taunts that landed a bit too personally. Sue would’ve rolled her eyes so hard they’d have permanently stuck in the back of her head. Ben would’ve gruffed something about him being a “walkin’, talkin’ OSHA violation.” Reed, already monitoring from the Baxter Building, would’ve started calmly recalculating his survival odds out loud in rapidly declining percentages. Whatever. It’s called flair.)
The point is, his flair had a blind spot. He’d been so focused on the big, loud guy with the plasma cannon—the main event—that he’d completely missed the second assailant slinking from the alley shadows. The one with the compact, humming rifle that looked way more professional, and way more deadly.
He didn't notice until it was almost too late. Until a crackling blast of concentrated energy, thick with the acrid stench of ozone and burning circuitry, was already rocketing toward his unprotected back. It was too close to outrun, too sudden to dodge. It was close enough that the fine hairs on his neck stood up from the violent static charge. Close enough that the searing heat of his own body was eclipsed by the cold, killing heat of the shot. Close enough that he had just enough time for a single, stupid, final thought: Oh, this is gonna—
And then—
You.
One second, empty air. The next—impact.
Not a collision, but a calculated, breathtaking interception. Your body slams into his with a precision force that steals the air from his lungs, spinning you both out of the blast radius in a move that defies every law of physics Johnny's ever pretended to understand. The world becomes a dizzying blur of motion and heat. Behind you, the energy discharge vaporizes a chunk of brickwork where his head had been a nanosecond before, sending superheated shrapnel singing past his ear like angry hornets—but all he can process is the solid, real weight of you. The way your forearm braces against his ribs, a firm, unyielding line of muscle and bone. The way your thigh presses flush against his as you pivot midair with impossible grace, like gravity’s a mild suggestion you’ve both decided to ignore.
Then, concrete meets your boots with a soft, definitive scuff, and suddenly, impossibly, you're right there. Holding him. Steadying him. Your face is inches from his.
"You're welcome," you murmur. Your voice is like good whiskey and midnight smoke, each syllable a low, intimate thrum that curls around him and settles deep in his chest, warmer than his own flames ever could.
Johnny's mouth moves. No sound emerges. His brain has officially blue-screened. The only thing running is a frantic, looping error message that just reads: !!!
Up close, you're impossible. A living, breathing paradox of lethal grace and maddening beauty.
The way your nose scrunches just slightly, a tiny, amused reaction to the spectacular dumbfoundedness written all over his face. The deliberate, almost lazy drag of your fingertips across the frantic rabbit-thump of his pulse point as you withdraw, branding him with the ghost of your touch. The knowing, wicked glint in your eyes that says you're not just aware of his staring—you're enjoying it. That you've been enjoying this whole damn chase. That maybe—just maybe—he wasn't the only one playing this game.
"Cat got your tongue, Matchstick?" You tap his chin with one knuckle, the brief, casual contact buzzing through him like a live wire. "Thought you'd have some smooth line prepared. You know, after all that very obvious, very dramatic pining from the rooftops."
Johnny finally, finally finds his voice. It comes out as a humiliating, reedy squeak, three octaves higher than intended. "Pining? I wasn't—I mean, sure, maybe I—wait, you knew I was—?"
Your laugh is a revelation. It’s bright, unguarded, and it seems to light up the whole damn alley. Johnny’s pretty sure his knees actually buckle, and it’s only the fact that you’re still vaguely holding him upright that stops him from melting into a puddle of goo on the pavement.
This is the part where he’s supposed to say something clever. A smug remark. A smooth, well-rehearsed line that’s been waiting in the wings for this exact moment. Something.
But his brain is pure, unfiltered static, the kind you get between radio stations. His pulse is a frantic, solo drumbeat hammering against his eardrums. Every witty line he’s ever possessed has vaporized, and his mouth, the traitorous organ, decides to operate on a completely separate, disastrous frequency.
“Let me take you to dinner.”
The words hang in the air between you, simple, blunt, and utterly, devastatingly sincere. No flair. No filter. Just a raw, nervous ask.
You quirk your head, that fucking smirk—the one that single-handedly short-circuits his entire nervous system—playing on your lips like it owns the place.
“Johnny,” you say, slow, teasing, drawing out his name like it’s a delicious secret only the two of you share, “you don’t even know my name.”
But all his brain registers, through the roaring white noise of his panic, is that it’s not a no—and the way his name sounds in your voice, all warm and knowing, like it’s something precious, something meant just for him.
“But you know mine,” he counters, a brilliant, lopsided grin breaking across his face like a sunrise, all charm and absolutely zero chill. He’s flying without a net now, and it’s terrifying and exhilarating. “That’s like, half the overall objective of any first meeting. So. Not a bad start, if I do say so myself.”
Your response is a soft, breathy laugh that goes straight to his head, more intoxicating than any high-altitude thin air. Your shoulders shake with it as you look him up and down, a slow, considering appraisal that makes him feel simultaneously X-rayed and worshipped. And Johnny? Johnny barrels on, a runaway train of word vomit, before his last two surviving brain cells can link up to form a single coherent strategy.
“We can go somewhere private, so nobody will know—” He winces the second the words leave his mouth, a full-body cringe. “Not that I don’t want anybody to know! God, no. I’d shout it from the Brooklyn Bridge. I just figured, since you’re obviously in disguise and all—secret identity protocols, very important, very respectful—I’m all about that, by the way, total feminist ally, support women’s rights and women’s wrongs, whatever you’ve got going on—”
He’s digging. He’s digging so fast and so deep he’s hit magma, and the heat he’s feeling has nothing to do with his powers. But you’re still smiling, a real, full-blown smile that makes the corners of your eyes crinkle in the most devastating way, and it’s simultaneously the most terrifying and wonderful thing he’s ever seen.
You cut him off before he can excavate his way straight to the Earth’s molten core, your arms crossing over your chest in a gesture that’s both amused and formidable. Your eyes are dancing with a dark, glittering promise that this entire, humiliating moment is going to be expertly weaponised against him for the rest of his natural life, and he finds himself weirdly, utterly okay with that prospect.
“You also don’t even know anything about me,” you point out, your voice a low, challenging purr. It’s a test. A gauntlet thrown down between them.
Johnny lights up like the entire Fourth of July, all traces of his previous panic incinerated in a flash of pure, unadulterated glee. This is it. This is his pitch. The one he’s been rehearsing in his head for weeks.
“I know you’re left-handed,” he volleys back, quick and eager, ticking the points off on his fingers. “You lead with it when you strike, every single time. It’s your tell.” He takes a half-step closer, his voice dropping, intense and intimate. “I know you flinch—just a little, a tiny tremor right here—” He taps his own temple, his gaze locked on yours. “—every time you hear a kid cry out. Like you’re already calculating how to get to them.” Another step. The space between them crackles. “I know you prefer rooftops to alleys. You like the high ground, the sightlines. And I know you live somewhere in the Midtown grid, probably below 50th, because you always, always vanish toward the north-east quadrant after 2 a.m. like clockwork.”
Your mask of amused indifference fractures. Just for a microsecond—a sharp, startled inhalation that’s louder than any explosion, a slight, almost imperceptible widening of the eyes. It’s not annoyance. It’s not anger.
It’s… a dawning, profound recognition. He hasn’t just been watching; he’s been studying. He’s compiled a dossier written in the language of your tells and habits, and you've just realised, with stunning clarity, how closely.
Johnny’s stomach does a free-fall that would make Reed’s gravimetric sensors scream. He’s either about to get a knife slipped neatly between his ribs for his trespass, or—
A slow, devastating smile spreads across your face, erasing the shock and replacing it with something far more dangerous. Something like approval. Something like intrigue.
“What would we get?” you ask, your voice a soft, deliberate challenge.
Johnny’s heart doesn’t just stop; it performs a full, dramatic Broadway musical number, complete with jazz hands and a tragic death scene, before slamming back against his ribs with enough force to bruise. “Uh—” (Smooth. Real smooth, Storm.) “Whatever you want. I know this great rooftop spot—my spot, actually. Best view of the city. No paparazzi, no interruptions. No one ever finds me up there.” He prays to every god he’s ever met that you don’t hear the way his voice cracks on the last, vulnerable word. Just… us.
A beat of silence so profound he can hear the distant, mournful wail of a siren three blocks away, the drip of water from a fire escape, the frantic hammering of his own heart.
Then—
“...Okay.”
The word hangs in the air, simple and earth-shattering. His brain, already running on fumes, short-circuits completely. “Okay?” he parrots, the word sounding stupid and small to his own ears. He needs confirmation. He needs it engraved on a plaque.
“Okay.” You’re already turning, a blur of motion preparing to dissolve back into the city’s relentless rhythm. But you pause, just for him, a final concession. You toss the words over your shoulder like a challenge wrapped in a promise. “Tomorrow. 8 pm. I’ll meet you on the Baxter Building patio. Don’t be late, Hotshot.”
Hotshot. The nickname, delivered in your voice, feels like a brand. A title. A blessing.
And just like that, you’re gone. Not with a poof of smoke, but by simply ceasing to be where you were, the space you occupied now feeling emptier than the vacuum of space.
Johnny stands there alone in the wreckage of the fight, the adrenaline leaching away. The only evidence you were ever there is the phantom pressure against his ribs where you’d held him, and the faint, elusive scent of your perfume—ozone, night-blooming jasmine, and something uniquely you—still clinging to the air. He doesn’t move. He barely breathes. He just stands there, a statue of stunned victory, until the cool night breeze raises goosebumps on his arms and the city’ sounds slowly filter back in.
Then it hits him. Not like a wave, but like a supernova, exploding out from his core.
Holy. Shit.
A grin splits his face, so wide and uncontainable it actually hurts his cheeks. A disbelieving laugh bubbles out of him, then another, until it erupts into a full-throated, ecstatic whoop that echoes off the glass and steel of the surrounding skyscrapers. On pure instinct, he throws a fist into the air, and a burst of brilliant, gold-and-orange flame erupts from it like a triumphant firework, lighting up the alley in a shower of sparks.
what if he's written mine on my upper thigh (only in my mind)
you've been on four dates with johnny storm. you don't think it's serious. he has a different idea in mind. (johnny storm x fem!reader)
AN: this fic is VERY LOOSELY based off that one lyric in guilty as sin that became the title. i usually don't write super shy or oblivious characters, but i am too obsessed with an opposites attract dynamic. so this is what came about. i hope u enjoy & lmk what u think!!!!! also not proofread again super sorry
WORD COUNT: 5.7k
“Briefing notes?”
“Check.”
“Final printed copy of the speech?”
“In a PDF format as well! Check.”
“Lozenges?”
In honey lemon. “Check!”
“Triple shot flat white?”
You don’t vocalize your opinion, but you felt like an old man ordering that at the coffee shop. “Check.”
“You’re getting good at this.”
You fight a blush, waving off Lynne’s praise.
It’s always daunting entering the Baxter Building (especially now more than usual), but you stick behind Lynne and follow her lead. The lift attendant ushers you both into the steel-lined elevator after you showed proper identification, and you’re off. You always get a bundle of nerves at this part; waiting to reach the actual living quarters of the building. But you’ve done it enough to know to stare at your shoes to avoid feeling nauseous. It’s only when you hear the ding do you look up, straightening out your work pants and making sure the coffee cup in your hand stays upright.
At first, you and Lynne are met with nothing but silence, which is quite unusual (usually there’s Ben in the kitchen, or H.E.R.B.I.E. watching baby Franklin by the couch, his various beeps that you don’t understand greeting you upon entering). You and Lynne don’t question it, though, her muttering something about a late morning while ushering you to the kitchen area where you put everything you’re holding on the counter.
It’s only when you feel like you’re taking your first breath of the day, hands cramped, do you hear footsteps bounding down the hallway, high heels clanking on the sleek floors.
Sue Storm strides in, the pinnacle of elegance. She takes one moment to dust off a piece of lint from her red long-sleeve, made of a material that you’re sure costs more than your weekly paycheck. She greets you both with a kind smile, “Good morning.”
“Hardly,” says Lynne, frowning. It took awhile to get used to the fact that Sue and Lynne’s friendship strung for many years that Lynne no longer bothers to give her an agreeable type of kindness that others seem to give at default for the Invisible Woman. “There’s a seventy-three percent chance of rain and the wind nearly ruined my hair.”
Sue snaps her fingers, regaining her memory. “I almost forgot my coat.” She’s bounding down the hallway again, calling for Reed, but not before telling you both to get yourself comfortable and ushering you to the stools in front of the kitchen island.
You don’t look at Lynne for approval before taking a seat, legs sore from the morning run your friend made you go on before work. You busy yourself by opening the manila folder that holds Sue’s UN speech, checking thrice for any grammar mistakes (if there are any, that’d be your fault and would no doubt be getting a scolding from Lynne).
You’re too immersed, brows drawn tightly together and lips mouthing each part of the speech. You don’t notice the soft footsteps entering the room, or the slight halt in the steps, before it continues to proceed in your direction.
A hand rests on the small of your back, finger splayed out on the material of your sweater.
You jolt, not expecting the contact.
You swivel the seat and are met with the eyes of Johnny Storm.
“I didn’t know you’d be here today,” he says flatly—a fact, yet there’s something else hidden beneath his tone. A slight surprise, maybe hurt, as if he expected you to let him know every time you’d be making an appearance in his vicinity.
His hand stays on your back.
You open your mouth to reply, though with what you’re not sure, but his movements stop you. He reaches his other hand to your face, thumbs brushing in between your eyebrows and smoothing out the furrowed line. “They’re gonna get stuck like that.”
You glance at Lynne. She has a compact in her hand, angling the mirror at a stray piece of hair, pretending not to notice.
When you look back, Johnny’s eyes are still on you. Observing, memorizing, whatever it is he does.
Your association with Johnny is… new. You’ve been on a few dates, four to be exact, and each time your eyes nearly bulged out of your head when you returned home and he’s already calling to schedule a new one. You’re unsure if you’re part of a rotation of girls, or if you’re the only one he’s seeing. You don't think it's the latter. You’re too shy to ask. What you do know, however, is that you’re certainly not seeing anyone else. Dating is a fickle thing for you, really, and you had only agreed to going out with Johnny because he’d been incredibly persistent. Plus, it is an undeniable and unmoving fact that he is—to the eyes of all—incredibly attractive. You never had it in you to say no.
You feel your face warm up at the intensity of his gaze, looking down briefly at your ballet flats to collect yourself. You look back up and manage a small smile, hoping it comes as casual and not the complete mess you feel inside.
You’re quiet—a plain fact that even Johnny has to have already gotten used to. Words don’t leave your mouth as you hoped it would. You imagine saying something that would elicit a smirk, or something. Instead, you remain silent.
If he notices your nerves, he doesn’t say anything. Just glances behind you at the counter before his eyes light up. “‘That the big speech?”
You nod, instinctively turning and moving the paper to the side and in Johnny’s line of vision to read. You feel the heat of him press against your back.
He pretends to scan the page. His eyes dot over the little notes on the margin, arrows pointing before and between words. His mouth crinkle upwards when he notices the tiny smiley face you’ve written after a particular note, commending Sue on a certain sentence. “So professional,” he says coolly.
Sue finally comes back down the hallway, coat splaying on her arm. She notices you and Johnny and a knowing smile plays on her lips. “Time to go. Are you done flirting with my assistant, Johnny?”
“Not yet,” he rapidly replies, barely sparing his sister a glance before his eyes shift to you and he smiles. It’s small, but carries the weight of mischief and reassurance. “So—how about dinner tonight?”
You blink. “Tonight?”
“Yeah. When you’re done with all this UN business.” His tone is light, but there’s a shift in his eyes like he’s unsure of whether or not your answer will be yes. Hope flickers.
You hesitate, aware of Sue and Lynne’s attention and the fact that your heart is beating way too fast. “I’ll see how late we’re there.”
“That’s not really the answer I was hopi—“
“Johnny,” Sue’s voice cuts through, demanding but light. “I’ll make sure she’s back in ample time if you can let us go.” She frowns at Lynne apologetically. “We’re already running late.”
They’re actually running early, but Lynne has always been a stickler for time. Sue seems to know that.
Johnny grins, as if the answer is as good as yes. “I’ll take it.” He pushes off the counter, standing tall with a kind of confidence only the Human Torch can carry. He leans in and brushes a piece of hair behind your ear, eyes scanning your nervous face. “Try not to frown too much until then.”
The weight of Sue and Lynne’s gazes on you is strong.
You try your best to ignore it, following them down the building and into the waiting car.
—
The UN conference goes by smoothly (for the most part), you not really doing much except standing to the side with Lynne while Sue delivers her speech with natural poise. At one point, a reporter walked up to you—nervous, unassuming you—to see if they could get the scoop of something, anything, on Sue Storm. You stared blankly at the reporter, not being trained for anything like this, until Lynne yanked your arm and said unequivocally, “We won’t be taking any questions.” The interaction was over soon after it started, but had left you shaken up, cursing at yourself for not knowing what to do.
The interaction still haunts you as you toe off your flats upon entering your apartment, slinging your bag down on the floor as you make your way to the couch and flop. You wonder if the reporter approached you because maybe you looked too meek to deny anyone a question. You hate that feeling. You always thought a job like yours would be a great way to make an impact while still staying away from the spotlight and glamour of politics, but clearly you had been wrong. Especially if you’re affiliated with someone from the Fantastic Four.
You’re contemplating your life decisions when your chubby tabby, Kiwi, curls himself around your right leg. He sniffs lightly at your work pants before nuzzling his head softly on your shin. You smile, reaching down to pluck the docile animal from the floor and lay him carefully in your arms.
“You don’t have to worry about the press, do you, Kiwi?” you say softly to the cat in your arms, pressing a light kiss to his cheek. “Well neither do I—anymore, at least. Let’s feed you.”
You make your way to your small kitchen and into the cupboards until you find Kiwi’s food. Your nervous system calms down at the mundanity, continuing your late-afternoon routine of making sure the bowl of food and water is full. When you’re sure that Kiwi is properly satisfied, you leave him and walk into your bedroom to change into more comfortable clothes.
You’re slipping off your blazer and blouse, eyes rummaging through your array of t-shirts in your drawer to see which one would be the comfiest to slip on. You pick a tattered college tee, the one where it slips off your shoulders to combat the light warmth with a pair of shorts to match. They have kiss marks printed in a straight pattern, something a friend got you for Valentine’s Day. It’s silk and feels nice on your skin. You slip off the remaining rings that adorn your fingers and hoop earrings, delicately placing them on a tray over your dresser. You breathe in relief, finally feeling normal again.
This is how the rest of your night goes, rummaging through your pantry for a snack and coddling Kiwi on the couch as you sift through various channels on your television. You’re praising Kiwi as he lets out continuous purrs on your lap when there’s a knock on your door.
Your head jolts us, eyebrows furrowing as you gently set Kiwi to the side before making your way to the door.
You open your door curiously, a hint of nerves, only to be met with Johnny.
Your nerves suddenly make more sense.
Your eyes angle up to meet his expression, one showing a bit of alarm.
“Who were you talking to?” he asks plainly, peering into your apartment.
You follow his line of vision, taking in everything he is. There’s a bunch of scattered papers, copies of the latest speech, on your small dining table. Various blankets litter your couch and you have two bottles of polish (one a top coat) on your rug. One part of the string lights you hung around your living room dangles down from when a tack broke and you were too lazy to fix it. Kiwi nudged a few pieces of kibble from his bowl and onto the floor.
It’s definitely not a sight to see for guests.
The silence stretches as you don’t have it in you to reply. What would you say? You were talking to your cat?
Thankfully, Johnny doesn’t wait for your reply. He peers down at your face, a lackluster and slightly disappointed expression. “Sue said you were too tired for dinner.”
You do remember telling Sue that, apologetically asking her to relay the information to Johnny since you probably wouldn’t see him for the rest of the day. It was a little embarrassing, a little scary, as you deny seeing Johnny to his sister. But still, she gave you a kind smile and said that she would tell him.
“But that never usually stops Johnny,” she added after, to which you only offered her a half-smile before scurrying off to Lynne’s side.
You should’ve known he’d show up.
“Sue said to leave you alone to, you know, de-stress, or whatever,” he flails a hand up to convey that he saw that advice as useless. “But you need to eat.”
It’s then that you look down and see the brown bag in his other hand, and the familiar waft of food hits your nose. Your stomach growls.
He hears it, the corners of his mouth turning up.
“It’s from that place you talked about. Chiu’s Garden, remember?”
The shock in you passes like a splash of cold water. You do remember. You said it in passing, once, about the Chinese takeout you get when work gets too busy and the ache in your head gets hard to manage and you don’t want to cook. You had their number memorized, and the workers there greeted you by name. The place isn’t what shocks you. It’s the fact that Johnny of all people remembers.
There are many things you want to say. Starting with Thank you and I hope you plucked the sauce that’s on the counter before you left. But mostly How do you remember?
If Johnny notices your shock at the gesture, he doesn’t comment. Only raising a single eyebrow at you. “Can I come in?”
You realize you haven’t spoken yet. “Are you a vampire?”
The words tumble out of your mouth before you can stop yourself, unsure if you meant it as a joke or if it just slipped out because it’s the first thing your mind went to.
Johnny stifles a laugh. “A vampire?”
Well, now you clearly have to give him an explanation. “Vampires need permission to be let into private areas.” There’s a hint of embarrassment in your voice, and you curse yourself once again for not knowing what to say and saying the wrong thing.
He peers at you, eyes squinting and assessing your face. “What have you been watching lately?”
You shrug. You don’t tell him you watched the Scars of Dracula while you were finalizing the last of Sue’s speech the night before. Or how you got fully immersed into it. Or how you talked to Kiwi about how thankful you are that you don’t have a roommate to let unknown strangers into your apartment.
“Well, I’m no vampire,” he says.
There’s a playful lilt to his voice, and you realize now that you might be in on a joke you created. Not wanting to disappoint him or bring the mood down because, hey, you’re not in on a lot of jokes, you take a long backwards step back into your apartment. “Prove it.”
Johnny responds by taking a similar long step into your apartment, now standing right in front of you. Your chest nearly meets his as he looks down at you with a smirk. Your heart stutters, and you hope the lack of space between you two doesn’t mean that he can hear it. “See?”
You manage a small nod, walking around him to shut your door. You think your stomach might start doing backflips if you stay that close to Johnny, mind unsure if it’s a rush of nervousness or excitement.
He seems to take your interaction as an acceptance that he’s allowed to be here, in your apartment, and though he’s never been inside, he quickly assesses the layout and walks towards your kitchen.
Kiwi looks as if to say, you let a man into the apartment.
Your eyes reply, I didn’t know he was coming!
“I know I didn’t show it—“ Johnny calls out from the kitchen. You hear the crinkle of the brown bag and food being brought out. “—but I was really nervous that I knocked on the wrong apartment. I only ever walked you to the front of the building!”
You pad the small way to the kitchen, peering in to see him open a plastic container and dip his fingers in to snipe a piece of broccoli.
“I had to look at each door to find your last name,” he says through a mouthful of broccoli. “Thank God you live on the second floor, right?” He turns to meet your eyes, giving you a close-lipped, goofy smile that has your mouth threatening to smile back. When he swallows, he motions to all the cupboards above him. “Do you usually eat with plates or out of the container? Also I brought you orange soda.”
“I—I just eat out the container,” you say softly, leaning against the entryway, arms crossed.
“Perfect! Me too.” He gathers the food into his arms in a perfect balance, picking up the soda can last before motioning past you. “C’mon. Let’s eat.”
You watch him maneuver your apartment with ease, as if it isn’t the first time he’s been here. He tiptoes past Kiwi’s kibble on the floor and barely manages to knock down a picture frame that sits at the edge of your coffee table. He mutters an apology before putting the food down and sitting on your couch. “So what are we watching—oh. Hello.” He peers down at your cat, who stares back at him blankly. “Is this the infamous Kiwi? Is this who you were talking to?” He reaches his hand out and scratches behind Kiwi’s ear tentatively, unsure if he would be squeamish or not. Unsurprisingly, Kiwi leans into his touch. Johnny is delighted “We’re going to have great conversations,” he whispers, as if keeping a secret between him and the cat.
You find the sight awfully endearing. You don’t realize you’ve been staring as long as you have until Johnny turns his head to stare at you. “You coming?”
You timidly make your way to the couch, now unsure of how to feel at place in your home when Johnny Storm is in it. Johnny Storm, who despite four dates, you’ve barely gotten used to. You like him (obviously, you’ve let him take you out continuously), but you’re still unsure of what he is to you. The ambiguity of your relationship to him is much easier to stomach when he’s across from you at a restaurant booth, or walking in the park with fresh air around you.
Now—here—with him on your couch, you don’t think you understand your relationship with him all too well. You wonder if he shows up at other dates’ houses like this; their favorite takeout and a soft smile that can quiet any ache. You wonder how different the other girls he sees are from you; if they stumble on their words despite ample practice.
You take a seat on the other end of the couch, Kiwi already taking up space in the middle. You angle yourself to face him, legs tucked under you with your arms still crossed.
“You’re too far away,” he says plainly, as if stating a fact instead of discontentment. “But I have a feeling he’s not going to move anytime soon, is he?”
This gets a laugh out of you, looking down at Kiwi, who blinks slowly at your face. “He’s the boss.”
Johnny lets out a tsk tsk, shaking his head with a grin. “I should’ve known. Guess I’m gonna have to share you tonight.”
The rest of the night goes like this: Johnny shows the various things he bought you from the Chiu’s Garden menu, as he was unsure of what to get you. He has a delightful expression as you express that you like all of them. He pumps a fist in the air and you laugh, leaning down from the couch to pick your food of choice from the coffee table. He makes sure to give you a review of everything he tries, and he’s deeply satisfied, muttering about how you two need to go back together next time. Something flutters in your stomach at the mention of a next time.
Eventually, Kiwi grows bored of the Ted Gilbert Show and hops off the couch, lightly swaying as he makes his way into your bedroom for some peace and quiet. Johnny takes that as an opportunity to sit closer to you, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and reaching his other to rest on your knee. He barely pays attention to the ministrations his thumb does on your knee, but it affects you greatly. You, again, wonder if he does this to other girls he’s with. You wonder if it’s stupid that you feel so special.
“Hey.”
You look up at him, brows already furrowed from how hard you were thinking.
“What did I say?” he scolds softly, his hand on your knee leaving as he reaches his thumb in between your eyebrows again. “They’re gonna get stuck like that.”
—
When you’re not suffering from severe imposter syndrome as you play assistant with Lynne for Sue, you’re taking up extra shifts at the coffee shop down your street. You’ve been working here since you were eighteen and trying to pay for college. Now, you’re a little older and trying to pay your college debts. Still, you know the owner, and they’re more than willing to pay you under the table for your efforts to keep the shop afloat when you can.
The line isn’t long and you’re striking up a conversation with Miss Sutton, a regular, as she fishes her purse for change.
“And, Freddie—“ she says, her eyes down at her bag, “—he keeps crying. He’s getting old. ‘Vet said he might be going blind in his right eye.”
Your heart lurches immediately as you imagine yourself in that position; Kiwi growing old and going blind. But he’s only four and you make sure to take him to regular checkups. “I’m so sorry, Miss Sutton,” you say honestly. “Maybe he and Kiwi can have a play date! It might cheer him up.”
She places a few dollars onto the counter and looks at you flatly. “Or remind him of what he no longer has.”
Well, that took a turn.
You smile tensely at the older woman, taking the dollars and commit yourself to counting them instead of making the conversation worse. So much for comfort. She’s fifty cents off, but you don’t mention it.
You busy yourself with making chamomile tea, which is one of the easier orders you’ve had all day (you love a good macchiato with lavender syrup with the nice cold foam on the top, but it’s a fucking hassle to make). You hum a little to yourself, in your element at a place you’re comfortable in. Thoughts of a sick Kiwi and a grumpy Miss Sutton exit your mind.
The bell over the door dings, alerting you of a new customer. You pass the finished drink to your coworker as she finishes heating a pastry. You dust off your hands and turn around.
“Hello, welcome to—“
You’re met with blue eyes, blond hair, and an accusatory look.
Your mind goes blank.
Johnny doesn’t wait for you to finish your obligatory customer greeting, “You’ve been overworking yourself.”
“I—what?”
“You were with Sue all day Tuesday, you cancelled our date yesterday to take a shift here and had an emergency meetup with Lynne, and now you’re back today. You’re overworking yourself.”
You want to say that this is actually what normal people do to make a living, but you don’t say that. Instead, you stare up at his unrelenting gaze and gulp. “Aren’t you—“ your voice comes out squeaky and you clear your throat. “Aren’t you, like, a superhero? You save Earth for a living.”
He shrugs off your answer like it’s nothing.
Beside you, your coworker takes note of Johnny, and gasps.
You both turn your head to the sound.
“You weren’t lying?” she says, mouth wide. “You’re friends with Johnny Storm?”
Johnny immediately looks offended. “Friends?”
“Viv,” you say, ignoring him, “can you go to the back and make sure Hal is done with the croissants batch? We’re out up here.”
Viv looks at you as if to say, you’re kicking me out as if Johnny Storm isn’t right here?
You manage a harsher look, and she’s off, muttering something about getting her camera. You hope to God out of embarrassment that she doesn’t. Johnny visits your place of work and the first thing that happens is your coworker ambushes him. And know he knows that you talk about him.
“I’m sorry about her, I’ll tell her to put her camera away,” you say.
Johnny looks at you, brows furrowing before shaking his head rapidly. “I don’t care about a photo. I care about you. When was the last time you took a break for yourself? Doesn’t Kiwi miss you?”
“… I did a face mask last night,” you say dumbly. You leave out the part where you were on the phone with an airline company until 2AM because you stupidly booked the wrong time for Sue and Reed’s flight to Chicago, face mask forgotten and on for hours while you tried to fix your mistake before Lynne noticed.
The admission seems to calm him down a bit, shoulders sagging as his mind recalibrates. “When do you get off here?”
You don’t really have set shifts, you’ve been here since 10AM and helping out any way you can. Hal had you making croissants with him for two hours until Viv asked for your help at the front. Now, it’s 5PM and the sun is getting ready to set—and you hate that Johnny is right, because you feel wrung out. Your body suddenly becomes more alert of the ache on your temples, and the emptiness of your stomach.
“I can technically leave whenever.”
His eyes light up. “Perfect! You’re leaving now. Grab your coat.”
“Johnny—“
“You can go,” a voice behind you says.
You turn to see Hal and Viv standing together by the door to the back, eyes wide in wonder as they continue to stare at Johnny. It’s a look you recognize from the amount of times you’ve spent with him. It’s why Johnny takes you to restaurants and you get seated at the most private corner, or why he wears sunglasses and a cap in the dead of winter when you stroll through the park. You appreciate the efforts Johnny goes to be unnoticed—knowing you don’t like the attention. But you wonder if that’s just how he’s been going around publicly lately; unnoticed. You realize it’s been awhile since you’ve seen a tabloid of him walking a girl down the street, or a blurry photo of him in a store with someone. Maybe he’s tired of the cameras.
“Are you sure?” you ask Hal.
He nods, taking his eyes away from Johnny to give you a softer look. “Croissants are done, I have Viv to work like a dog—“
“Hey!”
“—we’ll be just fine. Have fun with your friend.” He wiggles his eyebrows, and you fight the blush that threatens to coat your cheeks.
You’re too busy going to the back to grab your coat and purse to notice the shock on Johnny’s face. You give one last goodbye to Hal and Viv before you leave the counter to join Johnny’s side. He waits for you to slip on your coat before placing a hand on the small of your back to guide you out the shop.
You swear you hear a click from Viv’s camera.
You breathe in the fresh, cool air the second you’re out on the street. You watch as Johnny inconspicuously slips on a pair of sunglasses and pulls the hood of his coat up.
He’s silent as you both walk the short distance to your apartment, which is unusual. Usually, he’s already talking your ear off about his day, or something Ben has cooked since he knows your affinity with anything cooking or baking-related. You usually stay silent when he gets like that, listening intently and only giving your input when he manages to force it out of you (even after all this time, you’re still nervous).
But there’s none of that today. Silence stretches even as you enter your apartment building, him holding the door open for you, and as you pat the snow from your boots onto the rug (normally, this is where Johnny says something stupid, like how you both look like ducks shaking water off by a pond). You walk up the stairs and open your apartment door, still silent.
Your stomach churns nervously. You wonder if Johnny is mad at you—for overworking, as he says. If the concern has stretched into anger. Or if Hal and Viv’s peering eyes,, and knowing of him, threw Johnny off, realizing you’re just like any other person who brags about his existence. But it’s not like that! You wonder if you’ve ruined what you and he have—whether you know what you guys are or not.
Finally, as both of your coats have been shrugged off and left on the hook by your door—
“I’m your friend?”
You look up from where you were staring at the floor and furrow your brows. “Hm?”
“That’s how they talked about me,” he says, and you know he’s referring to Hal and Viv. “They said I’m your friend. Is that how you talk about me?”
He stares at you, eyes searching your own as you try to string together a response. “Um… yeah?”
Because you don’t know what else to call Johnny. Johnny who takes you to the most private parts of a fancy restaurant, and brings you takeout when you’re tired, and shows up to work to make sure you haven’t been burnt out. Johnny who now looks down at you with a pained expression, for reasons you’re a little unsure of why. Isn’t that what people are in whatever stage you and Johnny are in? Friends? Isn’t he seeing other people?
Johnny exhales sharply through his nose, walking up to you and shaking his head as if your answer had been outlandish. “That’s really what you think we are?”
Your lips part, but you don’t answer. He’s standing so close now that you can see the faint tint of pink on his nose from the cold. His breath fans down at you. You try to imagine what Johnny wants to hear, but still, you’re unsure. “You and I…” you say slowly, “We’re—what else would we be?”
His jaw ticks. “Together.”
Together. As in, you and Johnny. You think about Johnny walking you to your door, eyes lingering at your lips but he moves to kiss your cheek and you’re convinced you’d just imagined it. Johnny, who has admitted to looking for restaurants with similar dishes to ones you’ve cooked, so you can compare (“I bet yours is better,” he says plainly, taking another bite. “Do you agree? Or are you too modest?”). Johnny and his thumb that grazes the middle of your eyebrows because they’re gonna get stuck like that.
You blink at him, voice small. “Together?”
Johnny genuinely looked confused at your confusion. His brows knot in the way he always tells you to stop doing. “Yeah? Like dating. Together-together. What did you think this was?”
Heat crawls up the back of your neck, mortification and disbelief tangling in a mess that makes it hard to think. “I—I thought you were just being… you know. Nice. How you treat the other girls.”
His head jerks back. “'The other girls'? Well first, nobody’s that nice. At least, not like I have been. I’ve only ever been like this with you.”
Your stomach turns at the admission.
“Second, what other girls? You think I’ve been seeing other people?”
You’re too embarrassed to answer, because you know your answer would be yes. Instead, you huff a large sigh and press your palms to your eyes. “I don’t know what to think right now, Johnny.”
You hear him sigh softly. Two hands reach your wrists. “Hey, hey,” he coos, tone soft as he gently pries your hands away from your eyes. You’re immediately met with a blue storm, swirling with thought and something else that you’re unsure how to name. “I’m sorry if I stressed you out, okay? Come here.”
He envelopes you in a hug, warm and all-encompassing, the kind that makes you realize just how cold the outside has made you without noticing. His chin rests against the top of your head.
Your arms hover at your sides at first, stiff with hesitation. But as you slowly think through Johnny’s words, you melt into him. The exhaustion from the conversation, from work, from everything presses down harder, and the steadiness of his heart against your head makes something inside you settle.
Johnny thinks you too are together.
You wonder how stupid you must really be for not noticing.
“We’re together,” you say softly into his chest, breathing him in.
“We are,” he says, a whisper.. “I’m sorry for not making it more… known. I thought you knew.”
“No,” you say, shaking your head and laughing a little.
“I didn’t know. I’m too in my head about this, you know?” you admit meekly, your mind now re-assessing every interaction you’ve ever had with the boy against you. Re-assessing with the word EXCLUSIVE over every single memory.
The two of you stay tangled in each other’s arms until a small meow interrupts your moment, Kiwi coming to curl around your feet. You untangle yourself from Johnny to pick up the cat, resting his body against your chest as you turn to the side so that Kiwi’s head is facing Johnny.
“Kiwi, this is my boyfriend. I bet you knew that already, didn’t you?” There’s a glee in your voice that has Johnny lighting up, reaching down to give Kiwi a kiss on his head.
“He’s all-knowing,” he adds with a grin. He reaches out to caress your cheek, pulling you back in, Kiwi in the middle. He sighs happily. “You better reintroduce me to Hal and Viv,” he whispers softly into your hair.
You feel the soft impact of feet on the fire escape and open your eyes, forcing your head upright from where it had been leaning against the opened window pane. The exhaustion pressing on you from spending the last 12 hours in the ER dead on your feet clears as you perk.
“You’re back.”
“You should be sleeping,” comes Jason’s modulated voice, the exasperation undeniable despite the helmet obscuring any and all facial expressions. You are suddenly filled with a need to see his face. To fix your eyes on the features you’ve traced with your hands in the dead of night as the two of you lie awake and talk just to fill an oppressive silence.
Prayers answered, there’s a click and a hiss. Seconds later, the red helmet is in Jason’s hands as he shakes the hair out of his face. Your eyes catch on the white fringe, right before they systematically run down his body. Blood that isn’t his. No injuries. Not tonight, anyway.
Jason’s gaze is equally discerning, and you feel them travel up and down the length of you. You resist the urge to snort. You aren’t the vigilante traipsing through the city every night to knock out the teeths of all the crime lords, drug dealers, and pimps that populate the underbelly of Gotham.
“Sun’s ‘bout to rise, doc. I see sleep deprived medical malpractice in your future.”
The darkness of the night is giving away to orange, the sky bleeding into a cacophony of colors. You roll your eyes, lips easing into a smile. You can’t help the yawn that leaves your lips. “Couldn’t sleep. I was missing my guard dog. He’s 6’4, unbelievably jacked, and he’s got the prettiest blue eyes.”
Jason coughs, but there’s a red tint to his ears as he ducks his gaze away. You rest your chin on your raised knees, watching him, feeling unbelievably lucky.
Jason raises a pointed eyebrow at your staring. You grin, crooking a finger towards him in a silent ask. Jason doesn’t question it, just steps closer to you and lowers to his knees until his face hovers right in front of yours.
A smile splits your face as you see him bathed in the soft orange glow of the sunrise. It’s a shame you scarcely get to see him like this: he looks good in the light.
You place a hand on his shoulder to steady you as you lean forward, and gently press your lips to his. He’s still as a statue, as he always is every time you two kiss, as if too scared to even breathe. It’s an odd emotion to affix to such a large man whose name invokes fear in even the most street hardened criminals, but you know Jason. And to know Jason is to recognize that he is terrified of every good thing in his life, and what it might mean to be anything other than angry.
“Morning,” you hum, pressing another kiss to his cheek and laying your head into the crook of his shoulder. You can feel his slow breaths as every muscle in his body goes slack. A beat later, as if given permission, a hand comes to rest on the back of your neck, touch feather light.
You close your eyes, luxuriating his warmth and the smell of stale cigarettes and his aftershave. So intrinsically Jason. You’re sure you’ll wake up later in bed to the sizzle and hiss of him cooking breakfast in the kitchen, but for now you want to sit here with him in silence. A new day, another sunrise. You count them. You don’t think you’ll ever stop.
His voice is rougher than it usually is, a low murmur that reverberates and sends a bolt of warmth through you. “Good morning.”
Notes: Oof, I've been sitting on this one for a while. Not beta-read. Never beta-read.
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Early established relationship; office make-out
Summary: It’s a real shame that Rafael will be stuck in his office…But you could always drop off something sweet.
He leaves three things on your voicemail: A reason, an apology, and a murmured petname—mi vida.
You have to google what that means, and when you do, it kicks off butterflies in your stomach. Of course, most messages from Rafael do, even when he’s standing you up for a date.
Well. Does it count as standing up if he called and told you that he wouldn’t be able to make it after you showed up at the bar where the two of you were meant to meet up?
Probably not—it is probably, technically, just cancelling. And it’s something that you’re rapidly coming to realize is simply a reality of dating Rafael Barba.
You toy with your phone as you consider what to do next. You’re already out, you can just grab a bite, maybe a drink. It’s a real shame that Rafael will be stuck in his office…But you could always drop off something sweet.
--
"What are you doing here?"
"Oh, uh—" You look between Carmen and Rafael as they both wait for you to answer, a guilty smile curling your lips. "I just figured you'd have a late night. I was dropping off something for you to have later." You hold the bag up as you say so, melting a touch as Rafael's surprise shifts to warmth.
"Come in," He nods you closer. You give Carmen another flighty smile before hurrying closer, sliding past him and into his office. You take a quick look around as Rafael closes the shades on his door and windows. You've been in there a time or two, but only for a couple of minutes at a time. Your eyes sweep across the open files spread over his desk, accompanied by legal pads, a couple of pens, his open laptop.
"I'm sorry," You blurt as he rounds closer, clarifying when confusion washes his handsome face again. "I mean, I didn't mean to interrupt your flow or anything, I—I was planning to just leave this with Carmen."
"Well," He takes the bag from you. "I'm glad you didn't just leave it with Carmen."
"I would've if you hadn't come out."
"I heard your voice," He sets the bag down on his desk before he takes one of the chairs in front of his desk, carrying it around to set it beside his and setting his hands on the back of the seat. "C'mere."
You settle down in it, smiling as Rafael joins you, unpacking the cherry empanada and breaking it in two. You reach for the smaller piece, but Rafael tuts, holding out the larger of the two.
“Rafael,” You tut, waiting for the smaller one regardless, “All of this was supposed to be for you, that’s why I only got one. Gimme.”
Rafael pouts before he does as you ask, passing you the smaller piece. He leans in as he does, pressing a soft kiss to your lips. You smile at the touch, leaning back and relaxing in your seat.
"Are you headed for a late night?" You ask, fighting the urge to get a closer look at his files.
"It would appear so," Rafael sighs, glancing toward his desk. "We got some evidence late from the defense."
"You can't ask for an extension?"
"We did."
“Yikes. Sorry.”
“Mm. What’d you get up to today?” He asks before raising the empanada for a bite.
“Oh, you know, work. Put off some errands I’ve been meaning to run.”
“Any particular reason?”
“Honestly? I just didn’t feel like it. It’s been so gross out,” You wrinkle your nose, nodding toward the window. “I hate that you’re working late, but at least you’re working late in air conditioning.”
“Tell you what,” Rafael dusts his hands of the remaining flaking pieces of pastry, “We’ll do them together this weekend.”
Your brows tip up in surprise, and Rafael chuckles, “What?”
“You wanna come grocery shopping with me?”
"I'd love to. You can learn a lot about someone from how they buy their groceries. Besides," He nudges his knee against yours. "I haven't seen you all week."
You swallow a comment with your next bite, but Rafael seems to read your silence all too well, tacking on:
"I know that's my fault."
You shake your head. "Fault isn't—I mean, it's work, Rafa. Besides, it's not like I didn't know what I was getting into."
"Still."
"No 'still.' You set those expectations early. And you don’t do this all the time. Just, you know. Some of the time."
Rafael smiles, and appears to be winding up to say something else when there's a knock at the door. He tips his chin up, calls out, "Yes?"
Carmen opens the door, offering you an apologetic smile before turning the full force of her attention back to Rafael.
"Carisi called, said he found new footage of the victim. He’s sending it over.”
"Thank you."
You lean back in your seat as Carmen shuts the door, popping the last of the sweet morsel into your mouth.
"I should get out of your hair."
"Stay a couple more minutes."
You give Rafael a chastising smile, nodding toward his computer when it chimes with an email.
"You should check that. I'm sure it's important."
"So are you."
"It's different."
Rafael lets out a soft, dissatisfied grunt as he turns to his laptop. You gather the scraps of packaging, throwing them out before you turn back to give Rafael one more goodbye. Or, at least, you mean to—but the man is hunched over his laptop.
"Have you been sitting like that all day?" You tut.
“Hm?...Oh—most of it, I guess.”
You hesitate, swiping your hands against your pants before rounding behind his seat. His head tips back toward you, but his eyes stay set on the screen.
“Can I touch you?” You murmur. It takes him a moment, but Rafael nods. You reach down, sliding your hands over the back of his neck. You watch him draw in a deep breath, his shoulders lifting and falling with it. You work your fingers under his collar, massaging at the base of his neck. You hear and feel his soft hum, and you increase the pressure just a touch, sweeping your thumbs up and rubbing in small, firm circles.
You consider stopping when Rafael doesn’t move or make another sound—and then his laptop screen dims, and you eye his reflection. Your lips pull with a self-satisfied smile as you see his eyes closed, his lips parted slightly. You use the palm of one hand to massage the base, sliding the other up into his hair and gently combing your fingers over his scalp. You glance toward the computer as it chimes again, and you lean back reluctantly, smoothing Rafael’s hair back and lifting your hand out of his collar.
“Okay,” You sigh, “Really getting out of your hair this time—literally.”
You step back out from behind his chair, ready to leave, but Rafael catches hold of your hand. You look down at it, then catch his eye as he pushes his chair back, tugging you to stand between his legs. You drag your feet just a little, brow furrowing as you take in his face. There’s a slight flush in his cheeks; his eyes are dark as he smooths his other hand over your thigh, hooking it around the back to guide you even closer.
Rafael raises your hand to his lips, pressing a tender kiss to your knuckles before he rises from his seat, chest brushing yours. His eyes sweep across your face before he leans in, catching your lips in a kiss.
You think, at first, that it’ll be a quick goodbye kiss—but the slide of Rafael’s hands around your back tells you that he intends it to be otherwise.
There’s a tang of cherry on his tongue as he dips it between your lips, a soft groan falling from him as you tip your head to the side, deepening your kiss. He eases you a step back, then another, and you barely startle as the backs of your thighs bump against the edge of his desk. Your arms lift to curl around his shoulders, pressing your chest against his as he settles between your thighs. Your thighs twitch around his hips as his hand smooths down your back, his fingers bruising tantalizingly at your waistband.
“Rafa,” You breathe against his lips, the murmur of his name chased by a moan as he ducks his head, nipping tenderly at your jaw. You slip your hands beneath his suit jacket, easing it from his shoulders, and grinning as he lets go of you just long enough to shake it off. You part your lips as his tongue sweeps between your lips, teasing at yours as his hands grasp your hips.
You curl your hands around his suspenders, prepared to haul him closer—and freezing when there’s a knock on the door.
Rafael calls out, “One minute!” as you dip your head, resting your forehead against his shoulder.
“Got carried away,” You mumble.
“We both did.”
“You really do need to watch it with that tech-neck.”
“Mm.”
“I mean you were bent all over that keyboard—”
Rafael’s hand curl around your jaw, tipping your chin up to meet his eyes.
“I’m fully aware, mi vida.”
You bite the inside of your cheek to keep from grinning, give him a small nod. His eyes narrow slightly, head tipping.
“What’s that face for?” He prods.
“Nothin’. Just—Liked hearing it on the phone, like it even more in person.”
Rafael grins, leaning in and brushing his lips against yours. “Mi vida.”
“Okay,” You chuckle. “I really should go, ‘cause it’s late, and someone is waiting on you. Shouldn’t hold them up. If we're not careful, you’ll be snoring in court tomorrow.” You lean in, pressing another soft kiss to Rafael’s lips before you gently dislodge yourself from him, stepping around the desk. Rafael sticks close, taking your hand in his and giving your knuckles another kiss.
“I’ll make it up to you,” He promises.
“There’s nothing to make up for, Rafael, honestly,” You swear. “Text me when you get home?”
“It’ll be late.”
“S’alright.”
“Okay.”
You give his hand one more squeeze before opening the door to his office, giving a quick wave to Carmen and Detective Benson before hurrying to leave.
pairings .’ jack abbot ( the pitt ) x fem!morguetech!reader
summary .’ in which you ( the reader ) are a overworked and under appreciated morgue tech for the pittsburg trauma medical center. you are solely responsible for clearing out the deceased patients from the emergency department. but when there is a delay and all your cold storage lockers are full, jack pays a visit to this morgue tech he's never heard of ( aka you ) and basically tells you to do your job better ;'(
trigger warnings .’ lowercase intended!!! | age gap ( reader is late 20s, jack is late 40s ) | jack is kinda mean in this part srry | readers insecurty | a lot of overthinking | NO USE OF Y/N
notes .’ jack and shy!reader sign me tf up!!!! this part is very tame in the terms of smut but dont you worry, its gonna get nasty. you gonna need a bible after i am done lmao ( mdi 18+ )
masterlist | series masterlist | dividers by @cafekitsune | join the taglist
you liked the morgue.
that wasn’t something you could say out loud—not even to the handful of people who actually knew your name. but it was true. you liked the quiet hum of the refrigerated walls. the soft thunk of a drawer sliding into place. the hum of the vents. the artificial stillness that wrapped around you like a weighted blanket. it was the only place in the entire hospital that didn’t ask you to be anything other than quiet.
upstairs, the world buzzed. phones rang. radios barked. nurses called to each other across fluorescent hallways and doctors stomped past with clipboards in one hand and coffee in the other. everything moved too fast. everything was too loud.
but down here?
the dead didn’t rush you.
they didn’t care that you wore your scrubs one size too big to hide your hips. they didn’t care that your voice was soft and slow and hard to hear over the hum of machinery. they didn’t ask why you never wore makeup or styled your hair or joined in on break room gossip. they didn’t notice your anxiety. or if they did, they were too far gone to care.
the morgue was a constant. cold and predictable.
you liked that.
your shift started at 6:00 pm, but you always arrived by 5:40. early was better than noticed. being early gave you time to breathe, time to fall into your routine. you changed in the staff locker room, tied your hair back into a low bun, and slipped your badge onto your lanyard—backward. You always wore it backward. the sight of your name and staff photo made you flinch.
there was something about seeing it—your full name, government bold in black and white—that made you feel visible in the worst way. better to leave it unreadable. it feels safer that way.
the other morgue tech on rotation left at 6:15 with a nod and a yawn. you didn’t mind being alone. you preferred it. you’d already checked the autopsy schedule—two expected tonight, maybe three. the overflow drawer was full, but you had room. you always kept it clean, always organized. the medical examiner said you were the best at inventory, and he was old-school—stingy with praise.
it was 6:42 now.
your dinner sat beside you on the break room table: a thermos of reheated lentil soup, a single slice of soft bread, and the green stanley thermos you brought every night with coffee made just the way you liked it. the same thing. every shift. routine was comforting to you.
you weren’t much of a talker. small talk made your palms sweat. eye contact made your pulse spike. you’d been called shy, cold, quiet, even weird—usually by people who didn’t realize you were listening. you always listened. you heard everything. that was your job.
you noticed the smallest fractures in bone. the subtlest bruises beneath the skin. you labeled instruments with care and sketched anatomical details in your private notebook—not because anyone asked, but because it helped you focus. because it gave your hands something to do. because it made you feel useful.
useful was the closest thing to confident you’d ever been.
you stirred your soup, carefully. the fluorescent lights above flickered once, twice, then steadied.
you didn’t eat in the upstairs break room anymore. not since that nurse in green scrubs—jessica, maybe—had looked you up and down and laughed, 'don’t you work with the dead people? what, they let ghosts have lunch breaks now?'
you hadn’t replied. just packed your food and left. she hadn’t meant it cruelly, probably. but the words stuck. most words did.
your thoughts were interrupted by the distant sound of heavy boots on tile. you glanced at the clock.
3:14 am. too early for the medical examiner’s rounds. too late for the janitorial staff. too heavy to be anyone but—
the door slammed open.
you jumped.
a man stormed in—tall, broad, shoulders tensed under navy scrub top and dark wash cargo pants ( different from the normal doctor attire you were used to, but man he could pull it off ).
his chest rose and fell with labored breath, his short sleeves stopped mid bicep, exposing thick meaty forearms. his id badge bounced off his chest with every step, and his eyes—sharp, dark, furious—scanned the room like he was ready to fight someone.
you froze halfway to your mouth with your spoon, soup forgotten. 'can . . . i help you?' the voice was so soft, he almost missed it. like the words had to squeeze through a locked throat.
jack stopped dead. not the sight he expected. not even close.
tiny thing. curled up on a rolling stool, eating a thermos of soup like she was afraid it might fall spill out of your hands. drowned in baggy scrubs. barely looked old enough to drive, let alone be the only morgue tech on duty.
he shook off the flicker of surprise.
'you can explain,' he barked, taking a step in. 'why there are three bodies still in my er taking up beds i don’t have.'
her hands immediately retreated to her lap, soup abandoned. she didn’t even flinch—just… deflated. like someone used to being spoken to like that.
you blinked but otherwise still didn't answer. he advanced two more steps, hands on his hips, jaw clenched. 'can someone explain that to me?;
'i—I know,' she said, not quite looking at him.
'you the tech on tonight?' he asked as if he didn't already know the answer. you nodded. he exhaled through his nose. loud. 'perfect.'
you swallowed hard. 'i’m sorry. 'didn’t mean—'
'don’t apologize,' he snapped. 'just do your job. i’ve got live patients bleeding out in hallway beds while corpses are parked in mine like they’re waiting for the fucking valet.'
you flinched.
'why the hell are they still upstairs?'
his voice was like gravel—low and hoarse and too loud in the cold quiet of the morgue. you looked down, pulse in your throat.
'i can’t bring anyone else down,' you said softly. 'the storage is full. every drawer. every overflow table. i’ve been waiting on the funeral home pickup since midnight. they said morning. i—i sent three emails. no one responded.'
'who’d you email?'
she hesitated, eyes flicking to the badge on clipped to his scrub top pocket, then back down.
'uh, you.'
a beat of silence. just turned on his heel and walked straight out.
didn’t say thank you.
didn’t say sorry.
didn’t even close the morgue door gently behind him.
the door swung shut behind him with a dull clack.
you stared at it. then stared at your soup. then back at the door.
your fingers were still curled around your spoon, but your hand had gone numb. a familiar prickle crawled across your scalp and down your spine—the start of the cold-sweat panic you knew too well. it always came after. after the confrontation. after the humiliation. after the worst-case-scenario played out in real time.
you hadn’t cried. not yet. but your eyes stung.
you pushed your soup away, the smell suddenly sour.
why did you apologize?
he told you not to.
and you still did.
you always did that.
and of course it had to be him.
of course the first person to raise their voice at you in six months had to be that doctor—the one everyone talked about like he was a war god with a scalpel. jack abbot. trauma attending. king of the fucking er.
you’d seen his name on postmortem charts before, but you’d never met him face-to-face. he was a phantom. a rumor. a string of growled curses through stairwell doors.
but now?
Now he was the man who yelled at you while you held a spoon and shook like a leaf.
your heart wouldn’t settle. it beat in your throat, heavy and wet and fast. you stood slowly, hands trembling as you carried your tray to the small break room sink. dumped the soup. rinsed the mug. mechanical movements. muscle memory.
you didn’t do confrontations. you just weren’t built for them. every sharp word echoed inside you like it was etched into bone. every second of that encounter—his voice, the way he looked at you, the rage on his face—played on repeat, looping again and again with increasing sharpness.
why are there four bodies still taking up beds in my er?
like you’d chosen it. like you wanted the drawers full. like you weren’t down here alone, managing twenty-two corpses in twelve hours with no help and no backup and no one reading your emails for you.
and when you’d finally explained?
he hadn’t even looked at you. just turned around and left.
did that mean he believed you?
or that he just didn’t care?
you stood in the middle of the break room with water dripping off your hands and your badge still flipped backward on your chest. you didn’t move. you couldn’t.
you tried to shake it off. to tell yourself that it didin't matter. that him and his words were nothing to you.
you’d had worse days. you’d heard worse things.
but somehow, this felt different.
because this wasn’t just any doctor. this was jack abbot.
and you hated—hated—that even now, with your pride in pieces and your chest still tight from holding back tears, part of you still cared what he thought of you.
SUMMARY: Jack’s mouth opened like he might say something else—something honest, something heavy, but the words caught in his throat and never came. Instead, he gave a short, quiet nod, like he was tucking whatever that was into his chest for later.
Creative Event: A Doctor A Day 27, Prompt: "Even though the road to get here was long, at last I am home." (I reworded it to fit a little better sorry x)
Color: Green
PAIRING: Dr. Jack Abbot x f!reader (physician assistant)
WORD COUNT: 7.6K
WARNINGS: Canon-typical things, tension-filled confessions, veteran affairs (I have OPINIONS on the care of veterans and today's political climate/military industrial complex BUT held back from making this political but fuck the government), group meeting/therapy, allusions to PTSD and what comes with being a combat veteran, prothesis/amuptation conversations, religious jokes-ish, smoking, mainly just all angst to fluff, NOT proofread so be kind, movie magic plot, etc.
A/N: This was so much fun to be a part of! This was really cathartic to write as it hits home some, so I hope you all enjoy. Thank you to @fuckoffbard for listening and helping. Thank you for creating this @ananonymousaffair, @clubsoft, and @letsgobarbs!
COMMENTS ENCOURAGED! THEY FUEL ME!
The clinic lights always tried to mimic the morning light, but it was always too sterile, too awake. There was no natural gradient to welcome you into a new day. Instead, it was the kind of light that made you feel like you hadn’t slept enough, and never would, even if you had.
You were the first to arrive. It was hard to lose the habit, but it gave you time to review the backlog of missed calls. The quiet preparation was the only time you had to decompress before the day, but the rusted bell rang, knowing you never truly got reprieve.
Not many came in this early. Certainly not without appointments. Most regulars were punctual, others late, flustered, avoiding eye contact like the entire hallway and staff were some kind of moral jury.
Yet, this man was already looking at you. You turned, and there he was.
You were met with an already long day’s worth of stubble, a jacket zipped halfway, and a UPMC badge dangling low like a relic from a night shift not long ended. His shoulders filled the doorway like he hadn’t quite committed to being inside yet.
However, you recognized him immediately. Abbot, Jack. Early 50s. Transtibial amputation of rthe ight leg. Two canceled appointments in March. One in April. No follow-up scheduled.
His chart was one of those you flagged mentally; he was the kind of patient who only walked through the door once a year, just long enough to keep his services active before disappearing for another twelve-month stretch.
Jack cleared his throat, low. “You take walk-ins?”
You blinked. Technically…no. Not this early. Not without calling ahead. Not when it was a physical rather than an urgent medical concern. Yet, your mouth moved before policy could catch up.
“Give me a moment to get you checked in.” You nodded, words automatic and practiced. “First and last name?”
He looked like he might leave right there. But then he exhaled—just enough air to say: Okay. I’ll stay.
“Jack. Abbot. Had an appointment a while back…” He spoke like his confession would make up for wasted time and resources. “...couldn’t make it.”
You hummed, tapping the keyboard, pretending to scroll through the records you already knew by heart.
“Well,” You stared, standing. “Third time’s a charm.”
Guiding him through the narrow hallway, your shoes hit softly on the tile, linoleum too thin to hide the grout lines from the floor beneath. The overhead lights buzzed in that tired, mechanical way fluorescent bulbs always do after too many years and too few replacements. You moved past mismatched wall sconces and half-peeling placards that still bore the faint imprint of a previous tenant’s brass plates.
This place used to be a law office.
You could see it in the layout; the corner turns that led to nowhere, the heavy wooden doors that didn’t quite fit the newer hinges. Even the break room still had a long strip of polished wood where the receptionist’s counter once stood. Someone had slapped a rack of patient forms on it. A forced transformation.
Rented-out facility. Government-issued furniture. Nothing quite fit. Everything was too small, too sterile, or too hollow. And somehow, that made it perfect for a VA satellite clinic. A place repurposed by necessity. Like most things touched by war.
Jack didn’t make small talk, and you didn’t push. Glancing back, you could see the way he moved, shoulders slightly hunched, but still alert. He walked like someone used to being in charge of emergencies, but bone-tired from them, too. Like the ground might shake, but if it did, he’d know what to do. He just didn’t want to anymore.
Exam Room One.
You gestured him in, and he stepped through without hesitation. The room was small, cold in the way all clinics are. Pale blue walls, a single high window smudged with old tape residue, and an exam table that creaked when he sat on it, the paper crackling beneath him.
You picked up the prepared clipboard.
“Before we get started, any changes in your health since your last visit?”
Jack’s mouth twitched like he might say something sardonic, but it passed. He shook his head.
“Still breathing.” He gave a slight nod. No argument. No complaint. Just a quiet readiness, like someone used to being told what to do in a language he didn’t bother translating anymore.
“Good place to start.”
You ran through the intake questions like you always did, but you kept your tone light, measured. You knew better than to fill silence with something unworthy. Especially not with veterans like Jack; men who’d learned how to hear the things people didn’t say.
You moved slowly, on purpose. You’d learned, over time, that fast hands spooked the ones who carried invisible wounds. As you stepped closer to take his vitals, you noted the small details: the subtle shift of his leg as he adjusted, the way he sat still, like movement required permission now, but his gaze tracked you steadily. Quiet. Present.
Different than most.
Most avoided eye contact when you got close. Looked at their shoes. Or the ceiling. Or the floor that looked like it had been washed a thousand times but never once looked clean. Jack didn’t. His eyes followed your hands, your shoulders, your breath. Not intrusively. Just like someone trained to read a room for danger. Or maybe reassurance.
You wrapped the cuff around his arm, checking the alignment. The Velcro hissed softly. He didn’t flinch.
“BP’s holding steady. Good.” You murmured more to yourself to note. Then, you glanced up at him with a touch of dry levity, “I’ll let you keep your driver’s license.”
That got a small exhale of amusement.
Encouraged by the break in tension, however slight, you reached for the stethoscope slung around your neck. The room was cool, and the metal already had that unforgiving chill to it. Out of habit, you rubbed your hands together briskly, trying to warm your fingers before touching him. The stethoscope, however, was another story.
You curled the diaphragm in your palm to try and bring it to room temperature, but you knew from experience it would still be cold against skin. Jack didn’t comment, just pulled the thin cotton of his shirt up without being asked.
You stepped closer, moving to his left side, and placed the warmed back of your hand against his ribs first as a courtesy, a warning.
“This’ll be cold.” You commented apologetically as you pressed the stethoscope against him.
Jack gave a small grunt in acknowledgment, but didn’t pull away.
The chill made his skin prick instantly. You saw its trail along the slope of his side, pale against old scars and the faded outline of a long-healed abrasion near his flank.
“Deep breath in.” You instructed gently. He inhaled. You listened. “Again.”
The sound of his lungs filled the bell, steady, hollow, the faint pull of old tension sitting low in his chest. You knew what clear lungs were supposed to sound like, and Jack’s weren’t far from it, but there was something shallow in the way he exhaled. Something practiced. Measured, like he was holding back.
“Again.”
He breathed in deeper this time, like he wanted to prove something. You moved the stethoscope slightly, trailing it across the muscle between his ribs.
You were close enough to feel the shift in his posture, how still he went once your hand touched him. Not rigid. Just very aware. Another breath. Another exhale.
“Any shortness?” You asked, moving to his back, your hand brushing the curve of his shoulder blade.
“No.” He breathed out. “Just tired.”
You let out a small hum in acknowledgment, pressing the stethoscope to the space between his spine and scapula. The hush of his breathing filled your ears again.
He inhaled. You listened. Something shallow in the left lobe, but not worrying. Just tension. The kind that never really leaves the body once it learned the shape of impact. You noted the way his shoulders resisted it, like his ribs had forgotten how to fully trust their own expansion.
You placed the stethoscope lightly to the left of his sternum first, where the apex beat lived beneath the ribs and years. You could feel the rise and fall of his breath under your palm as you steadied yourself. The silence narrowed around you.
His heartbeat thudded into your ears: slow, firm, echoing.
“Heart sounds good.”
Normal S1 and S2 heart sounds. No murmurs, gallops, or rubs auscultated. You knew he knew this.
You pulled the stethoscope away gently, but your hand lingered, resting for just a second longer over the center of his chest. You didn’t know why you did it. Maybe you just wanted to feel it. Really feel it.
That was the thing about hearts. You could listen all day, but you never really knew what they were holding until they trembled under your palm.
You scanned his chart again, thumb grazing the line that made you pause the first time. Chronic low back pain. No follow-up. Recommend monitoring posture w/ prosthetic use.
Still unresolved. You moved behind him, palm resting lightly between his shoulders.
“Your last visit flagged some lower back strain.” Your tone was neutral, leaving space for more. “Flares up when you’re on your feet too long?”
Jack gave a faint grunt. “Sounds like something they’d put in just to make me come back.”
“Well—” You applied gentle pressure down his spine. “—if that was the plan, it worked.”
He didn’t respond, just sat steady as your fingers pressed lower, feeling through the tension under his shirt. When you neared the curve, you slowed, palpating carefully on either side of the spine. You knew where to look, especially with someone bearing the uneven weight.
“It’s important to check for overcompensation.” You continued quietly. “If the alignment’s off, you’ll feel it in the back long before the leg.”
“I’m fine.” Jack huffed, low.
You looked up at him. “Do you ever rest the site? Or let it breathe?”
He hesitated. “Sometimes.”
Which meant rarely. You marked that silently.
“The hospital isn’t exactly known for scheduled rest periods.” He spoke, and you could hear the smirk in his voice even if he didn’t turn. “If I sit, it’s to chart. If I stand, it’s to fix something.”
You pressed your thumb a little deeper, just left of his spine, right above the sacrum. He flinched, just a little. The smallest involuntary grunt, like a breath caught the wrong way. You let your hand settle there for a moment. Not scolding. Just noting.
“Right.”
He didn’t reply, but you felt the faint shift in his posture. Not defensive. Not defeated.
You made the mental note and stepped to the cabinet without a word, retrieving the otoscope. The instrument clicked softly in your hand as you turned on the light. It cast a warm glow between you in the still room, humming faintly as if to fill the space your fingers had just left behind.
“Ears, then eyes.” You spoke gently.
Jack turned slightly, letting you tip his head the way you needed. Your fingers were light under his chin, at the hinge of his jaw. The otoscope glinted softly as you angled it toward his ear.
But while you worked, Jack watched you. You could feel it, his gaze not just drifting but reading. Like he was still deciding what kind of person you were. Still trying to place you.
“You new here?” Jack finally asked. “You don’t seem like the city type.”
“Bold assumption to make so early in the morning.” You teased, pulling the light back and moving to the other side.
“Just an observation.”
“I was born here, actually…” You answered the question you always got casually. “...left for a long time. Transferred back this year.”
“VA brought you back?” Jack tilted his head slightly. You checked his pupils next, flicking the light across his eyes as they adjusted, one at a time. He didn’t squint or shy away. Just let you look.
“God, no—” You cursed. And then, to cover what threatened to leak out around the edges:
“—I just sleep better here. Can’t fall asleep without the noise.”
That made the corner of his mouth twitch. “Most people say the city keeps them up.”
“I like knowing something’s still moving out there,” You laughed lightly through a huff. “Ambulances, garbage trucks, people yelling outside bars. Need to fall asleep to a world still spinning…”
Jack adjusted his scrub top absentmindedly, the material wrinkled from a long shift and a longer week. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, clinical, unforgiving, same as the ones he worked under most nights. But here, in this quiet exam room with your back against the counter and your arms folded, something about the hum felt less surgical.
“Silence gets loud, y’know?” He’d said it like a joke, but you could tell it wasn’t one.
You tilted your head, watching him—not with pity, but with that quiet, observational calm some people wore like armor. He recognized it. Carried the same kind of thing into trauma bays.
You nodded, but said nothing. You knew better than to fill the pause.
He gave a faint, humorless huff. “Anyway, that’s why I stopped in. Better here than my apartment, staring at the ceiling with my ears ringing.”
“So this is a drive-by enrollment renewal?” You smiled softly.
“Don’t act like that’s the worst thing you’ve seen in here.”
“It’s definitely in the top ten.” You replied dryly. “Right between the guy who thought 'disability claim' meant show-and-tell, and the Marine who cried when I told him to hydrate.”
Jack didn’t laugh, not really, but something in his posture eased, like he was letting himself rest against the moment for the first time all day. Maybe all week. His hand brushed over his knee, fingers tapping a quiet rhythm, restless in that way only people wired for emergency ever were.
He watched you write like he wasn’t used to being on the other side of the clipboard. The subject instead of the observer. It wasn’t shameful. It was something quieter than that…displacement, maybe.
“You okay over there?” You asked, teasing just a little.
“Yeah. Just...weird.” He blinked like you’d pulled him out of a thought.
“What is?”
“Being the one getting charted.” He nodded toward your pen.
You smiled faintly. “Yeah. I get that.”
He raised a brow. “Do you?”
“Honestly?” You thought for a moment, tapping the pen against your thigh. “I can’t remember the last time I went to the doctor.”
That got a real look out of him. Not disbelief, just confirmation. That quiet, private awareness: Of course. You too.
“It’s hard…” You admitted. “When you’re used to being the one who knows the systems. Knows what they’ll say before they say it. Harder when you can’t picture someone on the other side knowing what to do with you.”
You watched him for another beat, then let your gaze drift to the clock. Not rushed, just reminded. You were still working.
The rhythm of the clinic moved on, woke up, even when the air between you had stilled. Somewhere down the hall, a printer coughed. A phone rang and went unanswered. Staff clocked in.
You cleared your throat. “Regardless, everything looks good— I’ll send the go-ahead so your enrollment stays active.”
Jack gave a short nod, business-like again. Like a door had been pulled mostly shut, though not all the way.
You stepped away from the counter, your hand brushing the edge of the sink as you crossed the room. He rose at the same time, out of courtesy and instinct.
“I’ll walk you out.” You held the door open for him.
The hallway outside was waking up, the liminal space between morning chaos and whatever came next. Jack walked beside you, not hurried, not tense. You both moved like people who’d learned how to conserve energy in sterile places.
You waited until you reached the corner near the exit, the spot where patients usually asked about paperwork or turned around to remember they’d forgotten something.
Instead, you spoke up, “We run a group. Off the books.”
Jack glanced sideways at you.
“Thursday nights—” You went on, like you were reciting a neutral fact. “—across the street, at the church. It’s in the community room. It's unofficial. No sign-in, no rank, no talking if you don’t want to. Just people who prefer the noise.”
Jack said nothing, but you didn’t mistake silence for disinterest. He tilted his head slightly, as if trying to figure out the angle. But there wasn’t one.
You didn’t fill in the rest. Didn’t say for people like you. Didn’t have to.
He nodded slowly. Like he didn’t know what to do with the information, but he understood it wasn’t being handed out lightly.
“I know you work nights. It probably doesn’t fit your schedule.” You couldn’t help but encourage, continue. “But in case it ever, you’re always welcome.”
Then, you pushed the front door open, holding it just long enough for him to pass through. The morning was bright out there, harsher than the lighting inside. He squinted against it.
“I’ll keep it in mind.” He answered finally, voice quiet but deliberate.
As he stepped out, you said, without ceremony, “You already did the hard part.”
He turned halfway, brow raised. “Which part was that?”
“Walking in.” You made it sound so simple. Maybe it was. “Letting someone see you before you’re bleeding.”
Jack stood there for a breath longer, the door propped open between you. You were close enough to see the small shift of his jaw, the ghost of tension at the corners of his eyes, like something flickered through him and caught behind his teeth.
He nodded, then he left.
—
The room smelled like burnt coffee and whatever detergent the janitorial staff bought in bulk. One of the folding chairs was broken, so you’d leaned it in the corner, hoping no one would try to use it. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, indifferent. Outside the windows, dusk hovered like it wasn’t sure whether to stay or leave.
You were halfway through introductions when the door opened.
Late. Not by much—seven minutes, maybe—but still, you glanced up instinctively, ready to gently redirect whoever came in. And then you saw him.
Jack Abbot.
He was still in scrubs, jacket thrown over the top, collar slightly wrinkled like he’d wrestled with whether or not to come and only won five minutes ago. His hair was a little longer than the last time you saw him, older somehow, even if it had only been a few weeks.
He hovered in the doorway, one boot inside, the other not. Caught between the hall and the possibility of something uncomfortable.
You felt the shift in the room. The group noticed him how he carried himself. It wasn’t just his build. It was the posture. That straight-backed, high-alert bearing you only ever saw in two kinds of people: soldiers and people trying very hard not to fall apart.
You stood slowly. Smiled like you weren’t surprised to see him, even if a small part of you was.
“Hey.” You were warm. “Come on in.”
Something in Jack’s shoulders eased, just slightly. You turned to the rest of the group, your voice calm, unforced.
“This is Jack. He’s joining us tonight.” No last name. No backstory. Just the gesture of arrival. That was enough.
A few nods, murmured hellos. One guy said, “Welcome,” like it was a rule. Jack gave a chin-dip in return.
A man, Martin, shared first, talking about how his daughter stopped calling in March. Two others chimed in with variations of the same wound. The room did what it always did: it stretched itself to hold whatever pain it was given, without fixing it.
Jack didn’t speak. He didn’t fidget either. He sat still, eyes forward, but not glassy. Listening. Taking inventory. And you watched him. Subtly, out of the corner of your eye, like you weren’t waiting for the moment he’d stand and say he didn’t belong here because you could feel it.
He looked like he was scanning every word, every crack in the ceiling tile, trying to make it make sense. His eyes occasionally drifted to the door. His hands stayed in his lap, steady, but his foot tapped once—twice—before stilling again.
He wasn’t unsettled because it was a group. He was unsettled because, for the first time in a long time, no one needed him. No one was coding. No alarms were beeping. No one called Doctor Abbot.
He was just Jack. And that didn’t feel like enough.
So, he didn’t speak for the first thirty minutes. Instead, Jack sat like he was made of poured concrete: solid, unswayed, unmoved. But the stillness wasn’t ease. It was maintenance. A posture that said: Don’t look too long or you’ll see the cracks.
The others took turns with practiced vulnerability. Another veteran, Lisa, talked about the baby next door who cried at night and how it sometimes made her want to knock on the wall and scream.
Someone else recited their weekly mantra about how small talk at the gas station kept them tethered to the world. Every voice added weight and oxygen to the room in that strange way group therapy worked: no one fixing, no one solved, but everyone surviving, together.
You didn’t push Jack, but when the lull came, when the air went quiet in that half-second of unclaimed silence, you turned to him. Not a spotlight, not pressure, just an open door.
He shifted, as if preparing to run, though he didn’t. His fingers rubbed the side of his leg, slowly. You saw the muscle clench in his jaw before he spoke. “I traded my shift to make it here.”
It came out simple, but the effort behind the words was unmistakable. He paused after that, long enough for it to seem like he might leave it there.
Yet, he exhaled, glanced toward the window, and you could almost see the gears turning behind his eyes, searching for a safer way to say what he meant. Something polite. Digestible.
And then he gave up on that, letting his tone drop into something flatter. Colder. Not harsh—just clinical, like he was delivering bad news to a patient’s family through a closed curtain.
“This isn’t a waste of time.” He started defensively, scared to offend your effort. “But sitting… idle like this for something I can’t even name… feels wrong.”
A few people looked up. He didn’t meet anyone’s eyes now. He kept speaking, as if he didn’t let the silence in, he wouldn’t be so measured.
“I don’t talk about things unless they have names. Symptoms. Patterns. Diagnoses. That’s the trade. You name it, we treat it. That’s how I work. That’s how I stay upright. But this…”
Jack trailed off again. Then shrugged, a short, tired motion.
“...this doesn’t bleed the same way.” He finished.
The words didn’t land like a dramatic revelation. There was no gasp, no cinematic hush—just the steady hum of a room that knew the texture of what he meant.
Jack’s fingers stilled against the side of his leg. He looked down at his hands like he half-expected them to be covered in something—blood, maybe. Or purpose. But they were clean. Still. Useless.
“I spent my whole career knowing what to reach for,” he said. “Chest compressions. Epi. Clamp and cut. Even when it was bad, even when it was too late, at least I could do something.”
He leaned back slightly in the folding chair, the metal legs creaking faintly beneath him. The gesture made his prosthesis shift under his pant leg, and he winced, not in pain, but in awareness.
“But this?” His voice dropped, vulnerable now. “This is like watching a code slow down in real time and realizing you’re not the one running it. You’re just watching the monitor. And the line’s not flat yet, but it’s close.”
He didn’t say what he was thinking, but you could feel it hanging in the air: I traded a shift. I changed my whole night. I said yes to something I barely believe in. And this—this silence, this seat, this half-truth I just spoke—is all I have to show for it.
So, the quiet held.
Not heavy. Not awkward. Just present. The way it got in that room—when someone finally said something so honest it didn’t need embellishment.
No one jumped in to reassure him. No one offered clichés. That wasn’t what this space was for.
You didn’t speak yet, either. You just sat with it. With him. The same way he’d done for the last thirty minutes. Like the room itself was trained to carry the weight for a while. He stayed, and that was what mattered.
Finally, Martin, the same man who had spoken first, shifted forward in his seat.
“I get it.” He agreed. “Post service, I became a firefighter…After I retired, I couldn’t go to the grocery store without looking for exits, looking for a problem. Couldn’t sit in my living room without wondering what the hell I was doing just sitting there.”
Jack didn’t nod, but he didn’t flinch either. He just stayed where he was, breathing evenly, like the effort of being in the room was more taxing than a double shift.
Lisa spoke next.
“It took me a year to figure out I wasn’t broken. Just… not useful in the way I was trained to be. No one ever tells you how to exist when there’s no task in front of you.”
Jack swallowed, his throat working hard against nothing. He blinked slowly, then glanced your way, but only for a beat.
The group kept moving, circling. No one tried to fix him. They just laid their pieces down beside his. You waited until the conversation had stretched on, shifted. Until someone made a dry joke about how the snacks were always good, and the weight in the air lightened just enough to carry again.
Only then did you speak—quietly, but clearly to everyone in the room.
“Remember, it’s now always about coming here to feel better.” You didn’t pose the sentiment to be questioned. “You can always come to not feel alone while it’s bad.”
The rest of the session moved on. The others began to speak again, and Jack stayed silent for the rest of it. Not because he didn’t want to be part of it, but because that was his part. The kind of sharing that left your bones hollowed out afterward. Like saying anything else would cheapen the breath it took to get that out.
Even after the session, when the folding chairs had scraped back across the linoleum and the regulars had filtered out with their usual half-smiles and murmured thanks, Jack lingered. Not awkwardly. Just unhurried, like his body hadn’t yet caught up to the fact that the talking was over.
Lisa was the first to approach him. Extended her hand, firm and sure, and told him where she served. Jack didn’t flinch, just nodded and returned the shake.
Someone else, Curtis, Navy, chimed in with a timeline, a base. The names passed like currency. The kind of shared vocabulary that didn’t need to be explained.
You were still inside, tossing coffee cups into the trash, wiping down tabletops that had already been clean.
By the time you stepped out into the night, the group was gone. The lot was nearly empty except for your car and one old truck idling at the far end.
The sharp chill of early spring hit your neck, and you hunched your shoulders as you reached into your coat pocket. Keys. Lighter. Cigarettes. A ritual, half-forgotten.
You moved toward the concrete steps at the front of the church, letting yourself exhale for the first time all night. You sat, letting the cold seep through your pants.
It was a habit, really—staying much longer than needed. No one around to clock you. No rules left to follow.
You tapped a cigarette out of the pack and slid it between your lips. Lit it with a tired flick of the thumb.
“Now that’s one hell of a sight.”
You startled. Jack’s voice came from the shadows, dry as whiskey left out overnight.
You turned to see him leaning against the stone railing, just out of reach of the yellow glow from the overhead bulb.
Then, you let out a soft huff. “It’s medicinal.”
“Oh yeah?” He nodded toward the cigarette. “What’s that treat?”
“Empathy fatigue.” You deadpanned. “And low-grade moral despair.”
Jack laughed, really laughed. Not loud. Not long. Real.
You glanced at him, surprised to see he was still here. Even more surprised by what his presence was doing to your posture, you weren’t standing straight anymore. You weren’t leading anything. You were just here.
You gestured to the space beside you on the steps.
“Come on then. You’ve already seen me sin. Might as well sit through the confession.”
Jack hesitated, then climbed the two steps and lowered himself beside you. He sat with the same precision you’d seen in the exam room, like even resting was something to be executed properly.
You flicked ash to the concrete. “You didn’t have to wait up.”
“Didn’t want to go back yet.” He admitted.
You both looked out across the street, quiet for a moment. He didn’t seem rushed now. He was just untethered.
“You know, this is the first time in five years I haven’t done a night shift.”
You turned to him. He wasn’t looking at you, his eyes were still on the street, jaw set like he’d said too much.
“It’s killing me—” Jack added. “—sitting still. Watching the hours pass without something bleeding or burning or breaking.”
You didn’t interrupt. You let the weight of the admission settle.
“You could’ve gone home.” You said eventually.
“I wouldn’t have stayed.” He looked at you then. And you saw it, clear in the way his green-hazel eyes softened; this wasn’t just a delay tactic, it was survival. “Don’t know what to do with the quiet.”
You offered the cigarette pack, not pushing, just holding it out in case. He didn’t take one, but he didn’t recoil, either.
Jack scratched his head in thought, looking sideways at you. “I don’t mean to unload on you, I know you already—I’m just—
“Don’t worry, I stayed for the same reason.” You cut him off, unwilling to entertain something so wrong. “Company makes it better.”
You looked at him in the glow of the streetlight, noticing how different he seemed outside the exam room, outside the group. How strange it was, seeing someone become real right in front of you.
His eyes flicked to yours, then, briefly, but steadily. A flicker of something like recognition passed between you.
“You’re different out here, you know?”
You raised an eyebrow, lips quirking around the filter. “Different how?”
“No clipboard. No script.”
You huffed a little, dragged the cigarette again before flicking ash to the side. “You say that like I’ve been reading off cue cards.”
“I don’t mean it as a bad thing. Just—” Jack leaned back slightly on his elbows, letting the stone of the step press cold against his back. “You’re quieter. Less… contained—wasn’t expecting it.”
“What were you expecting?” You gave him a sidelong glance.
“Not someone who needs to stay behind.”
That, more than anything, made something ache behind your chest. You looked away. Let the ember of your cigarette burn a little too long.
“Well…” You were gentle with the thought. “Not all of us know how to leave.”
You don’t continue right away. Just let the silence sit between you, a low hum of nothing but the wind moving along the street, the overhead lamp buzzing faintly like a broken thought. Yet, Jack knew the thought wasn’t through.
“...out here, I don’t have to keep anyone upright” You’d never said it aloud, afraid the guilt it would bring, but it was so relieving to admit. “...I don’t have to hold my own spine so straight either.”
Jack nodded slowly, gazing forward again. “That sounds nice.”
“It’s not.” Your tone wasn’t bitter, but sometimes honesty read that way. “It’s just true.”
Another car rolled past, headlights stalking across the sidewalk and over Jack’s boots. The beam caught the tired set of his jaw, the way his eyes had sunk slightly into their sockets from too many nights that didn’t end the way they should have.
Still, Jack looked better in this light. He looked less sharp, less made of stone.
“You ever try to quit?” He turned his head slightly, demeanor ticking in quiet acknowledgment of your cigarette.
“Ever the doctor.” You gave a dry laugh, slow and low. “Every other week I think about quitting, and then someone tells me they still remember the weight of the body they had to leave behind, and suddenly I’m outside again with a lighter.”
“Guess I should thank you for staying out here long enough for me to loiter.”
“Loiter?” You echoed, glancing sideways. “You’re giving yourself a lot of credit.”
He huffed a laugh. “Fair.”
The lull between you had settled into something companionable. A mutual endurance, like you were both learning how to be still in the same moment.
Jack shifted, like he had something else on the tip of his tongue but wasn’t sure how to give it shape. His gaze dipped to the cigarette now crushed out beside your shoe. Then, to your hands, your sleeves pulled down over your wrists like instinct.
“Gimme your wrist.” He cleared his throat.
You blinked, confused. “What?”
He held out a hand, patient and palm-up. “Your wrist. I’m being serious.”
A smile pulled at your mouth before you could stop it. “Jack, you trying to hold my hand outside a church?”
He didn’t miss a beat. “I’m offering you a free exam. Since you admitted it’s been years.”
You laughed, not quite believing him, even as your heart gave the smallest thud of something unexpected. “You remember that?”
“Of course I do.” There was a new wave of confidence as he spoke. “A licensed PA, going around telling people to take care of themselves, but too stubborn to schedule a check-up? That stuck with me.”
He flexed his fingers slightly, still holding them out. You let out a long, amused sigh—but gave him your wrist.
Jack took it carefully, cradling it like it was something breakable. His fingers were warm, steady. He glanced at his watch, brow furrowing in quiet concentration.
“You’re stalling.” You teased.
“I’m being thorough—
He kept counting. His mouth twitched like he was holding back a smirk, but when he finally looked up, his eyes caught yours and something shifted in the air between you. It was heavy and new.
—If I’m doing your first physical in however many years.” He clicked his teeth. “No way, I’m cutting corners.”
The line landed harder than he meant it to. You didn’t move. Didn’t breathe for a second too long. Neither did he. Then, without fanfare, Jack released your wrist, like he was afraid of making it mean more than it already did.
Jack’s eyes skimmed your face, thoughtful, quiet. Not searching for a reaction, just weighing something. Whatever hesitation had held him off earlier was gone now, replaced by a kind of gentle stubbornness that to you felt more him.
Jack lifted his hand again, slower this time, and brought his fingers to your jaw. He said nothing, just let the touch land carefully, fingertips warm beneath the edge of your cheekbone.
His thumb shifted slightly, pressing beneath the hinge of your jaw, then slid up toward the curve beneath your ear.
You didn’t move, not because you couldn’t, but because you didn’t want to. There was nothing performative in the gesture, nothing flirtatious. It wasn’t about romance or pretense or asking for more.
It was just Jack, still trying to be useful.
You tilted your head without thinking, letting him trace the side of your neck. His thumb swept slowly beneath your jawline, feeling for your lymph nodes.
His movements were sure, practiced. Not clinical in the cold sense, but precise. Tactile. Like each step in the exam was tethered to something older than routine.
“You had to do all this in the field?”
Jack nodded, his touch moving to the base of your neck. “Every day. No machines. Just hands and instincts.”
You heard something shift in his voice with a quiet flick of gravity. That subtle weight people carried when they weren’t talking about the past so much as living in it again.
“Vitals were all manual. Pulse checks. Respiratory counts by ear. Skin temp by touch. No monitors, no steady beeping to tell you who was slipping.”
Jack’s thumb passed gently along the tendon at the side of your neck, and for a moment, you forgot what the street sounded like. You were suddenly aware of the shape of your body in space, of the parts of you he could feel ticking beneath his fingers.
“At night we worked in blackout conditions.” He murmured, continuing a ritual he’d never forget. “No headlamps. No lanterns. Just stars, if we were lucky. Used the North Star to orient when GPS failed. Checked pupils by moonlight. You’d learn to tell cyanosis from normal by feel, not sight.”
You swallowed, but didn’t pull away. His hand was still there, anchored lightly against your throat. Not gripping, not holding. Just witnessing.
“And you trusted yourself to get it right?” You asked, not doubting him, but wondering what it had cost.
“You didn’t have a choice.” Jack’s gaze met yours again. And this time, something flickered in it, something bigger than both of you. “When someone’s slipping under your hands, you either learn the difference or you lose them.”
You swallowed again—and he felt that, too.
Jack moved to your collarbone, pressing lightly, checking along the line where lymph nodes would swell. Your eyes flicked up to him at that, but his gaze was steady on your shoulder, his hand still carefully mapping the shape of your body like it was a page he needed to memorize.
“You’re tense.” His fingers paused at the base of your neck.
You let out a breath. “Occupational hazard.”
Jack pulled back slightly, eyes finally meeting yours.
“Could say the same.” He said.
There was a stillness between you then full of something else. A thread tied between memory and presence. Between what he’d once done to save lives, and what he was doing now to feel human again.
You shifted, giving him a small, crooked smile. “This what you pictured for a night off?”
Jack didn’t answer right away. His eyes lingered on yours, thoughtful, like he was weighing how honest to be.
“Not exactly.” He confessed. His hand dropped from your collarbone then, the air between you still carrying the weight of his touch. “But it’s the best one I’ve had in a long time.”
“My health that riveting?”
Then, with a faint smirk, Jack returned to himself. “You’ve got a hell of a resting heart rate.”
You pealed with laughter. The grin tugging at the corner of Jack’s mouth softened everything in him.
“That’s your fault.”
He shrugged.
You sat back a little, feeling your own body again; your neck still tingling faintly where his fingers had been. He hadn’t lingered to touch you, not really. He’d touched you because that’s how he knew people. That’s how he made sense of the living.
And tonight, for once, he wasn’t too late.
The streetlight above flickered once, then steadied. The night still buzzed faintly with the sound of spring creeping in, but the world, for a moment, had gone small; just the church steps, the two of you, and the unspoken admission that this, whatever it was, had been needed.
And maybe, you thought, that was what healing sometimes looked like. Not talking. Not explaining. Just letting someone check for signs of life and finding them.
There was a kind of reverence in that. And you hadn’t expected reverence tonight.
You rubbed your fingers slowly along the fabric of your pants, grounding yourself with the texture. The quiet stretched again, but softer this time. Less like the end of a conversation and more like the lull before the next thing.
Eventually, you straightened, reluctantly peeling yourself away from the cold stone steps. Jack’s movement followed yours like a reflex;he stood, not with purpose, but with you, shadowing your motion, the way people do when they’ve been through long shifts together. When the silence between them means something understood.
Neither of you said Let’s go. But you both started walking.
Down the worn church steps, your shoes thudding softly on old cement. Gravel cracked beneath your weight as you crossed the narrow lot. It had gone almost fully quiet, just the low hum of the power lines, the wind slipping through the trees like a passing thought.
Your car sat waiting beneath a crooked lamp, light flickering as if undecided. Jack’s truck was parked a few spaces down, dust settling on the hood like it always did when someone stopped moving long enough.
You stopped at your door, keys already out but untouched in your hand. You didn’t unlock it. Jack didn’t walk past. He hovered there instead, just close enough to share the moment, just far enough to leave you room if you wanted to step away.
He rocked once on his heels, then cleared his throat. It wasn’t a nervous sound—just a nudge. Something that bridged the quiet without breaking it.
“You think that group’s got space next week?” He asked, his voice shier now, like he didn’t want to spook the stillness you’d both earned.
“We don’t do headcounts.” You smiled. “Just chairs. If one’s open, it’s yours.”
Jack considered that. Nodded once, brows drawing slightly inward with the thought. Then, a faint smile, tired around the edges, but real in the center.
“Alright.” He murmured, agreeable. “Might do that.”
You leaned your weight gently against the side of your car, letting yourself rest into the shape of the night for a breath longer.
“You know, Jack—” You started confidently. “—you don’t have to wait for Thursdays to talk to me.”
His brows twitched in the faintest flicker of surprise and confusion. The kind he tried to swallow but couldn’t quite manage, the suspense too enticing.
“I mean, if something comes up.” You smiled subtly. “Or if you need anything. Or just… if it’s late, and things are too quiet again….”
You trailed off and held out your hand, palm open. He blinked once, the weight of your words landing slowly.
“Your phone. So I can give you my number.” You kept your tone light. Gentle. “I’ll type it in for you. Easier than calling the front desk and pretending it’s about a referral.”
Jack hesitated, just for a second, but reached for it. His phone was warm from his pocket. The screen was still open. You clicked into his contacts, typed in your name, and entered your number without comment. No title, no clinic.
Just you.
Before handing it back, you paused with your thumb hovering over the message field, but you didn’t text yourself. Didn’t give him that easy opening. You locked the screen and gave it back.
“There.” You said, brushing your fingers against his as the phone changed hands. “If you want to reach out, you can. If not… no pressure.”
Jack looked down at the phone in his hand like it might bite back. The contact glowed softly on the screen—your name, simple and unadorned.
“You’re giving me an out.”
“Or an invitation.” You shrugged. “Depends on what you do with it.”
He didn’t answer right away. Just thumbed the edge of the screen, eyes distant for a moment. Processing. Weighing.
“You don’t give this to just anybody.” He realized quietly. It wasn’t a question.
You tilted your head. “Neither do you.”
Something flickered across his face and spread through his body. The road to something like this was never clean, and it sure as hell wasn’t straight, but this? This felt like rest. Or more like something unfolding, slow and tentative, in the center of his chest. A warmth he didn’t expect to feel tonight.
Jack’s mouth opened like he might say something else—something honest, something bold, but the words caught in his throat and never came.
Instead, he just held your gaze for a beat too long to be casual. Like he was still cataloging something he hadn’t named yet.
Not attraction exactly—but something adjacent. Something measured. Careful. Like he hadn’t let himself think about hope in a long time, and didn’t want to touch it too directly now in case it vanished.
You didn’t break the moment either.
Eventually, he stepped back, nodding once—not goodbye, just a shift in posture. A soft signal that he’d give you your space.
You watched him walk back to his truck. His gait was slower now, less formal than before. Shoulders slightly hunched, but looser. Like he’d left something behind on those steps and wasn’t sure yet if that was a loss or a relief.
You stood still until he opened his door.
He didn’t look back. But he didn’t rush, either.
And when the engine turned over and the headlights swept across the lot, you didn’t flinch from the brightness. You let it pass through you.
There wasn’t anything to say. Not tonight.
But the air had shifted.
Like something in the dark had turned to face the light again. And maybe next Thursday, you thought, when the chairs were pulled out again and the coffee burned a little on the bottom, maybe there’d be two people left sitting under the sky.
Still not talking. Still not explaining. But quietly, unmistakably—staying.
jack abbot x f!attorney!reader
ao3
content: 18+ mdni, sexually explicit content, age gap, swearing, brief mention of alcohol, co-opting christianity for my benefit (sex), being mean to robby but like lovingly. like ur brother, gingko trees as a plot device, tom cruise mention
words: 16.7k sry i <3 dialogue and write it before the rest of the plot
a/n: the backpack thing actually happened to me before and also idk how to write
synopsis: It’s routine. The first Friday of every month you make your way down to the emergency department with a stack of insurance claims in hand to harass Robby with, and you leave through the door with Jack Abbot, fresh off his shift and half a step behind you, muttering something lowly in your ear that makes you laugh. You’ll both stop off at your office just long enough to haphazardly toss the paperwork on your desk. And then you’ll go to the roof. You’ll pretend not to notice the hand hovering over the small of your back, and he’ll pretend not to notice the way your shoulder brushes his. Routine.
You’ve never seen a grown-ass man leap, but when you materialize beside Michael Robinavitch, ready to take advantage of his daily five minutes of quiet and drink his rapidly cooling coffee before he got down to business, with a stack of papers in hand, you think his skeleton might break from the violent flinch that racks his frame.
“God, what are you, a kamikaze lawyer? Are you heat seeking?”
“Why, you offering?”
It’s routine.
The first Friday of every month you make your way down to the emergency department with a stack of insurance claims in hand to harass Robby with, and you leave through the stairs with Jack Abbot, fresh off his shift and half a step behind you, muttering something lowly in your ear that makes you laugh. You’ll both stop off at your office just long enough to haphazardly toss the paperwork on your desk. And then you’ll go to the roof. You’ll pretend not to notice the hand hovering over the small of your back, and he’ll pretend not to notice the way your shoulder brushes his.
Routine.
So, like clockwork, the first Friday of the month rolls around, and with it comes you, metaphorical sunglasses on, sauntering off the elevator like you love the emergency department. Like you can’t wait to run around roleplaying Bolt from the titular Bolt to beg for signatures. Like this is exactly where you were hoping to be.
You click your pen, the sharp sound a tiny gavel sealing his fate.
“Come down to reject another insurance claim?” comes from your left.
“God forbid a woman have hobbies, Dana,” you scoff.
“Jack’s busy, ain't around for you to longingly gaze at.”
“I do not gaze at Jack,” you say defensively, hands abandoning the file they were holding on the desk to fly between your eyes and hers as you try to stress your point. “I look.”
She lets out an unimpressed mhm, her unconvinced eyebrows twitching in doubt at your self-proclaimed non-gazing status.
And you know that you really need to get these papers signed, but Dana sprang this on you out of nowhere, so now you have no choice but to pivot to a time-sensitive Gazegate investigation. Your mind begins to sift through all the evidence. You don’t gaze. You are totally in control of your physiological reactions to Jack.
Your face drops marginally. It’s not your fucking fault that you want him. As if it’s your fault that all you can think about some nights is his voice gasping out your name.
Minor desperation overtakes your frame and bleeds through your hushed words as you imagine Jack Abbot clocking you gazing at him.
Just embarrassing. Your lust is sickening.
“I don't gaze," you insist before dropping your voice and glancing at the attending. "Do I gaze?”
Robby’s eyebrows involuntarily shoot up, transforming his frozen, resigned face into one of are you fucking kidding me?, the statement making him consider whether he needed another cup of coffee or, maybe, a different career altogether.
Perhaps one without insurance claims.
His lips part around a question he doesn’t quite ask—words rising, then retreating as his throat bobs with the effort of swallowing them back down. Robby glances at Dana for a lifeline, but she's bloodthirsty for drama.
Robby finally exhales a short, incredulous laugh, shaking his head. "Do you... do you want me to answer that?" he asks, his voice laced with cautious amusement, hesitant to step in the trap you lay at his feet.
You’re silent.
His head drops into a single solemn, affirmative nod—your judge and jury. “You gaze.”
And there’s something on the tip of your tongue, locked, and loaded, and ready to fire—something connecting the word gaze to Myrna’s little nickname for him.
It doesn’t make it out.
Instead, you pick up the cup sitting to his side—the one patiently saying drink me, Robby! before it totally becomes cold—and silently reclaim it as your own, drinking the burnt coffee in one long, resigned sip.
Robby doesn’t speak.
It’s at that moment, of course, that Abbot appears—steady footsteps cutting through the low hum of the floor.
Jesus Christ. His hair was disheveled, curls sticking up at odd angles from running his hands through them all night and his black shirt, lacking any scrubs censoring the offending article, clings to his biceps like it was divinely tasked with ruining your concentration.
Your eyes catch there, unwilling to move, like staring is involuntary. A distraction you feel in your teeth. One you’d like to feel in your teeth.
As he approaches the desk you’re situated at, his eyes flicker up from the tablet in his hands just long enough to take in the scene: Robby’s flat stare, and your glare as you stand there, empty cup in hand.
“Robby,” Abbot drawls, loaded with the kind of dry amusement that suggests he’s made peace with your brand of destruction long ago.
His gaze slides pointedly to the cup, then back to Robby’s face.
Your victim looks up at him, forlorn, and mutters, “Can you just…?” His voice is flat, resigned—tinged with a special kind of despair reserved for the aftermath of you. Morosely, he half-heartedly gesticulates in your direction, trying to tell the man to control his animal.
Robby sets the cup down on the counter and picks up your pen, scrunching the sleeves of his hoodie at his elbows, wanting to end this.
Aforementioned animal owner has the audacity to smirk—half-awake and still deciding if he should be charming or infuriating—rolling his shoulders and then sighing before moving toward the desk, his movements slow and deliberate. He watches Robby for a moment, then shifts his attention to you.
“Any chance you’ll let him live to see tomorrow?” Voice dry but not quite masking the very real curiosity beneath it.
You shrug and slowly narrow your eyes as though the thought hadn’t even crossed your mind. “Depends.”
Typical lawyer.
“Get to him before that coffee does,” Jack advises like he’s giving medical advice, and Robby levels him with a flat stare because he knows that with you around, he is never going to get coffee, let alone have coffee get to him.
Jack huffs in amusement, shaking his head as he moves to join the taller man, tablet tucked under one arm.
“Still have a couple things to do,” Jack grunts to you lowly, and you glance down at your watch because surely you have the time right.
His shift should be ending.
And yet.
“What idiot starts his little tasks at shift-change?” you laugh, enjoying the unamused glance thrown your way from still-on-the-clock doctor—unimpressed, deeply earned.
“Wait for me?” Jack asks, already knowing the answer.
A small smile teases the edge of your lips in response. “Was going to anyway.”
With a low, reluctant breath, he straightens up, scraping a hand through his hair. He turns on his heel and strides through the department.
Dana looks up from behind the desk. Her gaze briefly meets yours, right eyebrow perched slightly above the left, as if to say not gazing, huh?, before she turns her attention back to the task at hand.
Jack’s off doing end-of-shift stuff, Robby is signing his life away, Dana is doing what Dana does, presumably—Christ, you would think these people were employed.
Floundering, you look around. So, no banter?
You’re already bored. You glance down at your watch, hand exasperatedly waving in the air as the numbers register. You'll have to act like you're employed soon, too. Your carefully structured morning—insurance claims, harassment, fifteen-minute break—crumbles before you.
God, so bored.
Eyes drifting around the department, your fingers start drumming an erratic rhythm on the surface of the desk, rebelling against the feeling of being out of place. Fingers dance along, down the length, adjusting a stack of papers, nudging them at an odd angle just to see if anyone will notice. You move on to your next victim, Dana’s hand quickly behind yours, returning the papers to their rightful place without so much as a glance in your direction.
Fluorescent lights glare down overhead, highlighting everything in a blinding white that dulls your senses.
You let out a low sigh, turning a tablet upside down in its dock. It’s not even fun.
Purposeful activity swirls around you in a slow tempoed symphony, a rare lull settling into the emergency department. To your left, Robby curses the claims in front of him in a hushed voice—and it’s a nasty, personal beef between him and that paper—pen scratching along the documents with resigned effort.
“You always act like I’m asking you to sign a voluntary execution agreement,” you sigh, a note of exasperation creeping into your voice. “I just need your signature, not someone to rewrite the Ten Commandments.”
That poor pen, you think, watching his reluctant grip tighten around it, the pen enduring its fate like a prisoner of war. Nowhere for it to run.
You lean on the counter and your head tilts, arms giving way and your body sliding an inch closer, observing with interest that his signature is essentially just a line. M——. You so could have done these yourself, if you really wanted.
You force yourself to choke back a laugh as expression tightens with each flick of the pen, the simmering annoyance contained just beneath the surface begging to be released.
Fingers beat slower this time, cadence matching the melody around you, watching as the charge nurse moves to undo your minor disruptions.
A smirk tugs at the corner of your mouth.
Time passes slowly.
This hospital should have more legal issues. You wonder who you have to talk to about that.
Robby flips the page.
And from across the room, you hear it. It’s soft, and warm, and, honestly, you have no idea how you hear it over the clamor of the emergency department, but it always lands on your ears deafening, like a clap of thunder.
And you have no reason to be jealous. Jack is, by all relevant and up-to-date nomenclature, your friend.
You trace the sound to the origin, and there he is, emerging from South 19, the smallest of smiles gracing his lips.
And, sorry, but that is your laugh. That’s the one you hear low and throaty in your ear when you’re walking too close, and you say something that catches him off guard. The one that haunts your dreams and wakes you up, the sound echoing in your ears. The one you would make a homily of, listening to it day in and day out, saying amen with devout obedience at every pause.
You blink, zeroed in and always devastatingly dramatic.
Maybe this is it.
Maybe the whoring out of his laugh—because apparently everyone gets it these days, because apparently, he feels magnanimous in the same way Oprah does—is his way of politely rejecting you.
Maybe it’s time to dedicate yourself to some religion somewhere and spend the rest of your life on your knees, lest another man tempt you.
Feigning nonchalance, your hand comes off the desk, very chalant eyes still fixed on Jack as you lean towards the blonde opposite you.
“Dana, you’ve lived here a while, right? What’s the convent scene like?” Robby lets out a snort at your question and the tip of your index finger firmly taps the papers beneath his palm three times to refocus him. “Sign the fucking documents, Michael.”
He obediently turns to the next page where you had so painstakingly and lovingly flagged exactly where his signature was required, and a mix of amusement and mild exasperation creeps across your cheeks, pulling the corners of your mouth into a small smile as he scrawls his indignant line across the pages.
“How about you go tell someone their insurance doesn’t care about their life. You’ll see how easy it is to sign these things then,” he says, turning to the next page.
“Are you kidding? I know you heard what happened to that UnitedHealthcare guy,” you click your tongue. “I ain’t doin’ all that.”
Robby doesn’t dignify your callus comment with a response, attention fixed firmly on the paper, willing it to absorb his frustration. The scratch of his pen dissolves into the steady drone heart monitors and residents trying their hand at cheating death. He flips the page, and his broad shoulders raise with his frustrated inhale, posture betraying his mounting irritation as he methodically—mechanically—works through the stack of forms.
The muted scuffle of boots against the ground alerts you of his presence as Abbot settles behind you, close enough his body heat warms yours.
“Free Luig, man,” he gruffly throws his two cents in.
“Luig?” you twist around, words laced with faint incredulity. “Y’all on a nickname basis?”
“Always have been,” he shrugs with such nonchalance that, for a second, you’re almost convinced they have always been.
You nod. Free Luig.
Caught in the crossfire, Robby closes his eyes momentarily and chokes back a groan. The headache was coming on already. It was way too early in the morning, and he was accosted before you even let him get his coffee, and now he has to listen to the two of you engage in what he and Dana and the rest of the staff with money in the pool could only assume was foreplay.
His pen etches into the paper one last time, a reluctant sigh escaping his lips as he finishes the final signature, his annoyance pooling into a little storm cloud over his head. He shoves the pages toward you with a motion that could rival a cat knocking a glass off the counter, his expression tortured, and you reverently accept the signed stack with flourish, a holy scripture freshly inscribed by a weary messenger of God.
“Thank you, sir,” you chirp, gingerly shuffling the papers and bowing your head.
“You’re too good to him,” Jack says, as if he genuinely expected better from you, nodding toward the older man, already rubbing his temples and back to pretending the two of you didn’t exist.
“He deserves a treat.”
He can’t take it anymore. Robby bolts—bolts—into the chaos of the department like a petty villain in the night.
You don’t even get a chance to double-check that his ridiculous little M—— is scrawled on every line it’s legally required to be on. He knows exactly what he’s doing, too—that smug twitch of his mouth giving him away as he disappears behind a random curtain.
What in the hell.
You tuck the files under your arm and slip a hand into your front pocket. Just as you’re about to let the let’s fly, Abbot roll off your tongue, your hand freezes, strangely empty.
You’re missing your pen.
That bastard still has your pen.
You inhale, long and tempered, because you don't want to be overly dramatic.
You don’t want to be overly dramatic because, okay, you get it, it’s a pen.
But pens don’t last down here in the emergency department, and every time you materialize, you end up giving Robby a pen, and you never get that pen back. And then Jack comes complaining to you because every time they work together, despite the growing number of pens you’ve surrendered to his cause, Robby never has a pen and then expects a pen from him. But the pen that Jack gives him is also your pen. So, then he’s asking you for a pen—which, really, no biggie, you’ve already looked up how much it would cost to buy Pilot so you could give him unlimited pens—and then you’re giving Jack a pen and then you’re also giving Robby a pen and then Jack is giving Robby a pen and you’re freaking hemorrhaging pens on three fronts.
You’ve Pavloved the poor men into carnal pen desire.
So, you stop yourself in your tracks, glancing towards your companion just enough to catch the angle of his head and smirk playing at the corner of his lips. Your shoulders shake as a huff of laughter leaves you.
There is no pen in his pocket, either.
Routine, you suppose.
“Anyone know where Robby went?” you ask, eyebrow arched, back to surveying the faces around you.
Jack nods over your shoulder, once again directing your attention across the room and you follow his line of sight, eyes landing on Robby’s stiff frame, hiding in plain sight. Two steps from him, a woman is standing way too close for his comfort, hand on his arm, the recipient of a very intense one-way conversation.
You’re so going to make fun of him for this later. Maybe even in the emergency department group chat that you’ve weaseled your way into.
“Explain,” you demand, ravenous for the gossip.
“Guy came in last night, not doing great. Advance directive on file, medical POA too—directive was signed after. The kids are pissed.”
He lowers his voice, conspiratorial, and you reflexively shift closer to hear him.
“Now they’re trying to bribe half the staff with Daddy’s things for comfort treatment.”
The word daddy leaving Jack’s lips makes your eyes freeze in place, the only visible crack in your armor. This is really not what you need to be thinking about this early in the morning. You give a sharp shake with your head, trying to physically eject the thought.
Man, that family is totally legal’s problem.
You deflate. Which means that’s your problem, really, and you know as soon as you get back to your office, you’ll be losing a game of rock-paper-scissors for who has to be on the way back down here, and you hate ancillary document infighting.
“Okay, well that’s…” Your eyes narrow slightly, contemplating. “…awful?”
“Was that a question mark?”
You shrug. Maybe.
“Any chance you think I can get his attention?” you question, acceptance of the fact that a new pen is about to be classified as missing in action settling in your pocket.
And then Jack forces you to look at him, hand slowly curling around your bicep, and you’re struck by the inexplicable, primal urge to flex to show him, hey, I could hunt and gather. I could do anything you need me to do.
And then you have to fight the other urge to check your watch, because God forbid you give the impression that there’s anywhere else you’d rather be, but you are positive now that it’s barely seven in the morning and you stomp that primal urge down because you cannot start your yearning and lusting this early. Especially with this new legal problem on your radar.
“Looking for something?” he says, and somehow it sounds like an insult.
“Theft charges,” you reply dryly.
His mouth twitches.
“If I am ever in that position,” he commands, voice gentle but unmistakably pointed as he tugs your focus back from Robby. Selfishly, Jack wants all your attention on himself. “Just put the pillow over my face, and press—”
You blink, drawing back. “Goddamn.”
“—create an airtight seal—”
“Just sign the POA, girl.”
“Bet you used to charge a premium for those.”
“Just, like, two thousand. That’s, like,” you expel a dramatic breath from your lungs, feigning introspective mathematical precision, and rock back on your heels. “Twenty beaver pelts back in your day.”
“Twenty?” His head reels back, his voice fading out at the end in an octave that you’re not quite sure he possesses, and the commitment to the bit makes your chest tighten. He leans forward again. “Real proud of those autogenerated documents, huh?”
“No one used to copy-and-paste like me, baby.” You bite your lip.
A beat passes.
He demands your gaze, insistent, possessive.
You suck your teeth and lower your voice, a teasing lilt rising to suffocate the longing that tries to break through. “So, I’m in your deathbed fantasy, huh?”
Enraptured by the way the left side of your mouth starts to smile before the right follows suit, he allows his eyes to flicker to your lips, too quick for you to catch.
He doesn’t even blink. The hand on your arm tugs you forward, gentle but certain, and you stumble closer to his body. Your tongue, usually razor sharp and biding time until the next joke, dulls.
You blue screen.
Why is his hand big enough to wrap around your arm like that? Dear Lord, has he always been this warm? You can’t remember. Whatever used to be where your brain was immediately betrayed you and fucked off, leaving in its place a panting dog. Does he need you to bark? You could bark. You have no qualms with barking.
He leans in close, voice fighting to be heard over the crackling PA system probably calling for an attending in some fucking room, and then you were no longer in the emergency department. Ringing overtakes your ears and you imagine the hand on your bicep somewhere a little higher.
“Sweetheart,” his drawls, sinfully wrapping around each letter, like he knows exactly what it does to you. The word drips from his lips with maddening ease, dragging down your spine like molten lava. “You’re in my every fantasy. Welcome to the conversation.”
You blink again. The PA system calls out another pleading demand for whoever was listening at this point, effectively eliminating you and Jack, and his voice—steady, warm, smug—fills your brain with cotton, making it hard to ration, or think, or breathe.
You’re what?
His eyes dance around your face reverently while the slightest ghost of a smile takes residence on his lips, memorizing the subtle flush traveling across your cheeks and your wide eyes—no longer the color you were born with—blinking uncomprehendingly up at him. He tucks some things away for later, too—the way your breath hitches in a shallow, uneven burst, and how your lashes flutter like they can’t decide to stay open or not while you process his words. In the back of his mind, he decides he likes making you speechless. He tucks that away for later, too.
Then the corners of your lips twitch, your voice slipping out before you could stop it, soft but teasing, “Careful, old man, lest someone label you a poet.”
His responding laugh is quiet, low, self-satisfied—just for you, as it should be, thank you. And when his hand loosens its grip on your bicep and trails down to brush his fingers against yours, your breath stalls.
For the first time, you realize that you’re not in control of anything here at all, let alone your physiological reactions to his proximity. Jack Abbot holds all the cards in a perfectly imbalanced stack against his chest, and, despite your best efforts, you’ve never been good at poker.
And then you feel it.
You are fucking gazing.
You very explicitly recall your job description reading: Hours: 7am-5pm, Mon-Fri.
So why, then, do you find yourself swiping your security card back into the stairwell, beginning your ascent just as the numbers on your watch creep to 6:48am on a Sunday.
Actually, you know why. A text.
You were tucked in bed, comforter woven from warm springtime sunbeams, thoroughly enjoying the walk on the fuzzy line between waking and slumber. And then, without warning or pause, your body was violently ripped from the veil like a loose tooth at a little kid’s freaking birthday party, phone buzzing, SSGT Jack Abbot, M.D. plastered across your screen and, below it, a text.
Roof, it read.
Well, yeah, Jack, you thought blearily. Roof. Of course, roof.
You say bark, I bark.
Your comforter was off, and shoes were being tugged on before the screen even dimmed from inactivity, the rational thought of changing out of your sad excuse of pajamas nowhere in sight. Heading into work on a Sunday before the sun was even up.
Nothing wrong with getting a head start on next week, you hum to yourself as you wait for the elevator to ding at the twelfth floor, and then you pause, disgusted with the stray thought. Since when did you want to willingly participate in capitalism more than required?
All because of a man?
Mental You takes the cookies out of the oven and giggles and twirls her hair and dreamily sighs out a yeah.
You step off the elevator and immediately cross the hall, shoving the door to the stairwell open, feet trudging up the steps.
At least you’re also getting paid for it. Not that you need to be paid to see Jack.
I’d pay to see Doctor Abbot, Mental You giggles.
You finally get to the roof, thighs burning, though not as much as they used to—shoutout to Andrea at the gym—and push open the door.
Or you would.
The door jams, halting your hand mid-motion, and you sigh.
Without thinking, you wind back and slam your shoulder into the damned thing. It flies open with a dramatic groan and you’re all but launched forward, right shoe catching awkwardly on the ledge. Gravity seizes the opportunity with enthusiasm, zealously pulling at your body, and you guess that your bag must want in on the action too, because it shifts the weight of everything inside, throwing you off balance, the momentum carrying you in a parabolic arc directly into the path of the bloodthirsty door, who vengefully desires nothing more than to claim your life and perhaps its rightful resting position in the frame.
And then time is slowing down in that unique and humiliating way it does when you realize with horror that you’re doing something that would land you on TikTok.
And then there’s another moment, fleeting but vivid, where you register how ridiculous you must look: clad in pajamas, bag swinging, your body a perfect picture of chaos.
And then it happens.
You collide with the door in a graceless, full-bodied tackle that rattles the hinges and might as well announce your presence to the entire city.
By the time you stumble away from the ring, vehemently declining another round with the door, your legs stinging where the exposed skin met the cold metal, you notice Jack already leaning against the far side of the railing, figure outlined by the slowly rising light of the sun.
At first, you think he hasn’t noticed your grand entrance, but Jack has always had the uncanny ability to see everything you don’t want him to see, and also you would have to have been dead to not have heard all that. It’s the single shake of his tense shoulders that betrays him, and, really, you have to give him credit where credit’s due, because he’s trying.
He’s trying so hard to not make fun of you right now.
You can feel it.
You straighten up, and you’re of half a mind to try and salvage the scraps of dignity you still have left, but, ultimately, you find that you just don’t care that much. You also find that it was so much colder than you thought it would be, given your current attire.
A coat, you think miserably. Anything. Anything at all would have been better.
“I swear it wasn’t like that a couple days ago,” you huff, brushing invisible dust off your sleeve as you lick your wounds.
Abbot finally allows a single soldier through the front lines in his battle against laughter, letting out a sharp chuckle that cuts through the cold morning air.
“You always know how to make an entrance,” he observes, similar to the way he’s observed cloud cover.
His eyes drag down to your legs and his brow subtly creases, trying to conceal the way his brain short-circuited for half a second.
“Shorts,” he mutters, blinking slowly, shoulders rising in a steep inhale. “That’s…a choice.”
"Yeah, well, you know..." you wave a hand in the air dismissively. "Sleeping."
And you realize, fuck, you really don’t care about your wounded dignity and stupid outfit if it makes Jack Abbot look at you like that.
A comfortable ease settles over you while something warm settles in the pit of your stomach, one that only he seems capable of conjuring. You take a deep breath, the cool air biting at your lungs, the tension from your stairwell match melting away as Jack’s presence steadies you.
“Wait, you come up here without me?” He clarifies, voice a little rougher than he means it to be, unwavering stare locked on you. “But it’s—this is mine.”
“I really don’t think you can have, like, a monopoly on the roof, Jack.”
“I was hired first,” he argues, like that alone justifies his claim to the space.
“Jack, how is it a monopoly if you let me in?”
He doesn’t answer, just stares at you flatly like that answers it.
“I literally work, like, eight feet below where we’re standing right now,” you stress, foot tapping against the ground in emphasis. “You understand that, right?”
He shrugs, corner of his lips creeping up. “You don’t have to beg, kid. I’ll let you use it,” he says, smug. “I’m magnanimous like that.”
You don’t even know where to begin tearing apart the words that just exited his mouth. But your mouth, your traitorous mouth, does. “I’m not begging.”
He leans in then.
“Do you want to?”
He knows it’s the only way he can throw you off the same way you so unknowingly do to him.
Sure enough, you lag behind his response, mouth parting as power is diverted from mandibular control to turn the gears in your brain, each one creaking with effort as they try to process what the fuck just came out of his mouth.
And he says it to keep your blinders on, to distract you from the way he almost said ours instead of mine, and to distract you from the way his fingers twitch at his sides, like they want to reach for you but are stuck in purgatory, unsure if they’d be welcomed.
But Jack notices it too much.
He notices his twitching hands, and the way your laughter lingers in his chest longer than it should, and the way your voice threads through the spaces of his day and ties his heart in knots in ways he doesn’t even know where to begin untangling. He doesn’t say anything, but he feels it, thick and unyielding, curling around his ribs and threatening to suffocate him whenever you’re near.
So, his arms fold over his chest, absently creating a protective barrier, his eyes falling somewhere distant.
And then cut to you sideways, softening despite himself, cracking through the flimsy pretense of just-friends banter you both cling to like it might protect you from the inevitable. It’s a game you keep playing, tossing a live grenade back and forth.
But he won’t drop it.
If there is one thing that Jack Abbot has in abundance, it’s patience. He is patient—he learned it long ago under the blanket of gunfire and the oppressive heat of the sun, and mastered it with bodies bleeding out beneath his hands. And he is tenacious. He is so fucking tenacious it would make your head spin. And he would toss that live grenade days, months, decades until you reacted too slowly and it went off.
And then the moment is gone and you’re dancing back over the line to friends. He punches your arm lightly, the movement too calculated to be casual, his fist moving forward unaccompanied by the fluidity and self-assuredness you’ve seen him possess with florescent lights above him and a body below. His knuckles burn your arm where they glance across it, and your eyes whip between the afflicted site and him, mind already curating a scathing retort.
He waits, daring you to notice how long he lingers in moments like this, how he drags out conversations just to keep you tethered here next to him, close enough to pretend you’re his.
But you step closer, eyes taking in the way his shoulders seem to be pressed down by an invisible weight—one that you wish you could become Atlas to alleviate, if just for a moment.
Bad night, you observe.
Bad night, indeed, Jack’s body screams in reply.
When the shrill alarm alerting him of 5pm pierced the fragile fog that had settled on his brain, it felt as though the world was gunning for his sanity. The weight of exhaustion pressed heavily on his chest, and his body, tangled in sheets that seem to have turned into chains and a sweat-soaked shirt plastered to his body, drags heavily, joints creaking as he began to extract himself from his fabric prison.
Thirty-three minutes of deep sleep, Jack’s watch spat in his face.
Kill yourself, watch, he grunted back.
But time, relentless and indifferent and, in the back of his mind, named Gloria Underwood (no relation, you tried to convince him during one of your rooftop meetings once. It’s a common name, Abbot.), marches forward, dragging him along with its cruel cadence and another hellish shift in the books.
And presently, you see his tense body standing—like the soldier he’ll probably always be—at attention, shoulders rigid, chin tilted defiantly as if daring the universe to shove him just a little further, just until the ground beneath his feet disappears, and hands clenched so tightly at his side that you think you should take him downstairs to check for open wounds.
The thing about the veteran that you clocked long before the start of soft smiles, and the banter, and the myriad rooftop rendezvous is this: when he has a bad night, he gets philosophical.
“Do you think God cares?” he deadpans—which is insane to you, because who opens like that?
You gently lean your demon-possessed bag against the AC unit and walk forward to settle beside him where he leans heavily against the opposite side of the rail. “Like, in general, or…?”
“The death,” he lists, ticking it off like it’s a mildly interesting footnote. “The helplessness.”
“I don’t know. Kinda used to want to ask God that,” you admit, your energy shifting to match his vaguely existential one. You try kicking at a rock to diffuse some of the tension and somehow miss entirely. “‘If you’re so loving, why do you allow so much suffering and injustice.’”
“Don’t question it anymore?”
The question makes you pause. You guess you didn’t question it anymore. You were surrounded by it every day, as was he—the predatory insurance companies and the maladjusted American healthcare system. It wasn’t as though you’d been exposed to the trademarked horrors, but the past six years were taxing enough. Year after year, case after case, you internalized the knowledge that the things meant to help you weren’t really there just to help. And that knowledge takes its toll.
So, no, you don’t really question it anymore.
But you do let it steal parts of you. It isn’t outright draining—more like a faucet that didn’t shut off completely, allowing a single drip to escape at a time, every couple seconds, every day, for years. Not something someone immediately identifies and fixes, but something that, when you do notice it, you kind of throw your hands up in the air like, well what the fuck now?
That’s where you’re at. Well, what the fuck now, indeed.
You laugh, the sound unbidden and a touch more bitter than you want it to be. “No, it just became a pride thing.”
And then the soft confession escapes you before you could beat it back with a bat and send forth some retort that would get you a huff of air through the nose at worst, and a scoff and shake of the head at best. The words cross your unspoken boundary of keeping it light and ambiguously sexual—they toe the line of being vulnerable. “I guess now I’m afraid that he might ask me the same question.”
Part of you really hopes he ignores the words. Part of you hopes that the words would fall on deaf ears and any response would die on mute lips. Part of you hopes that the world would open up and pluck those drifting words right out of the air before they could reach him.
But Jack is there. Jack is always there, and Jack always fucking saw you before you saw you, and he always heard what you said before you knew what you said.
And he would always be there throwing you a life-preserver, a way out.
He tries to salvage what’s left of the levity from your grand entrance and nudges your shoulder with his.
“It’s a really stupid question, anyway,” he utters softly, gently, the understanding of a man who has seen worse draping over the words.
A life-preserver that you would enthusiastically grab like you’ve asked for one every Christmas for the past thirty years. His eyes head turns, and his eyes lock on to yours, inviting and warm, and you realize you’re so fucked.
You swallow, the familiar teasing expression reappearing on command, the left side of your mouth coming up in a smirk and your right eyebrow raising fractionally.
“Yeah. We should really be focusing on big picture stuff,” you agree. “Like, ‘How does Tom Cruise do all that?’”
“That’ll blow God’s freaking mind,” he grumbles.
You nudge his shoulder back.
Cold wind nips at your skin, and you shudder, your arms drawing in to aid your body in retaining heat. Your eyes dart to the side hoping you were as subtle doing that as you thought you were.
Definitely not, you assume. The troubled man’s fingers tighten on the railing as he wordlessly swings himself under to the other side, shrugging off his jacket and draping it over your shoulders.
You begin offering up a weak protest, barely more than a whisper, until Jack’s eyes snap to you, cool and amused.
“Don’t get used to charity,” he murmurs, voice like velvet on steel. “Just say thank you, Jack.”
A meek thank you, Jack takes its place. A hum, noncommittal—casual—fills the space between you in reply.
The weight of it presses down, swallowing you whole. It’s warm from his own body, and it smells vaguely of the antiseptic you’ve come to accept as his cologne, and God, and it’s heavy. Not because of the fabric itself—that’s actually rather light, it’s still early in the season-change—but because it’s his. An ever-present fixture that emerges as soon as the temperature drops.
A constant.
And now it’s on you and it feels almost too personal, and you shift slightly trying to shake the intimate feeling off and just enjoy the moment as a girl with a crush on a man fifteen years older than her, but the bastard clings to you and settles into your heart.
“We should get you a new cologne, by the way.”
You said we. You had said we and Jack’s brain immediately latches onto the promise of something so domestic with you.
“Are you saying I smell?” he asks, expression unreadable but amused.
“Every day I sit in my office and pray you’ll take a shower.”
“You don’t have better things to pray for?”
You open your mouth to respond, but he’s on a roll.
“World peace,” he supplies, like it was the obvious office prayer.
It’s a good office prayer, you have to admit.
“I can’t wear cologne down there. Liability or something,” he continues dryly, and the next words seek out your pride with surgical precision, making a single, tiny cut. “You of all people should know that.”
He got you there again—you should know that—and that’s like three times in the span of ten minutes that he’s got you. You’re not quite sure what’s happening right now.
Deafening silence concedes the argument.
But as far as you’re concerned, you’ll let him have it. You have Jack on one side of you and the warmth of his jacket protecting you against the cold creeping in. You’re content.
And you thought Jack was content, too.
But apparently, he isn’t.
Can’t let the silence just freaking do its thing.
“Can I ask you something else?” he says, like the answer to that has ever stopped him before, “Why do you care?”
And the parallel between this question and the one about God makes your eyebrows furrow a little because, what does that mean? What does ‘why do you care about the suffering of human beings,’ mean?
“About suffering?” you say slowly, trying to find your footing.
“No.”
Your mouth opens a fraction, perhaps wide enough for a fly to be caught, while you work to follow what path his mind went down.
What, like, The Yankees? Yeah, you care about them. Obviously, because you love them. Any team that happens to be playing against Jack’s beloved Pirates, of course care about them, because you hate whatever team Jack loves. Annoying Robby? Sure. About Jack himself, absolutely. Fucking definitely, even.
You tick the entries off in your mind: career, first and foremost; your friends; Jack; your family that hasn’t talked to you in years; Dr. Abbot down in the ED; crippling debt payments from law school; that matcha place Samira showed you; the socio-political landscape of the world; former army medic, Jack Abbot.
You can’t imagine that Jack’s unprompted and vague question was about any of these things.
Your eyes squint not of your own volition. “What?”
“Yesterday,” he clarifies, tone clipped, ever a man of many words.
“What?” you try again.
“About that woman.”
You’ll shove this fool off the roof yourself, you decide. “What?”
He leans back, knuckles white from gripping the rail to anchor him, sighing that you’re the crazy one right now sigh—like he can’t believe he has to spell it out for you, word for word. “The one that was flirting with Robby.”
You actually look over at Jack then, confused. He’s not looking at you, his back now ramrod straight and jaw reflecting his fists, clenched so tightly you're surprised his teeth aren’t shattering from the pressure.
The woman that you had a very long, very tense, conversation with—brother’s presence intruding like a serpent in the garden, begging you to sin—about pulling her father off life support?
A laugh almost escapes you. You’re not sure he realizes how stupid he sounds thinking you cared about anything in that moment other than the way his hand wrapped around your bicep and the way he laughed, low and ruinous and lethal, and called you sweetheart.
Light and sexual, you chant to yourself.
“The one that wants her dad dead?” you bluntly ask—whatever, who needs light, anyway?
His shoulder draws up in a half-shrug, mouth opening in a wordless response. Finally, he settles on, “I’m just saying you seemed… very interested—”
“What, in my job?” your confused tone betrays the half-smile on your face.
“That’s not what I’m saying—”
"I mean, it sounds like what you're saying—"
"No, you looked upset at her—"
"—and it's definitely what I'm hearing—"
"Well, get your fucking hearing checked—"
“Are you jealous, Jack?” you press, cutting him off, pointed and a little smug.
“Yes.”
He says it so simply, and his voice is so soft, so confident, and it lands with decimating impact.
What happened to light and sexual, Jack?
It just swan dove straight over the ledge, Jack.
What the fuck is wrong with this guy?
Your next thought slams through you, so loud and so out of pocket, and you’re a little pissed because last time you had this thought, you told it to at least give you, like, an ETA next time. Your heart jumps a little in your chest. Maybe you don’t have to call that convent, you think. Maybe he isn’t a fan of polite rejection.
And then the third thing you cared about in yesterday’s interaction strikes you. Obviously.
“Jack,” you enunciate. You want your next words to be explicitly clear. “The only reason I was even looking for Robby was because he still had my pen.”
His jaw twitches. “What?”
“Holy shit, can we stop with the whats?”
“Okay, look, sorry if I need to make sure that my friend,” he spits out the word, duplicity-soaked label coating his mouth with a bitter aftertaste. “Isn’t pining over my- my fellow attending.”
“First of all, I would never pine,” you note. “I’m a maple, and I want that on record.”
For a turbulent second, Jack wants to grab you by the scruff of the neck and manhandle you like a misbehaved chihuahua because he’s serious and you make jokes when you’re feeling defensive—something that he usually finds endearing but simply can’t find it in him to do right now.
He doesn’t want you pining over Robby, he wants you pining over him.
And so maybe his response is fueled by jealousy, okay, sue him. He’ll bring it up to his therapist and then apologize to you, and you’ll say something like, I should invoice your therapist myself for emotional labor.
So, he digs in, tone sharp but surgical, and says something that he knows will get a rise out of you because he knows you—he knows everything about you.
“Maple? You’re so obviously an oak—you’ll never be a maple,” he fires back, voice incredulous, volume subdued, eyes narrowed in outrage. “You’re not even close to maple-level, be fucking for real.”
A strangled sound makes its way out of you, shocked that he would even think such a thing. “Of course you would say that you fucking ginkgo,” you snap.
“Gingko?”
You inhale sharply and force yourself to rein in your next sentence because there’s a feeling in your chest—one slowly rising, and it suspiciously feels like anger. Why the hell is Jack acting like this at seven in the morning on a Sunday, especially about someone that the hospital would sell out in a heartbeat over a wrongful prolongation of life lawsuit?
Pining over Robby? Is he fucking stupid?
Well, two can play this game.
You can be fucking stupid, too.
You can be fucking stupid, and—you want it known, labelled, and presented before the new J.D. recipient, prosecution attorney Jack Abbott, M.D., as Exhibit A—you’re not remotely capable of even pretending to be normal in a competitive situation.
“Sorry, Abbot, I didn’t realize you could even clock my pining over the volume of your giggles,” you counter hotly, throwing a trembling finger in his face at the scandalized look that crosses it. “Yeah. Giggles.”
“So, you were pining over Robby?” he confirms, and it lodges itself under your skin.
You’re sure if you looked down at your watch it would tell you that you have a heart rate of at least one hundred and eighty.
“Why the fuck do you care who I’m pining over?” you hiss, your voice dripping with frustration.
Jack opens his mouth, thinks better of it, then tries again—lighter, a silent prayer that maybe the joke can diffuse the mounting tension.
“I don’t care, but Robby is built like one of those car-dealership inflatables, and—” he shifts his weight to the left, leg aching.
But it’s too late. Your eyes narrow.
“Built like a car-dealership inflatable?” you echo in disbelief, hoping the words will help Jack realize the incredulousness of the statement. “What the hell does that even mean?”
That’s a great question, the prosecution thinks. He doesn’t even really know, but it’s out now and he has to roll with it.
“That’s your friend and now you’re being fucking mean,” the words press out through gritted teeth, humor long gone. “You’re just saying stuff.”
He agrees with you, he is just saying stuff, and Jack will apologize to his friend for the stray when his mind is clearer and blood pressure lower, even though the other man won’t have any idea what he’s talking about.
“Yeah,” he bites out, stepping closer. “But you kicked this shit off with your stupid maple thing, and now I’m stuck defending myself against a guy who walks like life’s spine-optional and he’s not sure how gravity works—”
“Shut up about Robby’s walk!” you yell in a rush, your voice shrill and piercing, the sheer absurdity of the argument making your hands fly into the air. “This isn’t about him! Or his- his saunter. This is about your—”
“This is not about me,” he cuts you off, too loud to be convincing. “I just think you deserve better spine-to-surface ratio, is all—”
“Because your body has such a perfect there-to-not ratio, right?”
“Ohhhhh, you wanna go there—?”
“No, actually, I don’t,” you snap back. Then, sharper, “Listen, Abbot—”
“No, you listen,” he grounds out, your name a heated whisper snapping against its leash. “You’re the one who made this weird. You got all defensive and—” Jack gestures around like it personally offended him, “And then you’re calling me a gingko. A gingko. Like that’s a thing regular people do in arguments.”
“Oh, I’m sooo sorry, Doctor,” you draw out the syllables in mock-sympathy. “Would you prefer that I use military metaphors? Would that make baby feel more emotionally validated?”
“Yes, it would!” the doctor hisses back, mouth a breath away from yours. “Maybe at least then I would know where the hell I stand in your metaphor jungle!”
There’s a beat—one that coils the tension tighter, and tighter, and tighter—and Jack’s eyes, always attuned to your body, snap to the frustrated pinch of your mouth. Then back up. Your breath comes in sharp, uneven bursts, a wild fire burning behind your glassy eyes, gravity giving up on strands of hair where you ran your rands through them.
Not for the first time, he thinks that you’re beautiful. Your beauty was noted and neatly filed away long ago at your first meeting, shelved next to other invariably true things like death, and taxes, and a subscription he forgot about charging his bank account.
Eyes snap back down again.
And fuck he wants nothing more than to slam his lips against yours, to win, to derail the argument—to get you to stop arguing for maybe the first time in your life.
You clench your jaw, and you take a deep breath.
Neither of you move.
Don’t even shift your weight.
Almost nose to nose.
Of course, you weren’t pining over Robby, he knows that.
Because in Jack’s mind, it’s simple.
You’re his.
And sometimes he forgets that this thing between you has never been verbalized and linguists and English majors around the world are probably still scrambling and conspiring to combine words and build syntax trees that won’t even scratch the surface of explaining how deeply you’re seared into his soul.
And he certainly forgets that in your mind, he’s not yours.
Then, of course, there’s also the fact that he hasn’t done this in years, not since his wife—so, admittedly, he’s a little rusty. He tried practicing, but this conversation isn’t going at all how he painstakingly and methodically rehearsed with Robby in the breakroom.
And then somehow trees were pulled into it, and he doesn’t know anything about trees—he could name maybe four types. He can’t even tell you what a gingko is. He honestly thought it was a lizard. He probably would have put money on it.
And also he loves your metaphors, you know that.
“There was a woman in South 19,” he starts slowly, forcefully controlled. The first words in an unspoken sorry. His hands twitch by his side. “She was eighty-two years old and told me I was too handsome to be a doctor. That I should be on the cover of Vogue.”
Your brain, which has been running on pure spite and cortisol, fumbles.
Silence presses down over you once more.
The roof is too quiet now.
Too stupid.
You’re angry and a little hurt. Jack’s angry and, you think, probably a little hurt, too—at the very least by the body-ratio comment and definitely by the gingko comment.
And you feel even more stupid because, through it all, you’re still swimming in his fucking jacket.
Unfortunately for you, you agree with the eighty-two-year-old woman in South 19. He should be on the cover of Vogue.
It’s your turn. You press your hands into your eyes hard enough you see stars, taking a small step back.
“Robby had my pen,” you mutter, reprising the explanation you started before the argument spiraled out of control.
Abbot blinks. “What?”
You sigh, loud and theatrical, hands dropping. “Robby had my pen, okay? And it’s—just—it’s always like this. I show up. He needs to sign. He never has a pen. I give him one, then you give him one, but it’s also mine, because you got it from me, and then I give him another, and it’s like—I’m hemorrhaging pens. I am singlehandedly keeping Pilot in business because of this freaking guy.”
He just stares at you.
You gesture helplessly. “So, yeah. I was looking for Robby. To get my pen back.”
Another beat.
Then Jack, flatly, “You picked a fight with me because of a pen pyramid scheme.”
“Okay, um, actually, you picked a fight with me,” you object, your mind scrunching up its sleeves and waving its fists in the air, ready to go again. Ballpoint trauma massages its shoulders, egging it on.
He watches you and shakes his head imperceptibly.
He’s in love with someone who’s bleeding office supplies.
The man runs a hand over his face, palm dragging slow, and when it drops, there’s something soft and aching behind his eyes. Not pity. Not amusement. Just this quiet, stunned affection like, God, it’s you. Even when you’re arguing over trees and tube men, it’s you.
Your shoulders start to slump, and you scuffle your shoe against the gravel, eyes fixed on the ground like you’re trying to disappear. All the fire from earlier is gone, and somehow that’s worse. He watches you there, wrapped in his jacket like it belongs on your shoulders, drowning in the sleeves, collar brushing your cheek a little every time you move. It’s recklessly easy to forget what started this fight—to forget that he can’t do anything in this moment but watch you shrink before him.
He wants to take your face in his hands, thumb the curve of your cheekbones and tilt your head up. He wants to bend down and let his lips press into the corners of your eyes, catching the unshed tears. He wants to press kisses to every inch of your skin—your temples, the tip of your nose, the crease between your brows—murmuring I’m sorry between each one like a prayer, drunk on adoration of you.
In a pathetic attempt at casualness, your voice breaks through his fantasy, “I’m ‘friend’ and Michael’s relegated to ‘fellow attending,’huh?”
Jack exhales, controlled and slow, not meant for your ears.
“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” the veteran says quietly.
“I would argue what he doesn't know appears to hurt him the most,” you breathe a laugh, eyes still downcast.
He inclines his head and forces a gruff chuckle quietly to escape, the sound landing gently on your ears. Your traitorous heart stutters in your chest at the sound. And then his laugh pauses, and eyes narrow. He nods because, actually, you’re right about Robby. He should really ask him about that tomorrow.
All at once, in the back of your mind, you start to feel guilty.
You know that your friend had such a bad night and, presumably, a bad shift, that he asked you to come to the roof on a Sunday. And then you just called him a gingko and that was so fucking far from cool. The lump swelling in your tightening throat starts to teeter on impossible to swallow around. The tears you never learned how to suppress in an argument burn the back of your eyes.
But the sound has already burrowed into your heart once more and you can’t even remember why you were having a hissing match with Jack Abbot about trees and car-dealership inflatables. His stupid fucking laugh took your composure by the ear and shot it point blank in the back alley of a Wendy’s all within the span of three seconds.
You can’t help it.
“Hey, Jack,” you begin, your voice floating out and dying in the air as the sounds of the street rise to battle them.
You’re silent for a second.
You know you should quit while you’re ahead and leave down the stairs with a thumbs up and one last joke about returning to the door for seconds, but the words hey, Jack are already out, and true to the name, this is Jack, and now he’s looking at you with such affection in those confusingly beautiful eyes that all you want to do is tell him how, most days, he is the only thing keeping you sane, and how when you imagine your future, you imagine the calluses on his hands and arms wrapped around you from behind. And you want to tell him that you want nothing more than to see him every day, hell, you’ll take seeing him off hospital grounds. And, God, you want to text him the stupid updates throughout your day—that your matcha sucks today and you think the barista wants to set you on fire.
You want this nearing ancient, active suicide risk in your life beyond insurance claims, and Rooftop Club, and stupid fucking fights pens and eighty-two-year-old women in South 19—even ones that are now confusingly flora based.
I think I love you, you want to tell him.
And for a moment you’re genuinely worried that you might say something conveying anything of a remotely similar sentiment—something definitely not light and sexual.
But then you hear yourself softly admitting, “For the record, you’re my best friend.”
The vulnerability makes you feel like you’ve been cut open, heart on display for the medic’s steady hands. The guilt gnaws at you, and you resign yourself to feeling like a fool, a lumbering joker standing in Jack Abbot’s jacket and your pajamas.
You start picking at the loose threads on his jacket sleeve.
His hand moves, slowly, the same way a cowboy would approach a skittish horse, and settles over yours, gently stopping the movement.
You drift your gaze up, just enough to catch his eyes with yours.
“You’re not a gingko, by the way,” you mumble, words barely making it past your lips.
His hand tightens on yours. It’s so marginal that you’re sure you’ve imagined it. His eyes stay locked on yours.
“Kid,” Jack says, and when he leans in, his voice drops, soft and steady and sacred. “Maples wish they had what you do.”
He angles his head just as the morning sun—surely a paid actor—breaks from behind the skyline and cascades over his face, bathing him in gold. For a fleeting second, the words of your mother ring in your ears and you think you finally understand what she spoke of when said that human beings are made in the image of God.
Slowly, your eyes begin to wander over the gentle slope of his nose, cataloguing the constellations of freckles across his cheeks, finding respite at the corner of his eye where his crow’s feet deepen as he squints, lashes battling the intruding light.
You agree. Surely something so beautiful couldn’t be anything short of divine.
The newborn light catches on what’s left of the copper stands in his salt and pepper curls and dances on the unshaven stubble dusting his face, and you decide that God was taking his job as Artist very seriously right now, pouring gold down from heaven and letting it mend every chip and heal every break, sculpting a kinutsigi statue before your very eyes.
The gravel crunches as he shifts, the sound effectively restarting your brain, your head whipping towards the skyline before he could comment on your very clearly and pathetically waxing poetic gaze.
What the fuck was that?
But you know exactly what that was, and it was not something that fell under the umbrella of keeping it light and ambiguously sexual.
You shift your weight anxiously.
“And you know Robby can’t help that he’s built like a broad scarecrow,” your quiet voice drifts into the air.
“I know, sweetheart,” and God his voice is so soft, somehow so steady, that you’re not sure how it has the ability to cut through you with such sharpness. “Still wouldn’t trust the integrity of his core.”
You nod. You could get behind that.
“I like your body ratio the way it is, Jack.”
He brings your hands clasped in his to his lips.
You had the first Friday of every month circled multiple times on your calendar. It was routine, one that Gloria knew and that Gloria respected. Which is why, you couldn’t for the life of you discern the reason you were thrown into the lion’s den of not routine when she decided that, actually, these insurance claims needed to be signed at this exact moment on some random ass Monday or, as far as you could gather, the entire hospital would crash down to the ground with everyone inside it and then the rubble would catch fire, too.
But you don’t argue. A trip down to the emergency department was always a joyous occasion in your book, and so you hoped it would stay.
And you stumble into the elevator, cup of coffee in a mug that reads soy milk on the front and hola milk, soy tu padre on the back in one hand, and a bundle of papers flagged for signature in the other. Your hips angle towards the paneling on the wall and you all but ragdoll your body into the buttons, aiming for the bottom floor and, regrettably, hitting the bottom three.
God forbid you have an easy start.
The elevator doors open with a groan, and the controlled chaos of the emergency department whirls around you, and you duck and weave around rogue employees, making your way through the halls, sniffing the air like a bloodhound in search of Robby.
“Jesus Christ,” vibrates out of his chest, eyes landing on you as you turn the corner. “Once a month isn’t enough for you people?”
“You people? Do you mean women?”
His hands come up and pull at his hair.
You take pity on him.
“Hey, Robby, don’t shoot the messenger.” You shrug, eyes already wandering around the floor looking for their natural target. You slide the cup of coffee in his direction, a silent peace treaty. “You don’t like it? Sue.”
Robby sighs and takes off his glasses as he watches your pathetic scan of the department. After the conversation he and Jack had after he came down from the roof several days ago—which was essentially Robby asking if he finally asked you out and Jack just grunting at him and leaving—he knows he should handle this with kid-gloves.
And he tries. He swears he tries. He would testify, hand on the bible, that he tried.
“He’s gone.”
And for a moment, the doctor almost feels bad because your head whips towards him and you resemble an abandoned shelter dog, eyes sad and brows furrowed. He makes the split-second decision to grab the cup of coffee and place it under his protection before you can do something drastic.
“What?”
“He’s gone. Day off. Today and tomorrow,” Robby declares, using his free hand to make grabby motions at the file he sees tucked in your arms.
His eyes squint in thought. “Yesterday and today, I guess, technically,” he revises.
You try to process the words, wondering why it didn’t occur to you that Jack might, like, not only exist in this building when it coincides with you.
You pull out your phone, eyes pausing momentarily on the coffee that Robby’s safeguarding before deciding it isn’t worth it. The screen reflecting your sad expression, you scroll to Jack’s number, thumbs tapping out a message, short and sweet.
And then you pause before hitting send, your gaze flickering up to Robby, who seems to be the poster child for enjoying himself, mouth greedily sipping coffee and lanky frame folded back in his chair. You tip your head to the side at the odd angle of his spine. Jack was right, he should do more core work.
“Are you lying to me right now?”
Robby looks up, head moving in a tight, rapid shake that screams exasperation with you. "Yeah, Jack’s actually fishing over in Trauma 1 right now.”
Jack hates fishing. Checkmate.
Ignoring him, you return to your phone, the message awaiting your command to go forth.
Jack was so going to hear about this.
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: so u hate me now?
You pause for a second, wondering if the two of you were at harassment level.
The way his lips seared into your hand flashes through your mind.
You decide to full send.
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: u hate me so much u quit ur job so u never had to see me again
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: is that it
And you don’t expect an immediate response, you just want him to know you know about the self-conjured hatred and you’re not happy about it. It was 8am on a Monday—a Monday that Jack freaking has off, apparently—and by all accounts, he should be in bed, snug as a bug.
But your phone vibrates in your hand. You look down.
SSGT Jack Abbot, M.D: If you wanted to see me all you had to do was ask
What the—? The audacity stops your thumbs in their tracks.
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: im a very busy woman abbot
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: u dont even know what my calendar looks like abbot
And then before you know what you’re doing, you’re sending another text reply.
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: can i see u
Was that too desperate?
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: im waiting for u to return from way
Deliberate typo.
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: war
Nailed it.
SSGT Jack Abbot, M.D: Way
Stunning O-Neg Attorney: kill your self
Three dots appear and then disappear as you see him try to formulate a response. They appear once more.
SSGT Jack Abbot, M.D: I want to see you too kid
SSGT Jack Abbot, M.D: Not on the roof I mean
You have to fight the smile that tries to overtake your face, eyes glued to the words on your screen, not even looking up when Robby’s hand enters your sight, snapping in an attempt to bring you back to earth.
But you, with days that start when Jack’s ends, and Jack, who seems to spend most of his free time in the emergency department whether he’s supposed to be there or not, have schedules that rarely align. As lamentable as it is, you both settle for a professional backdrop for your interactions.
Maybe God heard your plea from the rooftop and decided to have mercy.
I want to see you too, kid.
And so that night you find yourself at Jack Abbot’s fucking apartment, perched on his couch with his legs stretched long in front of him, ankles crossed, prim and proper, and yours tucked neatly to the side, body twisted towards his. Every once in a while, his knee brushes against your thigh. You have a Coke Zero in your hand—taken from his fridge after you showed up with a case that he immediately scoffed at—and a very manly beer is in his. The Pirates game plays forgotten on the TV. There is a pizza on its way with your name on it, which, really, should have been here, like, an hour ago, but neither of you really remember or care.
You’re mentally planning which route you’re going to take home—God forbid he lets you go home—so you could stop off at whatever church you pass first and throw up a thanks, Christ, owe you one also sorry for not visiting in a while.
“Why don’t we do this?”
“What do you mean?” you question. “We hang out all the time.”
“No, you asked me to come over once because you burnt yourself making cookies and you said that your arm resembled raw chicken.”
“Didn’t it though?”
He cocks his head to the side, bringing his beer to his lips, and his eyebrows move up in agreement. It did look like raw chicken.
“And wasn’t it the sexiest piece of raw chicken you’ve ever seen?” you press.
The natural banter presses deep and steady beneath his ribs. Silver curls tip back and his body shifts forward after it, a little closer to yours, as he laughs, and you catch a whiff of something unfamiliar, brief and blinding.
It’s going to be a good night, you decide.
Jack’s stare softens, tender and warm.
“You’re staring,” you tease.
“I’m gazing,” he stresses.
And you knew that son of a bitch Robinavitch wouldn’t keep his mouth shut.
You’re going to kill Robby. And maybe Dana, you’re sure she was in on that. And you’ll include Princess and Perlah, too, just to cover your ass.
You made it this far into the night, you suppose. Nice while that lasted.
The beer rests forgotten in the attending’s hand, condensation slipping down the glass. The game on the TV recedes into static. Your silence echoes in his ear and his arm shifts along the back of the couch behind you, fingers flexing.
“You don’t have to get defensive about it, you know. Whatever… looking. Gazing,” he shakes his head, while he sets his beer on the table, a crooked smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “I don’t mind.”
That smell enters your senses again, there and gone before you could focus on it, and you start to think that maybe you’re having a stroke. It’s the only logical explanation—it licks up your spine slowly, spreading over you and burning through your body, and holy shit how is he completely unaffected by this?
The crowd cheering quietly on the TV from a home run—which you’ll be pissed about later—the condensation from your can pooling in a puddle on the coaster, the older man’s body pressed to yours enough to throw you off balance. His arm, strategically placed behind you, is close enough for you to feel, and his legs, once prim and proper, have separated, thigh pressing against yours.
You’re about to lose your fucking mind.
And like always, Jack notices. He notices everything about you.
You press the cold can against your cheek as you groan, trying to ground yourself, but the metal does nothing to cool the heat building low in your spine.
And then that scent teases you again, barely enough and gone before you get a chance to pin it down to anything beyond Jack Abbot’s Natural Pheromones, and you can’t take it anymore.
“Okay, what is that?” you demand. “Is that you?”
Before he has a chance to respond, and before your brain can tell your carnal desire to, like, chill, you’re in motion.
Your first movement is sharp, and deliberate, and probably warranting the intervention of a priest, head snapping towards his as you push off the couch cushion and lean over him, trying to identify the scent invading your brain. Your left knee leverages you by his leg as your right moves behind you for balance.
And you pause.
Your second movement is slow, and hypnotic, and cautious, head dipping to allow your nose to hover above the column of his neck. Belatedly, it occurs to you that you might be crossing the boundary into territory you hadn't realized existed until now, one beyond banter and jokes loaded with yearning. Which is also a crazy thought to have when you’re almost straddling your friend, because obviously that crosses a boundary.
But the heat radiating off the body in front of you is searing.
You know you’re too close, the space between the two of you thinning to a thread, but you don’t think that even God himself could pull you from your place.
His body is firm under you as you trail your nose down, following the flow of blood from his jugular, so close you’re not sure if you’re hearing his heartbeat or yours. You tilt your head slightly, tracking the faint whisper of finally identified sandalwood and tobacco that lingers in the dip where his shoulder comes to meet his collarbone. The scent is intoxicating, earthy and bold, and mixes with underlying sting of antiseptic and of something so fundamentally Jack Abbot.
It clings to him like an omen, sealing your downfall. Head swimming, you decide you would go to war for that combination—you were ready to lay your life down, to become a faithful martyr to his cause.
Jack freezes so imperceptibly that someone less attuned to him might not notice. But you do. You notice the subtle, sharp exhale, the way his shoulders tense and slowly fall just a fraction more sharply than before. His head turns towards you marginally, one hand twitching where it rests on the couch, but not saying a word, and you freeze too because what the fuck has possessed you?
But then you catch the scent again and it feels like stepping directly into the fire, the tension surrounding you, poised and ready to suffocate given the order.
“I’m serious,” you murmur, your voice quieter now. “What is that?”
You’re close now enough to feel the rasp of his unshaven jaw against the soft curve of your cheek.
Jack finally turns his head fully and his piercing gaze drops, catching yours, demanding and unreadable, pinning you in place. And then, with the faintest of smirks tugging at his lips, his reply cuts through the tension like that stupid-ass tactical knife he keeps in his pocket, sharp and teasing, his voice gravelly and steady and casual, “Cologne.”
And fuck him because cologne?
But the way he says it, words low and rough, and the way his body coils, daring you to break first—something that you were more than willing to do, you would do anything he said right now, anything to ensure that not a millimeter of space came between the two of you—robs you of any oxygen that probably at some point surrounded you and feeds it to the embers, leaving none for your taking.
Your lungs constrict, desperately seeking out the air that seems to be in short supply, and a soft gasp is all you can manage. Pathetic, you think.
In front of you, you feel Jack’s muscles tense, pause in measured contemplation.
All at once, he pushes you backwards, crowding you couch, his body closing in like it belongs there. One hand clamps around your waist, dragging you tighter against him, the heat of it searing straight through your clothes and skin and bones and sinew to directly brand your soul. The other trails up your side, singeing sensitive skin, until his thumb hooks beneath your jaw and his fingers tangle in your hair, anchoring you there.
He slowly and cautiously leans in, his grip on you tightening. The distance—which you suspect he somehow invented, just to steal it back—shrinks. It could no longer be designated as platonic in any meaning of the word, though you’re starting to wonder if anything was ever platonic between the two of you.
Your voice sounds far away and foreign to your ears, lips barely moving and lungs barely containing enough air to get the word out, “Cologne?”
He hums and leans down further. His nose barely brushes yours and you’re certain the skin melts off of your bones in his wake, “It’s sandalwood and tobacco and called Cowboy,” he whispers, breath intermingling with yours.
And while the space around your bodies seems suspiciously devoid of any breathable air, every breath leaving his lips enters into yours, leaving you lightheaded. Jack’s unwavering eyes drop from where they burn into yours down to your lips.
Your tongue darts out to wet your lips and, Jesus Christ, his eyes are sliding shut and he honest to God groans, the talons of desperation clawing up his throat and shredding him from the inside. It escapes low and taut, as if only the only thing holding it together from crumbling under the weight of longing are the last vestiges of his frayed restraint which, admittedly, don’t seem to be faring much better. And then it travels, and it might be the lethal combination of lack of oxygen and too much anticipation and most importantly of Jack, but you think you can see the soundwaves vibrating the air as it advances towards you.
You’ve never heard an angel, but you have never heard a sound so holy.
A traitorous synapse fires and a rogue thought populates in your mind. You gasp as you try to catch your breath, “I thought you weren’t allowed to wear cologne?”
Jack’s eyes stay closed while he releases a slow, resigned sigh. “There is something deeply wrong with you.”
You don’t move.
Neither does he.
The world outside drops away, and all that’s left is the two of you, suspended in a moment so thick with tension, you’re briefly reminded of that Steve Spangler cornstarch experiment.
But the heat between you sharpens, hovers, coils tight in your gut. Your skin prickles, your breath catches, and you can feel him watching you—his gaze heavy, unapologetic, dark with intent. Every brush of fabric against your skin feels louder, every breath sharper.
That the only thing left is to decide who breaks first.
You’ll be damned if it’s you.
Jack just looks at you, eyes dark, jaw tight, like he’s barely holding himself together.
One hand comes to grasp your hip, firm and possessive, and he leans in close enough that his breath ghosts across your cheek, stealing the oxygen back from your lungs and returning it to his own. His mouth doesn’t find yours right away. It just hovers, lips brushing but never meeting.
His half-lidded eyes flick to your mouth, then back.
You try to breathe, try to say something, anything, but your body betrays you—something it seems to do a lot when it comes to the veteran, and maybe you should talk to a medical professional about that—hips shift without thought, chest rising with a quiet desperation to meet him.
And then, slowly, deliberately, he presses forward—his body flush against yours, the unmistakable growing hardness at your stomach drawing a sharp breath from your throat. A thigh between your legs like it has every right to be there.
His mouth finds your jaw, barely skimming it as he pulls the pin on the grenade you toss between one another, “Cat got your tongue?”
You don’t answer.
You can’t.
Because your pulse is pounding, and if he doesn’t touch you properly in the next five seconds, you’re literally going to set his apartment on fire.
And Jack knows it.
He’s the proud policy owner of renter’s insurance and he’s savoring every fucking second of it.
Throwing up a quick sorry, God, damnation it is, you fumble. You move a second too slowly, and that grenade, square in your hands, goes off. You break first.
Your lips brush his and time stops.
His eyes find yours, heavy and half-lidded, and somehow miraculously refocus on you, and you’re looking up at him and the words kiss me for real? drip like honey from your lips and when has he ever been able to deny you anything?
A large palm comes up to cradle the back of your head while he pushes you into the cushions, boxing you in, and then he’s kissing you—fucking finally—trying to make up for every second he had to keep his hands to himself, making up for every minute that he held himself back with the restraint he’s been choking on for months.
And, like everything Jack Abbot does, you’ve come to find out, he crashes over you like a wave. Movements clumsy, he moves to balance one knee between your legs, the other moving to the floor so he can put both hands on you. Without hesitation, his other hand comes up to cup your face, the movement surprisingly gentle compared to the way his lips move over yours, desperate and raw.
He doesn’t even give you a chance.
Another thing you’ve learned about Jack Abbot tonight was there are no such thing as half measures.
His tongue darts out and he swallows the soft moan of surprise that escapes you, and you feel Jack’s grip tighten, his fingers pressing into your skin, anchoring himself to you. The sound seems to rip whatever restraint he had left to shreds, a hunger that was so carefully veiled now spilling forth like the first crack in a dam. His lips trail down and find the hollow between your collarbone and neck, and every sound that you make in response to the deliberate press and drag of his mouth against your skin urges him on, nipping and biting, stealing the taste of a forbidden fruit.
“So responsive,” he murmurs, almost to himself, his lips ghosting along the column of your neck. “How much more can I pull out of you?”
His hands shake as they move from your waist, the small of your back, your neck—searching, anchoring, pressing in and testing the limits of the physical world because he thinks that whatever close this is is not close enough.
And then demonic, disgusting, monkey-brained Mental You whispers in your mind, he should never be pulling out, and you’re batting her away. But it doesn’t help that you agree.
You gasp, and he swallows it whole, palm skating down to grip your thigh as he presses you hard into his couch, his own between your legs flexing, shooting sparks dancing up your spine, the aching between your legs growing unbearable.
None of it is enough.
Not after the way you just fucking sniffed him like a freak.
Not after the way you said his name like a sin he should feel lucky to commit.
When he pulls back, you’re breathless, dazed, lips parted and swollen. He stays close, eyes burning, and brings his thumb to trace your lips.
“I’ve been trying,” he says, breath ragged, “so fucking hard to be patient with you.”
You fuzzily blink, no thoughts, head only full of anticipation and him. “Huh?”
You really try to make sense of what the man above of you is saying, but all he’s done is kiss you, and it’s so unfair because you can feel you soaking wet, and you’re over here in sensory overload and he’s over here trying to speak full sentences.
The response almost makes him laugh, and he probably would have, had the situation been any different. But you’re looking up at him with blown-pupils and shiny lips, and the last of his control shatters.
Warm hands smooth around the sides of your neck, gently yanking you up to him. His mouth descends to yours. Teeth nip at your lips, sharp and possessive, and you can’t help the desperate moan that escapes. He slowly thrusts against you, the motion making you lightheaded.
Suddenly, he’s pulling you off the couch and pushing you toward the bedroom like the demon in you left and entered him, barely keeping it together, and Jesus Christ who designed the floor-plan for this apartment? You’re going to sue the fuck out of them because the space between rooms is offensive.
He finally kicks the door open, half-collapsing onto the bed with you beneath him, and the second the mattress dips beneath your weight, his mouth is on your neck, your chest, your collarbone—biting, licking, tasting everything he’s been fantasizing about. His hands push under your shirt like he’s starving, dragging the fabric up your body with a kind of reverence that borders on desperation.
“You have no idea,” he rasps against your skin, voice shaking, “how many times I’ve pictured this.”
You arch into him, breath catching. “Who are you, Picasso?”
That’s all it takes.
He tears the shirt over your head, mouth following the trail of skin like a man on his knees in prayer—hungry and grateful and, honestly, a little bit unhinged.
When he settles, Jack blinks up at you and freezes.
It’s not lace, just solid black cotton. It shouldn’t punch the air out of his lungs.
But it nearly destroys him.
The way it clings to your skin, simple and unpretentious, it’s so you. If medicine doesn’t work for him, maybe he would go into art, just so he could paint strokes on canvases, not one coming close to capturing your beauty. It makes his heart clench in a way that he doesn’t quite understand. His hands twitch, desperate.
He bites back a groan, head dropping to your hip as if grounding himself, but the ache in his chest only deepens.
“You know,” Jack grunts, voice low and rough, struggling to hold himself together as he unbuttons and yanks your pants, blindly throwing them. “I’m oddly surprised by the amount of muscle you have.” A kiss is pressed right above your knee in emphasis, his tongue slowly moving over the small patch.
His hands don’t hesitate. Fingers slipping beneath the waistband of your underwear, he peels the fabric down your hips with forced, deliberate slowness, savoring every second. The cool air rushes to kiss your skin, and the contrast against his heated touch makes your breath hitch.
“Are you kidding?” you stutter out, almost insulted, and then you pull together whatever composure remains in your trembling body. “You know I go to the gym—I can’t be embarrassing myself.”
He drops the fabric somewhere forgotten and leans down, lips grazing along the curve of your thigh, sending electricity lancing through your body. His eyes flick up to meet yours. Too much composure remains in your body for his liking.
His left hand pins your thigh to the mattress, spreading you out, his thumb pressing so close to where you need him.
Slowly, keeping his eyes on yours, he leans in a breath away from your slick heat.
His lips curl into a slow, wicked smile.
“No, you embarrass yourself in other ways,” he agrees, eyes shining up at you.
He finally has you where he wants you.
Laid bare at an altar for his worship.
He closes the distance, licking a broad stripe. Slow. Deliberate.
Holy shit, his mouth is a slick furnace between your folds, it has to be because that’s the only way molten iron could be flowing through your veins, and his tongue comes out and flicks your sensitive nub, humming as he feels you clench.
Your back arches, hands fisting in the sheets or his hair—whatever in your reach, really—breath coming in shuddering waves, every nerve ending lighting up like a struck match. You reach for him—fingers in his hair, nails grazing his scalp—and he groans against you, the vibration rocking down your body.
“Jack—” you gasp.
He glances up, mouth slick. “Something you want?”
He ceases all movement, eyebrows raising in mock question.
You blink, not quite comprehending. “You bastard—”
“What happened to please?” he interrupts smoothly, hands flexing against your thighs.
“What happened to don’t get used to charity?” you snap, or try to, but it lands breathless and woefully unconvincing.
His thumb dips down, and his eyes follow, glued to the sight. The thick digit slowly sinks into your wet heat, before unhurriedly pulling back out. And again. And again, and you think that his degree is actually in ending lives.
Dark eyes flash back up. “Say please.”
You bite down on a moan, retort dying on your lips. Hips thrust, chasing the pressure, shame long gone.
Burned up by the way he’s looking at you like you’re the only thing that’s ever mattered.
And his stupid fucking hands. You used to love those hands.
Silence stretches between you, taut and breathless.
Then you cave—because you were always going to. Because he knows exactly how to break you apart and make you beg for it.
“…Please.”
His mouth curves, satisfied.
“That’s better,” he murmurs.
His head dips back down, tongue skimming over your pussy, and his eyes slide shut. Groaning, he flexes his arms around your legs, opening you wider, pushing closer, and taking everything your body gives him. A holy communion for his taking.
Your back arches, tension drawing tighter and tighter.
Drawing your clit into his mouth, Jack sucks softly. Blinding pleasure rushes through your veins and your hips buck upwards, seeking out his tongue, clenching on nothing. A soft moan leaves your lips, desperately begging this piece of heaven to never leave your body.
Without mercy, he sinks two fingers into your cunt, draws them back, and slams them in.
“Jack—fuck,” you breathe. “Jack, I-I’m gonna come—”
A gentle encouraging hum fills your ears and you clench down on his hand, fingers curling, pressing against something absolutely fucking devastating deep inside you, and all you can do is gasp his name as burning ecstasy washes over you. You took some science classes back in school, but nothing could have prepared you for the nuclear fission—or, maybe fusion, the classes weren’t that good—that washes through your veins.
You can’t even fucking see. Or hear. The only sense you have is touch, specifically where Jack’s mouth continues, tongue gently flicking your swollen clit, working you through your orgasm.
Dude, what the fuck? you think as he kindly returns your eyesight to you.
He crawls over you, suspiciously absent of clothing, your soft thighs moving to bracket his hips.
“That was a lot of exertion,” your mouth says of its own volition. “Sure you don’t need a break, old man?”
“You’re the one coming apart, sweetheart,” Jack raises a brow, his voice low, the thick head of his cock catching against your entrance and pulling back, teasing. “A challenge, or you just stalling?"
“No idea, can I,” you gasp, breath hitching as the sensation sets off every nerve ending like a chain reaction, “Ph—fuck, phone a friend?”
Jack pauses just long enough to smirk, his breath hot against your jaw, his voice dropping to a rough whisper in your ear. “You really think anyone can help you right now?”
And before you can respond, he shifts his head slightly, his breath dipping lower, and then he bites down. A gasp breaks loose from your lips, sharp and involuntary, as he takes the skin between his teeth, and you whine, high and needy. The arm not supporting his weight snakes around and presses into your lower back, lifting you slightly off of his bed, smearing his precum on your stomach. He wants to hear that sound again, and again, and again.
He wants to see the way your sharp tongue stalls and your words falter and crumble beneath his touch.
It doesn’t matter if it takes all week, he has sixty days of unused PTO and willpower.
But your lips are moving, loaded with a different one. “I’m starting to think you’re stalling.”
“Can’t you just let me enjoy the moment?” he huffs out, already sucking a new blemish into your neck.
“Pretty sure you’re enjoying it enough for both of us.”
“Damn right I am.” Teeth graze the mark he’s just made, tongue following like an apology he has no intention of meaning.
“I’m gonna need an alibi, at this rate.”
He groans against your skin, begging you to stop talking.
Nipping the cord of muscle where your neck meets your shoulder, he mumbles, “I’ll write your statement.”
Your fingers thread in his hair and tug, hard enough to remind him you’re not completely helpless under him and it takes everything in him not to snap. He finally retreats from your neck, lips trailing up and capturing your lips with his.
You push him back with a soft grin. “Just make sure you spell vampire right this time.”
Jesus Christ.
He flashes his teeth at you and drops his head back down. Seeking out an unblemished spot on your neck, he bites down. The pain blooms hot, chased immediately by a wave of heat that pulses low in your body.
He slowly pushes into you with a broken groan, burying his head in your neck. Inch by inch, he sinks into you, sparks shooting up and down your spine. Your hands scrabble at his back, gripping hard, needing more—needing him. He holds you there, slowly stretching you open, and you seize in his grip, mouth open in a soundless cry as the all-consuming feeling of fucking finally crashes over you both.
He’s trembling. You feel it in the tight line of his body, the way his breath stutters against your neck, and then he exhales, guttural and wrecked.
“Jesus,” he whispers. “You feel—fuck—you feel like heaven.”
He doesn’t move at first. Just leans in, pressing his forehead to yours, his breath ragged and hot between you. The cool drag of his dog-tags skims your chest with every sharp exhale. He wants to take his time—to drag this out until it’s unbearable. He wants you below him and moaning until your vocal cords don’t have anything left. He wants to burn every second of this in his memory.
“Jack, please,” you whisper, voice already frayed at the edges. You’ll be angry at yourself about this later, about Abbot making you so needy that you can’t even speak. You need him to fucking move, to do something, anything. “God, please.”
You say it again, and again, each repetition thinner, rawer. Like the word alone might crack him open, might finally tip the scale in your favor. “I need—” You break off with a gasp, hips shifting in a silent, wordless demand, but he still doesn’t budge.
“Please,” you try again, throat tight, lips brushing his. “I can’t… I need you to move. I need you.” It tumbles out now, shameless and urgent. “I want you. I’ve been good, I’ve waited—”
He stills like he’s savoring every syllable you offer up like prayer—like penance—his body tensing against yours, hand tightening its grip on you. He hears you.
He just wants to hear more.
“Please.” It’s broken now. Desperate. “Don’t make me beg—” but you already are, and you’d do it again, if that’s what it took to get him to fucking move.
“It’s okay, sweet girl,” he breathes into your lips. “I’m magnanimous, remember?”
And then his hips snap forward, rough, and your broken moan ricochets off the walls of his apartment. He’d be very, very shocked if there weren’t a noise complaint tomorrow, but he couldn’t care less. He wants fifty noise complaints by sunrise, minimum.
You gasp, sharp and shuddering, clawing at his shoulders like the only way to stay grounded is to anchor yourself in him. Your thighs tighten around his waist without thinking, dragging him closer, and the new angle presses him deeper, stars dancing behind your eyes. Every thrust knocks the air from your lungs, each one more brutal than the last, making up for the torturous stillness that came before.
Your back arches, trying to take more, begging him to give more, and he meets you there—half-growling into your neck, hands mapping, afraid if he stops, you’ll vanish. Like this is the last time he’ll ever get to touch you, and he’s determined to make it count.
He drags a hand down your body, teeth scraping against your shoulder as he mutters, “You asked me to move, sweetheart.” But he’s already unraveling too, eyes dark and unfocused, pace punishing. You don’t know where you end and he begins—all you know is the burn, the ache, the obscene need spiraling tighter and tighter between you.
There’s nothing careful left in him. Just possession. Just hunger.
“Fuck,” he grunts. “That’s really all you needed to stop talking, huh? Just needed me to fuck you?”
Your answer is a gasp, his name falling from your lips like a prayer—cracked and corrupt. He drinks it in like it’s holy, like the sound of it is sacred when it’s coming from you in this state—wrecked, open, begging. He groans, deep and guttural, like the name alone nearly breaks him. “Say it again.”
“Jack—” breathless, sobbed, nearly swallowed by the slap of skin and the scrape of his breath at your ear.
He could die like this. Right here. Right now. Buried in you, name on your tongue, legs locked tight around him like you’d never let him leave. He’d march into hell for you.
“God—fuck,” he pants, losing rhythm for a moment, hips stuttering. “L-like you were made for me.”
You tighten around him at that, a pulse he feels in every nerve, and he shudders like it’s too much, like your body’s trying to drag the soul from his chest. And maybe you are. You probably will.
He brings your wrist clasped in his hand by your head, the other slipping between your bodies to find your clit, rough fingers moving in tight circles, aching to push you closer to the edge with him.
“You feel that?” he growls, almost desperate now, voice roughened by strain. “You ruin me.”
“Jack—” you cry out, high and trembling, and that’s all it takes.
He’s relentless now—driving into you like he’s chasing something only your body can give him. Each thrust lands deeper, harder, pulling broken sounds from your throat before you can even catch them.
You try to focus on anything—the iron grip of his hands on your wrist, the cool scrape of his dog tags between your breasts, the hot press of his mouth at your neck—but it’s all a blur. Nothing anchors you. Not when your body’s burning up from the inside out, tightening around him with every punishing roll of his hips.
“Look at me,” he grits out, voice ragged, pleading. “Come on, baby—look at me.”
You do, barely, your vision swimming, and the second your eyes meet his—dark and wild and so fucking gone—you snap. Your body seizes under him, climax crashing over you like a wave with no warning, no mercy. You cry out, shattered and gasping, every nerve ending alight and pulsing.
“That’s my girl,” he pants.
Your responding Jack is high and needy and he didn’t think his cock could get any harder but he swears to fucking God he almost blacks out.
He growls your name like a curse, and then he’s gone—hips snapping forward one final time as he buries himself deep, spilling into you with a sharp, strangled moan. His whole body seizes against yours, trembling with the force of it, and you cling to him like he’s the only thing holding you to earth. His whole body trembles, breath tearing from his throat like he’s breaking apart inside you.
He stays buried deep, gripping you like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he lets go.
Like if he moves too fast, it’ll all come undone.
His weight presses down on top of you. The furthest thing from holy, your muscles still twitching from the aftershocks, his softening cock still in you, and you think you might start begging again, this time to never move from you. He inhales in your neck, slowly his lips find yours once more to press a kiss—slow, reverent—to the corner of your mouth.
It must be holy to feel so pure.
Your hand finds the back of his neck, fingers threading into sweat-damp hair.
He sighs, low and wrecked. “Jesus Christ, kid.”
You’re still trying to find your fucking lungs and tell them get it together, we have work to do, as you scratch your nails on his scalp.
Eventually, you whisper, lips barely parting, “Jack, where is that fucking pizza we ordered?”
summary : Jack Abbot shows up for the Fourth of July, three years since you last saw him. You’re 23 now—older, sharper, and very much not the girl he remembers. The tension builds fast: porch stares, jealous glances, a game of chicken no one wants to win. He nearly breaks. You make sure he does.
word count : 11,152
warnings/content : 18+ MDNI explicit sexual content, age gap (23/f, 40s/m), dominant/submissive power dynamics, jealousy, mutual provocation, grief, war trauma, PTSD references, mention of past death of a spouse, mention of a past death of a parent (mother), emotionally charged arguments, manipulation, dad's best friend trope, use of another character for jealousy, emotional repression, messy feelings, public setting tension, intense eye contact as foreplay, one bed (brief), reader is not innocent, reader is the problem (affectionate), Jack is also the problem (derogatory), slow burn with porn-level payoff ?
July 3rd, 4:42 PM – Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania
Outside of Pittsburgh. It’s humid. The cicadas are screaming like the past never left.
You hear the truck long before you see it, old engine, cracked muffler, the kind of sound that makes the birds stop screaming. The tires bite gravel. The engine cuts out. Then nothing.
You’re on the porch already, pretending to read. One leg slung over the other, a cold glass sweating in your palm. You don't look up. Not right away. Not until the driver’s side door groans open.
He came.
For the first time in almost three years, Jack Abbot is back in Westmoreland County. Back in your father’s house. Back into orbit, like a planet pulled from whatever distant axis he’d exiled himself to.
He steps out of the Silverado like someone who’s not sure the ground wants him back.
The engine ticks behind him, overheated, sun-fatigued, too old for this road. It’s the same truck he’s had for over a decade, still bearing the dent in the rear bumper from when someone backed into him in a Walmart parking lot and he refused to get it fixed because “it’s cosmetic.” He gets out slow, jeans loose at the knees, white t-shirt clinging at the chest. The cuff of his right pant leg settles just right over the boot that hides the prosthetic. Below the knee, right side, carbon composite. You’d never notice. Unless you already understood what to look for.
But you do.
You know more than he thinks you do.
Jack Abbot was a combat medic. Afghanistan. Did three tours before the last one took his leg and the rest of what he hadn’t already buried. The records say “non-life-threatening injury.” The look in his eyes says otherwise.
He doesn't talk about the explosion. He doesn’t talk about the two men he tried to save and couldn’t, or the third whose name he still says under his breath when he thinks no one’s listening. What’s worse, though, what he never talks about, is what happened at home while he was gone.
His wife.
She worked nights at PTMC, was the kind of nurse who didn’t speak unless it mattered, who remembered birthdays and blood types in the same breath. She was calm in the way trauma nurses have to be. Capable of turning a scream into a code and a code into a rhythm. Dana liked her. Which is to say: Dana gave her hell, trusted her anyway, and never asked twice when she needed coverage.
Her handwriting was a mess. Half-print, half-cursive, always rushing somewhere. He loved that about her. Said it looked like urgency in motion. She burned fall-scented candles deep into summer; warm vanilla, clove, too much cinnamon. She knew he didn’t like the smell, but she lit them anyway, and he never said a word. He hated the scent, but he loved her more.
She hated small talk. Hated pity. Hated the way cafeteria microwaves never got anything hot all the way through. But she loved warm socks, old mugs, and the last ten minutes of any shift when the adrenaline gave out and everyone finally got quiet.
They lived in Robinson Township, in a house with red kitchen walls and a porch that creaked when the wind hit just right. A house Jack had keys to before he ever figured out what it meant to stay.
She gave him six days in the summer of 2005.
He gave her five and a letter he didn’t plan to leave behind.
She never brought it up. Not once. But when he came back months later, washed out and bone-tired and finally willing to look her in the eye, she opened the door and said the only thing she ever asked of him again:
"You never leave like that ever again."
He didn’t.
They got married quietly. No cake, no dress, no music, no audience. Just a courthouse, two pens that barely worked, a clerk who didn’t look up, and a shared last name that didn’t feel like a question. She kept wearing his t-shirts to bed, always the softest ones, stretched at the collar and warm from the dryer. They argued about the thermostat like it meant something, like the temperature could settle the weight between them. And some mornings, before either of them spoke, she’d make toast and leave a note by the coffee: Buy milk. Or Don’t forget your charger. Or Come home meaner, I dare you.
He keeps that one.
Folded. Soft at the edges. Glove compartment. Always.
She died in winter. A back road, black ice, a semi she never saw coming.
He was overseas. In another country. Another war. Patching someone else together while the woman who taught him how to stay bled out on asphalt an ocean away.
By the time he landed back in Pittsburgh, the house was exactly as they left it. Her badge still clipped to the fridge. Her scrubs folded on the dryer. A bottle of half-used lemon cleaner under the sink, cap loose like she’d meant to come back for it. In the bedroom, her notebook was still open on the nightstand.
He stood in the doorway for less than an hour. Didn’t touch the lights. Didn’t sit on the bed. Didn’t open the drawer where she kept the post-its.
He kept the house. Paid the bills. Replaced the water filter when the light came on. But he never moved back in.
Instead, he rented a condo closer to the hospital. Said it was temporary. Said the commute was easier. But he knew what he was doing. Even back then. Even with the war still clinging to him.
He was going to go civilian. Go legit. Take everything he learned patching people together in tents and turn it into something permanent. Residency. Scrubs. Real name on a badge.
He signed the lease five months before the blast took his leg.
The house in Robinson Township stayed exactly where it was. Waiting. Still full of her. He tried therapy twice, then quit when the second one asked how often he thought about forgiving himself.
Your father didn’t know any of that when they met.
They weren’t in the same unit. Didn’t know each other overseas. They met at a VA support group in the basement of a Unitarian church—two men sitting too far apart on folding chairs, half-listening to someone read aloud from a worksheet titled Finding Purpose After Loss. Jack never spoke during the sessions, but he always stayed late. Your dad did too.
They didn’t bond over war.
They bonded over what came after.
Your mom was diagnosed with cancer just before your sophomore year of high school. Pancreatic. She was gone in six months. After that, your dad started showing up to group every Tuesday. Said it made the evenings easier. Said there was something about the way Jack didn’t talk that made everything quieter in his own head.
They’d sit on the curb after meetings, drinking from bottles in paper bags like they were back in high school. Talked about absolutely nothing.
Water pressure.
Dog food brands.
VA red tape.
They didn’t call each other friends. That would’ve been too sentimental. Too soft. But when your dad says buddy, Jack shows up. And when Jack slurs brother at the end of a bottle, your dad never corrects him.
Neither of them remarried. Your dad said no one could handle how he grieved. Jack said no one should have to.
And now he’s walking up the porch steps, sun in his eyes, curls matted under a hand he drags across his face like he's hoping to wipe it all away.
“Jesus,” your dad says, stepping out behind you. “I’ll be damned.”
“You already are,” Jack mutters, squinting. “I just came to make sure the rumors were true. You still live like this?”
“Worse. We put the flag up.”
Jack glances at the porch post—flag pole angled just right, stars flapping lazy in the July air.
“I hate that thing.”
“Then I knew you’d show.”
You finally speak.
“Well, look what the wind blew in.”
Jack’s eyes land on you for the first time.
And it’s not a casual glance. It's a diagnosis.
You’re not a shy undergrad in last year’s band tee. You’re twenty-three, two semesters deep in a policy program that’s made you sharper than steel. You know how to make yourself look harmless, and how to make someone regret believing it.
You didn’t even know if he’d actually show. Your dad said he was “trying to convince him”—had been for weeks—but Jack was always like that: half-ghost, half-promise.
You're wearing a ribbed tank top, faded from too many washes, braless but not on purpose, just because it was hot. Loose drawstring shorts, hemmed just above mid-thigh. Not tiny. Not suggestive. Just comfortable. Skin sticky.
You hadn’t dressed for him.
But now that he’s standing there in jeans and a white t-shirt, eyes flicking over you like he’s clocking every inch, it kind of feels like you did.
And it hits you all at once: This isn’t the last time you’ll think about what you're wearing around him.
Jack doesn't blink.
“Didn’t know you were home,” he says.
“I’m not,” you reply. “Just visiting. Like you.”
He exhales through his nose. “Right.”
Your dad claps him on the back. “C’mon in. AC’s holding on by a thread, but there’s beer in the fridge and the couch hasn’t gotten any softer.
Jack huffs something close to a laugh.
Later, 6:02 PM
The fan spins overhead like it’s trying to be helpful. It isn’t.
You’re barefoot on the kitchen tile, wooden spoon in one hand, a cast iron pan hissing softly in front of you. Butter, garlic, crushed red pepper, aromatics rising into thick July air. The A/C is technically on, but it’s been losing the battle since noon. The house is warm in the way childhood homes always are. Memory trapped in drywall, grief in the vents.
From the living room, you hear the crackle of a baseball game through uneven speakers. Your dad yells something at the screen like the Pirates can hear him. You don’t follow baseball. You know the rules, just not the religion.
They’re not even winning. They never are. But that doesn’t stop him from narrating every pitch like it’s the playoffs.
You’re slicing tomatoes when the work phone rings. Sharp tone. Your dad picks it up with a muttered curse.
"Yeah, I'm here. Go ahead."
The hallway swallows his voice a moment later. You glance at the clock.
Jack hasn’t said much since he got here. He didn’t need to. He’s already said enough by showing up.
Three years of hearing about him. Three years of your dad saying “Jack this” and “Jack that.” Three years of seeing the ghost of him in backyard chairs, photos tucked into drawers, stories told at half-volume.
And now he’s sitting on your couch in a white t-shirt and jeans like nothing happened.
You stir the pan and flip the burner down.
He enters the kitchen a second later.
You don’t hear him. You feel him.
The air shifts. Denser. Sharper. A presence like gravity pressed into the edges of your shoulder blades.
Jack’s standing in the doorway with a beer in his hand and the kind of posture that looks casual but isn’t. Like his body still runs on threat assessment. His white t-shirt’s damp in the places that count. Under the arms, at the small of his back, behind the neck, clinging just enough to make you wonder how long he sat in the truck earlier before coming inside. It’s soft with age, stretched a little at the collar, like most things in his life: functional, worn, and not replaced unless absolutely necessary.
He looks at you.
Not up and down. Not obvious.
Just long enough to take in bare legs, sticky collarbones, and the way your top clings where it shouldn’t.
“Need help?” he asks, voice low, lazy. Like he already knows the answer.
You don’t turn around right away. Just lift the spoon, slow and deliberate, as steam curls up from the pot.
“I’m not helpless, Jack.”
He steps inside anyway. Leans his shoulder against the doorframe. “Didn’t say you were.”
You glance at him over your shoulder, just enough to catch the way his gaze drops then snaps back up like nothing happened.
“I’m just saying,” you continue, too light, too easy, “if you’re offering out of some outdated sense of chivalry, don’t. I can handle a little heat.”
You’re not talking about the stove. You both know it.
Jack smirks, slow and dry. “That why it’s ninety degrees in here?”
You hum. “It’s the simmering tension.”
He takes a sip of his beer, then nods toward the pan. “Or maybe it’s the five cloves of garlic you just dumped in there.”
“That’s called flavor,” you say, turning back to the stove. “You might’ve heard of it.”
There’s a beat of silence behind you.
Then, quietly: “You always were a little mouthy.”
You smile to yourself. Stir once. Let the moment breathe.
Jack steps farther in. Sets his bottle down. You hear the sound it makes, a dull thunk against the laminate.
“I’ll chop.”
He doesn’t wait for permission. Just moves toward the cutting board you left on the counter and grabs a bell pepper from the bag. His hand brushes yours when he picks up the knife. Not enough to register as a mistake. Just enough to stay with you.
You glance over at him. The side profile. His jaw. The curve of his back.
“How’s the condo?” you ask.
He shrugs. “Quiet.”
“Still renting?”
“Still not planning on staying.”
You nod. “That’s what I figured.”
He keeps chopping. Slow. Even. Efficient like everything he does.
The silence stretches out between you again.
You move to the sink to drain the pasta. He stays at the stove, now stirring the tomatoes like he’s done it a hundred times. Like he belongs there.
And that’s the problem.
He used to.
He used to come by on Sundays. Used to wear his boots inside. Used to carry grocery bags in one arm and a six-pack in the other. You were still in high school. Still thinking you understood grown men just because you’d read Joan Didion once.
"I didn’t think you’d be here," he says, then adds, "figured you’d be too busy partying in D.C. with your grad school friends, running policy circles around senators or something."
You dry your hands on the dish towel, careful not to meet his eyes.
“I didn’t know you’d come.”
“Your dad didn’t mention it?”
“He did.” You fold the towel in half. “But your name’s been his excuse for things before.”
Jack nods once. Slow. Not defensive. Just resigned.
You lean back against the counter beside him. His shoulder is six inches from yours. You could feel his breath if he sighed.
“You’ve changed.”
“So have you.”
He doesn’t answer.
He just tilts the bottle to his lips and drinks.
And for a second, the only sound in the room is the hiss of garlic and oil behind you—and the way your name almost lingers in the air like something he won’t say.
July 4th, 12:32 AM
The porch creaks. The cicadas are quiet. And nothing good happens at this hour—except everything almost does.
You push the screen door open with your hip. It sighs shut behind you like it knows better.
Jack doesn’t look up.
He’s on the bottom step, forearms braced on his knees, head tilted just slightly. His t-shirt clings to his back, soaked through in patches. His beer—half-warm, untouched—rests beside his boot.
You walk to him barefoot. Sit two steps up. You don’t speak.
Not yet.
The air is thick. Damp. It smells like fireworks and asphalt and the past. Your thighs stick to the wood, your tank top to your spine. The shorts—America’s Sweetheart, marine blue cotton, cut high and soft from too many washes—cling in the wrong places and the right ones. You’d thrown them on before bed without thinking, worn them a hundred times without consequence. But now, out here, with him sitting just below you and not looking, they feel intentional. You didn’t change before coming outside. And you don't plan to.
“Couldn’t sleep?” you ask.
“No.”
“Still wired for hospital hours?”
Jack’s voice is low. “Still wired for war.”
You say nothing.
He says less.
So you try again. “My dad still thinks you’re half-avoiding the Fourth.”
“I’m not avoiding it,” Jack mutters, voice flat, like gravel soaked in heat.
You raise a brow. “Then what are you doing out here at midnight?”
He shrugs, slow, one shoulder tighter than the other. “Thinking.”
“About?”
His fingers flex slightly around the neck of the bottle. “Things I shouldn’t be thinking.”
You lean back on your palms, stretch your legs until your calf brushes his shoulder. Not by accident.
“I’m not trying to make it worse,” you say.
He glances at you. A quick flick of heat. Then gone.
“I know what I’m doing,” you add.
Jack shifts. Just barely.
“You’re your father’s daughter,” he says. It’s not kind. It’s not cruel. It just is.
You nod. “So?”
“So you should be asleep.”
“You should be honest.”
That lands.
He turns his whole body toward you now. His eyes drag down your legs. Your throat. Linger at your mouth.
“I notice everything you do,” he says. “Every fucking thing.”
You don’t breathe.
Jack’s voice drops lower, rough at the edges. “You changed into those shorts like it wasn’t on purpose. Like you didn’t know exactly what they say across the back, or how high they ride up when you lean over.”
“I don’t wear them for your attention.”
He stares. “But you don’t mind when you get it.”
Your pulse kicks. You try to swallow. It’s hard.
You whisper, “Do you want me to stop?”
Jack’s hands curl into fists on his knees. “That’s not the problem.”
“Then what is?”
“The problem,” he says, “is that if I get up and touch you, if I put my mouth on you, I’m not going to do it soft. I’m not going to be sweet. I’m going to take.”
Your legs clench.
He exhales like it hurts to hold it in.
“I’m going to get your knees over my shoulders right here on this porch,” he says, voice low and frayed, like the thought of it already has his hands shaking, “and I’m going to forget every reason why I shouldn’t.”
It’s not a line. It’s not even a warning. It’s a fact. Solid as his voice, steady as his breathing, tight and uneven, like it’s dragging heat up from somewhere deep in his gut and trying to tamp it down before it explodes.
You blink once but your body reacts before your brain can catch up. Your stomach sinks. Your thighs press together. The ache hits all at once, sharp and physical and throbbing, like your skin understood the promise before your mind even realized what was happening.
Jack doesn’t move. His face is barely lit by the porch light bleeding through the screen door, but you can see the tension in every line of him, the locked jaw, the flared nostrils, the way his hands flex uselessly at his sides like he wants to touch you but knows what’ll happen if he does.
He looks at you, and for the first time since he walked back into your life, he doesn’t look guarded. He looks like a man seconds from giving in.
“You understand?” he asks, quiet but not soft. There’s nothing soft about it,nothing gentle in the way his voice scrapes across your skin like it knows exactly where to land.
You nod. Just once. The smallest movement. But it feels massive.
“I do,” you say.
And it comes out lower than you meant it to. Breathless, a little hoarse. Like your body heard the word shoulders and hasn’t stopped pulsing since. Like your legs are already aching from the tension, the pressure, the restraint. From everything that hasn’t happened yet and still feels like it did.
Jack stays crouched for a second longer. Then, slowly, like he’s not sure if standing will make it worse, he rises.
He steps up. One stair. Then another. Just enough to bring himself level with you where you’re perched, legs bare and half-draped across the wood. He doesn’t touch you. He doesn’t speak. He just looks.
And that’s worse.
Now he’s standing between your knees, close enough to tower without looming, his chest rising sharp beneath the thin stretch of his shirt. You can smell him, clean sweat, beer, something sunworn and worn out. His eyes track every inch of your face, down your neck, and settle on your legs.
You don’t pull away.
You let him look.
You want him to.
Jack doesn’t move. Doesn’t reach for you. But you can feel the effort it’s taking not to. His hands hang at his sides like they’re waiting for orders. Like they remember what they used to do when they were allowed to want something and take it.
The porch groans faintly beneath both of you, but neither of you shifts.
He’s not touching you.
But it feels like he is.
The heat from his body pours over your skin like a warning. Your thighs are warm, throbbing. You feel it in your chest, in your stomach, in the slick place between your legs that’s already aching from the promise he made but hasn’t kept.
Still, he doesn’t lean in.
And that restraint, that quiet, Jack Abbot-brand control, makes it feel dirtier than if he had. Like he already has you. Like he’s already ruined you.
And maybe he has.
You shift slightly, tilting your hips just enough to open your knees. Bare. Flushed. Warm. It isn't a performance. It's instinct. A reaction. An offering without asking. Not coy. Not cruel. Just there. Just true.
And Jack sees it.
His eyes flash down, and something in him goes still in that way that isn't calm, it’s deadly. Like a trigger pulled halfway.
You tilt your chin up. “If you’re going to walk away, do it now.”
He doesn’t answer right away. Doesn’t blink.
Then, slowly, like it costs him, he looks away. His mouth hardens. His shoulders shift back like he's bracing for impact, like walking away is harder than staying.
And then he moves.
Not fast. Not abrupt. But deliberate. With the finality of someone pulling themselves out of a burning building and leaving the match behind.
He takes a single step toward the door.
Then stops.
His voice, when it comes, is rough. Quiet. Wrecked.
“Go to bed.”
You don’t move.
He turns slightly, just enough to look at you over his shoulder. His mouth is parted like he wants to say more, but the words get stuck somewhere in his throat.
You swallow. “Jack—”
He cuts you off, voice sharper this time. Controlled only by effort.
“Go to bed,” he repeats, eyes locked on yours now. “Because if I say one more word, I’m not going to walk away. And you’re going to let me.”
You don’t speak.
There’s nothing left to say.
He walks inside.
The screen door hisses closed behind him, and the silence left in his absence isn’t silence at all. It’s loaded. It’s loud.
You sit there for a long time.
Legs still parted. Breath shallow. Mouth dry. The porch beneath you hums with the imprint of heat. You can feel the weight of where he almost touched you, like it left a bruise.
And nothing happened.
But your thighs are still warm. Your heart still racing. And your body, wrecked by everything he didn’t do, doesn’t know the difference.
July 4th — 2:17 PM
The backyard is full of smoke, sweat, cheap beer, and men who talk like the war never ended.
The grill’s already flaring by the time you come outside. The back porch is crowded, the kind of crowded that smells like beer and bar smoke and the same five stories told on rotation. The grass is patchy. Burnt in the spots where the sun lingers longest, soft only where the sprinkler’s overshot its aim. A folding table buckles slightly in the middle under the weight of plastic tubs full of potato salad and grocery store buns.
The playlist’s stuck somewhere between Springsteen and Seger, blaring from a speaker your dad duct-taped to the porch rail. You can feel the heat. It’s oppressive. Sticky in that Pennsylvania way. It presses into your spine, rolls down your neck, clings to the bend of your elbows and the backs of your knees. Your tank top’s wet at the lower back. Your shorts ride up every time you shift. You stopped trying to fix them.
Your dad’s in rare form, commanding the grill like it’s a combat zone, beer in one hand, metal tongs in the other. He’s holding court with three of his oldest friends: Torres, Mancini, and Calhoun. They’re all wearing sunglasses, cargo shorts, and opinions. Men who talk like everything after deployment was just filler. Their laughter is too loud, their stories too sharp at the edges. It’s not nostalgia. It’s muscle memory.
Jack is there too.
He’s not talking much. He never does. But his presence is heavier than theirs. Quieter. He’s leaned up against the fence post, beer held loose in one hand, watching your dad talk like he already knows the punchlines.
He’s wearing an old Harley-Davidson t-shirt, sun-bleached and threadbare, the black cotton gone soft with age, the orange logo more memory than print. There are two holes near the hem and another at the shoulder seam, like it’s survived more summers than it should have. His camo cargo shorts hang low on his hips, loose, worn-in, one pocket fraying at the edge. The belt’s gone, replaced by the way his body holds itself together. His prosthetic is visible now—just under the cut of the fabric, dark carbon where skin should be. He doesn’t hide it. Doesn’t draw attention to it either. He shifts his weight like he’s done this a thousand times in a thousand places, quietly, precisely, like the act of standing is a skill most people don’t earn. Like a man trained to not draw attention. He’s good at it.
Except you’re watching.
And you’re done being quiet about it.
You haven’t said more than six words to him since last night. Not since the porch. Not since he stood between your knees and said things no one should say in the dark and then walked away like he didn’t mean any of them.
He’s been acting like it never happened.
Like you imagined it.
Like he didn’t almost fall apart in front of you.
So fine. If he’s going to pretend, you’ll make him watch.
Matt Warner is by the back gate, talking to someone with easy confidence. He’s filled out since high school—tanned, relaxed, more settled in his skin. His shirt fits well, sleeves stretched slightly over his arms, and his hair’s cut short, like he finally found a version of himself that didn’t have to try so hard.
You walk toward him, glass in hand, hips loose, smile casual.
He sees you and lights up.
“Hey,” he says, like you’re a surprise. “Wow. You look... different.”
“You still have that rusted Civic?”
He laughs, sheepish. “God, yeah. Still barely runs. You remember that?”
“I remember a lot of things.”
His hand brushes your arm as you shift your weight, deliberate and slow. You feel the way he swallows hard, like it costs him.
Behind you, the grill hisses. Your dad’s shouting about how Torres once set a tent on fire trying to light a cigar. More laughter. Another beer pops open.
Jack hasn’t moved. But you can feel his gaze like a brand.
You lean in. Your fingers are on Matt’s forearm now, light but lingering.
Matt chuckles. “It’s weird being back, right?”
You nod. “Everything’s the same. That’s the weird part.”
Across the yard, Jack shifts.
You don’t turn.
Not yet.
Matt says something about D.C., about how you’re probably too smart for this town. You smile, let him believe it, even as your stomach coils tighter. The sun’s high. You’re sweating. You haven’t tasted your drink in ten minutes.
Then you hear it.
Jack’s voice. Quiet. Dry.
“Haven’t seen that face in a while.”
You turn, slowly.
Jack’s standing four feet away, jaw tight, arms folded across his chest. His mouth is a flat line.
You smile. “Matt Warner. From high school.”
Jack nods once, his eyes never leaving yours.
“You two catching up?” he asks.
Matt shrugs. “We were just talking about—uh—”
“You were just touching her arm,” Jack says.
Matt laughs, awkward. “Yeah, well—I mean, I was gonna get a drink—”
“Go ahead,” Jack says. “Plenty left.”
Matt glances at you. You nod. He leaves.
Jack steps forward.
You meet him where he stands.
He looks you over once, slow, methodical, like you’re a problem he’s not ready to solve. His eyes settle at the edge of your tank top, then drift to your mouth, then hold.
“You having fun?” he asks.
“I was,” you say.
Jack nods. “Right.”
You take a slow breath. “You’re the one who walked away.”
“I’m not the one dragging civilians into the middle of it.”
You smile, humorless. “You’re pissed.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re jealous.”
“I’m not that either,” he says. “I just don’t like watching you beg for scraps.”
You step closer.
“He touched my arm,” you say. “You touched my throat with your voice last night and then left.”
Jack looks like he’s about to say something. Then doesn’t.
You tilt your head. “So what’s worse?”
He shifts. His jaw clenches. “You don’t want to do this here.”
You shrug. “Then make me go somewhere else.”
Jack leans in, so close you feel the sweat at his temple.
“I’m not going to fuck you on your dad’s lawn,” he whispers, voice dark.
“Then you’re not going to fuck me at all,” you say.
Your dad’s voice cuts through the backyard hum. “Jack, you gonna flip these or let Torres murder them again?”
Laughter rises near the grill. Torres shouts something back about medium-rare being a suggestion, not a promise.
But Jack doesn’t turn.
He’s still staring at you.
The space between you feels charged, stretched tight like wire pulled too far. His eyes drag over your face, down the slope of your neck, the sweat-slicked line of your collarbone. He looks like a man counting to ten, and barely making it to five. He doesn’t give you the chance to say something smart or reckless or too much like a dare. He just steps back. The motion is precise, like everything he does, and when he turns, it’s with that same heavy finality you’ve seen a dozen times now. Like he’s trying to save you from something. Or himself.
He walks toward the grill. Doesn’t look back.
Your dad claps him on the back, already handing him the tongs.
You don’t move.
You feel scorched. Lit up.
And all you can think is how much you want to know what it would take to make him snap. To make him stop walking away. To see what happens when a man like Jack Abbot finally lets go.
The sun’s lower now—dragging its heels, not quite gone but giving in. Light spills sideways through the trees like someone tipped a bottle too fast, gold pooling in uneven streaks across the bark and brush. Heat hangs stubborn, lacquered over your skin, clinging to the glass in your hand, seeping into the soft arches of your bare feet against the sun-warped porch boards.
“You’re playing,” your dad says, voice rough with beer and the kind of authority that leaves no room for negotiation. He slaps the edge of the pickleball paddle against his thigh like he’s warming up for battle. “Jack’s on Torres’s team. You’re with me and—”
He doesn’t even finish her name. Just jerks his chin in the direction of the lawn like it’s obvious.
“Her.”
She’s parked in a Tommy Bahama chair near the edge of the shade, legs crossed tight at the ankle, nails freshly done and glinting against her Yeti tumbler, expression unreadable behind oversized sunglasses that reflect the yard like a fish-eye lens. She looks like someone doing penance just for showing up. Like this backyard, this game, this version of your father is all one big favor.
Your molars grind.
And still, you smile. Polite. Performed. Perfectly practiced.
“Great,” you say, voice bright as the aluminum in her cup.
You haven’t even picked up a paddle yet, and already the sweat’s slipping down your spine.
The court’s a joke. Chalked out in lazy, uneven lines on the cracked driveway, already blurring under the heat. One of the nets is barely upright, duct tape wrapped like a tourniquet around one post, the other leg jammed into a rusted folding chair like that makes it regulation. It looks like it should be condemned.
It’s the kind of setup that screams middle-aged delusion and Fourth of July ego, and your dad eats it up like oxygen. Loud, improvised, vaguely unsafe—bragging rights baked into every serve, every sarcastic out call. This isn’t about exercise. This is about legacy.
Jack stands just outside the chaos, at the far edge of the driveway beneath the curl of shade that barely reaches the chalk line. Paddle in his right hand, water bottle in the left. He hasn’t moved much. Hasn’t spoken since the grill. The Harley-Davidson shirt he wore like armor earlier is dark now, clinging to him in salt-streaked patches, across his chest, along the spine, under the arms. The sleeves are tight around his biceps, sweat soaking through like the heat’s finally broken past whatever control he thought he still had.
And when you reach back to tie your hair, fingers threading through the heat and sweat at the nape of your neck, then bend to fix your sock, spine curving, breath catching beneath your ribs like it’s trying to disappear, the air shifts.
Because he’s watching you.
Not sidelong. Not distracted. Not with the casual glance of someone who stumbled onto something they weren’t meant to see.
He’s locked in. Eyes following every movement, every flick of your wrist, every shift of your weight like it’s already imprinted on him. Like your body is a memory he’s still trying to hold in his hands.
And he doesn’t look away.
Doesn’t blink.
Doesn’t even try to pretend.
When you straighten up, pass him without a glance, he lets it sit a beat before saying, low and rough:
“That little show for me?”
You don’t pause. Don’t flinch.
“You wish,” you toss back, all bite and heat.
He smirks. The kind that could unravel a lesser girl. The kind that dares you to do it again.
Jack huffs a laugh. And the game starts.
Jack plays like he’s punishing something. Maybe the driveway. Maybe himself. His grip is tight, elbows locked, that prosthetic planting rhythmically with every pivot. He barely talks. Just nods, gestures, focuses. But every time he scores, every time you miss, he glances. Never full-on. Never for long. Just enough to gut you.
You return the favor.
You lean into your shots. You make noise when you stretch. You throw your head back when you laugh at your dad’s girlfriend’s wild miss, even though you’re silently begging the sun to go down so you can stop feeling this exposed.
Matt Warner watches from the lawn chair with a beer in hand and a boyish, slightly dazed expression like he knows something’s going on but can’t name it. You let him stare.
Let Jack notice.
Let the sweat on your chest glisten in the low sun and the edge of your tank slip just far enough that it could be an accident or it could be strategy.
Jack misses a return.
Your dad crows. “You’re off your game, Abbot.”
Jack wipes sweat off his brow. Doesn’t answer. Just resets. Eyes on you like you’re the real problem.
And then, of course, she makes a comment.
“Maybe Jack’s just distracted,” your dad’s girlfriend chirps, tossing the ball back with a practiced flick of her wrist. “Could be the view.”
She doesn’t even look at you when she says it—just smiles into the sun like she’s so above it all she can afford to be cruel for sport. The ball arcs lazily, lands short.
You freeze mid-step.
The paddle goes still in your hand, plastic grip tacky with sweat.
Jack doesn’t blink. Doesn’t laugh, doesn’t roll his eyes, doesn’t give her the satisfaction of reaction. He leans in slightly, gaze locked on yours from across the makeshift court. His voice is low, not quite a whisper, barely shapes the words.
“Ignore her.”
But it’s too late. You’re already burning. Already lit up from the inside, chest hollowed out by heat and humiliation and something sharper that you don’t want to name. Your jaw sets. Your skin prickles. You take the next serve like you’re trying to drive the paddle straight through the driveway.
It should roll off you. You’ve been through worse. Said worse. But still, there’s something about being baited like that. About being the girl standing on the cracked concrete while your dad’s new girlfriend smirks and implies you’re just another body in Jack Abbot’s peripheral. Like you don’t know him. Like you don’t remember how he used to look at you when no one else was watching. Like you don’t still taste the way he said your name the last time you let him close enough to say it.
You feel ridiculous.
You feel seventeen.
And it only gets worse.
The round ends. Water bottles are uncapped, points argued, your dad’s already trying to claim he was fouled. You retreat toward the edge of the driveway, blinking against the sun, but your eyes catch him—Jack. Off to the side, shirt soaked clean through. His hair’s damp, curls starting to loosen around his ears, and there’s sweat beading down the side of his throat like it belongs in a memory you don’t have the strength to relive.
He’s talking to her.
Not your dad’s girlfriend. Worse.
One of the neighbors—older, tan, the kind of woman who hosts wine nights with RSVP cards and knows the name of every facialist within a forty-mile radius. Her bleach-blonde hair is pulled back in a perfect ponytail, lip gloss unbothered by the heat, laugh sharp and practiced. You know her type. You’ve seen her kind fold men in half without even raising her voice.
She’s smiling too much. Saying his name like it’s a secret. Leaning in like the joke only works if she touches his chest when she tells it.
And he doesn’t stop her.
He lets her laugh. Lets her fingers brush the curve of his collarbone. Lets her speak soft and familiar, like they’ve done this before. Like she already knows what kind of cologne he wears. Like she’s earned it.
You look away, jaw tight, throat tighter.
You know it’s nothing.
You know.
But your stomach’s already turning, rage blooming low and hot, not just because she’s touching him—but because he’s letting her. Because no matter how much he watches you when he thinks no one’s looking, no matter how sharp his voice gets when someone takes a dig at you, no matter how many years have passed, he still finds a way to keep you at arm’s length.
You’re not his.
And she’s proof of that.
You don’t realize how hard you’re gripping your paddle until the foam creaks under your fingers, compressing like it’s trying to escape your palm. Your knuckles ache, white and tight around the handle, but you don’t loosen.
“You good?” Matt asks, stepping a little closer. His voice is too eager, too bright, like he thinks maybe this is his moment. Like maybe the heat and the sweat and the tension have finally worn you down enough to let someone else in.
You glance at him sideways, lashes low, mouth curling into something that doesn’t reach your eyes.
“Peachy.”
It lands flat. Drier than the air.
Across the court, Jack looks up.
Just once.
A flicker, barely a lift of his chin, eyes cutting toward you like it’s reflex, like your voice is something he doesn’t have to hear to register. Like it lives in his spine. Under his skin.
And maybe it does. Because for the first time all day, he stops mid-sentence.
He sees the set of your shoulders. The tension in your jaw. The way your fingers flex once around the paddle like you’re deciding whether to use it or throw it.
So you make it easy for him.
You drop it.
Let it fall to the concrete with a flat, graceless clatter. Don’t even flinch when it bounces once and spins crooked across the chalk line.
And you don’t say a word.
Because if he knows you, really knows you, he already understands what’s coming next.
You don’t look at him. Don’t give him the satisfaction of a second glance.
You just turn, slow, unbothered, deliberate, and walk. Past the folding chairs with their sun-bleached stripes, past the cooler your dad dragged out of the garage and filled with discount beer. Past the scuffed-up edge of the lawn where the grass gives out, turning brittle and sparse, surrendering to gravel.
You don’t check to see if Matt follows.
You don’t have to.
“Hey—wait,” he calls behind you, already trying to catch up, sneakers crunching over dry earth. There’s a note in his voice, half concern, half something else, something closer to hope, and it grates.
He jogs to your side just as you duck beneath the low-hanging limbs that mark the property line. The line of trees swallows you both, branches rustling overhead like a curtain drawn shut. You’re still visible, just barely. Framed by green, half-shadowed, the faint echo of the driveway noise still chasing your heels. If someone were watching, and you know someone is, they’d have to squint.
They’d have to want to see.
Which is the point.
You spin to face him.
And before he can ask what’s going on, you grab the collar of his shirt and drag his mouth down to yours.
It’s messy. Immediate. Not even close to gentle.
You kiss Matt like he’s a weapon. Like he’s cover fire. Like he’s not even a person, just something to use. His hands find your waist, hesitant, like he doesn’t quite believe this is happening.
You push him back into the tree. Hard. He gasps into your mouth. You don't stop. You press your thigh between his legs. Tilt your chin up like you’re daring Jack to look. Like you know he is. Because you saw it, the way his gaze tracked you the second you turned away. The way his voice dipped low the last time he told you to behave. The way his hand twitched when that woman laughed too close.
And now? Now, you’re grinding against someone else’s thigh, and you want him to see it. You want him to burn.
Matt moans. “Fuck—you’re…”
You break the kiss with a harsh breath, palm against his chest.
“Don’t get attached,” you murmur, voice low and wrecked and barely holding shape. “I’m just pissed.”
You don’t wait for his response.
You turn, walk away like you didn’t just bite him back with your mouth still swollen, like your chest isn’t rising and falling like you’ve been sprinting, like your thighs aren’t trembling from the way you used him to get even with someone else.
You don’t care who saw.
But you know Jack did.
You feel it, before you even lift your head, before your eyes dare trace the distance back to the driveway, you feel it. The weight of his stare. Heavy. Sharp. Possessive in a way he’d never say out loud, not in a backyard full of lawn chairs and lukewarm beers.
This isn’t a game.
It’s not just a holiday. Not just a humid afternoon in Western Pennsylvania, not just another round of performative Americana and half-assed patriotism under strings of red-white-blue dollar store bunting.
It’s July 4th.
And Jack Abbot—still sweat-slick, still silent, still standing at the edge of everything—is about to remind you exactly what freedom looks like when it walks, stalks, burns through you.
Inside, the house is hushed. Everyone’s still outside, too drunk on smoke and sun and cheap beer to notice you’re gone. The laughter fades into the background, muted by drywall and distance, and suddenly it’s just you in the dim kitchen, your pulse louder than anything else. You don’t flip the light on. You don’t need to. You know this house, every creak, every floorboard.
You take the stairs two at a time. Your skin still smells like sun and salt. Your lips still taste like spite.
You reach your room.
You don’t cry.
You strip.
Tank top first—sweat-damp, clinging—peeled off slow and deliberate like a second skin you’re done pretending in. Then your shorts, shoved down your hips and kicked into the corner.
Now it’s just your underwear—thin cotton, dark from heat and sweat—clinging in places you don’t care to hide. Your breath’s shallow. Sharp. Angry. Not because of Matt. Not even because of her.
Because you’re tired of feeling everything and touching nothing. Because he keeps walking away like that makes him noble instead of cruel. Because he saw you kiss someone else and didn’t stop it, just watched like punishment was part of the deal.
And maybe it is. Maybe this is yours too.
You yank the drawer open, searching—clean underwear, something—anything—to cool the fire prickling under your skin.
But you don’t move fast.
You know the door didn’t catch all the way when you pulled it shut. It’s cracked just enough. You know the hallway’s empty, the house hollowed out with the sound of drunken laughter spilling in from the backyard.
You don’t hear the door open.
You just feel it.
The shift. The weight. The way the air behind you changes—like gravity’s tilted in his direction.
Your fingers linger at the clasp.
Then: his voice. Low. Rough. Cut from jealousy and something darker.
“That why you kissed him?” Jack says. “To get my attention?”
You don’t turn around.
Not yet.
“Did it work?” you ask, voice sweet and poisonous.
A pause.
And then: the door shuts. Click.
Your body tenses. You half-spin to face him, chest rising fast. He’s standing just inside your room. He doesn’t move. Just looks at you like he’s deciding whether to drag you to hell or ask if you’re already there.
You arch a brow. “Did you come up here to lecture me? 'Cause you’re late. The lecture ended the second I slipped my tongue down Matt Warner’s throat.”
His eyes go dark.
Still, no movement. But you can feel it coming.
“I mean,” you go on, cocking a hip, bratty and baiting, “he was surprisingly eager for someone with such a mediocre backhand.”
“Don’t,” Jack warns.
“Don’t what?” You take a step closer, close enough to see the pulse in his neck. “Don’t tell you how his hands felt on my ass? Or don’t mention that maybe you’re not the only one who knows how to play a long game?”
That’s when he moves.
You don’t even have time to breathe. He’s on you, crowding, consuming, grabbing your waist like a man who’s done pretending he doesn’t want to wreck you. Your back hits your closet door, hard enough to rattle the hinges.
He cages you in, voice a whisper just below a snarl.
“He touch you like this?” Jack growls, one hand sliding slow, too slow, down your bare side, fingers digging just hard enough to leave the threat of bruises.
You swallow. “He didn’t get the chance.”
Jack doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Just stands there, thundercloud-dark and impossibly still, like the calm before something breaks.
“And you think that’s gonna save you?” he asks, voice low and frayed at the edges.
You smile then, sharp, dangerous, all teeth and heat. The kind of smile that dares him.
“You gonna punish me, Abbot?”
His breath catches, just enough to give him away.
Just enough to let you know you’ve struck something vital.
His jaw tightens. His hand twitches. And for a second, the only sound is the distant crack of a firework and the hiss of something burning out too fast.
“You have no idea what you’re asking for,” he says, voice thick, like it’s been dragged over gravel and restraint and too many nights spent doing the right thing when what he really wanted was this.
Your lips brush his jaw as you lean in, soft and deliberate, every nerve in your body coiled tight with want.
“Then show me.”
And he does.
Jack’s mouth crashes into yours, hard and starved and fucking unholy. His hands find your thighs, your ribs, the back of your neck. He lifts you like you weigh nothing, slamming you up against the wall beside your bed. You yelp into his mouth, but it only makes him kiss you harder, filthy, messy, like he’s reclaiming what’s always been his.
You claw at his shirt, drag it up and over his head, panting when you feel the heat of his chest against yours. He’s all salt and smoke and late July, and when you wrap your legs around his hips, he grinds into you like he’s forgotten how to be gentle.
He hasn’t.
He’s just not choosing it tonight.
“Still wanna play your little game?” he rasps against your neck.
You bite your lip, smirking. “I’m still winning.”
He growls, low and rough, and his hand slides between your legs, cupping you through the last scrap of damp cotton still clinging to you.
“Not for long.”
And when he touches you, really touches you, it’s not hesitant. It’s not sweet. It’s punishing. He drags his nose up the curve of your cheek, exhales hot against your temple. “You don’t get to play with boys like that. Not with me near.”
Then he lifts you, hands sure, grip bruising, and lays you down on the bed like he’s claiming territory. Slow. Rough.
He steps back. Just enough to look at you. To see you.
His chest rises hard and fast. The air hums, thick with heat and whatever you’ve just become in front of him. And when his eyes drop, they don’t come back up right away.
They catch, on the soaked cotton clinging between your thighs, the tremble in your legs you can’t quite control, the flush that hasn’t left your skin since the second you mouthed Then show me.
His tongue grazes the inside of his cheek like he’s biting something back.
Or bracing.
“Hands over your head,” he says, voice rough, low and edged with command. Like it costs him nothing. Like you were always going to listen.
And you do. He smirks when you do it without a word.
“Good girl.”
His hands trail up your thighs, deliberate, unhurried, like he's memorizing the shape of your surrender. He doesn’t tear the underwear off. No—he peels it. Fingers curling into the waistband, knuckles grazing your hips, dragging it down so agonizingly slow you almost whimper.
"Look at you," he mutters, more to himself than to you. "All that attitude just to end up spread out like this. Was that the plan?"
You tilt your chin, breath hitching. “I knew you’d catch up eventually.”
He huffs, just once, and presses his thumb against your clit, lazy, taunting, like he’s got all the time in the world and you’ve got none. Your hips jerk up.
"No," he says flatly. One firm hand pins your pelvis to the mattress. "You don’t get to chase it. Not after all that shit you pulled outside.”
You moan through gritted teeth. “Jack—”
His name cracks out of you like it wasn’t meant to, like your body said it before your brain could stop it.
And it’s a mistake.
Because it makes something break open in him. Fast, raw, dangerous.
Whatever restraint he had left doesn’t just unravel.
It detonates.
He sinks two fingers into you in one slow, brutal thrust, thick and deep, and watches you writhe, thumb never leaving your clit. You arch into it, eyes fluttering shut—
“Uh uh.” He leans in, breath hot against your ear. “Keep those eyes on me. I want to see exactly what they do when I’m buried inside you.”
Your breath catches. You grip the sheets.
He doesn’t wait for a response.
He drops his pants, kicks them off, and grabs your hips like a man possessed. His cock presses thick and hot against you, sliding through your slick with a hissed curse. You feel the head catch—right there, teasing—then shifts his weight and drives into you all at once. Deep, brutal, devastating. Your breath catches in your throat like it’s been knocked out of you, spine arching off the mattress as your hands scramble for something, anything, to hold onto. Him, the sheets, the moment before it all gives out beneath you.
He doesn’t let you hide.
“Eyes,” he reminds you, low and sharp, rocking into you with steady, punishing rhythm. “Don’t look away.”
You don’t. Can’t. Not when he’s watching you like that, dark eyes locked to yours, jaw clenched, muscles pulled tight like he’s holding himself back by the skin of his teeth.
Every thrust is deliberate. Controlled. He’s not fucking you like he’s angry. He’s fucking you like he’s owed this. Like he’s earned the right to ruin you. Like he’s waited long enough.
Your legs wrap around his waist, instinctive, desperate.
He grins, feral, crooked. “That’s right. Hold on.”
Your head tips back, a strangled moan slipping free, but his hand is already there, curling around your throat. Not tight, not harsh, just enough to bring you back to him.
“You don’t come until I say. You do, and I’ll pull out. And you’ll finish the night with your hand between your legs wishing it was me.”
You nod, frantic.
“This what you wanted?” he grits. “To fuckin’ rile me up? Make me watch you parade around in those shorts acting like you don’t know what you’re doing?”
You’re gone. All you can do is nod, whimper, take it.
Each thrust lands harder—more frantic, more punishing, like he’s trying to drive the memory of anyone else out of you, like he’s trying to anchor you here with nothing but the weight of him.
You choke on a gasp, vision blurring as the edge crashes in too fast, too sharp. Your fingers claw uselessly at the air, at his shoulders, at anything. Tears slip from the corners of your eyes, hot, helpless.
“Jack—I can’t—”
“Yes, you can.”
Your body shudders beneath him, hips stuttering, legs beginning to shake. You’re close. So close it hurts.
“Please—please, I’m gonna—”
“No.”
He stops.
Still buried inside you, still thick and pulsing, still the only thing holding you together—and he stops.
You sob, broken and furious.
“I said,” he growls, voice ragged, teeth clenched, “not yet.”
Then he pulls out halfway, just enough to leave you empty, and pushes back in slow. Slow enough to torture. Slow enough to ruin. He grinds against that spot that makes your vision spark, makes your body betray you all over again.
“Jack—” Your voice cracks on his name.
“Look at me.”
You do. And whatever he sees in your eyes—it breaks him.
"Fuck it," he mutters, voice wrecked.
He grabs your wrists, pins them above your head, and fucks you like it’s the last night on earth.
You don’t stand a chance.
It crashes through you like a wave, sharp and fast and obliterating. You shatter with a broken sound, clutching at his shoulders as your vision goes white around the edges.
But he’s not done.
He groans, deep and guttural, still moving through your aftershocks like he’s addicted to the way you break. His rhythm falters just enough to tell you he’s close.
And when he finally comes, spilling into you with a curse against your mouth, it’s with his forehead pressed to yours, his breath ragged, and your name a ruin on his tongue.
You’re still trembling when he finally lets go of your wrists. Fingers loosening slow, like even that parting costs him something, and collapses beside you, chest rising hard and uneven with each breath.
The air between you crackles with leftover heat, the kind that doesn’t burn out easily. Your skin still hums. Your thighs ache. Your pulse is nowhere near steady.
Neither of you speaks.
Not yet.
The silence stretches, thick, electric, until he turns his head, hair damp, eyes half-lidded and flushed with something that still hasn’t cooled.
“Still think you were winning?” he murmurs, voice hoarse and smug and so fucking Jack it makes your stomach flip.
You grin without turning, dazed, breathless. “Pretty sure we both lost that one.”
He huffs, somewhere between a scoff and a laugh, and then reaches for you without hesitation. Not tentative, not casual. Possessive. Certain. Like your body is the only place he’s supposed to be now.
He pulls you in, arms around your waist, mouth at your shoulder, breath still ragged, and doesn’t let go.
And you know he won’t.
July 5th — 7:32 AM
The house is still. Not quiet—just still. The kind of heaviness that settles after a storm. A plastic fork is stuck in the grass just outside the open screen door. A cooler sits half-drained by the back steps, lid propped with an empty beer can. You can still smell smoke from the fireworks. You can still feel last night in your legs.
Your dad’s passed out cold in the living room, snoring loud enough to rattle the walls. Half a cigar sits in the ashtray by his chair, burned down to a limp curve of ash. His paper plate of ribs is crusted over on the coffee table beside him. There’s a spot of barbecue sauce dried on his temple.
You didn’t even bother covering him with a blanket.
Jack snuck back in sometime after midnight.
You don’t know the exact time, just that you were lying awake in that too-small twin bed in your childhood room, heart racing, sweat sticking to the inside of your knees, when the doorknob clicked and the door creaked open an inch at a time. You didn’t turn on the light. Didn’t speak. Just lifted the sheet without looking at him, and he climbed in like he’d been aching for it all night.
Now it’s morning, and he’s still here.
Bare chest against your back, hand splayed low on your stomach, the steady drag of his breath along the curve of your neck like he's trying to memorize what it feels like to wake up beside you. You haven't moved. Haven't blinked. You’re afraid if you do, he’ll vanish.
But eventually he stirs. His grip on your waist tightens, then eases. His hand pulls back.
“Don’t,” you whisper. Your voice is hoarse, raw from sleep and want. “Just a few more minutes.”
Jack exhales, quiet and pained. He shifts onto his back, staring at the ceiling. His prosthetic leg is still lying on the floor beside the bed, just where he left it.
“I gotta go soon,” he says, almost apologetically.
You roll over to face him. The light’s filtering in soft through the curtains, and it cuts across his jaw, his collarbone, the slope of his shoulder. There’s a pink mark blooming just beneath his throat, your doing. So is the bite on his rib. You think, stupidly, that you should’ve left more.
"You could stay," you murmur, fingers brushing the edge of the sheet between you.
Jack looks at you. Really looks at you. And for a second, he wants to. You can see it. The war behind his eyes. Then he blinks. Swallows. Shakes his head. “Your dad’s still here. It’s already pushing it.”
“He’s not gonna wake up. He had like six Miller Lites and half a cigar.”
That earns a huff of a laugh from him, barely, but his expression doesn’t soften. He sits up slowly, the sheet slipping down his back. He scrubs a hand through his hair, the other braced on the edge of the mattress like it’s helping him hold the line. His dog tags are still tangled in yesterday’s shirt draped over the chair, and for a moment, he just stares at them. Like he doesn’t quite recognize the version of himself that left them there.
You stay curled in the bed, watching him.
He reaches down, clips the prosthetic into place with practiced ease, and exhales once, sharply, like it hurts a little more this morning than usual.
“I’ve got a shift tonight,” he says, not looking at you. “Need time to shower. Change. Pretend I’m not…”
He doesn’t finish. Doesn’t have to.
“Still feeling it?” you ask.
He nods, just once. “Yeah. All of it.”
You sit up too, dragging the sheet with you. “Then stay.”
“Don’t start with that—”
“I’m not starting anything, Jack.” Your voice is soft but pointed. “You came back.”
His head drops for a second. A quiet breath, measured. Then he turns to face you fully, barefoot, bruised, somewhere between still half-dressed and half-out-the-door.
You watch each other like it’s a question neither of you has the guts to ask out loud.
“It wasn’t just the Fourth,” you say. “And you know it.”
He nods again, slower this time. “I know.”
You reach for his hand without thinking, fingers brushing over the back of it. “So stop acting like it’s some mistake we need to fold up and hide.”
Jack looks down at where you’re touching him. Doesn’t pull away. Just stares, thumb twitching slightly like he’s considering lacing it through yours.
“I think about you more than I should,” he says finally, voice quiet and steady. “And not just like that. I mean—Jesus—I read that op-ed you published last month and had to put my phone down halfway through. You’re so damn smart, it pisses me off sometimes.”
You smile, small and crooked. “It’s mutual, you know.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You’re pissed off by how smart you are?”
You nudge his knee with yours. “You know what I mean.”
Jack laughs under his breath, and it’s that same low sound from the night before, the one you felt between your legs before you heard it in your ear.
Then his expression shifts again, softer. Tired. Real.
“I don’t want to do this halfway,” he says. “Not with you. And I can’t be the guy driving back and forth between Pittsburgh and D.C., sneaking into your bedroom like I’m nineteen and still bulletproof.”
You swallow. “Then be the guy who texts. The guy who tries. Who doesn’t disappear every time something real happens.”
He swallows. “I’ll text when I get in.”
“Don’t say that if you won’t.”
You don’t kiss. Don’t cling. Don’t ask him for anything more than what he’s already given.
He leans down anyway, presses his mouth to your temple, then your cheek, then lingers for one hot second just above your lips before pulling away.
“Tell your dad I’m heading out,” he says, voice rough again. “And that I owe him a new folding chair.”
“What’d you do to it?”
“Nothing. He just doesn’t need to know I was never in it.”
You watch him walk out. Slow. Heavy. Steady.
The door clicks behind him like a sigh.
And for once, you don’t feel left behind.
10:38 PM
Southbound, pulled off just before Route 70 splits east
The roads are dead quiet, the kind of heavy summer silence that hangs thick over the hills. Cicadas drone in the trees. Your engine ticks in the stillness. You’ve pulled into a tiny gas station lot, closed for the night, fluorescent lights flickering overhead, just to breathe for a second before the long haul.
You haven’t hit play on your music yet. Haven’t even touched the coffee in your cupholder. Just silence and the glow of your dashboard. Just the weight of him still pressed into the inside of your thighs.
You told your dad you’d leave before midnight. You hugged him at the door, watched him try not to say too much about your too-short visit, and promised you’d come back Labor Day if your schedule allowed.
He didn’t say a word about Jack.
You don’t think he knows. You don’t think he’d believe it if he did.
You open your phone one last time before turning it to Do Not Disturb. There's a text from Jack. It came in hours ago.
JACK ABBOT :
Just hit Allegheny. Back to the land of gunshots and alleyway nonsense. Let me know when you’re home—or don’t. I’ll go ahead and assume you’re ignoring me in a way that’s honestly kind of flattering.
You smirk. Tap the message. Type out something. Delete it. Start again. Then, without overthinking, you scroll back in your camera roll. Past the brunch selfies and screenshots of policy memos. Past the Fourth of July photos.
You land on the one he’s never seen.
Low lighting. Bare shoulders. Lacy straps and flushed skin. Not pornographic, but dangerous. The kind of picture you took in your D.C. apartment on a night you were thinking about him.
You attach it. No caption yet.
Then you hesitate.
Your thumb hovers above the keyboard. You glance around the lot again, still empty. Still quiet. Your headlights cast two long beams onto the stretch of two-lane ahead, and you know the moment you hit the interstate, it’s just you, a playlist, and every memory of his hand on your skin.
So you type, slow.
Don’t crash your car. But maybe think twice next time before sneaking out before breakfast.
A beat. Then one more text.
Turning on DND. Be good, Pittsburgh.
You hit send. Turn your phone face-down in the passenger seat. Pull onto the highway, headlights carving into the black ahead.
Jack’s phone will light up in a hospital hallway, maybe mid-shift, maybe mid-chart note. And you’ll be halfway to Maryland with nothing but open road and last night’s ache.
note : in the same universe as just passing through
summary : You weren’t supposed to be at the bar. He wasn’t supposed to notice. But then the bass hit, your dress stuck, and Jack Abbot—forty-something, dog-tagged, black zip-up and ruin in his eyes—started watching you like you were the emergency. One look turns into a dance, a kiss, a cab ride, and a night tangled in heat and restraint. You make him work for it. He’s used to control. But tonight, you’ve got the upper hand—and Jack? Jack’s not sure if he wants to fight it or beg for more.
word count : 5,413
content/warnings : explicit language, intense sexual tension, one extremely hot dance floor encounter, graphic descriptions of oral sex and penetrative sex (couch setting), dominance/submission power play (light), delayed gratification, consent emphasized, Jack Abbot being deeply feral, mutual teasing, grinding, age gap (reader late 20s/Jack late 40s), dirty dancing, emotionally charged eye contact, and one (1) couch that will never recover.
a/n : You need to listen to “She Wants to Move” by N.E.R.D first. I’m serious. It’s hot, throbbing, unapologetic tension—the kind that takes its time before it lets you break. And, it will let the fic come to life.
It starts with bass. Thick, hot, slithering through the air like smoke.
The kind of bass that doesn’t ask permission. It grabs you by the hips and pulls you under. The kind of beat that doesn’t just live in your ears—it makes a home in your bloodstream.
The bar’s packed wall-to-wall with bodies. Dim lighting spills gold and crimson across bare collarbones, button-downs, and sweat-slicked hair. There’s condensation sliding down every glass, heat rising off every inch of the dancefloor, and the scent in the air is some dangerous cocktail of perfume, cologne, and late-night decisions waiting to happen.
You’re not supposed to be here.
Not because you’re too good for it—though that’s what you said earlier, in the Uber, arms crossed, jaw set, swearing you were gonna stay thirty minutes max. But because this isn’t your usual Friday. You’ve had the week from hell—coworkers breathing down your neck, your manager “circling back” on every email like a threat, and your ex having the audacity to like your story with the outfit he once said made you look “too much.” Your friends said you needed to blow off some steam.
But you didn’t come here to be watched.
You came to move.
You’re in a backless dress that makes no promises and keeps none. Black, tight, cinched just right. The hem kisses the tops of your thighs when you walk, and clings higher when you dance. Lashes curled to hell, nails done in a color you picked just because it made you feel expensive. You’re not trying to impress anyone—but God, you look like sin.
You’re three drinks in. Gin and lime, no tonic. Lips slick, eyes glossed with a buzz that feels better than clarity. Your best friend is already halfway to hooking up with a guy she said looked like a 'knock-off Timothée Chalamet,’ and you’ve been fending off some finance bro with gelled hair and a chin sharper than his personality.
You keep brushing him off. But he won’t take the hint. He’s standing behind you now, one hand hovering just close enough to make your skin crawl. Not touching. But too close. Like he thinks he owns the space you’re in.
And that’s when he sees you.
Across the bar, tucked near the exit like he’s been trying to leave for twenty minutes but hasn’t moved an inch, there’s a man watching you.
Not watching you like the others are.
Watching like he knows something.
He’s older—late forties, maybe, early fifties if the light hits his jaw right—but it doesn’t age him. It makes him dangerous. A little wrecked, a little unshaven, in a way that says he’s not here for games. Broad shoulders beneath a black zip-up, dog tags under his collar that flash when he turns. His hair’s short, face a little sharp, there’s a tiredness around his eyes that doesn’t make him look weak—it makes him look lived in. Like he’s been through it and came out the other side still standing.
There’s a drink in his hand he hasn’t touched in ten minutes.
And he’s looking at you like you’ve been looking for a way out.
Not out of the bar.
Out of him—the guy still trying to press his chest to your back. The one talking too close. The one whose hand you moved for the third time.
And Jack?
Jack sees everything.
He sees the flash in your eyes that says you’re about to lose your patience. The way your spine straightens. The quick flick of your wrist when you knock the straw against the side of your glass. He sees the way you dance for yourself—not anyone else—and he sees how your mouth curls when the beat drops, like it’s the only thing tonight that actually touched you right.
He doesn’t smile.
He doesn’t wave.
But he straightens. Watches the way your gaze lifts—like you can feel his attention even from across the bar. And when your eyes finally meet his?
You feel it in your chest like a drop. Like gravity shifting.
You tilt your head. Curious.
He raises one brow. Just barely. An invitation.
And that’s when it hits you:
You want to be seen.
The man behind you leans in again, murmuring something in your ear, too loud and too close. You don’t even listen. You’re already turning, sliding past him with a practiced smile that means nothing.
You walk toward the bar. Your heels bite into the floor with every step, but you don’t flinch. You don’t swerve. Don’t smile too soon. Don’t hurry. You walk like you know what you’re doing. Like you’ve already decided how this ends.
Jack watches you the whole way, one hand still curled around his empty glass, the other flat on the bar like he needs to anchor himself to keep from leaning into you too fast. Because there’s something about the way you move—undeniably hot, yes, but it’s more than that. It’s unbothered. It’s deliberate. It’s yours.
There’s a gap at the bar between him and the next guy down, and you step into it like it’s been there waiting for you.
You don’t look at him right away. You flag the bartender first, ask for another gin and lime with your voice a little hoarse from the music, and only when she nods and turns away do you glance sideways.
He’s still watching.
You raise a brow. “You gonna keep staring or say something?”
Jack’s mouth twitches like he wasn’t expecting you to throw the first punch.
“I was trying to decide if you wanted to be interrupted.”
“You decided yes?”
“I decided the guy behind you wasn’t getting the job done.”
You huff a laugh—sharp and surprised. “What gave it away?”
“The way your shoulder tensed when he leaned in. That, and you haven’t smiled much in his direction all night.”
“You’ve been watching me all night?”
He shrugs like it’s no big deal, but there’s heat behind his eyes. “Not all night. Just since you started dancing like the beat owed you something.”
Your drink arrives. You wrap your fingers around the glass, wet with condensation, and raise it to your lips.
“You always this smooth?” you ask, chin tipped toward him now, that spark in your eyes daring him to keep going.
Jack leans in—just slightly, just enough to let the scent of him hit: clean soap, bourbon, faint antiseptic. Something warm and late-night and not meant to be shared.
“Only when it matters,” he says.
You arch a brow, smile tugging at your mouth like a secret. “And this matters?”
His eyes drop to your mouth. “Yeah. Think it does.”
You look at him closer now. The stubble at his jaw. The faint scar above his eyebrow. His body language says he’s not on the clock. Not unless it’s for you.
“Rough day at work?” you ask, voice lower now.
Jack nods. “Twelve hours. Four codes. One too young to call it.”
You blink. Not because you’re startled—but because it tells you something.
“You work in a hospital?”
“Emergency department.”
“You a nurse?”
He quirks a brow. “Would that be a problem?”
You shake your head, smiling. “Not even a little.”
He leans in just enough to make your pulse skip. “I’m an attending.”
You raise your glass, lips twitching. “Of course you are.”
He lets the silence stretch. You both sip. The bass is still throbbing, the beat is dirty, sweaty. You let your body move to it, just slightly, hips shifting, lips parted, half-aware of the way his gaze lingers.
“Do you dance?”
“Depends who’s asking.”
You don’t answer with words. You slide one hand lightly across the bar—your knuckles brushing his—and lean in close enough that he can hear you over.
“I’m asking.”
He studies you like a problem he’s already half-solved. Then finishes what’s left in his glass, sets it down with a clink, and says—
“You gonna let me touch you, or are we just flirting for sport?”
Your smile sharpens.
“Try me.”
You don’t ask if he’s coming.
You don’t look back.
You just start walking like you’ve got the devil on a leash and a drink to finish.
You’re halfway to the floor when it happens.
The music dies. A weird second of static. People looking up, confused. And then—
Shake it up
Shake it up, girl
Shake it—
The opening hits like a slap.
And you smile.
God, this song. You haven’t heard it in years, but it drops into your bloodstream like it belongs there. It’s not a cute track. It’s filthy. Brazen. Throbbing in all the right places. The kind of beat that doesn’t ask you to dance—it drags you into the center and makes you beg for more. Everything thumps. The floor vibrates like a live wire. The crowd shifts to make space for you—not because they’re being polite, but because they feel it. That something’s happening.
You’re not the drunkest girl here.
You’re not the loudest, or the flashiest.
But you’re moving like you know the beat personally. Like it owes you money. Like it’s trying to make you forget someone and failing spectacularly.
She makes me think of lightning in skies
(Her name) she’s sexy!
How else is God supposed to write
The beat licks your skin like oil on asphalt.
You don’t dance for anyone. Not usually.
But tonight?
Tonight you dance like the floor owes you rent. Hips slow and sharp. Legs steady, knowing full well the hem of your dress is flirting with godlessness. Your arms move lazy, loose, intentional—one above your head, the other trailing a line across your own stomach, like you want to touch you too.
You know he’s behind you before he touches you.
He stands behind you. Close. Just shy of touching. And then, slowly—carefully—his hand finds your hip. It’s not sleazy. It’s not rushed. It’s intentional. He holds you like he’s getting a read on your pulse. Like he wants to know where to put the pressure.
You tip your head back, letting it rest against his shoulder.
“Jack,” he says, voice low and wrecked in your ear. “Before you ask.”
You smile. A sharp curve of lip and teeth. “You always this polite when you’re groping strangers?”
He huffs a laugh against your cheek. “If I was groping you, you’d know.”
“Oh? And what’s this, then?” You grind against him once, slow, letting your dress ride up a little.
“Me,” he says, dry as hell, “restraining myself.”
You laugh—actually laugh—and his grip tightens slightly, like the sound caught him off guard. You feel the front of him line up with the back of you. Not gross. Not aggressive. Just deliberate.
“You always dance like this?” he asks.
“Only when I like the song.”
Move, she wants to move
But you’re hogging her, you’re guarding her
She wants to move
His hands twitch. Your ass brushes the front of his jeans, and it’s not subtle. He leans in behind you, mouth near your cheek, voice a low rasp against your skin. “You gonna tell me your name, or am I supposed to keep calling you trouble?”
You don’t answer right away. Just keep moving, slow and taunting, grinding back against him until you feel his breath catch.
Then—calm, smooth—you turn your head over your shoulder, lips brushing his jaw as you say it:
“Astrid.”
Jack stills.
Then, voice low and certain: “No, it’s not.”
You glance back at him, one brow raised. “Excuse me?”
He looks amused. “No offense, but that’s a girl who studied abroad, wears linen, says ‘divine’ unironically.”
You raise an eyebrow. “And what am I?”
Jack smirks, eyes flicking down your body like he already knows the punchline. “You’re the girl who walked onto the dance floor like she was dragging hell behind her. I don’t know your name yet, but it’s not Astrid.”
You laugh—low, dangerous, curling in your throat.
Then, slow and deliberate, you turn to face him. Your body brushes against his as you do—chest to chest now, sweat-slick skin catching under the low lights. Your fingers trail up the front of his shirt, just enough to remind him who’s been leading.
And you tell him.
Your real name.
No smirk. No shield. Just heat and honesty, dropped between you like a match.
Jack says nothing. Not at first. He just stares at you like you’ve cracked something open in him—and now he can’t look away.
Then:
“There she is.”
You swallow. Your mouth is suddenly dry. “Was she hiding?”
“No,” he says. “Just waiting for the music to be right.”
Mister! Look at your girl, she loves it
I can see it in her eyes
She hopes this lasts forever
You feel something break. Something good. Something electric.
“Atta girl,” Jack says under his breath.
And you burn. The way he looks at you? Like you’re a fucking sermon in stilettos? It’s worse.
It’s better.
The kiss lands like a blackout.
It doesn’t ask. Doesn’t flirt. It takes.
You feel it in the backs of your knees. In your fingertips. In the hard thump of your heart against his chest. Jack kisses like a man who doesn’t beg for shit—but knows how to ask with his mouth. And when you break—flushed, panting, lip-gloss ruined—you don’t step back.
You grip his zip-up.
Because you want to see what he does next.
He’s breathing heavy. Not winded, just—changed. Like something in him just got rewritten and he’s trying to pretend it didn’t shake him.
Your lips are still hovering near his. You don’t pull away. Neither does he.
He stares.
Eyes sharp. Searching.
Then—voice low, steady—he says:
“Now I’m really fucked.”
You laugh.
Jack grins like he hates that he said it—but not enough to take it back.
(Move, she wants to move)
But you’re hogging her, you’re guarding her
“I should go,” you murmur, voice unsteady.
“Yeah?” he says, like he doesn’t believe you for a second.
You don’t move. “I don’t do this,” you add, quieter.
Jack hums. “What’s this?”
“This—floor. Bar. Random men.”
“Good,” he says. “I’m not random.”
You blink. “Aren’t you?”
He tilts his head. “Are you?”
You look at him for a long beat. The song’s still pounding around you, hips still brushing, heat still everywhere. But there’s something sharp in his eyes now. Something that wasn’t there before.
“I don’t make sense, do I?” you ask, not sure why you’re even saying it.
Jack studies you like he’s unwrapping something he shouldn’t touch but can’t stop himself from pulling apart. “No,” he says. “But I’m not here for sense.”
You let that sit. Then, tilting your chin up, you say:
“So what are you here for?”
Jack doesn’t blink. He steps in closer. So close his mouth grazes your cheek when he says it:
“You.”
Somebody get us some water in here
’Cause it’s hot!
Your breath stutters.
He presses his hand flat against your lower back. Doesn’t pull you in. Just holds you there. Anchors you.
His jaw flexes. He looks like he’s trying very, very hard to behave.
“I shouldn’t be doing this,” he murmurs.
You tilt your head. “Doing what?”
Jack leans in—nose to yours, mouth ghosting your cheek.
“Letting you get in my head.”
You laugh again. But this time it’s softer. More dangerous. He mutters something that sounds like a curse and presses his forehead to yours. You close your eyes.
For a second, it feels like the music vanishes. Like the floor disappears. Like you’re somewhere else—somewhere quieter, somewhere worse.
You open your eyes and he’s already looking at you. Like he never stopped. You don’t speak. Neither does he. You just stand there. Breathing the same air. Holding the same pulse.
And then—you move first. You grab his hand.
You don’t look back.
And Jack?
He follows.
Again.
You don’t say a word the entire ride to his apartment.
You sit in the back of the cab like you own it, legs crossed, one arm draped over the seat like you’re posing for a noir film. Your hair’s a mess. Your lipstick’s ruined. And you look like you planned it that way.
Jack doesn’t ask questions. He just stares out the opposite window like he’s trying to breathe through a four-alarm fire.
But his knee’s bouncing.
His jaw’s tight.
And when your heel nudges the inside of his ankle, just light enough to be casual, just sharp enough to be intentional—his entire thigh jerks like he’s been shocked.
You don’t look at him when you say it:
“You gonna survive the ride?”
He exhales through his nose. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
You smile. “Too late.”
The cab stops. You slide out first without waiting, and he throws a couple bills at the driver before catching up, hands shoved in his pockets like he’s trying to hide just how badly they’re shaking.
You wait by the front door of the building like you live there.
“Top floor,” he mutters, unlocking it.
“Of course it is.”
He raises an eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
You shrug. “You seem like the type who’d want to be above it all. Elevators. Silence. No neighbors to hear you beg.”
His mouth twitches. “You think I beg?”
You lean in, brushing past him just enough to graze his chest as you step into the elevator. “I think you’ve never had to.”
He follows like gravity. Like hunger.
The elevator ride is silent, but not still.
You feel it in the tension of his shoulders, the way his hands flex at his sides like he doesn’t know whether to grab you or kneel. You feel it in the breath he lets out when the doors open, and the way his palm flattens against your lower back as he guides you down the hallway—not possessive, not protective—anchored.
He unlocks the door and steps aside, letting you enter first.
You walk in slow.
Deliberate.
Like you’re casing the joint.
“You bring a lot of women back here?” you ask, voice light, almost careless—like the question doesn’t already carry weight.
Jack drops his keys into the bowl by the door with a clatter, the sound sharp against the hush of the apartment. “No.”
You tilt your head, one brow arching. “Why not?”
He meets your eyes then—direct, unreadable, like he’s deciding how much of the truth to give you. “Most don’t make it past the bar.”
You laugh, low and smoky, lips curled around it like the edge of a cigarette. “So I’m special.”
He doesn’t flinch. Just watches you. "You’re dangerous."
“I get that a lot,” you murmur, half to yourself, like it’s a warning and a dare all in one.
You drift deeper into the living room, slow and unhurried, fingers trailing along the scarred edge of the coffee table like you’re reading it in braille. There’s no hesitation in your steps—just the kind of quiet certainty that comes from already having imagined this place in some half-formed dream. And now you’re here, seeing if the real thing matches the version you built in your head.
It does, mostly.
The couch is worn but clean, cushions slouched like they’ve weathered more than one exhausted shift. There’s a stack of JAMA journals on the end table, dog-eared and coffee-stained, buried halfway under a trauma manual and what looks like a folded VA benefits packet. An old Army rucksack slouches near the door. One of the kitchen chairs holds a crumpled black scrub top, sleeves still rolled. On the mantle: a coin from a combat medic unit, polished with habit. No pictures, no sentimental clutter—just usefulness, memory, and muscle memory dressed as routine.
It smells like soap and black coffee. Like someone who’s trying. Like someone who didn’t expect company but hasn’t minded the silence until now.
Jack doesn’t follow. Doesn’t interrupt. Just watches you like he’s trying to memorize the way you move—like every motion might be a trick wire.
You lower yourself onto the arm of the couch, smooth and casual, one leg crossing over the other with practiced grace. Your heel dangles in the air, catching light as you tilt your head, waiting.
Testing.
“Take your shirt off.”
He blinks, like the words short-circuited something in him. “Excuse me?”
You lean back, spine arching just slightly, mouth curved like sin. “What, shy all of a sudden?”
Jack breathes through his nose—controlled, clipped. “No.”
But he stays exactly where he is. Doesn’t lift a finger.
So you stand. Slow. Deliberate. The sound of your heels against the floor barely audible over the tension winding between you.
You cross the space with the grace of a fuse burning down. Stop just in front of him. Your fingers reach for the hem of his shirt—brush against the warm skin beneath.
Then pause.
You glance up, smile ghosting your lips.
“You want me to say please?”
His voice is low. Rough. All gravel and gasoline.
“Wouldn’t kill you."
You smile. “No. But it might ruin the fun.”
You trail your fingers just under the fabric, brushing the bare skin of his stomach. His abs tighten.
Then you back away.
And he follows.
God, he follows.
You circle the couch, slow and predatory, every step measured. Jack shadows you without hesitation, his gait looser, rougher—controlled chaos barely held in check. You feel it behind you, the tension, the heat, the way the air stretches thin and electric between your bodies. Like a wire dipped in oil, ready to catch flame.
Then—his hand closes around your wrist.
Not rough. Not gentle. Just decisive. A touch that says enough without raising its voice.
“Stop teasing.”
“I’m not teasing,” you murmur, voice slick with heat and intent. “I’m building tension.”
Jack pulls you flush against him, the heat of his body undeniable. His breath ghosts your jaw before his lips do, and when he speaks, it’s a growl under his breath.
“You planning to snap it?”
You smirk, tilting your head just enough to brush your cheek against his. “Eventually.”
He kisses you—hard, sudden, like he’s trying to reclaim ground he never owned. It’s messy. Hungry. All teeth and tongue and something older than want. His hands slide up your sides, slow at first, then firmer, more sure—fingertips skimming under the edge of your bra just enough to make you gasp into his mouth.
But then you push him off.
Just a few inches. Just enough to break the kiss.
To remind him—you’re still calling the shots.
“Not yet.”
He blinks. Dazed. Breathless.
“Jesus,” he mutters.
You reach up, slow and certain, fingers threading through the sweat-damp strands at his hairline. You brush it back from his forehead like it’s nothing—like it’s everything—and watch the way his breath hitches, how his eyes stay locked on yours even when they flicker like a flame in wind.
“You’re used to being the one who calls the shots, huh?”
Jack doesn’t answer right away. Just stares at you—like he’s not sure whether to pull you under or fall at your feet. Like he wants to ruin you and worship you in the same breath.
“I’m used to getting what I want,” he says finally, voice low and raw.
You don’t blink.
You lean in. “And what do you want right now?”
He swallows hard. “You.”
You hum. “Say please.”
Jack closes his eyes. Jaw clenched.
You wait.
And wait.
Then—
“Please.”
You grin.
“There he is.”
You push him onto the couch and straddle him, grinding down slow. He groans, head tipping back, hands clutching the fabric of the cushion like he’s going to tear it in half.
“Can I touch you?” he pants.
“Not yet.”
He curses under his breath.
You lean down and whisper, “But soon.”
You kiss him again—messy now, deep and open-mouthed, your teeth catching on his lower lip. He groans into it, hands flexing at his sides like it’s taking everything he has not to touch you.
You slide down his body slow, lips dragging over his neck, collarbone, chest. You unbutton his shirt halfway just to make room, push the fabric aside. He’s warm under your mouth. Tense.
When you sink to your knees, his breath catches.
“Fuck,” he mutters, already wrecked.
You glance up, smirk tugging at your lips. “Breathe, Jack.”
But he can’t—not really. Not when you’re undoing his belt, not when your fingers slip inside the waistband of his jeans. He lifts his hips without being asked, eyes locked on you like you’re something holy and untrustworthy all at once.
And when you free him—thick, flushed, already leaking—his jaw drops open, like the sound he makes gets lost somewhere in his chest.
You drag your tongue up the underside of him once. Light. Teasing.
He shudders.
You hum like you’re tasting something expensive. “Is this something that you want?”
He nods, but it’s not enough.
You look up. “Use your words.”
His voice is hoarse. “Yes. Please.”
So you give it to him.
You take him in slow, the kind of slow that ruins men. Hollow cheeks, wet lips, just enough pressure to make him twitch.
You don’t break eye contact when you take him in your mouth.
Not once.
Jack’s head tips back with a groan, low and guttural, like he’s trying to stop himself from unraveling. One hand curls into the couch cushion behind him, the other hovers mid-air, clenching and unclenching like he doesn’t know where to put it.
He’s trying so hard not to touch you.
Trying to be good.
And you love that.
“Jesus,” he rasps, the word punched out of him. “Fuck, you—”
You pull off suddenly, lips wet, breath steady, and just smile.
“Still think I’m dangerous?” you ask sweetly.
“Worse,” he mutters. “You’re fucking lethal.”
You run your thumb along his slick length. His whole body tenses like you’ve rewired his nervous system. Your lips are swollen, chin slick, breath steady only because you’ve trained it to be. Jack’s a fucking mess—his head tipped back, chest rising like he’s trying not to lose control of every muscle group at once. His shirt’s halfway open, clinging to sweat-damp skin.
Good.
You lick your lips and sit back on your heels, slow. Measured. In control. Until your voice cuts through the air like a match to gasoline:
“All right, Doc.”
He looks down at you—lips parted, chest heaving, pupils blown wide. Dazed. Wrecked. Like he can barely focus through the aftershocks.
You tilt your head. Smile like a loaded gun.
“You earned it.”
He doesn’t move. Just stares. Breath shallow. Jaw clenched. And then it hits him—what you mean. Something flickers behind his eyes. That clean, military stillness, the ER control—it burns off like vapor. What’s left is heat. Dark. Focused. Dangerous.
He moves like a lit fuse—controlled, lethal, immediate.
“You sure?” he asks, voice low, rasped, already rising like the question doesn’t matter.
You nod once, slow. Deliberate.
“Don’t go easy.”
He doesn’t.
Jack grabs you with both hands—one under your thighs, the other cradling the back of your neck—and lifts you off the ground like it’s nothing. He drops you onto the couch with a roughness that makes your breath catch, not cruel, but deliberate. Like he’s finally been unshackled.
“You tease me like that,” he says, peeling your dress down with sharp, practiced motions, “and think I’m gonna be gentle?”
You’re already gasping when he drags your underwear down and parts your legs. His thumb presses against your inner thigh like a hold order. His eyes—fuck—they’re so locked in it’s like he’s triaging you.
“Jesus,” he mutters when he gets a full look at you. “Dripping.”
You tilt your hips forward, inviting. “Guess you made an impression.”
Jack growls.
Actually growls.
He drops to his knees between your thighs, grabbing your ass and pulling you forward like he’s anchoring you. You barely manage to exhale before his mouth is on you—hot, devastating, tongue working you open like he’s angry about it.
You gasp, loud, your hand shooting out to grip the armrest. “Jack—fuck—Jack—”
He doesn’t stop.
He devours. Moans into it like you taste better than anything he’s had in years, and every flick of his tongue feels designed. Precision-trained. Weaponized. You grind against his face, and he lets you, lets you lose the last of your power because he wants it.
When he pulls away, your thighs are shaking. His mouth is wet. And his voice is wrecked:
“Still feel like running the show?”
You stare down at him, breathless—lips parted, chest rising fast. “No.”
Jack moves without a word, the shift in him absolute. He pulls the condom from his back pocket, movements sharp, assured. The foil tears with a sound that feels like a warning.
You’re still catching your breath when he grabs your waist and flips you, quick and certain—like instinct. The cushions press against your chest as your knees sink into the couch, legs spread, back arched. There’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide—just the give of the cushions beneath you and the way he holds you there, open. Offered. Ready.
His hands grip your hips, anchoring.
He leans in, breath hot against your shoulder.
“This okay?”
“Yes,” you gasp, already shaking.
He squeezes, hard enough to ground you. “Say it like you mean it.”
“Yes, Jack, please—”
He slides in with a brutal, delicious thrust that knocks the breath clean out of you.
“Holy—fuck—”
Jack doesn’t ease in. He’s slow for maybe one, maybe two strokes, just long enough to feel you clench around him—and then he lets go.
He grabs your hips and he slams into you again and again, groaning low in his throat like he’s been holding this in for years.
“You feel what you did to me?” he pants, one hand sliding up your back, gripping your shoulder as he fucks you like he’s chasing something.
You moan into the cushions. “Yes—yes—fuck, Jack—”
“Losing it in my own damn apartment, couldn’t even breathe—and you just smiled. You think I wasn’t gonna make you pay for that?”
He hits deeper. Harder.
Your back arches, your nails digging into the upholstery, every nerve ending lit up like a switchboard.
He leans over you, one hand sliding under to toy with your clit, the other braced at your jaw, tilting your face toward him.
“Come for me,” he growls into your ear. “Let me have it.”
You fall apart with a gasp so loud it rips straight through you. You convulse around him, hips bucking, whole body shaking as the orgasm slams into you with no warning, no mercy.
Jack fucks you through it—grunting, holding you tight—and then he’s gone too, groaning into your shoulder, hips stuttering as he spills into the condom, voice low and ragged like gravel dragged across pavement.
When he finally stills, he stays there—pressed against you, catching his breath, one hand still fisted in your hair, the other braced on the back of the couch.
Neither of you moves for a long moment.
And then, low, lazy:
“You always give control up that easy?” he mutters, voice rough—still wrecked from it.
You laugh, breath catching on the inhale.
“That wasn’t easy.”
Jack kisses your shoulder, mouth warm, open. “No?”
You shift back against him, ass brushing his thigh, grin tugging at the corners of your lips.
“That was me returning the favor.”
He laughs—low, broken, completely unrepentant.
“Shit,” he mutters, voice all gravel and smoke.
“I’m screwed now, huh?” you breathe.
Jack drags you into his lap like gravity’s got a grudge. Like the space between you was never meant to exist. The couch creaks under the shift, one cushion dipping low beneath his weight, the other barely holding you up—like even the furniture knows how close this is to collapse.
His hand slides around your waist, anchoring you there, and he leans in—breath warm at your temple, mouth brushing skin like it’s a promise.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he murmurs, low and wrecked. “You have no idea.”
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