if someone had told you a year ago that you’d be standing on the balcony of a parisian hotel overlooking the eiffel tower in jack abbot’s arms, you’d have laughed in their face. but here you are, wrapped in your attending turned boyfriend’s embrace as you watch the eiffel tower glisten in the distance.
jack’s lips find your neck and you smile, relaxing in his comforting hold, “happy one year, baby.”
“you know, six months of that year were spent sneaking around.” you point out matter-of-factly, which makes jack chuckle against your skin, the warm sound vibrating against your shoulder.
“seems like i have a lot of showing you off in public to make up for it,” he responds, hands following the curve of your hips in the dress you’re wearing. “and in a dress like this? you make it easy.”
“you flatter me.” you say just as he kisses you, the taste of the cigarette he smoked earlier and champagne the two of you have been drinking on his tongue.
“come on,” he takes your hand and guides you back into the expensive hotel room. “we’re gonna be late for our reservation.”
jack playfully taps your ass as the two of you leave the room, giggling like a bunch of teenagers.
ʚᯓ ᴀʙʙᴏᴛ'ꜱ ꜱᴏɴ x ʀᴏʙʙʏ'ꜱ ᴅᴀᴜɢʜᴇʀ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ who absolutely can't stand each other, but are forced into close proximity because their fathers are best friends. — WC; 1.8k
tw; adoption mention (reader is adopted by robby), alcohol mention
cred; @cannedibal on tiktok
pt. i
Benjamin was an asshole to say the least, and an absolute fucking douchebag to say the most.
If your father didn't have a practically codependent relationship with his dad, Dr. Abbot, you would not be here right now, sitting on their couch while your dads cracked open the third beer of the night.
Ben was sitting beside you, manspreading like his life depended on it, and playing some random first-person shooter game.
You scoffed and curled closer into yourself on your corner of the couch and fumbled with your phone in your hoodie pocket to try and occupy yourself.
"Hey, kid, what's wrong?"
Your head perked up at the voice, your father, of course. His footsteps were practically silent compared to Dr. Abbot's whose gait was slightly off and would clink with his prosthetic.
"Nothing, Dad, just.. tired," you sighed, tucking your phone into your lap.
Your father cocked a brow and stared at you over those ridiculous glasses he always wore. "You're lying," he commented without hesitation. The man always found your tells and could see right through you.
You looked between him and Ben briefly before fixing him with a look, your silent signal for "I want to go home, I don't like him".
Your dad nodded in understanding before ruffling your hair and patting your shoulder, his own silent signal for "Hold out a little longer and try to get along", before walking back to the dining room where Jack was giving him a curious look.
Ben finally died in his game then and looked over at you with a furrow in his brow and an upturn in his upper look that conveyed something like annoyance. "You made me lose with that freaky silent talk thing you do," he complained.
You raised a brow. "Then you must suck if silent talk made you lose your game," you retorted with a scoff before grabbing your phone from your lap to return to mindless entertainment.
Ben stared for a moment longer at your uninterested expression before mumbling something eerily similar to "piece of work" under his breath before returning to his game.
A few minutes of silence passed until that familiar gait caught your attention and you looked up to see Jack coming behind Ben's spot. The idiot was too immersed in his game to realize his father was behind him and he jumped when Jack's hands smacked right against his shoulders, making him lose instantly.
"Bro! You're actually so lame, Dad!" Ben groaned as he turned to face his father.
The two were so identical, it made you wonder what his mom looked like because her genes put in absolutely no work. Ben was every bit his father except his hair was a mousy brown shade while Jack had long since been salt-and-peppered and Ben had significantly more freckles from time in the sun– no one could fault Jack for that though, then man ran the night shift and therefore was a night owl.
"Tell our guests bye and go up to shower. I swear you haven't had one in two weeks," Jack replied, his dry voice holding a hint of teasing.
Ben's cheeks pinkened and he stumbled over his words before placing his controller down and looking over at you for a moment. "Bye," he muttered.
You nodded in acknowledgement before unfurling from your crumpled spot on the couch to leave. "Bye, Mr. Jack, see you later," you spoke politely before rounding the edge of the couch to find your own father in the foyer, pulling his shoes back on.
"Bye, kiddo!" Jack called back before looking back to his son and smacking him across the back of his head.
You stifled a laugh as you slipped your shoes back on and followed your father out of the Abbot's house and to his truck.
The night air was cool against your cheeks and you shivered lightly, more than eager to enter the warmth of the old pickup.
"So, Benji's having his birthday party next week. You should go," your dad spoke once the two of you were settled in the truck.
You quirked a brow. "Dad. No. No way–" you scoffed, trying to figure out if he was actually being serious.
"Oh, c'mon, kid. It won't be that bad. It'll be hot, they have a pool, plenty of Jack's barbecue," he began to list, trying to convince you.
"Dad, no– why would I want to go to his birthday?" You argued.
You had gone to Ben's birthday every year since you could remember because Jack and your dad were convinced the two of you would be best friends because they were. Every birthday party ended with the two of you fighting, though.
On his tenth birthday he pushed you into the pool and you pulled him in with you, leading to the two of you almost drowning by trying to fight each other to the surface.
On his fourteenth birthday, you slammed his face into his cake after he threw a water balloon on your new lace dress you had gotten from a box of your birth mother's things.
And of course you never forgot on his seventh birthday when he found out you were adopted and made fun of you with all his friends. You rode home crying that night and didn't see Jack or Ben for almost three months.
Your father sigh from the driver's seat caught your attention again and you looked back at him.
"I know you don't like him, kid.. but give this party a chance," he requested, looking over at you. "For your old man?"
You huffed as he pulled that card. Of course he would.
You laid in your bed that night, contemplating it. It was his eighteenth birthday and the two of you were graduating this year. If you went, this would be the last of his birthdays you'd ever have to go to and if he humiliated you, at least you'd barely see him around and could live down the shame at a college out of state where no one went to.
You rolled over to stare out the slightly ajar window before sighing. You would go. If only for your dad's sake.
The party was lively, and the scent of Jack's cooking wafted through the back yard that could barely contain the sheer amount of people invited.
Of course the extended Abbot family was there, but also so was the entire football team it seemed. You brushed past people, attempting to stay close to your dad so you didn't risk the chance of running into Ben.
"Hey! There's my bonus kid!" Jack grinned as you and your dad found him. The two shared a brief hug before Jack hugged you as well– always one to be affectionate to the ones he cares about.
"Look at this, all grown up," he sighed as he pulled back to grasp your shoulders. "Don't let any of these boys here ogle you," he added in a mock authority tone before patting your shoulder and going to his conversation with your father about kids growing up so fast or something along those lines.
You hovered, but looked around awkwardly, trying to find familiar faces that weren't people who asked you for the answers during class.
As you were preoccupied with searching the crowd, Ben came up to his dad and began asking questions about food.
You turned at the sound of his voice and saw him in just a pair of swim trunks, torso glistening like he'd just come out of the pool. Despite yourself, your gaze lingered, eyeing the slight chub on his bones from bulking and trailing the thousands of freckles that littered his skin. You were about to look away when his head turned and he met your gaze.
Fuck.
He smirked, because of course the idiot smirked, and returned to his conversation like he didn't just catch you sizing him up like he was a porterhouse.
You felt your cheeks get hot and you looked away to try and take your mind off that interaction because why did Benajmin John Abbot make you flustered? This was your mortal enemy! The bane of your existence that called you a piece of work!
But God, he was a really sexy enemy who grew into his body really well.
You shook the thought from your head before deciding maybe a dip in the pool would do you some good.
You headed inside and walked upstairs to the bathroom so you could set your clothes somewhere they'd stay dry and safe.
While you were tucking your clothes away in a safe spot in the cabinet with your purse and shoes, you heard a knock on the door.
Assuming it was a stranger, you cleared your throat and called out, "Occupied!"
There was a small chuckle on the other side. "It's me. Are you decent?"
Ben. Because of course.
Your brows furrowed and you felt your pulse leap into your throat. "Still occupied!" You yelled again.
"Dude, just let me in, I wanna talk," he replied. The words were followed by a small thud that sounded like his forehead hitting the door.
You sighed and closed the cabinet door before opening the door to reveal Benjamin standing there with a shit-eating grin, wet curls sticking to his forehead and a towel thrown around his thick neck.
"Wow, nice rack," he muttered, staring down at your bikini top, leading you to shut the door in his face. "Hey I was joking!" He called from behind the wood.
You contemplated shutting yourself in the bathroom for the rest of the party for a moment before slowly relenting and opening the door.
"Thank you," he hummed once the door opened again. "Besides, I only think it's fair from how you were looking at me earlier," he added in a teasing tone.
You sputtered for a moment, trying to come up with a valid excuse for practically drooling at the sight of him.
"Hey," he began defensively, holding his arms up. "It's a compliment from Miss Hates Me," he continued with another grin, this one softer.
Your cheeks burned again and your grip on the doorknob tightened. "Do you want me to slam this door in your face again?" You spoke, trying to keep your voice steady.
"No, sorry–" Ben quickly replied, rubbing the nape of his neck.
You rolled your eyes before looking at him, expecting him to say something– fess up the real reason he was here, for one.
Ben just stared unknowingly, brow quirked. "There– you're doing that freaky silent talk thing again!" He pointed out, making you groan.
"Why are you here?" You asked bluntly this time.
Ben's face morphed into one of realization before he grinned again. "Because you like me."
this is literally younggf!reader and jack abbot after he picks you up at the end of your work day, only a few hours before the beginning of his night shift, so you two can do your routines together.
doing your post-work, his pre-work shower together (it takes longer than any other shower because he’s still dealing with “morning” wood and you’ve been salivating since the car ride when he showed up with sleep-messy hair and plaid pajama pants) brushing your teeth in the mirror besides each other. taking off your makeup and doing your skincare, forcing him to stand still as you apply it to him too, even as he grumbles about his face feeling sticky. putting on sleepwear while he lounges in his boxers because he doesn’t have to get dressed for at least another 45 minutes. him putting his old man reading glasses on as he lays beside you in bed, playing solitaire on his phone with only his pointer finger, all while you eat whatever he picked up for you on the way home and watch a tv show he swears is stupid but lowkey is so invested in that when he readies to leave, he says, “tell me what i missed in the morning”
summary: One glitchy tablet, one HR email, and suddenly you’re married to your attending, Jack Abbot. HR thinks it was intentional and has already started merging your records. Claim it was a mistake, and your residency could be delayed. With only three months left until you're an attending, Jack agrees to play along. Pretending to be married might save your career—but can your heart survive the side effects?
tags: accidental marriage, slow burn romance, HR involvement, nosy coworkers, reader is a PGY-4 resident, jack is not a widow in this fic, possible medical/legal inaccuracies, mutual pining, angst, 18+ smut, fluff
word count: 7.6k
a/n: thank you for waiting so patiently!! i hope you enjoy! and as always, since this is an ongoing process, your ideas and thoughts for future scenes are more than welcome! big kisses to everyone who has sent in ideas already<33
i'm not keeping a tag list for this series!
Diagnosis: Married | Masterlist
The Pitt | Masterlist
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The drive from Pittsburgh to Cleveland takes just over two hours. Two hours trapped in a car with Jack in awkward silence. The radio had murmured softly in the background, but the tension between you was almost palpable, thick enough to cut.
Neither of you talked. Neither of you hummed along when a good song came on. You both just stayed silent—your body angled toward the passenger window, where you were still able to catch glimpses of Jack's fingers tightening periodically around the steering wheel.
The only words he managed to squeeze out during the entire ride were when you bent back to grab your bag from the backseat.
"Don't."
You'd frozen mid-motion.
"Sit up straight—you're gonna hurt yourself." His eyes had flickered to yours in the rearview mirror briefly, and you'd been so flustered that you hadn't even argued that your ribs barely hurt anymore. And when he'd stopped at the next red light and reached back for it himself, you'd only muttered a soft "thanks".
That marked the extent of your exchanges—practical concerns that felt so distant they barely registered.
But you're fine now—mostly. Enough to have moved back to your own room after Robby dropped this on you. Enough that you’ve decided it’s time to set Jack free. After this conference wraps up, you plan to present him with the divorce papers sitting neatly on your desk, just waiting for his signature.
One pen stroke and then he'd be free. Free to stop pretending. Free from this cage you've trapped him in.
The parking lot is already bustling with people when you pull in. Jack is out of the car before you can get your seatbelt off, popping open the trunk and grabbing both of your bags with ease.
"I can carry—" you start to say.
"I've got it," he cuts in, already walking toward the entrance.
You press your lips together, then follow him.
The conference is held at a hotel, the kind with huge glass doors, marble floors and chandeliers swinging above. Just another reminder of how the administration pours money into superficial perks rather than addressing the hospitals' actual needs.
Jack jerks his head toward a cosy seating area near the entrance, where plush couches surround coffee tables stacked with books. "Sit."
You don’t get the chance to protest or even offer to take the bags before he strides off to reception, both bags shifted comfortably into one hand. You can’t help but admire the flex of his forearm before shaking yourself back to reality.
With a quiet sigh, you sink into one of the cushions. You'd expected this weekend to hurt, but seeing just how annoyed he is that he has to be here with you hurts worse than you thought. Flicking through one of the coffee table books, you try to distract yourself while Olivia’s words echo in your mind: You’re reading this all wrong. I promise, just tell him how you feel.
Promises feel meaningless when faced with cold, hard facts.
"Let's go." Jack stops in front of you, watchful as you rise. You try to hide the slight wince when you do, but judging by the way his brows furrow, he notices. His hand reaches out, but he draws it back immediately.
He trails behind you to the elevators, and you step in with a few other people. He pushes the button for your floor, and then the silence continues. Out of the corner of your eye, you catch sight of his tensed shoulders and the rigidity in his jaw.
It's the longest elevator ride of your life.
Jack sets off the second the doors open, leading you to a door where he swipes the key card hard. He steps inside, placing it in the power slot and the light flickers on.
You linger hesitantly by the door, confused as to why he hasn’t handed you your bag or the key card. "Is this mine or yours?" you ask.
Jack sighs, his back turned to you. "It's...ours."
"Oh." You're glad he isn't looking at you, or he would have seen your face fall. Yet another way you've made this weekend hell for him.
Robby had said to just show up to the reception and tell them your names—that the hospital had taken care of it—but something must have gone wrong. You know better than anyone how their systems can't be trusted.
Jack exhales sharply, dropping your bags onto the desk before turning to face you. "We're still married in the system, so they must've auto-booked us together," he explains, his voice tight.
"Oh." That’s all you manage to say again as you step fully into the room, closing the door behind you and taking in the surroundings: a desk, a closet, a bathroom, and a single bed. Great.
"I tried changing it," he says quickly, "but they're fully booked."
You nod, trying not to show him just how much that hurts to hear. Of course, he tried to change it. Of course, he doesn’t want to share a room with you.
Two more days and he's free.
Your gaze drifts helplessly back to the bed.
"I can sleep on the floor," he offers, clearing his throat.
"What?"
He shrugs stiffly.
"You don’t have to sleep on the floor." You frown. Were another few nights really that horrible that he'd prefer sleeping there? You bite your lip, stepping into the bathroom pretending to inspect it, but mostly to not see his face as you say, "It's fine. What's two more nights?"
Jack's silent for a moment, and you almost don't hear his "okay" over the sound of your heart cracking.
The first day at the conference passes by faster than Jack expects. A good thing, even if it does feel slightly bittersweet. Time alone with you is all he's wanted for months, but now that he has it, he doesn't know what to do with it.
Not when you've made it clear this past week that you want nothing to do with him. You've moved back to your own bed, and the hospital had forced you right back into sharing again—just like it had forced you into this whole thing in the first place.
Jack knows the end is near, and he's trying to give you space. But he can't help being pulled in by you—watching as you listen carefully to demonstrations, his hands hovering near you to keep the crowd from jostling your ribs.
Normally, he’s not a fan of this part of the conferences: the chaos, the noise, the sales reps tripping over each other to pitch their latest gadgets.
Today, he leans into it. He lets himself get trapped in twenty-minute demonstrations he doesn't care about. He asks unnecessary questions, picks up brochures he knows he won’t read, and lingers at displays his hospital would never consider—anything to keep his mind occupied and avoid fixating on you. Your sweet perfume still wraps around him, your accidental brushes against him still make his skin flush, and his heart still races whenever you glance his way.
And despite this distance between you, you're still looking out for him. You still notice how he subtly shifts to put more weight on his good leg, and even when he'd told you he was fine, intending to soldier on, it had only taken a stern glare from you for him to relent.
The foolish part of his heart can't help but hope that it means something more—that the way you look at him means more than it probably does. He's probably just seeing the reflection of his own hurt in your eyes because he knows you've been searching for a way out—bringing up getting a divorce, looking at apartments and distancing yourself again.
The way you'd reacted when he told you that you had to share a bed again only solidified it. So, even if it's the last thing he wants to do, he does his best to keep his distance like you want him to.
By dinner, though, the distance is harder to maintain when walking into the stupid hotel restaurant feels dangerously close to a date. The lighting is low and warm, reflections dancing off polished glasses as the waiter leads you to a four-person table.
He's trying not to stare at you or the lipstick you'd put on before leaving, but he's failing. His gaze keeps drifting to the soft curve of your cupid's bow and the way you nibble on your lower lip. When he forces himself to look away, it's only to trace the marks you left on your glass.
You both attempt awkward small talk about the conference, which feels like the safest topic, and his heart lifts a little when you laugh at his reminder of the sales rep who actually fell over in his eagerness to speak with you.
You twirl the stem of your glass, and he traces condensation around the rim of his glass when silence falls over the table again. Now and then, your eyes meet before darting away again.
It hurts that this is what it's come to. Jack still remembers the first time you went to dinner, back when this whole thing had just begun, and how gorgeous you had looked that night. The way you had smiled when he'd brought your flowers, how you had teased him all night—how much fun the two of you had had.
This couldn't be farther from that.
Just as he’s about to say something—anything—to reach out to you again, a shadow falls over the table.
"Excuse me, sir? Ma’am?" The waiter stands there looking at you both apologetically. "I'm sorry to ask, but would you mind sharing your table? We're fully booked, and I was told you know each other—"
Jack is prepared to say no, doesn't want people he supposedly knows to witness this, or to ruin his attempt at salvaging it, but before he can speak, a bright and jarring voice cuts in.
"Jack!"
His stomach drops as he recognises the voice, and he has to stop himself from grimacing. "Dr. Warren," he responds with a forced smile.
"Oh, Jack won’t mind," she chimes in cheerfully to the waiter before he can protest. Then her tone turns sugary sweet as she looks at him again. "Right?"
She's set him up perfectly, making it impossible to refuse her without causing a scene. He glances over at you, noticing how you're staring down at your plate, and with a resigned shake of his head, he replies, "Of course not."
Warren breezes past the waiter and pulls out the chair next to Jack. "Sit down, Turner."
Jack hadn’t even noticed the man until now. He’s tall with dark hair, young, and looking vaguely uncomfortable as he flashes Jack an apologetic smile before taking a seat next to you.
"Sorry to intrude on your dinner. I'm Jeremy," Turner says. Jack watches as you look up to greet him and sees both of your faces shift from confusion to recognition. "Wait—"
"Jeremy?"
"Is that you, Sleepy?" His face breaks into a stupid grin. Jack hates him instantly—mostly for the nickname but also for the way he manages to make you smile.
"Oh my god, don't call me that!" you groan, covering your face briefly.
Warren leans back into her chair, watching the exchange with curious eyes. Meanwhile, Jack feels a wave of nausea wash over him.
Turner leans in, bumping his shoulder against yours, and Jack has to grip his glass tighter to prevent himself from commenting on it. Why is he sitting that close? Why are you letting him?
"Wow, you look exactly the same! How long has it been—five, six years?"
"Something like that," you nod, then huff softly. "But I think my eye bags have definitely worsened since then."
"Ah," Turner chuckles. "Still living up to your nickname then, I see."
You glare at him, and he only smiles wider. And Jack—
He wants this man dead. Not literally—or well, not mostly. But when was the last time you'd laughed like that with him? When was the last time you looked at him like that? He'd thought Warren was going to be the worst part of this dinner, but Turner is quickly taking first place.
"So, how have you been—" Warren starts, turning her body toward Jack, attempting to start a conversation between just the two of them.
But Jack doesn't care. He cuts her off, "You two know each other?" He tries to sound casual as he looks at you, but he can feel his jaw tense up.
Warren frowns as Jack speaks over her, but all he sees is Turner, glowing at you.
"Yeah, we met in med school."
"Oh, how fun!" Warren chimes in. She turns to Jack again. "Jeremy just started at Presby—he's our newest attending."
Jack still isn't looking at her, only seeing the way you smile warmly at Turner as you congratulate him.
"Did you manage to keep that attending offer at PTMC?" Warren asks you with a pointed smile, and Jack notices your brow furrow slightly before you answer.
"I did."
"She's doing amazing," Jack offers, finally looking at Warren. "Still the best-performing doctor we have."
"Oh wow!" Turner says, and Jack can see you flush, tucking a hair behind your ear.
You deftly steer the conversation into general hospital topics, easily falling back into a rhythm with Turner. You share stories from med school and let inside jokes slip, leaving Jack to simmer quietly.
And while that's going on, Warren keeps shifting her chair closer to him. Her knee brushes against his, her hands keep squeezing his arm as she tries to sequester him into a separate conversation. He's pushed his chair as far away as he can to try and avoid her touch.
"I never thought I'd see you at one of these things again," she says lightly, taking a bite of her salad.
"No," he replies, taking a sip of his wine.
Warren's silent for a second, watching him. She's definitely clocked the weirdness between you. "You're more than welcome to come to Presby anytime you want," she says, then adds, "I’d love to show you around." The implication is clear as daylight, and Jack is stunned by her audacity.
Even if she feels the weirdness, the fact that she feels it appropriate to come onto him in front of you—his wife—is astonishing. He notices your shoulders tense slightly, but he convinces himself he’s imagining it because you’re still laughing with Turner.
"Oh, I've already been there."
Warren just shrugs, spearing another piece of salad with her fork, smiling at him with a knowing look. "Things might have changed."
Evidently satisfied with that, she turns to Turner and you. "So, how close were you two back in med school?"
Jack stills, his attention honing in on you and the way your eyes widen slightly.
"Uh—"
"We dated," Turner says.
Jack's vision blurs and the noise of the restaurant dulls as blood rushes in his ears.
"Briefly," you add immediately, glancing over at Jack before dropping your gaze again. "For like two weeks."
"Still broke my heart," Turner says dramatically.
You roll your eyes. "You dated Tiffany literally less than a week after."
Turner shrugs with a grin, and Jack can't decide which is worse—knowing he once dated you, that he didn’t value you enough to keep you, or that he so easily replaced you.
You laugh, and it doesn't look like you care that much about it, but Jack can't help the ugly feeling that curls in his stomach.
"You still out there breaking hearts?" Turner asks.
"She's my wife." Jack doesn't hesitate, wanting to lay his claim even if he doesn't have the right to.
Turner's expression shifts to one of surprise, followed by a wide smile. "Oh wow. Congrats!"
He sounds genuine, which somehow only makes Jack hate him even more.
"You must be real special if Sleepy decided to settle down."
You offer a tight smile, taking a long sip of your drink as Jack follows suit. Unable to stop himself, he asks, "So, what's up with the nickname?"
Turner bursts into laughter, while you groan and point a finger at him, "Don't."
"She fell asleep in a lecture once," he says, clearly enjoying the moment.
Warren laughs loudly and mutters with a smile, "That's not very professional."
Your expression tightens, but Turner either didn't hear or just chose to ignore it, as he continues, "Our professor actually stopped class to call her out."
"I was exhausted," you defend yourself.
"You also used to fall asleep during study sessions."
"It's not my fault that you guys insisted on studying until like three in the morning," you retort.
"Good thing that's over then," Jack comments.
You look over at him, surprised. "...Yeah," you say softly.
For the first time all night, it feels like it's just the two of you again.
Until Warren smiles cloyingly at you. "A good doctor never stops studying."
"Of course," you smile, letting your gaze drop down to your plate again.
Later, after awkward goodbyes and forced smiles, you and Jack retreat back to your hotel room. There's a sharp bitterness settling in your mouth, your stomach churning after having to watch Warren flirt—blatantly, in your eyes—with Jack, and him not doing anything about it.
He could at least have some decency to wait until you're not there. You're not even going to comment on her and how disrespectful she was. All you can focus on is the anger that simmers under your skin as you brush your teeth. The rush of frustration drowns out everything else as you wash your face, your breath uneven as you change into your pyjamas.
The only thing that had gotten you through that dinner was seeing Jeremy again—he'd been the perfect distraction, keeping your attention on him with tales from med school. But you'd still noticed how Warren kept touching Jack and how pointed her comments were when she did speak to you.
When you step out of the bathroom again, after taking a few deep breaths, you find Jack sitting on the edge of the bed in sweats and a t-shirt, glasses low on his nose as he scrolls through his phone.
You look away before it can stir something in your chest. "I'm done," you tell him as you slip under the covers, turning your back on him.
By the time he comes back, you've dimmed the lights except for the lamp on his side. You listen as he removes his prosthetic, the soft sound of cream squishing as he gently massages his leg. Part of you wants to help him, but you hesitate, unsure if he would welcome it.
You stay still as he slides under the covers and turns off the lamp. You wonder what he's thinking of—if he's relieved the first day is over or if he wishes he were here with Lily instead.
A minute passes, then another, only the sounds of your breathing filling the room. Out in the hallway, you can hear muted footsteps, quiet laughter and then—
A loud sound tears through the wall. A moan, to be more specific. Long, dramatic and almost definitely fake.
Your eyes widen as another sound permeates the wall, somehow even louder the second time. It continues in a flurry of noises.
"Oh my god," you whisper.
Jack lets out a short laugh through his nose. A smile tugs at your lips at that sound. You haven't heard him laugh in forever when it was just the two of you. Without thinking, you ask, "Do you think he knows?"
Another moan echoes, and Jack snorts. "No."
You laugh quietly into your pillow. "Poor man."
Jack huffs another soft laugh. "Poor woman, more like."
You glance at him, turning around without really meaning to. "What?"
He shifts, too, his body turning toward you. "If she feels the need to fake it like that," he nods toward the wall, "then she clearly hasn't been with men who know how to make a woman feel good."
"Oh, and you do?" Your voice is light, teasing him like these past weeks haven't happened. You freeze the second you register it.
Jack stills next to you.
Heat floods your face immediately. "Oh my god, forget I said that." You turn around quickly, pulling the blanket up to your chin as if it can cool the flush that's travelling upwards. It sounded like you were challenging him, like you were asking him to—
You squeeze your eyes shut.
The mattress shifts slightly behind you as Jack exhales softly. "You know," he says after a moment, "I'd like to think I'd figure it out."
"You do not have to answer that," you squeak. "I shouldn't have—I'm sorry."
He chuckles quietly, and after a moment of silence, he replies, "Goodnight, Trouble."
He doesn't like you crossed a line or like you've annoyed him—he sounds...gentle. You pretend not to notice the way he puts pressure on your nickname.
"...Goodnight, Jack."
Nothing from the second day really sticks in your memory. You sit through lectures, take notes, nod at the appropriate moments, but your brain keeps snagging on the same thing—over and over again.
How you woke up wrapped in Jack's arms. How warm he was, the weight of his arms, the steady rise and fall of his breathing against your neck, and—
God.
The feel of his cock against your ass. How, when you'd shifted, still half asleep, it had twitched against you.
You'd tried to ignore it all day. It wasn't on purpose—just biology—but your mind keeps trying to spin it. The cold shower you took was not enough to keep the flush away throughout the day.
Jack's acting like it didn't happen. Like he hadn't nearly jumped off the bed when he woke up and noticed it. That still hurts to think about.
The warm feeling immediately turns sour when you remember that—a feeling that only worsens when Warren and Jeremy run into you after the celebratory dinner is over and the room has been turned into a dance floor.
Warren barely even acknowledges you as she sidles up to Jack. You hate how she speaks to him, hate how you can't help noticing how she stands close to him, how she laughs when he jokes, how she keeps touching him.
Jack doesn't seem to mind, and it makes you wonder briefly if you've been wrong about Lily—that it wasn't necessarily her, it was just anyone but you.
Jeremy tries to keep a conversation going with you, but even he sees it. His eyes keep glancing from the way you glare down at your champagne flute to the way Warren is laughing. He places a gentle hand on your shoulder, offering a sympathetic smile that asks if you're okay. You nod your head and force a smile back. You don’t need him to intervene; if Jack wanted to, he would.
He doesn't.
A sudden squeal from the microphone interrupts the chatter. "If there are any couples here tonight—or anyone hoping to be in one—head to the dance floor!"
Laughter ripples through the room as soft music begins playing.
You press your lips together, staring down at your drink. You plan to stay where you are.
"Wanna go—" Warren begins, and your chest aches. You can't stay here if he dances with her.
But Jack stays still, too, only to then reach his outstretched hand into your field of vision. "May I?"
You look up at him, surprised, but then realise it's just for show. Married couples dance. He can't exactly go off with Warren when there are people here whom you know. One last time pretending can't hurt, so you place your hand in his.
He leads you out onto the crowded dance floor and places a hand at your waist. The two of you step awkwardly, but somewhere between the music and the closeness, it stops. Your body remembers the shape of him, the rhythm, the ease of existing near him.
Your arms wrap around his neck, and the two of you sway gently. For the first time during this trip, you actually look at him. The lighting catches the green flecks in his eyes, his gaze locked on yours.
Your mouth goes dry, and you nervously bite your lip, almost willing to swear that his gaze drops down to it. Heat rushes up your neck.
You lean in closer, and he mirrors your movement.
"Can I—" he begins, and for a foolish second, you think he might kiss you. Then the room erupts into loud claps as the song ends, and your eyes snap open. You take a quick step back.
"I—I'll be right back," you stammer.
Jack frowns. "You okay?"
"Yeah," you nod quickly. "Just need to...pee!" You rush off before he can say anything else.
The bathroom is too bright and too quiet, though you're thankful no one is here to watch your spiral. You grip the sink tightly, exhaling harshly.
You need to get your shit together. Remember that this doesn't mean anything. It's a performance—he doesn't want you. No matter how much you can't help but keep hoping, even after the hallway, that he does.
You stay in there longer than you should. Splash water on your wrists, fix your lipstick, and try not to feel like you're sixteen years old again—stupid and foolish when it comes to love.
When you finally head back, you're not sure what you expected, but it wasn't seeing Jack and Warren laughing together. Her hand on his bicep, her head tilted backwards. You watch as she leans in, whispering something to him before heading over to the bar.
The hurt turns into anger as humiliation washes over you. He really doesn't care about your reputation or the fact that you'll forever be known for him straying.
You stride over to him.
"There you are—" he begins with a relieved smile.
You don't let him finish, leaning in to murmur to him. "I'm gonna go."
Jack blinks at you. "Why? Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," you huff, but he seems unconvinced, searching your face for answers.
He sets his glass down. "Okay, let's go."
Your brows knit together. "No, you stay." Your gaze shifts to Warren. "It looks like you're doing just fine without me anyway."
"What—"
You step back, sending him a forced smile that hurts. "Have fun." You begin to turn around, but then remember— "Oh, just text me if you need the room."
Before he can ask anything else, before you can embarrass yourself further and before he can notice the angry tears glistening in your eyes, you turn and walk away.
Jack stands frozen for several seconds after you leave, staring at the spot you just occupied, trying—yet failing—to wrap his head around what just happened. He’d been trying to shake off Warren ever since you went to the bathroom, and just when she finally decided to head to the bar, you appeared with that piercing glare.
It looks like you're doing fine without me anyway.
Your words replay in his head.
Text me if you need the room.
Said as if you expected him not to come back, or like you expected him to—
His stomach sinks. He pushes through the crowd, ignoring Warren’s calls, impatiently tapping his fingers against his arms as he waits for the elevator. When it finally reaches your floor, he rushes out, swiping his key card haphazardly.
As the door swings open, he immediately sees you pacing, making sharp turns from the bed to the desk and back again. Your heels are thrown off to the side carelessly.
He closes the door behind him softly. "What's going on?"
You stop at the desk, your back turned to him, and he notices your shoulders rising and falling with quick breaths. "Nothing. You can go back," you dismiss him with a wave of your hand. There's an anger in your tone he’s never heard before.
"Go back?" He doesn't understand why you think he would—you're clearly upset.
"To Warren. Or whoever."
"Why on earth would I do that?"
You huff a laugh, bitter and low. "Don't play dumb."
Jack takes a cautious step closer. "Tell me what's going on."
"I told you. Nothing."
"Well, it's clearly not nothing," he says, frustration creeping into his voice. He doesn't understand why you won't look at him or why you're pushing him away like this—like you can't stand him.
"Jack—" you sigh, glancing back for barely a second. It's enough for him to spot the frustration carved deep in your features.
"Sweetheart," he says softly. You remain silent, but he feels like he’s making progress. "Why did you say that? About the room?"
Whatever hope he had quickly dissipates as you rip your earrings out and fling them onto the desk. "You know."
"No," he says. "I really don't."
You let out a sharp, disbelieving laugh, turning to face him, your eyes blazing with fury. "Oh, please." You cross your arms defiantly. "She was all over you. And you just let her."
Jack doesn't pretend not to know who you're talking about. It's clear that it's Warren. He wants to make it clear that he has no interest in her, but in his surprise, all he can manage to say is, "She knows we're married."
You scoff, rolling your eyes. "Well...you're not. Not really. Not in the way that matters." Taking a step closer, you add, "And she clearly doesn’t care anyway, but if it matters to you, you can just tell her we’re in an open relationship."
Jack stares at you. "Is that what you want?"
Your expression twists instantly. "What?"
"Is that what you want?" he repeats, slower, taking a step forward, too.
Your laugh this time sounds bitter. "Who cares what I want? If you want this, go for it," you say, gesturing vaguely toward the hallway. "Seriously. Have fun. I’ll leave."
Jack watches as you begin messily shoving things into your bag. Why is it that you keep saying things like this when you know what he feels for you? Are you just looking for a fight so you can leave?
Jack tightens his jaw. "And where exactly are you staying?"
You shrug.
"At Jeremy's?" he says, mocking the way you said it all evening. Soft and sweet and nauseating.
"Maybe...yeah," you snap, glaring at him. "He wouldn't flirt in front of the person he’s supposed to be married to."
Jack shakes his head in frustration. "What the hell is that supposed to mean? Why did you keep saying that?"
You throw a shirt down and spin toward him. "Because it's true and you know it." You step closer, and he mirrors your movement. "Just stop pretending."
You’re close enough now for him to see your hands shaking with anger.
"I know you regret this," you say, voice cracking as it rises in volume. "And it’s okay."
"What?"
"The least you can do," you continue, "is be honest about it."
"I don’t—" His pulse races, the blood rushing in his ears as he tries to catch up.
"Come on," you scoff. "You don’t have to pretend anymore."
"Pretend what?" He steps closer.
"That you didn't hate every second of this. That saying yes to me wasn’t the biggest mistake of your life."
"What are you talking about?"
"That you regret getting stuck in this marriage!"
"That's not true!"
You close your eyes briefly, looking utterly worn out. "Can we not do this? Please?"
There’s barely any space between you now. He can feel your uneven breaths, just as clearly as he can see them.
"I've got a viewing in a few days. If it looks good, then I'll be out of your hair soon." The words pummel into him, stealing his breath.
You continue like you haven't just broken his heart, "We can sign the divorce papers when we get back. It's been long enough now."
The pieces of his heart shatter into even finer shards. "What?"
You avoid his gaze. "You can finally be with the person you actually want to be with."
His brows pinch together. "Who?"
"Lily."
Jack stares at you, confused. "...Lily?"
You huff, anger bubbling back up. "Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Don't pretend you don’t know."
"I genuinely don’t know what the hell you’re talking about!"
"I've seen the way you talk about her," you tell him. "The way your face changes."
His brain feels like it’s malfunctioning. "You think I’m in love with Lily?"
"You seriously expect me to believe otherwise?"
"Yes, because that's insane."
"I’m not blind, Jack!" you snap, your voice cracking. "I love you, and you don't love me, and that's fine."
"You—" His voice comes out rough. "What?"
Your eyes widen, and you quickly look away. "...Let's just stop."
Jack's hand shoots out, grabbing hold of your wrist before you can turn away. "No." The word comes out fast. "That's not what I want."
His mind is spinning. You love him.
"Well, we can't always get what we want," you say quietly, sounding incredibly sad. You try to tug your wrist free, but he keeps his grip firm.
"Trouble—" Jack begins, running a hand through his hair, tugging at the roots. "You love me?" he asks quietly.
You love him.
"Jack," you interject.
He takes a step closer. "I don't understand why you’re still pulling away. Not when you know—“
"That’s exactly why!" you cut him off.
His laugh comes out strained. "Is it that horrible to be with me? To let me love you?"
You stare at him with wide eyes, but then you shake your head. "You don't love me."
"What?" he asks. But you knew? Didn't you?
"No, you’re upset," you say quickly. "Or you feel guilty, or—or you're trying to fix this because I said something embarrassing."
"You think this is pity? After everything?"
"I think you're a good person," you say quietly. "And I think you're trying not to hurt me."
"No."
"Jack—"
"You really think I'd do that?" he asks quietly.
You hesitate.
His laugh comes out sharp. He turns away for a moment, pressing both hands against his mouth, as if trying to hold it together. Because somehow this feels more devastating than everything else: worse than thinking you didn’t want him, worse than the apartment viewings, worse than the divorce papers.
You think he pitied you. That every moment between you had been an obligation.
"You think I stayed because I felt bad for you?" he asks.
"I...yeah," you murmur, and the words nearly take him out at the knees.
"Sweetheart," he says softly, and there’s something wrecked in the word now. "I don’t know how I fucked this up so badly."
"You think I wanted out?" he asks. "All this time?" He shakes his head hard before you can answer. "I have spent months trying not to love you."
Your breath hitches in your throat.
"I tried," he admits helplessly. "I tried so hard. And I failed."
Doubt still flickers across your face.
"Sweetheart. Please. I don't know how else to tell you."
You look down. "I just don't want you to say something you'll regret tomorrow."
"Regret?" he repeats quietly. That damn word haunts him.
You shrug helplessly, eyes glassy. "When this all settles," you say softly, "I don't want you to wake up and feel trapped again."
"Oh sweetheart," he murmurs, "I have done a lot of stupid shit that I regret, but loving you has never been one of them."
You still look doubtful.
Jack feels something hot and frantic curl in his chest. He doesn't know what to say to make you believe him, so he does the next best thing. He closes the gap between you, his hand cradling your jaw as he tilts your head back and kisses you. It isn't a soft or careful kiss like he'd imagined you'd share after he'd told you that—no, this is angry, frustration bleeding into every part of it.
You shove weakly at his chest, and he's ready to step back, but then your fingers close into a fist, tugging at his shirt and pulling him closer.
His lips press against yours again, devouring you as he crowds you into the desk. He loses himself in the feeling, barely noticing how he's lifted you onto the desk, how your legs have parted around him or how he's grinding into you.
All he can focus on is the way you breathe his name softly, the sweet sounds you make as he trails kisses down your neck, and how your fingers claw at his hair, his shoulders, his arms, urging him to come closer.
You love him.
It's an euphoric feeling—he almost feels like he's floating outside his body. The thought keeps hitting him over and over again, dizzying and intoxicating.
Jack pulls back to look you in the eye. "I love you." His thumb brushes your jaw gently and across your kiss-swollen lips. You kiss it softly, leaning your face into his touch.
"Do you understand? Not Lily. Not anyone else." He searches your eyes, desperate for you to grasp the depth of his feelings. You’re the only one who’s ever mattered. "I love you."
Your eyes start glistening again, but you nod. Relief fills his chest. "I thought you didn't—" Before he can say anything to reassure you again, you move forward, capturing his lips in another heated kiss. The force of it nearly tilts him backwards, and the way you giggle against his lips sends his heart fluttering.
Your legs pull him closer, and he finally notices how your dress has bunched up around your waist. He curses at the sight of your underwear, the sweet little bow that starkly contradicts the naughty way you're moving against him and the wetness that's slowly soaking his slacks.
"Fuck me," he groans, his fingers gripping onto your waist, helping you move. He's never been this hard before. He moves slowly, trailing his fingers down to your thighs, watching you carefully.
His chest rumbles lowly when he finally feels just how wet you are. He can't count on one—or even two—hands how much he's thought about doing this and reality is so much better.
"You really love me?" he asks quietly, still not quite able to believe it.
"Yeah," you whisper. "I always have."
He leans his forehead against yours, pieces of his heart mending with each kiss. He pushes the fabric aside, brushes his fingers softly through your wetness, circling your clit and listening as you moan sweetly for him. He swears he could cum from just this.
You're so soft. So sweet. So tight around his fingers. "You're gorgeous," he breathes, and he feels you squeeze around him. He catches on to that quickly, leaning in close so he can whisper to you. "You're doing so well, sweetheart. You're so wet. So perfect." He pulls his fingers in and out, relishing in the sounds he manages to pull from both your cunt and your mouth.
"Ja-ack," you gasp, and he can tell you're close.
"Be a good girl and cum for me," he says, pressing his other hand against your clit. The combined stimulation and his words push you over the edge, your legs shaking against him, your nails pressing hard into his arms. He doesn't mind, welcoming it and staying close until you begin pulling back.
He's never seen anyone as stunning as you. He watches as the glazed look in your eyes slowly subsides, and you come back to earth.
He still can't believe this is real. His thumb brushes softly against your jaw. "Hi, sweetheart."
"Hi," you murmur, a shy smile on your face. "That was—that was incredible."
It's like you know he'll tease you because you pull his face close, kissing him again. He could do this all the time. He hopes you'll let him.
He's so caught up in your kisses and making you feel good that he's forgotten about himself. It's only when your hands travel down his chest to his slacks and begin to palm him that he remembers.
You grin into the kiss at the groans he makes.
"Stop teasing," he begs, but doesn't move to change anything. He stands still as you find the zipper and begin pulling his slacks and boxer briefs down. He lets you take the lead, won't force you to do anything you don't want to—even if he's aching to feel your heat around him.
You pull him out, and then you stare down at his cock with a wide-eyed look. He can't help but tease you. "Don't tell me you've never seen one of these before?"
"Ha," you huff, slapping his chest. "It's just...big."
"You flatter me," he says, pride rushing through him. He's about to make another silly comment, but it evaporates the second you twist your hand.
"Fuck," he gasps when you pull him close, letting the head swipe through your wetness.
"I don't—" It takes all his strength to think clearly. "I don't have a condom."
"It's okay." You continue grinding against him.
"You sure?"
"Yes," you confirm, looking him deeply in the eye. Then you position him against your entrance and pull at his hips. He pushes forward slowly. Fuck. You're so tight. So warm.
He watches you carefully, ready to stop at the slightest hint of discomfort.
"Move, Jack," you beg him once the full length of him is inside. "Please."
Who is he to deny you? His hips snap forward, setting a steady pace. "I won't last long," he warns you.
You kiss him again, pulling him closer. Your gasps and moans are more than enough to send him over the edge, but he gathers all the strength he has. He reaches a hand down and finds your clit and waits until your eyes begin to glaze over and your legs shake again.
Only then does he let go of all restraint. His hips snap into you in a furious pace before he pulls away with a loud groan, spilling onto your cunt. He watches it drip down your thighs, his chest rising unevenly as he comes down from his high.
"That was—" he breathes out, locking eyes with you again. You nod, equally speechless. The two of you share a moment of silence before Jack springs into action, grabbing a towel to wipe you down.
He sends you away to pee and slips out of his clothes, leaving only his underwear on. His prosthetic lands next to the bed as he crawls under the covers, a wave of nervousness washing over him.
What if you regretted it? What if you didn't feel like that anyway?
You emerge from the bathroom, barely meeting his gaze, and Jack's stomach drops at the sight. His t-shirt from yesterday hangs on the chair, and he watches breathlessly as you put it on along with a fresh pair of panties. Then you settle in beside him, leaning into the crook of his neck with a smile, and he finally feels himself relax.
You don't regret it.
"I'm sorry," he says softly after a moment of breathing in your calming scent.
"For what?"
"For not telling you sooner." He exhales, tracing gentle patterns on your skin with his fingers. "I thought you knew. I thought you were pulling away because of that."
You pause to process his words, your head shaking firmly. "I'm sorry, too. I should've asked you instead of just assuming." You take his hand, intertwining your fingers. "I overheard you saying you regretted this, and that sent me spiralling. It didn't help that I thought you loved Lily."
Jack frowns. "When did I say that?"
"In the hallway. With Robby..."
He thinks back and realises, "Oh, sweetheart. That's not what I meant—I said I regretted it because I fell in love with you during it, and I couldn't stop it from happening despite knowing you didn't want me like that."
"I do—"
"I know," he interrupts gently. "I know that now." He squeezes your fingers and leans down to plant a soft kiss on your head. "And just to be clear—if you need to hear it again—I don’t love Lily. I love you."
He can feel the smile spreading across your face. "I love you, too."
He's grateful you're not looking at him because he must look silly grinning this widely. You press a kiss to his neck and then sigh contentedly.
"Guess I should've trusted Olivia," you murmur after a moment.
He chuckles, making a mental note to send her a thank-you gift for having his back without him knowing. "Robby, too."
You groan. "They're gonna be insufferable once they find out they were right."
Jack hums, his fingers dancing along your back. "We don't have to tell them right away."
"No?" You lean back slightly to look at him.
"We can keep this between us for a little bit, don't you think?" he says, his gaze dropping down your lips.
"Yeah," you breathe, your eyes darkening as your fingers gently tug at the hair at the nape of his neck to bring him close. Jack kisses you again. And again. And again.
He isn't sure how long he kisses you for, not that it really matters. All he knows is that it won't ever get better than this. He finally has his girl.
a/n: aaahhhh!! they finally confessed!!! it's been a long (and painful) journey but we're finally here <33333
summary: yours and dennis' routine on a cold december day, plus a little sneak peek into your future.
pairings: dennis whitaker x RT!reader (respiratory therapist)
cw/tags: FLUFF!!!! non-sexual intimacy and nudity, just reader and dennis being domestic and cute and in love. swearing. mentions of nausea/vomiting/generally being sick but no depictions. dennis and reader celebrate christmas because i assume that dennis' family does, but you can also envision that they celebrate more than one holiday :) reader has hair long enough to tie up in a nondescript updo, wears jeans, a sweater, and a sundress
donning and doffing is the process of putting PPE (personal protective equipment like masks and gowns) on and secure chat is a patient privacy compliant messaging system that hospital staff use to communicate :)) this was requested by an anon thank u so much for requesting!!
word count: 3.4k
dennis x RT!reader masterlist
general masterlist
The alarm goes off at five thirty-five, Dennis’ phone lighting up and buzzing on the nightstand, dragging both of you out of sleep. He reaches over before it can ring a second time, hitting the power button, shutting it off for the time being. You don’t open your eyes, but you shift yourself closer to him, smiling when his arms curl around your waist and pull you against his body. He plants a kiss on your ear, then on your cheek, eliciting a hum from you.
“Hi, lovely girl,” He murmurs, putting his head back down on the pillow, closing his eyes to take advantage of the eight minutes remaining before the alarm goes off again.
“Hi baby,” You mumble, half-coherent, relishing in how warm he is, not wanting to face the temperature of your apartment in the middle of December. It’s still completely dark out, making the prospect of getting out of bed even worse.
“You want breakfast today?” He asks, slipping his hand under your shirt, warmth pressing lightly against your stomach. You whine, wiggling in an attempt to get even closer to him.
“Yeah, I think so,” You say. “Thank you.”
“‘Course,” He says. He presses another kiss to your cheek, squeezing you tightly. The two of you lay in silence until the alarm rings again, your cat lifting his head up at the sound, letting out a tiny chirp and hopping off the bed and onto the floor.
“Fuck,” You whisper, rubbing your eyes, groaning when Dennis lets go of you and climbs out of bed, exposing you to the frigid air for half a second. He walks off into the bathroom, brushing his teeth while simultaneously turning the shower on, closing the door behind him once he’s done to make sure the whole room is warm by the time you manage to crawl out of bed.
He comes back into the bedroom with your towel slung over his shoulder, opening the closet and pulling out a pair of jeans and a sweater for you. He grabs clothes for himself, then disappears down the hallway, tossing the towel and your clothes into the dryer before continuing on into the kitchen. You open your eyes again, sigh, and hype yourself up enough to throw the blanket off.
You practically run into the bathroom once you’re up, not wanting to stay in the cold any longer than necessary. The shower is the perfect temperature, with steam curling up and over the glass door, clinging to the mirror. You smile to yourself, your stomach filling with butterflies as you think about how lucky you are, a regular occurrence in the morning as Dennis does everything he can to make your day easier.
Dennis is in the doorway a few moments after you turn the shower off, holding up the warm towel, wrapping it around your shoulders as you step out.
“Clothes in the dryer, angel,” He says, leaning over, kissing your forehead. You smile.
“Thank you,” You say, the two words a constant in the morning when you both work, no matter how many times he’s done these things for you.
“You don’t have to thank me,” He says, like always. “Breakfast’ll be ready in a few minutes.”
Your smile grows. “Thank you.”
He shakes his head, closing the door, his footsteps receding back into the kitchen. You brush your teeth, do your skincare and hair, then grab the clothes from the dryer, climbing into them. You make it into the kitchen by six-fifteen, admiring the sight of Dennis for a moment, watching the way he moves as he makes your plate and pours coffee into a mug. He slides it onto the breakfast bar just as you take a seat, flashing you a small smile.
“Thank you,” You say. He teasingly rolls his eyes, but his cheeks go pink, ruining his attempt to seem nonchalant. He notices the way you glance towards the food, early-morning nausea obvious on your face, making him frown.
“You don’t have to eat it all,” He says. “Or any of it. Only as much as you want, yeah?”
You nod, sticking your fork into a piece of fruit, taking a small bite. “Yeah, I know, thank you.”
“I’m gonna’ start charging you each time you say that,” He says, picking up his own mug of coffee, moving towards the bedroom to take his own shower. You laugh under your breath, taking another bite of food, trying to get yourself to fully wake up.
You try your best to help once Dennis is out of the shower, but you’re still a little sluggish, likely hindering more than anything as he packs a few snacks for the day, fills your water bottles, pours more coffee into travel cups, and starts the car. He scrapes the snow and ice off the windows after letting it warm up for a minute, then carries your backpacks out, setting them in the backseat.
You tug your boots and jacket on, following him out, grabbing your keys off the hook and locking the door behind you. He opens the passenger door once he sees you, letting you hop in before getting into the drivers side. Music plays softly, buzzing from the speakers of the old car, filling the space perfectly until you’re awake enough to make conversation.
“Feeling okay today?” You ask, reaching your hand over, threading your fingers through his.
“Yeah, hopefully it’s not too crazy,” He says.
You hum, smiling. “Can’t wait to don and doff for every single patient all day.”
He laughs. “Hard to enjoy the holiday season when it’s really just…flu season.”
“And RSV, covid, noro,” You add, rattling the diagnoses off, already envisioning the way the board will look when the two of you arrive.
Cough. Congestion. Shortness of breath. Nausea. Vomiting. Wheezing. Fever.
“Maybe we won’t get sick three days before Christmas this time,” He says, squeezing your hand. “I’d like to actually make it to the farm for a bit.”
You think about last holiday season, both of you sucuumbing to the same virus within five hours of each other, quickly devolving into feverish delirium. You exhale, leaning your head back, closing your eyes.
“Oh my god,” You say, laughing through the words. “We were so fucking sick.”
“I was convinced a racoon had broken into the apartment,” He says, making you laugh harder, recalling the number of times he tried to convey that concept to you, all without actually saying the word ‘racoon.’
“You never said it was a racoon!” You exclaim. “I thought you were trying to tell me there was a man in our home, but I was too fucking out of it to actually process that.”
He chuckles. “I remember saying ‘he’s here’ over and over again.”
“That’s exactly what you were saying,” You confirm. “I asked ‘who’ like…one time and then gave up, accepting our fate of being murdered by this unknown man.”
“I had accepted that the racoon was going to get us,” He says. “My face was basically the surface of Venus with how high my fever was.”
“Ugh, and we were so sweaty,” You say, grimacing a little at the memory of sticky sheets and hair sticking to your face. “Then people were trying to Facetime us, we looked disgusting, and I’m sure we were completely incoherent.”
“My mom really wanted us to go to the ER,” He agrees.
“We basically are the ER,” You counter.
“That’s what I said!” He exclaims. “Or…at least I meant to. I probably said something incomprehensible.”
“Yeah, probably,” You say, running your thumb along the back of his hand. “Let’s not do that again this year.”
“Great idea,” He says, pulling into the hospital lot and into his usual parking spot.
You spend the first few hours in the zone, running the occasional code, making eye contact while charting across the central hub, purposefully bumping shoulders as you walk past each other. You send him a secure chat just after eleven, watching him from across the department as he types on a computer.
can you spare five minutes?
DENNIS WHITAKER, MD
Yes :)
He doesn’t need to ask what you want.
You log off the computer, slipping into the locker room and grabbing a granola bar, apple slices, and crackers from your backpack, all of which Dennis packed for you this morning. You head through the double doors, into the back hallway, setting yourself up on the marble staircase while you wait for him. He rounds the corner a few minutes later, a tired smile on his face, his hands reaching for you first as he takes the seat beside you. One lands on your lower back while the other touches your forearm, his head resting against your shoulder briefly.
“Tired?” You ask, passing him a slice of apple, raising your own and tapping it against his before taking a bite.
“Very,” He says, sighing, shoving the entire piece into his mouth. You grin, cocking your head to the side, watching as his cheeks puff out for a second. He shrugs, swallowing, raising his finger up for a moment.
“Sorry,” He says. “I don’t have a lot of time.”
“Oh, okay, yeah, that’s very efficient,” You say, giving him another piece, watching him do the same thing again. You laugh, knowing that he only did it to make you smile.
The two of you eat as much as you can within five minutes, then Dennis stands up, brushing his pants off and adjusting his badge. He kisses your forehead, his hands resting on your cheeks for a second.
“I love you,” He says. “See you in there.”
“I love you,” You say. “Good luck.”
You’re dying to go home by the time three o’clock rolls around, the day consisting of never-ending respiratory and stomach viruses, just like you thought it would. Your hands are raw and sore from the number of times you’ve sanitized them, the shitty lotion at the nurses station doing nothing to fight the dryness that seems to seep down to your bones.
Dennis stops beside the desk you’re working at, setting a small container down in front of you, pulling your attention away from the screen. You glance down at the object, gasping when you see that it’s your favourite shea butter, not one that he’d be able to get from the hospital gift shop.
“Did you bring this from home?” You ask, already opening the lid and starting to slather it onto the back of your hands.
He nods. “They were cracking last night, wasn’t sure they’d make it through the day.”
“Do you have a crush on me or something?” You ask, teasing, watching as his cheeks heat up.
“I don’t know where you got that idea,” He says, but he stutters slightly, and you grin.
“Thank you,” You say, then glance back towards the computer, remembering something. “Can I grab a VBG instead of ABG for thirteen? She’s been poked like, a million times already, and the VBG won’t hurt as much.”
It takes him a second to remember exactly who’s in thirteen, considering he’s spent the last two hours doing back-to-back traumas, but then he nods.
“Oh, yeah, that’s a good idea,” He says. “Thanks.”
“Cool, I’ll do it right now,” You say, standing up, your hand finding his for a split second. “Four more hours.”
He sighs. “Four more hours.”
For once, Dennis is ready to leave before you, waiting for you to finish up your conversation with Cassie before actually walking over. He’s bundled up—his jacket zipped up to his neck, blonde curls poking out from beneath a grey beanie, thin gloves covering his hands. He’s holding the car keys, spinning them around his finger a few times.
“Hey, sorry, I’ll be like fifteen,” You say, grabbing a tablet and logging on as you talk. “McKay needs an urgent neb and whoever’s supposed to be here after me is clearly running late.”
“It’s okay,” He says, giving your arm a quick, reassuring rub. “I’ll go get the car warmed up, text me when you’re done?”
The sun is long past the horizon by the time you get back home, limbs aching from the chill outside, each of you carrying a bag of groceries. Dennis has both your backpacks slung over his shoulders, and you’re tucked into your jacket, eyelashes starting to freeze as you race towards the door to your building. You yank it open, holding it for him, quickly shuffling in behind him.
“Thanks,” He say, hitting the elevator button with his elbow. You press yourself into his side, shivering, wanting nothing more than to cuddle up beside him on the couch and watch movies until you can’t keep your eyes open anymore. The elevator doors slide open, as though they’re protesting the cold themselves, and both of you step inside, hitting the button for the fourth floor.
Neither of you speaks, you just stand side by side, shoulders brushing together. You unlock your door, finally, kicking your shoes off into the corner and setting the bag of groceries onto the counter. Your cat screams at your feet, twisting around your legs, making you grin as you bend down to pick him up.
“Hi,” You say, kissing the top of his head. Dennis comes into the room, putting the other bag on the counter, then coming to your side, stratching the cat’s chin. He shoves his face against Dennis’ hand, nuzzling into him despite how frigid both of you are. You put him back on the floor after a bit, opening one of the grocery bags and starting to pull out ingredients for dinner.
“Go shower, I’ll get dinner started,” You say, sticking your hands under the tap as he comes up behind you, sliding his arms around your waist, burying his face into the sweater you’re wearing. He says something that you can’t quite hear, his voice muffled against your clothes, but you take a wild guess. “I love you too, baby.”
He sighs, holding you for another second before letting go, trailing off into the bathroom to wash the day off. You roll your sleeves up, pulling out a cutting board and putting it onto the counter. You grab a frying pan, lining it up with the burner on the stove, turning the knob to the right temperature.
Dinner is almost finished by the time Dennis comes back out, wearing plaid pajama pants and a black crewneck, his hair wet and face slightly flushed from the hot water. He leans back against the counter farthest from where you’re working, knowing better than to try and offer any help, certain that you’ll usher him away, insisting that he works too hard already. He watches you with a fond smile on his face, admiring the way your hair has started falling out of the updo you put it in this morning, how your left sleeve has fallen back down to your wrist while the right is shoved up past your elbow, the way you’re standing entirely on one foot, the other pressed against your thigh like a flamingo.
This is his favourite part of his life.
If he only had ten minutes left to live, he’d ask if he could watch you like this, one last time.
He’s so fucking lucky.
You finish up five minutes later, and the two of you sit across from each other at the dining table, fancy wine glasses filled with juice beside both your plates.
“Thank you for cooking,” He says. You raise an eyebrow.
“Should we start charging for ‘thank you’s now, or…”
He smiles. “Let’s just call it even.”
You smile back. “Fine, if you insist.”
His eyes fall past your face, landing on the shelf behind you, his brows furrowing. “When did that plant die?”
You don’t have to look to know the one he’s referring to—the brown, limp fern that sits beside your books and a few other knicknacks.
“It’s not dead,” You counter. “It’s…dormant.”
He squints. “Dormant?”
“Obviously,” You insist. “I just need to re-pot it. I think.”
He scoffs, smiling again. “Okay, whatever you say, lovely.”
Conversation drifts between topics until you’re both finished, but neither of you move to get up. You bring a foot up onto your chair, leaning back, holding your glass of juice as you talk about the gifts you still need to buy for your nieces and nephews and when you’ll actually get around to decorating for the holidays, which somehow devolves into a heated debate about the best Christmas movie, one you’ve had many times throughout the past six years.
It’s only when you both start getting quieter that you actually stand, taking your plates into the kitchen, you starting to clean the mess from the day. Dennis stands off to the side for a moment, then opens his mouth, but you’re quick to cut him off.
“Absolutely not,” You say. “I’ve got it, you can sit down.”
He frowns, but he knows you won’t budge, so he takes a seat on the couch, picking up the remote and looking for a movie to watch.
You load the dishwasher, wash and refill your water bottles, tidy up your abandoned jackets and boots by the front door, and wipe the counters off before going down the hall and into the bedroom. You pick up the basket of dirty laundry, hauling it over to the washer, putting a load on before folding into him on the couch.
He catches you, like he has a million times, sliding his legs apart and letting you take the spot between them, your knees tucked up and cheek against his chest. He holds you, rocking back and forth gently, kissing your temple.
“Tighter?” He asks. You nod against him, shoving your face into his neck, closing your eyes as he squeezes a little more. He feels the way your breathing slows, how your grip on his sweater loosens, your muscles slowly relaxing as his hand trails up and down your back. He sits with you, not speaking again until you shift, kissing just below his ear.
“Better?”
You hum. “Thank you.”
The rest of the night goes the way it usually does—you watch a movie, switch the laundry over, take a quick shower, then get into bed. Dennis brings your water bottles with him, setting yours on your nightstand, quickly getting under the covers after switching the light off. The reflection of the street lights in the falling snow glows orange outside, the typical drone of the city muffled by the weather. You lay your head on Dennis’ chest, pulling the blanket up to your chin.
“I think we should actually take that trip to the Poconos,” You say. “Now that you’re an R2 maybe you can actually get a weekend off.”
He laughs a little. “Yeah, that would be great, angel. I’ll uh, I’ll check with Robby tomorrow, see what he says.”
“Okay,” You say, smiling. “Maybe this spring?”
He nods, kissing your hairline. “Let’s do it.”
*BONUS*
Despite how early it is, you’re up and out of bed before Dennis, flitting around the apartment as the early spring sun trickles in through the windows. You’re wearing a sundress, bags already packed and over by the door, trying to finish the final things that need to get done before your trip. Dennis stands in the bedroom, putting the last of his belongings into the suitcase, his eyes drifting over to the door before he steps towards his backpack, unzipping the front pocket. He freezes when he hears your voice from down the hall.
“Are you almost ready?” You call. “We should get on the road soon!”
He swallows. “Be there in one minute!”
The sound of the front door opening suggests the coast is clear, and he reaches into the pocket, fingers grazing over a white box. He tries to convince himself that that’s enough, but his anxiety spikes, and he pulls it out, lifting the lid up to reveal the diamond ring that he had been saving for for years. He hears your footsteps come back inside, and he slams it shut, tossing it back into the bag and zipping it up. You poke your head into the doorway half a second later, smiling.
“Good to go?” You ask. He nods, returning the smile and hoisting his bags off the bed. He stops to kiss you on his way out, lingering for a second, his heart pounding against his ribcage.
“I love you,” He says, touching his forehead to yours.
“I love you, Denny,” You say, brushing a few stray curls back. “Ready?”
He nods. “Absolutely.”
A/N - surprise! she's back :) i missed u guys :)))) i probably won't get back into the full swing of things for a little while longer but i'll be responding to all ur lovely comments and messages and DMs soon! also if you’ve left a comment to join my everything taglist within the past month ish or so i promise u will be added!! i just haven’t had time to update it. okay love u see u later bye bye!!!
summary: your relationship with jack has always been 50/50: he buys you everything, and you let him. this arrangement, as he calls it, works perfectly - until you start to worry that you may not be the only one who's doing it with. (4k)
characters: jack abbot / fem!reader, mentor!michael robinavitch, baran al-hashimi, samira mohan
contents: friends with benefits, sugar daddy!jack, jealousy, angst, hurt/comfort, so much sexual tension cw for mentions of injuries, medical procedures, medical inaccuracies, heavy mentions of smut 18+ (MDNI)
( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )
Jack Abbot rushes into the ER with a high-velocity GSW, a close call of his own, and a terribly smart mouth.
Splotches of dark crimson stain the camo of heavy-duty tactical gear as he bursts through the double doors of the ambulance bay, squeezing rhythmically at the intubation bag he holds in a bloodied hand. You rush instantly from the work station to meet him halfway without a second thought.
“I thought you were off today,” you tell him, in lieu of a greeting, as you escort him to the nearest open trauma room from the opposite side of the gurney.
“Well, my therapist said I needed a hobby, so…” he quips, with sweat dripping from his greying curls. He manages to flash you a playful look in the midst of all the chaos as you situate the unconscious policeman in the center of the room. “What about you, huh? You’re supposed to be off, too— What’s your excuse?”
“Well, I had a strange feeling that I might see a pretty man in uniform today,” you shrug, slipping on a pair of gloves. “So I decided to work a double— See if my wish would come true.”
The corner of Jack’s mouth lifts into a crooked, tight-lipped smile. “Well, if you like this, you should see me as a flight attendant—”
Robby rushes in with Dr. Al-Hashimi just behind him a second later, shattering the playful tension between the two of you with a thousand different questions. You’re left as the only resident in a sea of attendings and nurses; Dr. Al passes you the reins accordingly. “This is a learning hospital, right? Time for you to learn how to be the boss, R4.”
“Hear that, Abbot?” you joke as the older man migrates inevitably to your side, smelling of blood and sweat and the cologne he always leaves on your pillow. “I’m the boss here.”
“Well, you could try to be a little more humble about it, sweetheart,” he squints and tugs on a disposable PPE gown, which Perlah helps him tie in the back. “Let’s do some skin hooks— 4 Shiley. Sound good?”
You hiss through your teeth and drag the clear blue sleeves of your own gown over your shoulders, while Robby stands behind you to knot the garment in place. “I don’t really like the curve of a Shiley… Especially not if we’re about to rush him up to the O.R.”
“I didn’t know you were so picky.”
“Well, you should know better than anyone, Dr. Abbot,” you grin. “Cut me an ET tube, will you? 6-0?”
“Yes, ma’am…” the older man nods and holds back his giddy grin until he turns away from you.
Robby grumbles a noise of disgust in the back of his throat in the meanwhile — quickly realizing that the two of you were much easier to stomach when you were working night shifts together, and he only had to see you for half an hour in passing, at most.
“Jesus Christ— Get a room, you two.”
“Well, technically, this is a room,” Jack quips distantly as he returns to your side with the endotracheal tube in tow. You make room for him at the head of the gurney on instinct, and drape a thin blue cloth over the patient’s neck, centering the aperture over the gushing wound.
Robby moves to the opposite side of the bed and pulls the haphazardly placed intubation bag from the man’s mouth with careful hands. “One without me in it, preferably,” he argues.
“Ooh…” you lilt. “Don’t threaten me with a good time, Dr. Robby.”
“Just focus,” he scolds in a gritty tone of voice.
“You need to find the second and third tracheal rings,” Dr. Al instructs, sliding between the crowd and motioning to his neck with her gloved pinky. “You’ll be able to feel them with your fingers— just make the incision through the cricoid cartilage and be careful to avoid hitting the vocal cords, yeah?”
She flashes you a dark, doe-eyed, and distantly unamused look, seemingly immune to the playful banter surrounding her.
You nod once, scalpel in hand. “Yes, ma’am.”
You make the incision while Jack preps the tube. You work together with deft hands and a relative silence, aside from a few procedural directions. For the most part, the two of you communicate without words — you locate the man’s ruptured trachea in a sea of bright red blood while Jack slides the thin tubing to make an airway.
“I’m in,” he blurts after a few tense minutes. “Balloon up.”
The rapid beeping of his dropping SATs begins to even out almost instantly.
“I’ll sew the tracheal to the skin,” you announce within a sigh of relief. “2-0 silk, please.”
Jack passes you the round of sutures with a proud nod and a quiet smile. “Not too shabby, Doc… We make a pretty good team.”
“Or maybe I’m just really good at telling you what to do, Abbot,” you quip.
“Yeah,” he shrugs. “That, too.”
Robby and Dr. Al take their leave when the chaos dissipates, and Garcia comes down from the O.R. for a consultation. They trade the crowded trauma room for an equally crowded emergency department — slowly filling to the brim, like a pot bound to boil over. But, even still, it’s not nearly as tense as whatever you and Abbot have going on.
“Are they always like that?” the woman wonders aloud, nodding her tied-back curls towards the room behind them.
“Yep…” Robby nods with a heavy sigh, rubbing hand sanitizer between his calloused palms. “But they’re not usually dayshift, so… My philosophy is— let the night crew deal with it.”
You and Jack decide to follow Robby’s advice and find a room of your own — on the half-abandoned wing of the eighth floor, where everything smells like dust and time gone by, and the dying overhead lights only work a quarter of the time. It’s a good enough place to be alone with him, though; it gives you ample time to patch up the wound on his shoulder, and saves Jack the trouble of getting caught with the injury and being forced to fill out a mountain of paperwork accordingly.
He sits on the edge of the hospital bed with his shirt off and his broad arms crossed over his chest. The tendons in his freckled back twitch despite himself when you smooth a fresh bandage over his freshly cleaned scrape.
“Does it feel okay?” you ask him.
“Yep…” he nods once, trying and failing to get a peek of the gauze from over his shoulder. “Fine.”
Your concern doesn’t waver. Your brows lower with it, in a palpable look of worry that etches across your face. “You’d tell me if you were, like, in pain, though, right?”
Jack ponders for a moment, lips jutting faintly. “No, probably not,” he answers, too blunt for his own good.
“Well. At least you’re honest…”
You sigh and turn on the heel of your sneaker to chuck the dirtied napkins and crumpled wrappers into the bin across the room. Jack watches you go with something mischievous glimmering in his gaze.
“But I am fine, though— If you’re really all that worried about me,” he assures you with a quiet smile. “I’m a little banged up, but… I’ll survive.”
“So I can still come over tonight?” you wonder, half-shy.
Jack nods slowly and tilts his scruffy chin to keep your gaze when you walk the short distance back over to him. “Yes, sweetheart— I still plan on buying you dinner tonight,” he answers in a dry, sarcastic lilt.
Because that’s usually how it goes nowadays. You keep him company for a night, and he gets you food, pays off your grocery bill, or covers your rent — and then you go to work the next day like none of it ever happened.
It didn’t always used to be that way, though, this quid pro quo thing that the two of you had struck up over time. Jack bought things for you because he cared about you, because he didn’t want you to go hungry or homeless when he knew he had the money to help. It was all a part of his job, he figured, to help his residents out whenever he could. But, somewhere down the line, he became more than just your attending, and a whole lot less than your boyfriend. It was more like a secret, third thing that the two of you never bothered to put a label on.
You frown. “That’s not why I was asking, smartass.”
“Well, that’s the arrangement, though, right?”
“Calling it an arrangement makes it sound like I’m your— mail-order bride or something,” you scoff and cross your arms over his chest, following his form with a squinted gaze as he reaches for his discarded shirt. “You don’t have to make it sound so formal, Jack. I know this is fun for you, too.”
“Well, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t…” he quips with a faint wince as he slides the thin black t-shirt over his head, grimacing at the burn that blooms beneath the bandage as he does so.
“And no pressure or anything, obviously, but, uh…” You trail off and swallow hard, struggling to find the courage to continue as your eyes flit everywhere but at the man before you. “My student loans are about to hit for this month, and I—”
“I know,” Jack interjects with a polite nod. “I already took care of it.”
You lose your breath almost instantly, for a reason you can’t quite name.
“…Seriously?”
He scoffs like it’s obvious and rises from the bed, towering several inches over you. “Well, yeah. I told you, sweetheart— You don’t have to worry about that stuff anymore. As per the arrangement...” he croons lowly, with a playful half-smile, before bending softly at the waist to press a fleeting kiss to your lips.
You’re too busy trying to remember how to breathe to respond.
You struggle to finish the rest of your charting through the thoughts of Jack still plaguing your mind. You don’t think you’ve been so taken care of before; so seen, so held. You’re not entirely sure what to do with all of it now — these feelings that you’re harboring for your boss, of which you’re almost certain there is no room for in such an arrangement, as he so lovingly calls it.
Because he doesn’t take care of you because he loves you. He takes care of you so you’ll come over at the end of every night, and remind him what it feels like to be a little less lonely. And even still, you run hopelessly to his side anyway — half-ashamed because you don’t even care that he’s using you; half-ashamed because you like it.
“Have you seen Dr. Abbot?” Samira wonders through panted breaths, disrupting your distracted train of thought. She enters your tunnel vision from the opposite side of the desk, and all of a sudden, you’re back in the E.R. The distant droning of constant noise fills your ears when you’re shoved back to reality again. “I’ve been trying to find him for, like, ten minutes at this point.”
“Uh… No— Not recently, no,” you stammer.
Her chest deflates with an exhaled breath. “Shit…”
Your eyes narrow as they scan over her form, frazzled and sweaty, with dark curls falling out of her claw clip to frame either side of her face. “You okay? What happened?”
She sighs and leans her elbows on the desk in front of her.
“Nothing, I just… I should’ve planned this better,” she murmurs, mostly to herself. She talks with her hands as she rambles, “My patient doesn’t have any insurance. And he’s already in a mountain of medical debt as it is, so I was gonna send him home with some supplies, right? But then I lost him, and I was gonna Uber the stuff to his house, but then Dr. Abbot said he’d pay for it, and… Now I can’t find either of them, so…”
She trails off with a deep huff.
You forget that it’s your turn to respond, too hung up on the fact that Jack had offered to help her pay. It shouldn’t bother you as much as it does, but it hits you like a punch to the stomach all the same. Because you weren’t special, Jack was just kind; and you’re only realizing now that this arrangement of yours was never exactly exclusive.
“Sorry,” Samira shakes her head. “I know I’m rambling. It’s just… been a long day.”
You blink rapidly, clearing the haze of hurt from your eyes. “No, I— I totally get it. You should check upstairs. He might be with Hiro in the O.R.”
“Thanks,” she says with a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes, that disappears the second she heads back for the elevator across the room.
You return to your charting when she’s gone, but forget to do any of it. You lose yourself in the void of the stark white computer screen, instead, while your hurt and distant jealousy scratches at your chest from the inside out.
Robby watches from afar, giving you a few minutes alone, before dismissing himself from the interns and shattering your cynical stream of consciousness. “How’s the charting coming along?” he asks in lieu of a greeting as he walks to stand at your side.
“Great,” you deadpan, muffled into the hands holding up your heavy head.
He scoffs out a quiet laugh. “Not to say I told you so, but… I did kinda tell you so…”
You turn slowly, peeking at him with one glaring eye as he leans against the desk beside you with his arm crossed over his chest. “What’s that supposed to mean?” you question in a gritty monotone.
“I told you not to get involved with Abbot,” Robby shrugs. “Not until you were done with your residency— ‘cause you already repeated one year, and if you want that neuro fellowship, you can’t have Jack screwing with your head.”
“Oh, yeah?” you squint, feigning interest as you slouch back in your chair. “The same way you screwed with Heather’s? When you got her pregnant when she was your resident?”
You say it to hurt him, and you can tell that it does, though it doesn’t feel as rewarding as you thought it would.
“Yeah, actually…” Robby nods and scratches at the greying patch in his beard. There’s a hurt look swimming in his dark eyes that almost makes you cower when he peers down at you. “Look, kid. I don’t care what you and Abbot get up to in your free time. That’s not what this is. But I’ve known you since you were an MS3— and I know you’re gonna go off to do great things, because I’m the one that taught you, right?”
Your frown deepens.
He smiles wider. “I just don’t want some relationship getting in your head, that’s all.”
“Well, it’s not, so…” you trail off with a less than convincing waver in your voice.
“Really?” he hums, eyes narrowing in a challenging squint. “Have you checked in with that fellowship you wanted?”
You smack your lips against your teeth. “Not yet…”
“And why’s that?”
“When did you become my mom, exactly, Dr. Robby?” you joke and spin in your chair to face him. “‘Cause it feels a little like you’re reprimanding me here—”
“I am reprimanding you,” he tells you, only partially joking, before turning at the distant call of his name. He stands to full height again and flashes you a playfully stern look as he walks away. “Take care of it, alright? Or else I’m grounding you.”
“For how long?” you call after him.
“However long it takes to get your head out of your ass—”
You’re left reeling for the rest of the day, trapped in a merciless cycle of want and unwavering doubt.
Jack is not yet close enough, even when he’s all but smothering you in the center of his bed, pressing you into the mussed sheets below with his broad body propped on top of yours. He smells distinctly of sweat, stale cologne, and the steak dinner he took you to after your shift ended.
You wrap your arms around his freckled shoulders in a feeble attempt to pull him impossibly closer, careful to avoid the bandage still stuck on his left shoulder blade. You bury your nose in his greying curls while he sprinkles warm, wet kisses along the tendons of your neck, relishing in the salty tang of sweat staining your skin.
But even as he slots himself between your spread thighs, even as he marks his territory in the lovebites he litters on your collarbone, you can’t shake the feeling that he’d rather be somewhere else — that there’s someone else he’s thinking of, someone else he’ll call after you’ve left for home, someone else he’ll take care of when you’re gone.
The train of thought leads you inevitably back to the root of your cynicism, which you struggle to shake out of your mind once the visual has entered it.
“Did you ever find Samira?” you hear yourself ask, shattering the honeyed quiet of his lamplit bedroom.
Jack’s head is far too cloudy to hear you properly the first time.
He pulls away from you with a quiet smack and sits back on his haunches. Your hands fall to your stomach, clad only in a thin white tank top, while his rest over your bare thighs, propped on either side of his waist. Your cotton panties are the only thing keeping you hidden from him now, and his form-fitting boxers cradle a hardening length that threatens to make your mouth water.
He wears a swirled look of confusion across his scruffy face, along with his spit on his swollen, kissbitten mouth, as he asks, “Did I ever find what?”
“Samira,” you echo, brows raised to your hairline. “She was looking for you a little bit before we left— Said she needed your help paying for something.”
“Oh. Yeah,” Jack hums, pale shoulders bouncing in a lazy shrug. “Her patient needed some supplies Ubered to his house, so… I took care of it. No big deal.”
He bends down to kiss you again, but freezes with his nose pressed against the bridge of yours when he feels you tense below him. His heavy sigh fans warm across your jaw before he sits back again, features screwed in a faint grimace.
“And I’m realizing now that that’s probably not the best phrase to use, but… I was just helping out a friend— a patient, actually,” he rambles. “That’s it.”
Your eyes narrow in a playful squint.
“That’s it?” you echo.
“Trust me, sweetheart,” Jack scoffs and shifts between your thighs, lifting your hips with his wide hands cradling your ass and bending at the waist to press his mouth over the bow in the center of your underwear. “The only girl getting her student loans paid off by me, is you.”
He leaves another chaste kiss on the cotton of your panties, right over the place where you throb like a heartbeat for him. Your stomach blooms with warmth.
“Because I’m special or because you don’t have the money to afford anyone else?” you ask.
Jack squints, light eyes glimmering with mischief in the low light. “Because you’re special and because I don’t have the money to afford anyone else. How about that?”
You roll your eyes despite the soft smile hinting at the corners of your mouth. “Just get to work, Dr. Abbot,” you scold in a distant monotone.
“With pleasure,” he mumbles, right before sliding his fingers through the hem of your underwear, pulling them to the side, and kissing your glittering pussy the way he would your mouth.
The lamplit bedroom swells with panted breaths and the heavy scent of sex.
Jack slouches against the headboard, heavy-eyed and wearing a mixture of your cum and spit down to his scruffy chin. His toned chest is coated in a thin layer of hair and glittering sweat. You watch a rogue bead trail down his sternum from where you’re perched on top of him — with the sheets bunched around your hips, and your thighs straddling his waist. Your pussy still clenches with the aftershocks of your orgasm while his spent cock softens slowly inside of you.
His calloused hands trail slowly up and down the length of your torso — from your shoulder blades, down to your ribs, over the bend of your waist, and up again. His touch is softer than summer rain, warmer than the cum leaking slowly out of you now.
“Do you think you could write me a letter of recommendation?” you ask, tracing the freckles on his chest with your pointer finger. “You know, for the neuro fellowship we talked about?”
“Wow…” Jack croons drily, brows raised to his hairline. His words slur slightly together as he comes down from the remnants of his high. “No aftercare, huh? Not even a little pillow talk? Just… straight to the point?”
You flash him a playfully stern look from beneath your lashes, lips quirking in a shy smile. “‘M just asking a question…”
“Yeah, while I’m still inside you,” he scoffs a tired laugh. “You know you don’t have to sex with me to get what you want—”
You frown. “That’s not what I was—”
“—You can just ask.”
“I’m having sex with you because I like it, Jack,” you blurt, very foreignly stern with him, as your eyes harden in a glare. “And I’m asking you for a letter of rec because I respect your opinion—”
“And because you don’t trust Robby to give you a good one, I’m assuming?” he quips with an arched brow.
“Exactly,” you nod.
Jack laughs. You can feel it rumbling in his chest beneath your palms. “I’ll e-mail it to you later. How about that?”
“There’s no rush,” you assure him. “Seriously. I haven’t even applied for it yet—”
“Don’t worry about it. I already wrote it.”
He steals the breath from your lungs for the second, third, or hundredth time that day.
“You already wrote it?” you echo, brows furrowed. “When?”
“When you told me about it the first time,” he confesses, bouncing a bare shoulder in a lazy shrug. “I knew you’d need a letter of rec eventually, so... I wrote while I had some free time and just… waited for you to ask, I guess.”
Your face screws with skepticism. It burns somewhere in your chest, too.
Even with him softening inside of you, leaking out of you, you can’t help but feel slightly suspicious of his sincerity. You still can’t quite believe that he cares about you this much.
“…Really?”
“Yeah,” he laughs and squeezes gently at your sides. “Why do you look so shocked? I do care about you outside of… all this. You know that, right?”
“I didn’t…” you confess, painfully shy, and lacking the courage to meet his gaze for several long moments. You focus instead on your hands, and the shapes you trace along his chest. “Not until now…”
“Well, what do I gotta do to prove it to you, huh?” Jack asks within a huff as he rises from his slouched position against the headboard.
The mattress creaks softly as his weight shifts. His warm chest presses firmly to yours, smothering your breasts against his heartbeat, as he cradles you to his chest. His glittering eyes dart back and forth between the two of yours as he says, “I’ve already given you everything, sweetheart…”
“I don’t want everything,” you murmur with a shake of your head, unable to tear your gaze from his attentive one. “I just want you.”
summary: when an abandoned baby takes the e.r by storm, and seems to only be comforted by you, jack takes a keen interest in the maternal streak he didn't know you had. (5k)
characters: jack abbot / wife!reader, dana evans, emma nolan, michael robinavitch, whitaker and his ducklings (joy and ogilvie), baby jane doe!!!
contents: grumpy!reader, established relationship, angst, hurt/comfort, humor, not proofread cw for mentions of child abuse (r had a bad upbringing), smut 18+ ft. breeding kink!!
FIC #3 / 20 FOR 20
The smell of fresh coffee clings to the stale air of the empty break room, mixing with the stubborn scent of antiseptic that always seems to follow you and the ghost of Shen’s egg salad that he just had to pack for lunch. You sit slouched in a plastic chair at the round table, with one leg hooked over the spare one at your side, and a clipboard resting on the thigh of the other.
You hope to spend the next hour or so of your shift right here, pretending to stay busy flipping through MRI results and procedure notes until it’s time to go.
“I won’t tell anyone you’re camping out here if you promise to do the bulk of the driving to the cabin tonight,” Jack had told you when you found him in the break room, passing you the mug of steaming coffee he’d made for himself without a second thought.
The caffeine is the only thing keeping you going this far into your shift; along with the fact that you’ll be spending the rest of your Fourth of July with him in his countryside cabin — the furthest from the PTMC either of you has been since you got married.
“How about you don’t tell anyone, and you do the driving?” you propositioned, flashing the man a faux-innocent look from over the top of the rim as you brought the cup to your mouth. The fresh brew singed the tip of your tongue a bit, just enough to jerk your exhausted mind awake.
“Fine…” Jack caved with a slow huff; his first good breath all day. His following words came out slightly muffled as he leaned forward to press a fleeting kiss to your temple before walking on by you. “How much we got left on our sentence, huh? An hour? Two?”
“Sixty-four minutes, but… Who’s counting?”
“Well, that’s plenty of time for something fun to happen.” Jack turned in the doorway to flash you a knowing grin that you met with a tired scowl.
“Don’t jinx it,” you called to his retreating figure.
You’ve given enough of yourself for one night, you think; and after a rather urgent thoracotomy that nearly killed both the patient and you (though mostly in the metaphorical sense), you feel like you’re owed the small break. Now that the day shift is trickling slowly in, you’ve decided to stay hidden until somebody absolutely needs you.
You sink deeper and deeper into the plastic chair, willing yourself into invisibility, until a baby’s cry shatters the sacred quiet.
The high-pitched whine cuts through everything — your heavy exhaustion, your simmering headache, and the steady hum of the emergency department you’ve learned to tune out over the years. You drag yourself from your seat with a distant groan in the pit of your throat, ‘cause you know you won’t be able to relax until you know someone else has got it handled.
You trudge to the door and take a peek down the hallway, if only to say that you did, and find the long corridor bustling with an energy much livelier than you are. When the crowd parts, you spot Dana walking your way with something tiny swaddled in her arms — much too small to be as loud as it is now.
Her eyes light up at the sight of you.
“Dr. Abbot— Just the person I was looking for!” the older woman croons in her usual gritty monotone, with a knowing smile sitting crooked on her mouth. “We got a baby Jane Doe, ditched in the bathroom.”
Your features crumple under the weight of your exhaustion. Your head tips back to groan a long and theatrical, “No…” though your sneakers scuff the floor as you trudge her way despite yourself. “I only have one hour left on my shift— Please don’t make me do anything else.”
“Well, I also got a central line placement in Central 13,” Dana deadpans. “You know, if you’d rather not waste time takin’ care of this perfectly nice baby.”
The swaddled thing fusses when it’s shifted in her hold. Your eyes flit from its scrunched face, round and wet with tears, to the wise look in Dana’s eyes. She grins at your obvious hesitation.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
You sigh and step forward, like a martyr to the gallows. You trade the clipboard in your hand for the baby in Dana’s. She sets the thing gingerly in your hold — a warm and delicate weight between your arms, fitting just perfectly against your chest.
You had done a rotation in pediatrics before you settled on emergency medicine some years back. You know what it means to take care of a baby in the most technical sense, though none of it ever seemed to come totally naturally to you.
You move like a robot accordingly, all tense and methodical. The whining baby settles into your hold with a gentle coo anyway, like a switch suddenly flipped.
“Well, look at that,” Dana hums with an arched brow of amusement. “You’re a natural.”
“You’re evil,” you deadpan.
“So they say,” the woman quips drily, patting you on the shoulder with a warm hand. “C’mon. Show my shadow how to do a proper pedes check-up— Dr. Abbot’s not as mean as she looks, Miss Emma, I promise.”
You flash the young, fresh-faced nurse a polite smile that doesn’t quite meet your eyes before leading her towards the pediatric unit across the way. She’s made of bright smiles, braided chestnut curls, and sunshine incarnate as she scurries just behind you. She’s got a sparkling look in her dark eyes that you’re pretty sure you lost somewhere around your first week of residency.
You pass the workstation with a sort of tunnel vision zeroed in on the vibrantly painted pedes room. You nearly miss Jack standing there, leaning over the desk with his arms folded and his biceps straining against his scrub sleeves.
The silver-haired man briefs a newly arrived Robby on the morning cases and pauses at the sight of you — his whole entire life, cradling a much smaller one in her arms, with an exhausted frown on your face that you don’t bother trying to hide.
Robby traces the man’s suddenly distracted gaze over his shoulder. His brown eyes follow your form, lighting up at the sight of you the same way Jack’s do.
“Well…” the older man croons. “Would you look at that—”
“Don’t,” you cut in sharply, and don’t bother slowing your stride as you pass them.
Jack’s quiet laughter follows you across the room. His eyes do, too, as he drinks up every ounce of you and the tiny thing swaddled in your arms. He finds himself getting drunk on a craving he didn’t know he had until that very moment.
Robby’s dark eyes squint. “Why do I have a feeling that you’re mentally siphoning through a bunch of baby names right now?”
“I always liked the name Milo for a boy. And Iris for a girl— but the missus is pretty allergic to pollen, so I’m not sure she’d go for that,” Jack answers without missing a beat, as though the thought had haunted his head at least once before. He only turns to face Robby again once you’re out of view. “What do you think?”
Robby just scoffs out a laugh. “I think you’re screwed, brother.”
Baby Jane Doe is mostly stable, all things considered.
Physically, she’s perfect. She had obviously spent the bulk of her little life being properly cared for. And, if you had to guess, she spent most of the time being held — if her immediate protest at being left in the warmer had anything to say about it. Her breathy whines fill the otherwise silent room as you perform a routine evaluation with practiced hands. You pay little attention to her annoyed cries and slip into teaching mode despite your palpable fatigue.
Emma hovers just behind you, with empathy glittering in her dark doe eyes. “Gosh,” she sighs. “How sad…”
“Eh,” you hum with a lazy shrug. Your gloved fingers lift the hem of her tiny white t-shirt to check for any bruising on her soft, pale skin, or for any other markers that might indicate signs of infection. You ramble on, half-distracted, “If you think about it, this baby got pretty lucky— If it really was abandoned, I mean. Better to be left here than with a family that can’t love it properly, right?”
Emma’s eyes widen at your cynicism. She can’t shake the feeling that you’re speaking from experience as she swallows hard and nods once in response. “Right…”
The door swings open across the room. The noise of the E.D. swells for a brief moment, before muffling when it clicks shut again a second later. Robby steps in first, with Jack following close behind. The former stands on the opposite side of the warmer and keeps his suddenly softened gaze on the cooing baby before him.
Jack migrates to your side the same way he always does — never as close as he’d like to be while on the clock, but never more than a few inches away from you when he can be.
“What are we thinkin’ here, Doc?” he asks.
“Normal pulse. Normal BP,” you rattle off with an air of indifference. “She’s well-hydrated, too. No visible sign of infection, either — though I guess we can’t rule out a benign virus just yet.”
“Do you think she qualifies for Safe Haven?” Emma wonders from Robby’s side.
You shake your head, lips softly jutted. “No. Either this baby is gigantic, or it’s well past the twenty-eight-day mark for Safe Haven. Worse-case scenario at this point is obviously abandonment. She’ll likely be put in foster care after a full evaluation.”
The young girl’s face falls slightly.
You soften despite yourself.
“But,” you add, if only to make her feel a bit better. “Past experience tells me that her parents might’ve just needed a break. Maybe they— I don’t know— stepped out for a cigarette or something. God knows, I’d need one if I had to take care of an alarm clock twenty-four-seven.”
Robby scoffs a weak laugh and shakes his head. “I’ll get Lupe to make an announcement in Chairs. See if anyone’s looking for her— If you’ll excuse me,” he nods with a polite smile down at the squirming baby below before sauntering out of the room.
The baby jerks when the noise of the crowded E.R fills the room again, startled by Dana’s yelling, who seems to be telling off a rowdy patient down the way. Her wet eyes squeeze shut as her gummy mouth opens to bellow a tiny wail. You reach out to comfort the baby, if only to hear less of the thing, with a methodical palm placed against its frail chest.
It whines for a moment before softening with a contented sigh.
“Look at that… You’re good with her,” Jack mumbles, taking a step closer to peer over your shoulder — until you can smell the coffee on his breath and the musky cologne lingering on his skin. A small smile lifts the corner of his mouth as he watches you with glittering eyes. “Told ya you should’ve gone into pedes.”
You flash him an emotionless scowl. “Don’t patronize me,” you scold.
“Have you guys ever thought about having kids?” Emma wonders with a kind smile, having assumed your marital status from your matching last names and golden wedding bands. She cowers instinctively when your eyes turn to her in sync, fearful she might’ve said the wrong thing. “Or is that super rude to ask? I’m sorry—”
“No, it’s not rude at all,” Jack assures her, reaching to wrap his hands around either end of the stethoscope around his neck. It makes his freckled biceps strain against the black sleeves of his scrubs as his silver head swivels slowly to look at you. Something mischievous swims in his blue-green eyes as he lilts, “We’re just… going with the flow. Right, Dr. Abbot?”
You meet his tightlipped grin with a deadpanned look. The two of you agreed long ago that, while neither of you is totally opposed to having children, you’d also be perfectly happy living a completely childfree life.
But instead of getting into all of that with less than an hour left on your grueling shift — in front of the newest addition to the nursing team, no less — you just nod with an artificial smile.
“Right. Yeah,” you say, already inching back towards the door. The baby starts to cry again a second later, in a series of revving whines that lead to a sharp shriek. You flash an apologetic grimace over your shoulder from your place in the doorway. “You guys have fun with… all that.”
You spend the next half hour finishing up your already-completed charting. You reword, backspace, and click occasionally at your mouse — pretending to work to keep from being bothered, though it isn’t quite as foolproof as you would’ve liked. Whitaker rushes your way with one of his interns in tow, sporting a worried sort of glint in his wide puppy dog eyes that he only gets when something’s going wrong.
“Hey… Dr. Abbot. Are you— Are you busy at the moment?”
“Nope,” you answer in a monotone, without looking up from the bright-white computer screen ahead of you. “And I’d very much like to keep it that way.”
“Well, uh…” Whitaker falters, shifting awkwardly on the other side of the desk. “We— We kinda need you. In pedes.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Baby Jane Doe hasn’t stopped crying since you left,” the woman behind him says, standing several inches shorter than the boy and sporting a heavy pair of glasses and a glittering silver septum in her nose.
Your eyes dart toward the stranger — Joy Kwon, MS3, the badge on her chest reads.
“That was, like, twenty minutes ago,” you say with an incredulous twist to your features.
“Exactly,” she deadpans.
You huff and lead the duo the short distance back to the pediatric unit. The crying hits you before you’ve even crossed the threshold — a sharp, unrelenting wail that adds to the headache you’ve been nursing all day.
You find a lanky, blonde-haired man who eerily resembles Whitaker in the vibrantly painted room, though his badge reads James Ogilvie, MS4. The young med student flashes you a wide-eyed look of horror, holding the writhing baby in a visibly awkward hold.
“Please help me,” he pleads.
You don’t bother trying to hide your apathy as you trudge across the room to close the distance between you. You slip the tiny baby back into your hold, where it settles almost instantly, heavying against your chest with another breathy whine. You rock it gingerly in your arms the way you were taught to. Its wet eyes flutter slowly shut as fat tear drops trail down its reddened cheeks.
Whitaker gestures with a dazed smile. “See? Knew it. Total natural.”
You flash the boy a deadpanned look over your shoulder. “Because I’m a woman? That means I’m automatically a natural-born caretaker?”
His light eyes widen with an immediate panic. Joy tries and fails to hide her amused smile as she purses her lips to the side of her mouth. Whitaker, meanwhile, stumbles over himself to get the words out.
“W-What? No! No, not at all! I just—”
“She’s just messing with you, kid.”
Jack’s voice drifts in as he steps through the door, saving the boy from his own stuttered-out apology. He’s perhaps the only one in Pittsburgh who can decipher your usual monotone from your humorous one, which he was only able to master after years of loving you.
“Oh…” Whitaker says, deflating with a relieved sigh, though his pink cheeks are slow to lose their newfound color.
“Go check on Mr. Alvarez for me, will ya?” you tell him, jutting your chin back towards the door. “You know, since I have to take care of… this thing.”
Whitaker leaves and takes his interns with him, who trail after him in line like ducklings. They pass by Jack in the doorway, who peers at you over their heads with a pair of wide eyes.
“This thing?” he scoffs.
You bounce a shoulder in a lazy shrug. “I’m not getting attached to it.”
“It?!”
You huff and adjust the baby in your arms, with one hand resting on its diapered bottom and your other rubbing gently over its tiny back. You sway gently back and forth, far too sweetly for the following words out of your mouth.
“The entire reason I got into emergency medicine was so I could help people without having to deal with all the— baggage that comes with him.”
“Well, babies don’t have baggage, honey,” Jack laughs as he strolls slowly towards you. “They’re brand new— that’s literally their whole thing.”
“Yeah. That’s because the parents give it to ‘em through… years of psychological torment.”
Jack studies you for a long moment with a pair of squinted eyes. “I think you might be projecting a little bit here…”
“I know I am,” you scoff. “Which is why I’d be a horrible mother. ‘Cause I’d just be a mirror of my mom, and our kid would just be a mirror of me, and it’ll just be a whole cycle of… emotionless, unaffectionate women...”
You trail off with a heavy sigh, lifting your gaze from the calming baby to the man towering over you. You find him wearing a much softer gaze than you expect him to. He tilts his silver head to his shoulder, eyes narrowing and lips curling slowly.
“Our kid?”
Your eyes flick away and back again. “…What?”
“You said our kid,” Jack clarifies with a wider grin.
You roll your eyes at him despite the way your cheeks blaze beneath his unwavering stare. “Well, we are married, you know? Who the hell else would I be having kids with— Robby?”
“God, I hope not— Poor kid,” Jack quips drily before leaning in to press a soft, fleeting kiss to your temple. His silver scruff brushes our delicate skin when he pulls away, far sooner than you would’ve liked. “And, just for the record, I think you’d be an amazing mom.”
Something warm flickers in your chest at his words, like embers stoked suddenly to flame. You recoil physically from the foreign feeling, with a grimace twisting your features.
“Eugh…”
“What?”
You shake your head in response, parting from him to set the now-slumbering baby into the warmer at your side. You lay it gingerly onto the blankets before stepping away with your hands splayed out, as if it had burnt you in some way.
“It got too real for a second there,” you mutter with a look of disgust on your face. “I started feeling all… warm and… and fuzzy— I didn’t like it…”
Jack laughs.
“Yeah, that’s what they call happiness, Dr. Abbot,” he jokes in a gritty deadpan. “And I’m glad you’re finally getting to experience it after three whole years of marriage.”
Jack can’t get the sight of it out of his head. You, in the rocking chair in the corner, with the pedes room dimmed to a dull lamplight, cradling a sleeping baby to your chest and looking half-asleep yourself.
“Thought you weren’t getting attached?” he whispered into the serene silence from his place in the doorway.
“’M not,” you mumbled back, head lolled to your shoulder, eyes half-closed. “‘M just using this as an excuse to shut my eyes for a second.”
Something about it all catches him off guard. Not the baby, exactly — he’s seen a thousand babies before — held them, handed them off, charted them like any other patient in a sea of a hundred different patients. They were always temporary things to him, always someone else’s.
But then he sees you — his future, his eternity — with someone else’s baby tucked to your chest as if it had always been there. You had one hand instinctively supporting the weight of her head while your other smoothed up and down her back. And your voice, often edged with sarcasm dry enough to sand wood, had softened into something warm and low and honeyed. And the seemingly orphaned baby, who could cry loud enough to rattle glass, goes instantly still in your arms like it finds sanctuary in you alone.
It does nothing more than pique his curiosity at first — the idea of having kids with you, of how great a mom you would be — which isn’t a completely rare thought, but one that is typically fleeting. But then the thought lingers. Festers. Settles somewhere in the pit of his chest until he can’t breathe without thinking about it.
By the time you’ve settled in the empty cabin, six hours away from the PTMC, the desire has rooted itself somewhere far deeper than he’d like to admit.
Jack, freshly showered, reclines on the clean sheets of the familiar bed, smelling of detergent and time gone by. The bedroom settles slowly into a lamplit darkness in time with the late night. Fireworks crackle faintly in the distance, in mere echoes rolling across the midnight-colored lake outside. The quiet feels borderline suffocating compared to the never-ending chaos of the E.D.
You move through the space as if you had always been there. Jack watches you from his spot on the bed, which gives him a perfect view of you in the adjacent bathroom.
Your hair is still slightly damp from the shared shower, dripping onto the t-shirt swallowing your body whole. Your bare feet pad softly along the tile as you complete the last steps of your skincare routine; your attention flitting between your reflection in the mirror and the video playing on your phone.
It strikes him somewhere deep — swells from his stomach, to his chest, to his throat, until he gets the very sudden urge to cry.
“Should we have a kid, you think?” Jack blurts, as if the question were as simple as asking you if you wanted pizza for dinner.
You still in place in the golden-lit bathroom. Your fingers freeze on your cheeks, mid-swipe of moisturizer, as you flash him a deadpanned glare from the doorway.
“…Do you hear that?” you wonder in a monotone.
“The sound of my sperm dying?” Jack jokes
“The sound of quiet,” you correct before turning away to continue your work in the mirror. “Which doesn’t exist when you have kids. I mean, think about it— We wouldn’t have even been able to come here today if we had a kid. We wouldn’t be able to do anything.”
“Well, that’s just not true,” Jack scoffs, folding his arms behind his silver curls until his biceps strain beneath the sleeves of his black undershirt; the hem rises just enough to reveal the tuft of light brown-blonde hair trailing down into his sweatpants.
His silver scruff brushes his freckled skin when he turns his head. “Parents take their kids places all the time— or alarm clocks, as you so lovingly called them.”
“Yeah, well, not mine,” you murmur distantly as you chuck your crumpled cotton pads into the bin beside the sink. “They always told me that I was the reason we couldn’t afford to do anything. ‘Cause apparently feed and clothing me was such a burden to them— as if I asked to be here.”
“Your parents were just assholes, babe.”
“The crazy thing is, they were actually pretty nice…” you sigh, bare feet padding softly across the floor as you trudge to bed, plugging your phone into its charger on the nightstand. “Just not to me. Like I ruined them or something.”
Jack’s chest flares with a white-hot warmth that makes his eyes sting. “You know that’s not your fault, right?”
You don’t answer him with words. You just bounce your brows and tilt your head, though he struggles to tell if it’s an agreement or not. He shifts on the mattress when you pull the fluffy comforter down to slide into bed beside him, brows lowered as he keeps his unwavering stare locked on your face.
“Is that why you don’t want kids?” he wonders gently. “Because you think you’ll end up like your parents?”
You scoff, kneeling on the mattress until you settle into place next to his reclined form. “Isn’t everyone terrified of ending up like their parents?”
“Sure, but… You’re nothing like them. I mean, I saw you with that Jane Doe today— You were perfect.”
“Well, you have to say that.”
“No, I don’t,” Jack scoffs. “If I thought any differently, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. But I know you’d be a great mom because I saw that today— Saw the rest of my whole goddamn life in that place…”
He trails off with a faraway look in his eyes.
You watch him with a suspicious glint in yours.
“…You really mean that?” you murmur, halfway shy, picking at pills of cotton on the blanket thrown over your legs. “The part about me… You know, being a good mom, I mean?”
“Of course I do,” Jack laughs like it’s obvious, eyes glittering as he peers up at you. “And it’s not like I expect you to change your mind right now— or ever, if that’s what you want. It’s just… Something to think about, you know?”
“Well…” you tilt your head and trail off with a mischievous sort of lilt in your voice. “They do say the best part of having kids is trying for one.”
Jack grins up at you, brows raised to his hairline. “Do they?” he hums lowly.
“Mhm,” you nod.
“Should we test that theory out, you think?” he teases, all giddy like a teenage boy.
You shrug lazily, t-shirt sleeping off your shoulder, pretending to remain uninterested despite the excitement flaring red-hot in your chest. “Well, what the hell else are we gonna do?”
Something about your indifference makes Jack ravenous. It always has. It makes him feel like he’s got something to prove. And there’s nothing he loves more than watching your mask slip, than watching all your attempts to tease him fade into moans you couldn’t hold back if you tried.
You melt for him first, when his long fingers slide your pretty panties to the side, dragging an orgasm from you with an expert hand — and then further when he presses his mouth to the wet spot in the thin cotton, drinking the honey you leak from him until he licks another twitching orgasm from your buzzing body.
Jack’s wearing your slick down to the silver scruff on his chin when he crawls back up your trembling form, massaging his stiff cock through his boxers. “You’re not too sensitive, are you?” he wonders gently despite the proud smile sitting crooked on his face and the honey still coating his tongue.
Your hips buck on their own accord, chasing a pleasure you’re not entirely sure you can take.
“Fuck a baby into me,” you plead in a half-drunken slurs, etching scratch marks long his back in an attempt to ground yourself. “Wanna make you a daddy, Jack— Want feel you leakin’ outta me…”
“Jesus Christ,” Jack huffs, like you’ve just punched all the air out of his lungs. “You can’t talk like that, baby— I’ll cum before we’ve even started.”
He knows it’s just the previous two orgasms talking, ‘cause you’re still on the pill after all — having a baby now is pretty much out of the equation even if you really wanted to. But Jack isn’t in the business of depriving you of what you want. So he gives you all he has for the time being.
He folds your knees to your chest with a pair of wide, calloused hands, keeping your drooling pussy spread for him as he pierces you slow. The head of his cock, glowing red with need, disappears inside your pulsing confines. His throaty groan entwines with your quiet whimpers as your cunt suckles him further in. Once he’s sheathed fully inside, he stills just against you, with the greying thatch of coarse hair above his cock nestled against your sensitive clit.
“Yeah, you feel that?” Jack croons with a breathy laugh, which turns into a moan when your nails rake down his muscular chest. “You’re so full of me, aren’t you, baby?”
Your heavy head nods lazily against the pillow, eyes bleary and wet with desire. They squeeze shut a second later, when Jack’s hips drag back, until only the head of his cock is left inside you. Then he slides back into you, slow enough that you feel every ridge and vein of his cock, and smiles when your back arches off the mattress.
“I’ll give you a baby one day, honey, I promise,” the man babbles, choppy between his measured thrusts. “Fill you up so much it’ll be leakin’ outta you for days—”
You whine, hips bucking into and away from his cock all at once.
“Yeah, that’s it… I’ll get you all round and full… ’Til you’re walking around the E.D… Showin’ everyone what I did to you— how good I make you feel…”
“Please,” you whine.
“Yeah?” Jack coos sympathetically, beneath the wet schlick, schlick, schlick sound of his thrusts inside you. “That what you want?”
You nod, head tilted back and eyes squeezed shut, though the pathetic “please, please, please”’s continue spilling from your kissed mouth.
“Take it then, baby— Take it.”
He buckles down over you, punching into you with shallow thrusts that slowly start to lose their rhythm. He talks you through every inch of your orgasm, which hits you so hard it makes tears swell in the corners of your eyes.
“That’s it, honey. Let me have it,” he murmurs in your ear as your body starts to twitch beneath his muscular one. “Give me all of it, baby. That’s it.”
Your stomach pools with heat a second later when Jack tenses on top of you, burying his groans in his neck as his jerking cock spits thick ropes of warm cum inside of your pulsing confines. He deflates on top of you when he’s finally spent, sticky body melting with yours, until both of you are melting into the tousled sheets below.
“You okay?” Jack asks through panted breaths, muffled into your sweat-slick neck.
You nod wordlessly, swallowing hard as the high fades, and shoving lazily at his bare shoulder. “Get off— I gotta go to the bathroom,” you huff.
Jack slides off your body and falls heavily onto the other side of the mattress. He watches with lidded eyes as you hurry to the bathroom with your thighs clenched together. You clean yourself up inside and return some minutes later to Jack having wiped himself off and tucking his soft cock back into his grey boxers.
“Do you wanna… talk about all that?” he asks with a knowing squint in his eyes.
“Remind me tomorrow,” you sigh, feet heavy as you trudge back into bed.
Jack scoffs a laugh, knowing you’ll likely tell him the same exact thing tomorrow, and flips off the lamp on the nightstand. The golden bedroom delves into a midnight-blue darkness.
His limbs entwine with yours on nothing short of muscle memory when he slides back into bed with you. His long legs slot with yours beneath the covers as he throws a heavy arm over your stomach, folding his free one beneath his head.
Quiet settles over the dark bedroom like a blanket.
“Actually,” you blurt into the silence, catching Jack right before he falls asleep.
“Yeah?” he mumbles, warm breath fanning over your shoulder.
“It’ll probably take about— I don’t know, three or so days for all the results to come back. You know, for Baby Jane Doe’s workup,” you murmur, half-shy. “And we’ll be back to work by then, so… I was thinking maybe we could… Never mind, it’s stupid.”
Jack lifts his head before you can shrink back into yourself, eyes flitting across your shadowed profile. “No, what is it?”
You roll onto your back to meet his darkened gaze with a far more sheepish one. “Maybe we could take her, you know? Just foster her on an emergency basis until we can find her family. Or someone who can foster her long-term. Like a…”
“A trial run?” Jack finishes for you with an audible grin. “Yeah, that’s definitely one way to pitch it, honey.”
You grimace, hiding your burning face behind your hands. “I told you, it’s stupid,” you whine, muffled behind your palms.
“It’s not stupid,” Jack assures you with a quiet laugh. He pries your hands from your face with gentle fingers wrapped around your wrist. “I think it’s a great idea. We can, you know, taste the waters about the whole baby thing and help a kid in need at the same. Sounds like a win-win to me.”
“Yeah?” you hum with a soft wince.
“Yeah,” he nods. “We can look into it when we get back.”
Your chest swells with a sunshine sort of warmth when he settles back into bed beside you, tossing a muscular arm over you to tuck you back into his bare chest. It’s a pure, unadulterated feeling of overwhelming happiness that weirdly makes you feel like crying. ‘Cause only Jack would agree to foster an abandoned baby you found at work not even a day ago; only Jack would see all of you and still love you completely, for a reason you still can’t name.
“I hate when you’re supportive,” you grouse on instinct as you bury your head back into the pillow, even though you mean the exact opposite.
Jack knows this, too, so he just grins into your hair and jokes, “Yeah, I know. It’s definitely my worst quality.”
having the most nonchalant conversation about work or errands or fucking whatever with jack abbot while dry humping on your living room couch.
he’s listening, he swears. looking up at you, neck strained but who cares, with a pointed stare that tries to peel you apart by sight alone. his hands knead your hips to glide you back in forth across the bulge under his sweats as he absorbs your words. moving you through deliberate, sluggish grinds until your center in nudging him in a way that hitches your breath while you speak.
“you promise you had a good day?” jack asks the question without looking away from you, your lips. tugging you again and again. “nobody i need to beat up or anything?”
a huff laugh from you lifts the corners of his lips. with arm around his neck, you shake your head.
“s’okay. i’ll take ‘em to the ed right after. get ‘em all fixed up. maybe,” he shrugs, dragging his hand to press into your ass. with his prosthetic off since he’d arrived at your house, jack uses his left leg to buck upwards while pushing you down. hard enough for you to really feel him knock into your slit.
“oh, can—mmm—your off for a few days, right?”
“yep. all yours.” jack rasps the promise, nosing at your neck and inhaling before licking across the skin.
“can you run to the store for me? m’ a little low on some stuff… toothpaste, toilet paper, shit like that.”
jack keeps lapping at you, breaths turning loud and rough at the fact that you need him for something.
“yeah, baby. just send me the list. i’ll pay for it.”
Fanfiction is supposed to be cringy. You're allowed to write bad. You're allowed to be cringe. Fanfiction is supposed to be self indulgent. You're allowed to be cringe. Let yourself be cringe. Fanfiction is supposed to be fun. Stop putting arbitrary rules on yourself and be free.
on the night of your wedding, robby carries you through the hotel room door in the most fitting manner: bridal style. you giggle in his hold, and he beams at you as he places you down on the bed that’s decorated in rose petals. the staff went all out in making sure the bridal suite is perfect for the two of you.
“wow.” robby says, taking a step back to admire you. you smile at him from your spot on the bed, lifting yourself up with your elbows planted on the mattress.
“what?” you ask sweetly, still breathless from laughing.
“just lookin’ at you,” he says softly. “my wife.”
“well, mr. robinavitch,” you lean forward and grab his loosened tie. “i think you’d better show your wife why she married you.”
robby wastes no time in capturing your lips in a heated kiss and as the two of you fall back onto the bed, he considers himself the luckiest man alive.
6.2k || All my content is 18+ MDNI || CW: hurt/comfort; fluff; reader struggling; overwhelm; sadness; reader has one of those days; crying; nondescript mention of reader's cycle causing sore breasts; gets a little smutty at the end; reference to oral and PIV sex; no use of y/n or related.
Summary: Jack takes care of you when you have one of those days.
AN: They're backkkkkkkkkk!! Nobody may care, but I care, I love them 😂. Honestly shocked I managed to stay away from them for so long. You don't really need to have read the series for this to make sense (though I'd encourage it because I love these two), but some things will make much more sense and maybe there will be more depth? Idk. Reader is in such a specific mood it's not like it necessarily screams them the entire time. You can find Part 1 here if you'd like to read or refresh! If you haven't read, Jack calls Reader Doll as a pet name and Reader calls Jack Peter as a pet name which is explained more in the series lol. Inspired by this ask for the 1k celebration! I'm not sure if any of reader's words about what one of those days feels like will make sense or resonate with anyone but I tried lol. I hope this turned out comforting and fluffy and that you enjoy! ♥️
You need Jack.
You need your husband.
If you walk in the door and find him getting ready for work and he tells you they need him to come in you'll come fully fucking unglued.
You know it's ridiculous that you feel this way but you just fucking do. It was a day. You're not sure how else to describe it. It was just one of those days.
"Peter?" you call as you finish unlocking the door and push it open. "Please tell me you're not getting ready to go to work."
"I'm not getting ready to go to work," Jack confirms for you.
You look over at him as you shut and lock the door. Jack nods toward where his crutches are balanced against the couch. If he had to go to work he'd already have his prosthetic on and crutches set aside. He's smiling at you softly from where he sits on the couch, blanket spread over his lap, looking like he was waiting for you. There's something in his expression, in the way his eyes crinkle at the corners this time that tells you he knows. He knows it was a fucking day for you.
He beckons you with a finger. "Come here, Doll," he says quietly, delicately, like he's worried the sentence might be too much for you. He's not wrong to worry about it.
You take in a deep breath and sigh deeply, set down your purse. "If I don't go change first I won't at all until we go to bed and I want to be out of these pants and this fucking top so badly."
Jack smiles at you, his hands pulling the blanket off him a little. He holds up one of your favorite pairs of comfy lounge pants and your favorite shirt of his that you love to steal and then puts them back under the blanket against his body. "Been cuddling them so they're warm for you and smell like me." Your shoulders drop and a small pout pulls onto your face. Jack furrows his eyebrows and shakes his head. "Was that not the move?"
You nod at him, swallow hard and then laugh through your nose. "It was the perfect move," you reassure him as you start walking over to him, vaguely teary because it’s so sweet and perfect and Jack. "You have done so, so many sweet things for me over the years, Jack, but this…" You shrug. "This is one of the sweetest."
"Good," he nods as he shifts so that he's sitting normally on the couch but closer to the edge than normal, spreads his legs for you to step between. "Though I'll admit there's a caveat," he smirks at you.
"Oh yeah?" You step between Jack's legs and rest your hands on his shoulders. You don't wear the smirk you normally would, don't have that lilt in your voice, that teasing playfulness that is so you.
It confirms everything Jack was thinking. He continues to be flirty and lighthearted but not overly so. "If you want the comfy clothes you have to let me strip you," he tells you, voice low and full of the smirk he's still wearing.
You click your tongue and sigh dramatically. "You drive a very hard bargain Dr. Abbot, but I accept."
Jack winks at you and brings his hands to your waistband, and unbuttons them and pops the clasp. He unzips them and then pushes them down your legs, helps you step out of them. He hums appreciatively at the pair of underwear you're wearing. "I like this pair," he murmurs, leans forward and kisses at the waistband over your hip. "On or off?"
"Off," you murmur back, run a hand through salt and pepper curls you'll never stop loving and finding unreasonably hot.
"Yes ma'am." Jack hooks his thumbs under the waistband and pulls them down where you easily kick them off. He holds out the pair of pants he has for you, helps you step in them and get them pulled up before his hands grab the hem of your shirt and start to pull it off. Jack hums again as you finish getting your shirt off and toss it aside, his eyes adorably intent as they roam your exposed abdomen and chest. "I love you so much, Doll," he whispers before leaning in and pressing kisses across your exposed skin, not focusing on but certainly lingering on some of your scars.
"I love you so much too, Peter." And you do. You really, really fucking do. He is so good to you, treats you so well, makes you feel so much better just by being him and loving you. He makes everything so much better just by being his sweet, affectionate, teasing self.
Jack presses one lingering kiss to your skin and then pulls back, bunches up his shirt for you and holds it out for you to stick your arms through and then pull on properly. The second you have it on Jack's pulling you onto his lap perpendicular to him, has your ass closer to the outside edge of his thigh so that you're leaned back in his arms and he's almost cradling you. "You hungry?"
You shake your head at him. "Not right now."
He nods, is quiet for a few seconds. "You wanna talk about your day?"
You let out a soft breath. He always knows. It’s like a sixth sense. You've almost never had to tell him or say anything in particular or do something out of the ordinary for him to know. You're not quite ready to yet though, so you defer. "How'd you know?"
Jack gives you a small smile. "You were quiet today." He leans his head down close to yours and kisses one of your cheeks. Normally you text him fairly regularly. Not today.
"I could've just been busy." You nuzzle your nose against his when he keeps his face close to yours, rub your cheek against his lower cheek and jaw to feel the slightly longer than usual stubble scratch your skin.
"No," Jack drawls. He kisses your other cheek. "There's you normally," he murmurs, presses an achingly sweet kiss to your forehead. "There's you busy." His voice stays low and this time his lips find the tip of your nose. "And there's you quiet." Jack's lips finally find yours and yield to you, let you control the kiss, the kisses, because it always turns into more than one with you guys. He pulls away after a few kisses, moves his head back up and looks down at you. "You were quiet today, pretty girl."
You could legitimately scream at how fucking sweet and adorable and healing Jack is being right now. How fucking perfect. How he's being everything you need and then a whole lot more.
"I don't know Jack." Your words aren't whispered or murmured but they're soft and low. A kind of dejection to them almost that makes Jack sad in the truest sense. He keeps his face as it is though, loving and admiring. "It was a day. Not a bad day, just… a day." You let out a long breath. "It was one of those days."
You don't know what else to say and that frustrates you. You know that Jack understands and that he doesn't care that you don't have the words to describe it right now but you do. You care. "Nothing was even that wrong or that bad, some stuff went well even, but it was just so fucking bad at the same time. They day felt so, so…" You trail off because the words don't magically appear for you.
"I don't know," you sigh, looking away from him but not really at anything at all. "I don't know, I don't know how to describe it and that makes it fucking worse somehow, it makes it feel manufactured, like I'm just making it up so that I can feel this way and wallow in it and my self pity and whatever else."
Jack nods slowly. "You're not though," he murmurs, just barely audible on purpose. He wants you to know that he heard you and he understands and that you don't need to respond to what he said and that he isn't invalidating your feelings, but he also wants you to know that he knows you're not making it up.
When you don't say anything Jack sits you back up fully and squeezes your thigh. You stand almost on instinct and Jack grabs a couple of pillows and puts them at the end of the couch and then leans back against them and spreads his legs out so he's laying on the couch but sitting up a little. Once he's comfy he beckons you with his finger and there's no hesitation, you're laying cuddled on top of Jack in seconds, quick enough that it makes him chuckle as he pulls the blanket he'd set on the back of the couch over the both of you.
He gives you some quiet to think about and figure out what you want and need right now, wraps his arms around you under the blanket and holds you and rubs your back and lets you soak in his warmth and smell and listen to his heart beating under your ear. When you start to shift on him Jack loosens his arms for you and smiles to himself as you wiggle your way up him a little so that you can burrow your face into his neck.
Jack wraps his arms back around you and starts rubbing your back again. It would be impossible to explain how loved you feel in the moment, how much you love this, getting to snuggle with him like this, getting to come home to him after one of those days and be able to exist how you need to with no judgment or expectation. It would be impossible to explain how much you love him.
You swallow hard and then ask even though you know you don't need to. "Can I just…?" Your words are muffled and mumbled against Jack's neck but he hears them. And he understands them.
He holds you a little tighter, brings one hand to cup the back of your head. "You never have to ask, Doll. Never. You do whatever you need to." Jack feels the first of your tears against his neck. "I've got you, okay? I've got you, let go if you want, Sweetheart."
Your tears are quiet and somewhat light for a moment before Jack feels you shake your head against his neck a little bit and then finally let go, start crying into him in earnest. You let out the indescribable and inexplicable emotional pain and suffering that has plagued you all fucking day for reasons you either don't know or can't understand or that your brain won't let you fully realize through sobs into Jack's neck as your hand fists at his shirt.
Jack holds you through it, rubs your back and strokes over your hair, whispers soft words of reassurance that he has you and he's here. He's your constant as you fall to pieces in his arms, steady and strong and unwavering as he holds you and catches every piece of you. "I know it doesn't feel like it right now Doll, and that's okay and understandable and more than allowed, but you're going to be okay and even if you don't know what exactly you're feeling, these feelings at this intensity will pass."
It takes what feels like forever but eventually Jack is proven right and the feelings ebb, your tears slow until they've finally stopped completely, replaced by wracking and hiccuped breaths. "I don't, don't, I don't know," you start, cut off by a series of hitched breaths.
"Shhh, Doll, just let this pass. Let yourself recover a bit, yeah?" Jack grabs your hand that's still fisting his shirt and uncurls it gently and places it flat on his chest, his hand on top of yours. "Breathe with me. You don't need to force words out right now or explain. Just breathe. I'm not going anywhere."
You do your best to listen to him and sync your breathing with his. It takes a bit but eventually you're able to. Jack smiles to himself, knows you're recovered enough to talk without making yourself choke and hyperventilate when you pull a corner of the blanket up and move your head and wipe off the side of his neck so that it's not covered in your tears and mucus. He makes a mental note to throw the blanket in the washer.
When you're satisfied with your cleaning job you wipe your face and then put the blanket back and then burrow your face right back into Jack's neck, smiling to yourself a bit when you feel his chest shake and vibrate a little with a quiet laugh.
"What?" you murmur. Jack can hear the small smile in your tone.
He shrugs as best he can in your current positions. "You're just fucking precious and you're all mine." His arms squeeze you a little tighter for a second to emphasize his words.
You sigh noncommittally into his neck, thankful for his words and knowing how much he means the first part and loves the second part but you don't feel particularly precious right now or like anyone much less Jack should love that you're all theirs. You're quiet for thirty seconds and then you finally make yourself pull your face from Jack's neck so you'll be understandable when you talk, adjust yourself so that your head is tucked under his chin.
Jack considers telling you not to apologize preemptively because he knows that's what you're about to say but he doesn't. He knows that you need to say it, knows what it feels like to need to say it.
"I'm sorry," you whisper.
"You have nothing to apologize for, I promise," Jack murmurs.
"I just hate it, Peter. I hate it when I do that to you." You sigh angrily at yourself. "When I just fucking cry for no fucking articulable reason and don't even say anything to you really. I just fucking cry. And it's worse when I walk in the door and basically straight into your arms and just start crying after barely saying hello or asking how you are or how your day was. I hate it."
"I know," Jack says softly. "But sometimes that's what we need. I do it sometimes, and no, before you can say it, it's not different."
"It is though, Jack" you tell him emphatically. "It is because when you do this it's for a reason, a good reason, it's something really bad or sad or difficult or scary. Something you can name. I do it because it was a day, but then I can't even articulate what that means or why it was a day. I'm going to start doing it for no fucking reason here soon I bet."
"That's okay. Your feelings are still valid, your needing to cry or have whatever kind of catharsis is still valid, even if you have no reason." Jack slows his hand as he moves it up and down your back. "You don't need a reason to feel the way you feel, at any time, ever. You can just feel it. So even if you have no reason, I'll still hold you just like this. I'll still have you. I'll still think how lucky I am that you trust me like this, that you feel safe enough to be this vulnerable around me. I'll still think about how lucky I am that you're mine."
"So you don't need words, Doll. You don't need to be able to explain how you're feeling or what you're feeling. You don't need to spin or overstimulate or overwhelm yourself even more by trying to figure out how to articulate how you're feeling and why." He takes in a breath and lets it out slowly. "At least not for me. But I understand the urge and the need to know for yourself. I know that not being able to articulate your feelings and the reasons for them makes it feel like they're winning, like they're in control of you."
"Yeah," you agree quietly. Jack's words are so sweet, pull at your heartstrings and make you feel so loved and accepted you're almost not sure what to do with yourself. You feel so restless, not even in a physical sense though, it's all mental. It's like the words you want and need to say to get this to pass are right on the tip of your tongue but you can't find them to get them out.
You try to reset yourself a little, nuzzle your nose against Jack's chest and breathe him in deeply. "Nothing bad even happened." You can't help but shrug. "Especially in comparison to some days that don't even turn into actual bad days."
Jack brings one of his hands up and cups it over your cheek that's not pressed against his chest, thumb running back and forth over your skin soothingly. "It can just be one of those days even if some stuff went well or better than you could've ever hoped for or good things happened. The day can just be one of those days because it is and because that's how it feels to you, regardless of what's happening externally in the world around you."
"I don't want it to." The words sound as small as you feel.
And Jack knows it and it hurts him, kills him that there's not more he can do. His hand leaves your face so he can hold you tighter to him. "I know, Doll, and I don't want it for you either. Ever."
He feels you turn your head slightly and press your lips against his chest over his shirt in acknowledgment, are quiet for a moment or so before speaking again. "I just should be able to articulate it if it's making me this upset."
Jack is careful to keep his next words loving and not teasing like they could be. He knows that teasing isn't what you need right now, isn't going to help anything. "Well, you know what we say about should in this household," he murmurs, starts rubbing circles over your back.
You huff a small laugh. You're not upset, don't roll your eyes. If anything, like Jack hoped, it makes you smile to yourself just a touch. Because he would catch you using that word and remind you.
And Jack smiles to himself at your small, huffed laugh. "You want me to try to describe how it feels for me? See if that kind of prompting works. Maybe it'll be easier to add onto what I’m saying and not have to figure out where to start."
"Please," you whisper. You really need to get this shit out of your head. You know it'll make you feel so much better.
Jack takes in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "I guess for me… when it's one of those days it's usually because it feels like everything is too much, everything is overwhelming but not in the kind of way where you can take a few minutes to yourself and calm down and feel better. It's just constant overwhelm. But you can't find the source of the overwhelm, so you can't try and make it better, so you're stuck. Which makes you feel helpless, which makes you feel out of control, which exacerbates everything."
"Yeah," you agree before Jack can continue. "You're stuck and you can't figure out what it is, in part because there isn't anything. Or there isn't anything that should be overwhelming. Even all the little things added up don't feel like they should be overwhelming, which contributes to the overwhelm itself, but they fucking are overwhelming and it's impossible to let them go and then you pick one and ruminate on it and then pick another one and so you're just constantly in it. So then everything feels overwhelming and it becomes one of those days."
"It feels like whatever happens next will be the last goddamn straw." Now that you've found the words they pour out of you easily. You have no idea if they make sense or will be understandable to another human but it doesn't matter. You need them out. "And you put on this fake smile and try to hide it and act like you're not dying inside because somewhere between the constant overwhelm and bouncing from thing to thing to ruminate on, you've just gotten sad."
You blow out a small breath from your nose and swallow hard. "You've gotten so fucking soul-consumingly sad, but even that's almost blunted in some way. Like you feel it all, you feel that fucking sad, but you don't. You almost can't. At least you're able to recognize the emotion though. But as soon as you start to really feel and identify the sadness you just jump back to feeling totally overwhelmed with just a side of sadness, and so you go from stuck in overwhelm to stuck in limbo somewhere between overwhelm and crushing sadness and that feels awful. So you're feeling it all but you're still not. And you're back to not knowing what 'it' is. Not being able to define how you're feeling."
"You still feel like the next small thing could push you over the edge but never does because the ledge is moving with you. You're constantly chasing it. You're restless, so fucking restless, mentally more than physically, but sometimes it feels like you need to just go run as hard and fast as you can for as long as you can to try and get it out, whatever it is, and to try and clear the fog from your brain. And you're agitated in this sad and overwhelmed way." You let out a sad sigh through your nose. But you can feel it helping, can feel yourself getting a little better and perking up a little as you get it all out.
"You know that in some ways it feels better to go over the ledge and get it out but you can't. Until you can and it's too fucking much as you start to fall and you don't want to go over the ledge anymore and get your hand out just in time to hold on, but then your pen dies or your Diet Dr Pepper spills or you get one more thing at work and you're falling and maybe you hit the ground and you're crying or maybe you're trying not to cry and so you're stuck feeling like you're falling while still having to work." You shake your head slightly against Jack's chest as you think back on feeling it today. So many fucking times. "And so you're sucking on your tongue and pushing it against the roof of your mouth as hard as you can while still looking normal to not let the tears you feel fall or you're crying silently at your desk at work and trying to pass it off as allergies or you're sobbing into your husband."
"And you fucking still can't explain why." The 'still' is harsh, sounds desperate, as desperate as you were before you found these words. "You still can't explain why it was one of those days. You can't explain why everything was too much today. You can't explain how you feel. And then it starts all fucking over again because none of it ever really went anywhere. You didn't really work through any of it, you didn't cry it out and work through it that way, unless you're lucky and you finally did and it's the end and you're coming out of it, so it just starts all over again and you realize you're still stuck."
"You know there still isn't anything or any combination of things that should make you feel like this. Sometimes on one of those days, if you're honest with yourself you can step outside it for a second and can see the things, objectively, you can see how they stack and would be too much for anyone. But then you step right back in it and that objectivity and realization is kind of gone. And on the rest of them, on most of them, your brain shuts off all your insight so there's no stepping out of it and so as far as you're concerned there truly is nothing that explains why you're feeling like this." You pause, quiet for a moment as you catch your breath and realize how much lighter you feel just from talking, from being able to finally get it out, like you knew you would if you could just find the words. And Jack helped you find them. Like he always does.
"I don't know if that made any sense." You huff a laugh and sigh. "Probably not, but saying it all helped, getting it out, talking it out. It helped. A lot I think." You're quiet for a moment and Jack lets the silence linger, waits patiently for you to say more. "It's just… it's all there and you can feel it all, but it's not and you can't feel any of it and so you don't understand how you've ended up here feeling the way you are." You shrug against him. "And so you say it's been a day, that it's been one of those days."
You pull your head off his chest and shift yourself. You need to see him, need him to know how much you love and appreciate him, need him to know you know how lucky you are to have him. Jack makes a little noise of displeasure when you start to move off him but is quickly soothed when you just shift so that you're laying on top of him somewhat, your forearms on his chest as you hold your head up so you can look at him.
"And if you're really fucking lucky you have someone who knows exactly what it's been one of those days means without you saying a word. Who senses it over text. Who gets it. Who relates. Who knows that there's nothing he can do to fix it but also knows that he can make it better and will do anything to do so." You look at him with what you hope is enough adoration and love he could drown in it.
Jack smiles tenderly at you, puts his hands on your back just above your ass under the blanket and listens as you continue. "You have someone who helps you try to articulate it and listens, without interrupting, to you go on and on and on once you find the words when he already knows and you know he listened, he really fucking listened and didn't just space out and he could probably repeat some of it verbatim."
Your voice grows a little shaky. "You have someone who's been there and helps lead you out of it, someone who, if he hasn't been there, jumps into the fray, your fray, where he abso-fucking-lutely doesn't have to go, he jumps into it with you and helps you look for and find the way out of it."
"You have someone who loves you and won’t give up on you. Ever. For any reason. Even when you feel like he should." Your eyes are slightly glassy now as they bore into his, saying thank you and you love him and you're grateful for him and need him and want him. You and Jack stay like that for just a moment, eyes locked on each other's, soft, almost mushy, smiles on both of your faces. So much is said between the two of you with no words, only your eye contact and expressions.
"And if you're really lucky," you whisper, "he has salt and pepper curls you fucking love and hasn't shaved in a day so his stubble is a little longer and-"
Jack snorts a laugh at the abrupt change and shakes his head at you, glad to see you perking up as you sniffle a laugh. "Come here, you." He slides his hands up your body, one to the back of your neck so he can pull you in for a kiss. You giggle but it quickly fades once your husband presses his lips against yours. There's the perfect give and take, Jack letting you take what you want and need before he starts seeking more and you let him take, let him give you what he thinks you need, really, back and forth as you kiss until you're breathless.
When you're finally forced to break apart from air you stay as you are, your hands resting flat against Jack's upper chest. His lips are lightly flushed from kissing you, his hazel eyes sparkling and pulling so beautifully green in the lighting.
"Everything you said makes sense." You give Jack a little look of disbelief. "It does. I promise," he murmurs, returning his hands to your back and pressing just the tips of his index fingers into your skin and running them up and down your mid to lower back. "Feeling a little better?"
"Yeah," you nod, looking and feeling lighter. "I needed to be able to get it out. Thank you for helping me get there, and…," your smile turns so sweet Jack can nearly taste it, "For everything, Jack."
"Always. And you have nothing to thank me for, Doll. I'm your husband." Jack brings his left hand up and stretches it, wiggles his ring finger a little bit to emphasize his wedding band. "I'm here for you. Today, tomorrow and every day after."
You grab his hand with one of yours and bring it to your lips, kissing over his ring a couple of times before lacing your fingers so that you're palm to palm. "I love you."
"I love you too." Jack sticks his lips out requesting another kiss and you're quick to drop his hand and lean up to give it to him, giggle into the kiss a little when Jack uses his hands to grab your ass and pull you up his body a little closer. "You wanna keep talking about it?" he asks once you've both had enough kisses for the moment, his hands not leaving your ass.
You shrug a little. "Only if it flows. Like if it comes up or out when we're talking normally because I think I need normalcy right now and not to focus on it."
"Okay," he nods. His eyebrows raise slightly as he gives you a little bit of a look. "We should get you some food."
You scrunch your nose at him. "I'm fine," you mumble, already knowing he's right. "I'm not hungry."
Jack knows you're telling the truth, that you aren't hungry, because he knows how appetite vanishes when you're feeling how you are, it happens to him too. "It'll make you feel better." He gives you a knowing smile. "You know I'm right."
You sigh over-dramatically and rest one side of your head on his chest. Jack chuckles nearly soundlessly but you can feel the vibrations and movement of his chest. His arms wrap around you tightly, one running parallel up your spine so he can cup the side of your face to keep you close. He starts listing off names of places and eventually one sounds good and you nod against him telling him you'd like that.
Food gets ordered and you and Jack stay as you are while you wait for it, talking about whatever comes up. Once the food arrives you guys turn the TV on to the show you're currently making your way through, sit on the couch with the side of your thighs touching, still chatting some as you watch. You get everything tossed once you're both finished and settle back on the couch, Jack laying out on it and you cuddling on top of him, your back to his chest with the blanket on top of you.
You alternate holding Jack's hands and playing with his fingers under the blanket as you watch and chat. At the end of one episode you sigh softly, not really wanting to move but knowing you should. "You wanna go shower?"
Jack hums, low and from his chest, his hands slipping from yours and sneaking their way under your back. "Maybe in a bit." You can tell what he means from the tone of his hum, his growing hardness against your ass also a give away.
He pops the clasp of your bra and moves his hands back around to your front. You think he's going to reach for your shirt to take it and your bra all the way off at the same time but he doesn't. His hands slide up the front of your shirt and dip under the cups of your bra, pushing it off and up enough to be out of his way.
You sigh when your breasts are released, a light hint of a moan to it. That bra is cute and makes your boobs look good, but it's so uncomfortable so you always get that sensation of relief and aching soreness that feels good when it comes off. You're also at that point in your cycle where your breasts get a little sore.
Jack's warm hands squeeze your breasts, fingers kneading with the perfect pressure. He's well acquainted with the sighs of relief you make when you take off the bra you were wearing, watched you put it on this morning and made a point to remember. He knows you're at that point in your cycle, too.
It's when his thumbs and index fingers pinch and roll each of your nipples that you finally give him a proper moan, arch your back some. Jack hums a laugh telling you he knew exactly what he was doing and how it was going to feel for you. "Yeah," he murmurs, the confidence verging on a subtle cockiness in his voice making you shiver, "I thought that would feel extra good right now, Doll."
"God, you have no fucking idea," you moan, eyes fluttering closed as you let the sensation consume you, feel yourself get wetter and wetter for him the longer he plays with your breasts and nipples. You swear to god Jack could probably make you come just like this, that's how fucking good it feels. "I'm gonna give you the best blow job of your life or whatever the fuck you want as a thank you, fuck Jack."
"While I'd never turn that down," Jack emphasizes his words with a particular rough twist of your nipples that sends a shockwave of pleasure over you, "you don't have to thank me."
You moan again. "Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean, I don't feel like I have to, I want to. Because this… this feels so, so good Jack." He swears he can already hear a little bit of a slur to your words from the pleasure he's giving you. "We could continue this in the shower?"
"How about I take you to bed first," he rasps, fingers rolling over and massaging your breasts so deliciously it's hard to breathe. "No sense showering and then getting all sweaty."
You bite your lip and try to think of anything to say while also thinking about all the things he could possibly do to you. "Does that mean you have plans?" you finally get out.
"I have a thought or two," he hums.
You clench around nothing at the edge in his tone. "Like what?"
"I'd like to taste how wet just my hands on your tits has made you. Keep my hands on them as I do." He brushes his thumbs over your nipples teasingly light.
You jolt at the sensation, already feeling shaky from the pleasure. "Jack if you eat me out and play with my tits and nipples right now I might cease to be." He's too fucking good at eating you out, it's obscene how good he is at it, how much he loves it.
"Well the general idea is to clear your mind for at least a little bit, yeah." You whine at his words, thinking about his mouth on you and his hands still at your breasts and his stubble in between your legs and what it would feel like against your extra sensitive nipples and breasts.
"What else?" you pant.
"I'd like to fuck you." Jack lifts his head up and leans it forward a bit so his lips can be right next to your ear as he murmurs. "Hard."
Jack doesn't need to say more the way some men might to make their words hot as all fuck. It's in his delivery of the word, the way his voice sounds when he says it, how he murmured it right at your ear as his hands continue to make you wetter and wetter for him.
"How?" you breathe.
Jack hums a dark laugh. "Gotta keep some secrets, Doll." He moves his hands from your breasts and takes them out from under your shirt. "Go get on the bed."
My pen dying or my diet dr. pepper spilling or getting one more (sad) thing at work have definitely NEVER been my last straw. I don't really know what the end was or where it came from but I had that feeling of relief and good soreness pain taking a bra off while writing this and thought to myself what if Jack Abbot was here to make the most of this feeling and you know, here we are.
Anyway, I hope it was okay and comforting and fluffy and that you enjoyed! I have so much I'd like to do with these two still, they are my original babies. 🥹 If you have any ideas or things you'd like to see with them, feel free to let me know! I'd love to hear your thoughts and comments, they mean so much to me! Thank you so much for taking the time to read! ♥️
Want more Jack and the Pitt content? Check out my masterlist here. I also write for Pope from Animal Kingdom!
Want to be added to my Jack tag list? Interact with this post!
Interact with this post if you'd like to join my Michael Robby Robinavitch tag list, and this post if you'd like to join my Andrew Pope Cody tag list! Each tag list is separate, so be sure to interact with each post for each character you'd like to be tagged for!
summary: when you injure yourself two weeks before a showcase, dennis nurses you back to health.
pairings: dennis whitaker x ballerina!reader
cw/tags: mentions of a knee injury, x-rays, pain medications (advil). blisters. no use of y/n, use of pet names (bug, baby), established relationship, swearing. reader has hair long enough to be put in a nondescript updo. hurt/comfort and fluff!!! i am not a dancer so this is extremely vague but please enjoy :))
word count: 4.2k
masterlist
requested by @coldbrewspice thank u so much!!!
“You should get that checked out,” Your friend says, sitting on the floor beside you, stretching her legs out and leaning to one side. “I swear I heard something snap.”
“Nothing snapped,” You counter, still oscillating between massaging and trying to move your knee. “It feels fine now.”
Lie.
She raises an eyebrow, grimacing as she remembers the way your knee shifted when you came down from your jump, and how you had instantly walked off the floor, not even attempting to finish the choreography before sitting down.
“Well, luckily you basically have an ER at home,” She says, making you laugh a little. “Don’t keep dancing on it, seriously, you don’t wanna’ mess it up before the showcase.”
“Yeah, I’m gonna’ head home in a bit,” You agree.
You get back to yours and Dennis’ apartment sometime after nine, pushing the door open quietly, not sure if he’s already in bed or not. A few lamps are on in the living room, but Dennis is nowhere to be found, which means he doesn’t see you limp inside.
“Bug?”
His voice comes from the bedroom. You take a deep breath as you make your way over, poking your head into the doorway, smiling at the sight of him wrapped up under the covers.
“Sorry, did I wake you?” You ask, and he shakes his head.
“Wasn’t sleeping yet,” He says. “How was rehearsal?”
“Great,” You say, still not coming into the room, which makes him raise an eyebrow. You usually jump onto the bed when you get home after him (if he’s awake), throwing your body across his and laying there until you decide to get up and shower. “I’m starving though, are you going to bed soon?”
“Hopefully,” He says, sitting up so he can see you better. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, why wouldn’t it be?” You ask, subtly shifting more of your weight onto your uninjured leg, leaning against the doorframe for support.
“Why are you staying in the doorway?” He asks.
“I’m tired, not sure if I’ll ever get back up if I get in bed now,” You say, the excuse coming easily, worrying him being the last thing you want to do right now.
“Okay,” He says, hesitantly. “Why don’t you get in the shower and I’ll heat up your dinner?”
“You made me dinner?” You ask, smile obvious in your voice. He always makes you dinner when you’re at rehearsals late, but it still makes your brain feel fuzzy.
He nods, tossing the blanket aside, swinging his legs over and standing up.
“You don’t have to do that,” You say. “Stay in bed, please.”
“I don’t mind,” He says, pulling a crewneck over his bare torso, leaning in to kiss you as he walks by.
You wait for him to disappear into the kitchen before heading to the bathroom, jaw clenching harder with each step. You strip your tights and leotard off, tossing them into the laundry basket while the water heats up, carefully stepping into the shower. You rinse off quickly, then get out, wrapping your robe around yourself and moisturizing.
You suck up the pain for a minute as you walk into the kitchen, trying to appear as normal as possible, sitting at the island just as Dennis slides a plate over, handing you a fork.
“Thank you,” You say. He kisses your temple, hands falling onto your shoulders, massaging them lightly.
“Vic asked when she’d be seeing you again today,” He says. “I said we could do a movie night or something soon.”
You huff dramatically, leaning into him. “That would be so nice.”
He chuckles. “After the showcase, maybe?”
“Definitely after,” You say, bending your knee to lift your foot up onto the chair, completely forgetting about the injury for a second. You hiss, wincing, immediately straightening your leg back out. Dennis flinches, movements pausing for a second until he looks down towards your knee.
The swelling is obvious, making his eyes widen. He crouches down, gently grabbing your foot to keep you still.
He says your name softly, drawing it out a bit. “What happened?”
“I landed wrong, it’s fine, I just moved it too fast,” You say, trying to play it off. “I’ll ice it tonight, then it’ll be okay.”
“How bad does it hurt?” He asks.
“Like…right now?”
“Right now.”
“Not at all,” You say, despite the tiny amount of throbbing that rattles around the joint. “Mostly hurts when I walk on it.”
“Did you hear anything when you landed?” He questions. “A pop or a crunch?”
“No, I don’t think so,” You say. “Probably just over-extended it.”
He lifts his free hand up, looking towards you for permission, continuing when you give him a nod. He touches a few spots along your leg, taking note of when you wince or move away. He has you bend and straighten it a few times, slowly, frowning at your limited range of motion.
He stands back up. “If you came into PTMC like this I’d definitely order an x-ray.”
“Good thing I didn’t do that, then,” You tease. “I always have some kind of injury, Den, I’m okay.”
He nods, knowing that you know your body better than most people, and that you wouldn’t jeopardize making it worse with your show coming up so soon.
“Okay,” He says. “Let me set you up on the couch for a minute.”
He helps you into the living room, one arm propping you up and the other carrying your food. He sets you down, putting your legs straight out over the cushions, placing your dinner on your lap. He walks off for a minute, returning with an icepack, Advil, two kinds of tape, and antiseptic.
He puts the icepack on your knee, then gives you the painkillers and water. He sits down by your feet, rubbing some hand sanitizer in before starting to peel back the loose tape that’s covering your blisters. You watch him work, admiring how precise he is, cutting tiny strips and putting them in place with ease. He still isn’t entirely cool with the idea of you constantly having open wounds, but it doesn’t spark anxiety the way it did when you first started dating.
“You always do that better than me,” You say eventually, trying to lighten the mood, Dennis’ concern obvious by the way his eyebrows are knit together. “Thank you.”
He hums, still focused, putting another piece in place. “You’re a lot faster.”
“That’s true, this is taking fucking forever,” You say, making him laugh.
“I’m almost done,” He says. “Don’t want you to bleed through them right away.”
He finishes up a few minutes later, moving onto your knee, taking the icepack off and grabbing the athletic tape. You’re leaning against the back of the couch, eyes half-closed, not paying attention to what he’s doing anymore. He carries you to bed when he’s done, setting your alarm for you and making sure you have everything you need before climbing in beside you.
“Come get an x-ray before practice,” He says the next morning, watching you carefully test your leg out, placing increasing amounts of weight on it as you get ready for the day.
“I don’t have time,” You argue. “It feels better than last night.”
“You have an hour,” He says. “I’ll make it fast, promise.”
“What if people are dying?” You counter, zipping up your hoodie over your leotard.
He shrugs. “Nightshift’s still there. They won’t need me.”
You purse your lips, thinking about it for a second before nodding. “Okay, if it would make you feel better.”
He brings you in through the staff entrance, and you shrink into yourself, feeling guilty for bypassing the already very long line that’s forming in the waiting room. You don’t know the nightshift as well as the dayshift, but there are a few vaguely familiar faces around as he guides you into the department.
“You’re here early,” The red-haired nurse, who you assume is Lena, comments, peering at both of you over the counter. “You must be the ballerina girlfriend that he never stops talking about.”
You grin, glancing down at your outfit quickly. “What gave me away?”
“Right, uhm, this is Lena,” Dennis says, the tips of his ears bright red. “She’s the nightshift charge nurse.”
He tells Lena your name too, and she smiles at you. “Nice to meet you, hon. What’s going on?”
“She twisted her knee at rehearsal yesterday,” He explains. “I was hoping I could get her an x-ray before she dances on it again.”
“Oh, absolutely, not a problem,” She says. “Eight’s open, why don’t you take her there and I’ll send someone over?”
“Great, thanks, Lena,” He says, putting his arm back around you and showing you to the room. He helps you up onto the bed, and you narrow your eyes at him once you’re settled. “What?”
“You said it would be fast,” You say. “Getting a room doesn’t feel very fast.”
“Well, someone has to do an exam, then order the scans,” He says. “But from there it’ll take five minutes.”
“I need to be at the studio by eight.”
“And you will be.”
You fill out a registration form while you wait, and he eventually leaves you alone at six-fourty, needing to change into his scrubs and get his handover. He assures you again that it won’t be much longer, seeing how restless you’re getting, wanting to get to practice.
You shift on the bed, setting your uninjured leg on the ground, grabbing your other foot and raising it above your head without bending that knee. You hold it there for a minute, then you stretch farther, pointing and flexing your toes inside your slipper.
“Uh, what’s eight here for?” Cassie asks, tilting her head slightly, coffee in one hand and stethoscope in the other as she stands by the central desk. The curtain is only partially closed, letting her see half your body as you stretch, making her squint to make sure she’s not seeing things.
Parker looks up, raising an eyebrow. “I didn’t think there was a patient in eight.”
“Well…there is,” Cassie says, and Parker moves so she can see into the room, her eyes going wide. “I think.”
Parker pulls up the chart on her tablet, reading the brief triage note and your name.
“Knee injury,” She says, which only makes the situation that much more confusing. “Doesn’t seem very injured to me.”
“Hey, Lena?” Cassie calls. “What’s the deal with eight?”
Victoria can’t help but look too, a small gasp falling from her lips when she sees you. “You haven’t met her yet?”
“Can’t say I have,” Parker says. “You know her?”
“Yeah, that’s Dennis’ girlfriend,” Victoria explains, saying your name. “She’s a ballerina.”
“Ah,” Parker says. “That explains…that.”
“She’s so cool,” Victoria adds. “Is she a patient?”
“Apparently.”
Parker passes the tablet to the medical student, who nods as she reads it. “I can do the work-up.”
“I don’t think she needs one,” Parker counters, just as Cassie returns from chatting with Lena.
“Whitaker says she needs an x-ray,” She relays, watching as your leg is finally lowered back to the ground. “Fibular head and patella tenderness, moderate swelling after twisting it yesterday.”
“Jesus, this is her on a bad day?” Parker asks.
“Is there a reason you’re all staring at eight?” Robby questions, coming up behind them, not actually looking towards the room yet as he gets oriented for the day. Parker vaguely gestures in your direction, and he follows the motion, looking just in time to see you fold forward, torso flush with your legs and arms wrapped around your calves. “Whitaker!”
Dennis, who’s adjusting his stethoscope as he comes out of the locker room, jumps a little. “Yeah?”
“What’s your girlfriend doing here?”
“Oh, she needs an x-ray,” He explains.
“Of…what?” Robby questions.
“Her knee,” Dennis says, slowly, seeing the precarious position you’ve put yourself in like it’s nothing. “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but it’s hurting her pretty bad.”
“I can do the work-up,” Victoria repeats.
“She’s your friend,” Robby argues. “McKay, can you…?”
“Yeah, definitely,” She says, setting her coffee down and walking over to you. You lift your head up when she knocks on the wall outside your room. “Hi, I’m Dr. McKay. You can call me Cassie.”
“Hi, sorry,” You say, unfolding yourself and standing back up, shuffling towards the bed. “I have rehearsal in half an hour, figured I’d make the most of my time.”
“Right, yeah, no worries,” She says. “You’re Dennis’ girlfriend?”
“Yeah, I am,” You say, then you say your name. She nods, repeating it as you crawl onto the bed, grimacing.
“Can you tell me what happened?”
You shrug. “I landed on it funny at practice yesterday and Dennis insisted I needed to get an x-ray, so.”
She laughs, nodding. “Yeah, I think he’s probably right.”
“How long will it take?” You ask, not wanting to be annoying, but you’re also well aware that rehearsal officially starts in an hour.
“Not long, I’ll do a quick exam and get them ordered, they haven’t gotten too backed up yet,” She says, pulling on a pair of gloves. “May I?”
The x-ray is done by seven-thirty, and Cassie pulls it up on her computer, knowing you won’t have time to wait for the radiologist to result it. Dennis can’t help but glance over, watching as she zooms in on a few spots, looking for tiny fractures.
“I think she’d be okay with you seeing it,” She says, not even having to look to know that he’s staring at the screen.
He exhales, nodding, crossing his arms over his chest as he leans over. “Osseous structures look intact.”
“Yeah, significant soft tissue swelling, though,” She adds. “Any chance she doesn’t go to practice today?”
Dennis laughs a little, shaking his head. “No, none.”
“You wanna’ let her know?”
“Sure, yeah,” He says, putting his tablet down and heading to your room. You’re sitting on the bed in a second position stretch, one arm raised delicately above your head as you tilt to one side, your head landing on your shin. “Hey, bug.”
You snap back up, placing both your hands on the mattress in front of you, smiling. “Hey, am I good to go?”
He nods. “Technically, yes. Nothing’s broken.”
“Thank fucking god,” You breathe, swinging your legs back together and getting to your feet. “Advil and ice it is.”
He grabs your arm, forcing you to slow down for a second. “Be careful on it, please.”
“I will,” You promise, grabbing your bag and slinging it over your shoulder. “Have a good shift, Denny.”
“Good luck at practice,” He says, looking around quickly before pressing a kiss to your forehead. “I love you.”
The next few days follow a similar pattern, minus the ER trip. You wake up, test your knee as you get ready, then you go to dance. You mark lots, but you’re always in pain by the time you get home. Dennis stays up until you’re back, making sure you ice it while he replaces your bandages.
You come home on day five exhausted.
It’s almost eleven, and you were gone before Dennis woke up this morning, meaning you were there for at least twelve hours. He knows you’re not dancing the entire time, but that’s too long for you to be bearing weight on your knee.
“Hey,” You say, leaning back against the front door as you close it, face tight with pain.
“Hi,” He says, reaching for your bag, taking it and putting it on the floor. You slowly sit on the bench along the wall, carefully sliding your leg out, avoiding bending your knee more than necessary. You exhale, eyes screwing shut. He kneels in front of you, bracing your leg with one hand and sliding your slipper off with the other, then doing the same with your other foot. “Worse today?”
You shake your head too quickly. “No, not really.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Bug.”
“It’s just a little achier than before,” You say. “But I think it’ll be okay once it’s elevated.”
He helps you over to the couch, again, and you fall into routine. This time, while he’s bandaging your foot, he finally gathers the courage to say something.
“You’re pushing too hard,” He says, wiping disinfectant over a blister, making you flinch. “Sorry.”
You hum, grabbing a fistful of the throw blanket to distract yourself from the burning sensation. “I can’t take it any easier.”
“You could,” He counters, gently, knowing how reluctant you’ll be to take his advice here. You’ve been dancing your entire life, injured or not, so what does he know? “One day off would make a big difference.”
You don’t respond. He finishes up the bandages, taking hold of your ankles, squeezing them. He moves his hands up your calves, rubbing along your sore muscles with his thumbs. You take a deep breath, exhaling loudly, putting a hand on your forehead as you squint.
“I can’t just not dance,” You say, and he isn’t sure if you’re trying to convince yourself or him.
“I think one day would be okay,” He says, still gentle, not wanting to push you. “The odds of you injuring it further are pretty high, and that time it might be worse than a sprain.”
He’s teetering on the edge of boyfriend and doctor now, which makes you smile a bit.
“That’s your professional suggestion?” You ask. “One day off?”
He nods. “Yeah, just one.”
You inhale again. “Okay.”
While that’s instantly relieving, it also sparks worry in his chest. He bites his lower lip, gnawing on it for a moment.
“It hurts more than you’ve been letting on,” He says, not as a question. You shrug.
“Yeah, I mean, a bit,” You say. “It’s okay though, honestly.”
But he knows you. Better than anyone ever has.
“Baby,” He murmurs, the sweetness in his voice making your throat tighten. He carefully moves, sitting beside you, looking at you with both eyebrows raised. “How bad, scale of one to ten?”
You think for a second. “A four right now, maybe a six when I’m upright.”
He checks his watch, lifting the icepack off now that it’s been on for twenty minutes. He sets it on the coffee table, and you carefully shift, giving him some more room on the couch.
“You work tomorrow, right?” You ask, leaning your head against his shoulder once he’s settled beside you.
“Yeah, sorry,” He says. “I could ask Trinity if she could cover, then I can hangout with you.”
You shake your head. “No, I’ll be okay, thanks Denny.”
Dennis gets home the next night around eight, a trauma keeping him late. The apartment is quiet when he comes home, a few lamps on and soft music playing. He frowns, coming farther inside.
He’s expecting to see you marking the routine, but he’s shocked when you’re not doing anything of the sort. You’re sitting on the living room floor in a wide straddle, elbows on the floor with a book open in front of you.
“I just wanna’ finish this chapter,” You say, not even looking at him. He smiles, nodding, dropping his bag beside him.
“Okay,” He says, still smiling, bending down and planting a kiss to the top of your head. “I’ll be back.”
You mumble something incoherent in response.
He takes a quick shower, and you’ve finished the chapter by the time he gets out, still sitting on the floor. You beam up at him, making his heart pound in his chest. He sits on the floor too, kissing your forehead, then your lips.
“Is it good?” He asks. You nod emphatically, delving into the most recent plot point. He bought you the book for your most recent birthday, and while you’ve never not enjoyed one he picked out for you, he always feels a twinge of pride when you get wrapped up in them. He listens intently as you talk, watching you with bright eyes and a soft smile.
His eyes trail to your knee once you’re seemingly done, but it’s covered by the sweatpants you’re wearing.
“How’s it feel?” He asks.
You shrug. “A bit better.”
There’s a moment of silence.
“You can say ‘I told you so’ if you want,” You add.
His face contorts with obvious confusion. “Why would I say that?”
“Because you were right,” You say. “I should’ve just taken the day off after I fucked it, it’d probably be almost healed if I had.”
“Maybe not,” He counters. “I’m just glad it’s feeling better, bug.”
A week and a half later you’re backstage, fully costumed with your pointe shoes laced up, doing a combination of marking your routine and stretching. You pull your phone out, the time reading six-oh-six, with no new text from Dennis. He sent you one earlier, wishing you luck and saying that he wished he could be there to watch. He had tried desperately to get someone to cover his shift, but it just hadn’t happened.
“Your boyfriend coming?” One of your friends asks.
“No, not tonight,” You say, a small smile on your face. “He couldn’t get the day off.”
“He can’t just leave early?” She asks, and you laugh.
“He barely gets to leave on time most days,” You counter. “Let alone early.”
You take a deep breath, putting your phone away, trying to calm the nerves that have settled in your chest. You manage to drop your heart rate by a few points, but then you’re taking your place beside your fellow dancers in the wings, the lights dimming slightly as the performance is announced.
You shake your hands out, wringing them in front of you before you have to walk out, plastering a poised smile on and walking gracefully to your spot near centre stage. You shift into the starting position, eyes scanning the crowd quickly, your heart jumping in your throat again.
It doesn’t matter how many times you do this—this feeling is still fucking terrifying.
The audience cheers, and your eyes fall on a very familiar head of blonde curls in the front row. You have to stop your eyes from popping out of your head when you realize that it’s Dennis, holding a bouquet of flowers in his hands, his eyes meeting yours. He’s already grinning despite the fact that you haven’t even started dancing yet, and you can’t help but smile a little wider, giddiness replacing the nerves.
Dennis’ eyes don’t leave you for the entire performance, watching every move like his life depends on it. He’s amazed by everything you do, each twirl and jump making his smile somehow grow even wider. He doesn’t hesitate to stand up the second you’re done, clapping and cheering loudly when you hit the final pose.
“That’s my girl!” He yells, the sound almost completely drowned out by the rest of the crowd, but you hear it. You duck slightly, heat rising on your neck and cheeks as you walk off.
You see him again once you’re changed, hair freed from the updo and slippers on. He’s leaning against the wall down the hallway outside of the dressing room, along with some of your teams partners and family. You would run to him if you felt like you could, but your feet and knee are aching, so you opt to just walk. He meets you halfway, a shocked laugh escaping when you throw your arms around him, jumping up and wrapping your legs over his hips, crossing your ankles around his back.
His free hand falls to the bottom of your thigh, effortlessly keeping you up.
“You were incredible,” He says, slowly putting you down, shifting his hand so it’s on your lower back. You grin, pressing your lips to his.
“You made it,” You murmur, fingers twisting into the curls at the nape of his neck
“Yeah, I think Santos felt bad for me,” He admits. “Or she got sick of my moping. She convinced Vic to help her cover my patients so I could get out of there.”
You laugh, leaning back, admiring the flowers that he’s holding. “Those for me?”
“Oh, uh, yeah,” He says, passing them over. “Of course they are.”
“Thank you,” You say, taking them carefully. Dennis reaches for the bag that’s slung over your shoulder, taking it and putting it on his own. His badge is still clipped to his scrub pocket, his mostly unzipped hoodie not completely hiding it from view. You reach for it, plucking it off, smiling when you read the letters at the bottom. “I didn’t know you finally got the new one, Dr. Whitaker.”
He laughs softly, a hand coming up to the back of his neck, cheeks turning red. “Yeah, a few days ago.”
You exhale, putting it back where it was, nodding. “That’s fucking hot.”
His eyes go wide, his throat bobbing with an obvious gulp as he tries to recover from the comment, a slightly nervous chuckle coming from him.
“I, uhm, really?” He asks.
“Very.”
He’s about to continue the flirting, but he notices the way you shift off your injured leg, and he’s snapped back into reality.
“Come on,” He says, moving your bag out of his way and letting you lean on him. You wince after a few steps, and he doesn’t hesitate before bending slightly, sliding an arm under your legs and picking you up. You gasp, naturally putting your arms around his neck, and you can’t keep yourself from smiling the entire way to the car.
A/N - hi y'all!! happy thursday i hope ur all doing amazing and u look amazing wow im agog. i hope u all enjoyed this :) next week i start studying for finals (fml) so uploads from me will likely be pretty infrequent but ill be updating my 'this week' post as best as i can lol. okay bye love u mwah!
summary: you can’t help but be upset when your husband gets hurt on the fourth of july
word count: 1.2k
warnings: slight angst, slightly suggestive, slight disdain against Robby #sorrynotsorry, written and posted in one session, not proofread
It was the Fourth of July, and you were meant to be enjoying yourself at a friend’s barbecue. The sun shon down on you all, your friend’s husband and brother in law stood around the barbecue grilling burgers, sausages and much more.
Their kids shrieked and hollered in delight as they played around in the sprinkler set up on the lawn, you were sat at the table, a now-warm beer held in your hand as your friends laughed and chatted around you.
But you couldn’t focus on any of it.
Why?
Because your husband insisted on doing volunteer SWAT work on his rare day off. Your leg jogged anxiously against the patio and your jaw clenched. The thought of Jack risking his life, being injured whilst you ate hotdogs and drank with your friends made you feel sick.
Jack was well aware of your feelings on his volunteering habits, but insisted he would be back to you in time for the fireworks.
You checked your phone constantly, his last text being half an hour ago:
All going well, should be finished up soon 👍
Soon? How soon was soon?
You felt ridiculous, he was a grown man, an army veteran for christ’s sake! But how could you not worry, after the events of Pittfest, an unease at big events festered within you - especially where Jack was involved.
Your phone wouldn’t buzz for another forty agonising minutes of attempting to play bulldog with a bunch of under 10 year olds and forcing down some food.
You heard as it rang and pounced on it, not checking caller ID before holding the phone up to your ear.
“Jack?” You asked.
“Not quite, honey.” It was Dana.
-
No one dared make eye contact with you as you stormed through the waiting room of the Pitt, Lupe letting you through to the ER as she fanned herself with a clipboard.
You grumbled to yourself as you made your way to the hub, loudly slamming your bag onto the counter as Dana gave you a sympathetic look.
“Happy Fourth, he’s in there.” She pointed to a room by the ambulance bay. You turned to move.
“You snitched?” Robby’s voice entered your ears and you turned back to see him looking at Dana, arms folded.
“She’s got a right to know.” Dana stood her ground, as always, brow raised indignantly and loudly chewing her gum.
“I just- maybe you should let him decide when and how his wife gets involved.”
“Shouldn’t you be riding your motorcycle into the sunset by now?” You snapped and he retreated, arms held up in mock surrender.
Dana patted you on the shoulder and allowed you to find Jack.
You approached the room and saw the curtain was closed, but heard Jack’s voice. You ripped the curtain open and took in the sight before you.
Jack, shirtless, thick muscles on display as his arms folded over his chest, you forced your eyes away and watched Dr Mohan swabbing at a spot behind his shoulder.
“I have to find out you got shot from Dana?”
You cringed at the sound of your own voice, you hated being angry at him. You also cringed as Samira flinched at your intrusion.
“Hi Samira.” Your voice softened and you offered her a small smile. She returned it, albeit awkwardly as she mumbled something about leaving you two alone before excusing herself for another case.
“She called you?” Jack sighed and you nodded, “sweetheart I promise I was gonna call you as soon as Mohan patched me up.”
Your jaw clenched as you walked behind him, frowning at the purple, bruised gash that covered his skin and ghosted a touch across it, not missing the way Jack shivered at the movement.
“Y’know I’ve been worried sick all day about you.”
He tilted his head to look at you, and reached his arm out to guide you back to face him, standing in between his legs as his hands found their place innocently on your hips.
“This was a robbery gone wrong, we just happened to be in the area to lend a hand - one of my buddies they got him in the neck-“
You gasped and your eyes widened, “-He’s okay, but if I wasn’t there I don’t know how it would’ve gone.” Jack finished.
He watched, his heart aching as your frown deepened. Lifting a hand to push a stand of hair away from your face, allowing his palm to stay across your cheek which you accepted, leaning into his touch.
“You just don’t get it.” You whispered.
His brows furrowed, “what, sweetheart?”
“That it could be you! You, Jack! My Jack! All I do is worry whenever you’re with that stupid fucking SWAT team and you didn’t even need to be.”
He pulled you gently down to his level, resting his forehead against yours. The two of you stayed in silence as he thought and you calmed your breathing.
“You remember what my therapist said-“ he started.
“Yeah, you need a hobby - so read a book! Do a puzzle! Don’t volunteer yourself to get shot at.” You stood tall again, looking down at him and sighed.
“They don’t need you Jack, not as much as I do.”
The weight of your words came crashing down on him, how could he have left you to suffer his absence? He felt so selfish, so stupid.
“You’re right.”
You let out a breath of relief, and ran a hand through his grey curls.
“I just- I find it hard to leave that mindset, the military, night shifts. I find it hard to just stop.”
You hummed, continuing your ministrations on his hair, “I know honey, but I’m here. Always.” He nodded, and sighed.
He suddenly felt very exposed, the curtain open for anyone to look in on this moment between him and his other half. And the fact he was shirtless in his work environment.
“Close the curtain.”
You huffed out a laugh, “seriously?”
“Please?” He chuckled, and you gave in before returning to your spot in between his legs.
Grinning, he pulled you down gently to his level once more and connected his lips to yours. It was cautious, as if you would suddenly remember what brought you here in the first place and snap.
But how could you? He was the only thing on your mind in that moment as you allowed him to encompass you and your mind. Your hands found a place on his broad shoulders, running your fingertips along the expanse.
Jack made a noise between a grunt and chuckle at your touch, forcing himself away from you.
“Careful.” He warned as you grinned, knowing he didn’t really mind.
“Let me get Samira back so we can get you out of here as quickly as possible, we can go home, you can shower and we’ll get dinner before the fireworks.”
“Fuck the fireworks.” His voice came out gravelly, you cocked a brow.
“Oh?”
“We’ll be able to see them just fine from bed.” His hand reached down to pinch your hip, causing you to jump and laugh.
“Careful.” You mocked his previous warning as the two of you smiled widely at one another. You placed a kiss on his cheek and then turned, going to find Samira.
"I, uh... posted a pic of you. On my MySpace." Rodrick mumbled, like maybe you wouldn't hear it if he said it quiet enough. He sat in front of his computer on his beat-up desk chair, the glow illuminating his face. You gave him a little grin, crossing the room to stand over his shoulder.
"Lemme see." You demanded, resting your hand affectionately on the top of his head. He looked up at you with a little smile and those eyes ringed with eyeliner, before returning his eyes to the screen to click around a few times.
Your eyes widened in interest when he pulled up the post. It was extremely plain, he "didn't have time" for his blog, though you knew he was kinda terrified what people thought of it, and just didn't want anyone to think he was trying. You knew he definitely was, though, you'd seen the focused way his teeth tugged at his bottom lip when his fingers flew across the keyboard.
It was just a picture of you, one you recognized being from last weekend when you'd been getting ready to go out at his house. You were set up in the bathroom, makeup cluttering every inch of the smooth white countertop and the back of the toilet, too. Hair pulled back so it was out of your way, face intently focused as you put your lashes on. It was a cute pic, even if you weren't all the way ready, you let it slide. You could even see a little sliver of Rodrick in the pic, reflected in the mirror when he'd leaned against the doorframe to take it. You remember turning around and waving him off with a laugh, but he sat with you in the bathroom while you finished your makeup, watching you from the edge of the tub with admiring eyes.
Your eyes caught on the title of the post, which just read "glitter glue drinker" and that made you laugh loudly. A couple of his friends comments only made it worse, one of them reading: "she lookz like it." Rodrick's face was lit up with glee as he watched you laugh, effectively giving your stamp of approval, and he was visibly relieved.
"That's cute." You offered him, leaning down over his shoulder to kiss his cheek, though he kept you there long enough to snag a longer kiss on the lips, and he tasted like a tootsie roll.
content warnings: 18+!!!! Gets quite smutty, fluffy, jack abbot invented YEARNING, age gap!!!, no use of Y/N
notes: i know this one sounds kinda depressing but i promise its fun and funny and flirty and it’s my favorite one ive ever written!! also debating on making an ao3 account - should i?
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
Jack Abbot was unfortunately intimately familiar with the 5 Stages of Grief. Depression, Bargaining, Denial, Anger, Acceptance.
He grieved his leg at the ripe age of 31 - courtesy of an IED in the desert of Afghanistan.
He began grieving his late wife the following year at 32 - courtesy of an arrogant, misogynistic emergency medicine resident.
At 33, he grieved the life he thought he was going to have while he started a new one. No longer a husband, but a widow. No longer an army medic, but an Emergency Room attending at Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center.
Sometimes when he would come back to the empty home he bought at 34, the ghosts of that life were louder than any silence he thought he could drown out with the police scanner.
Jack Abbot knew the 5 Stages of Grief like the back of his hand.
In hindsight, he didn’t know how he didn't realize the 5 stages in which he fell in love with her were quite similar. A mirror of his grief refracted through a lens of unconditional love.
depression
If someone would have asked Jack at the time, he wouldn't have admitted he was depressed. He truly didn't think he was.
He didn't need therapy to deal with his trauma. His wife passed away a decade ago. His leg, or lack thereof, the constant reminder of the time he gave up while he had her on this earth - was physically healed. As much as it was going to be anyways. So therefore he was mentally healed. As much as he thought he was going to ever be anyways.
He'd been running on autopilot. It carried him from but mostly to the emergency room at PTMC. It's what made him stop at the unfamiliar sight of Gloria in his ED. This was why he didn't work the day shift. He never wanted to deal with all of the bureaucratic administrative bullshit. The only business Jack Abbot was ever interested in was the one of saving lives. Gloria hadn't even opened her mouth and Jack already knew that Robby was going to owe him one.
"Dr Abbot! Wonderful timing. I have a residency interview waiting in Robby's office for you."
Now Robby really owed him one. "Doesn't Robby usually..." Jack scratched at the back of his neck, still confused as to why Gloria had involved herself, and now him, in a residency interview, "...facilitate those?"
Gloria gave a curt nod before glancing around them, as if checking to make sure they would not be overheard. She lowered her voice as she spoke, "Yes but I specifically scheduled this one when I knew you were covering. She is the best candidate we have ever had and probably ever will. I cannot risk Robby running her off."
Right. The Adamson of it all. There was a joke in there somewhere about Jack being considered the stable one in the ED. He guessed he must be. He had become fairly good at presenting an even keeled, calm front. He still had kind of felt like a mess in every other area of his life but the ED was the one place he was the furthest from one. It's where he solved the mess instead of becoming it.
She shoved a printed resume into Jack's hands before she was off. Back up to her ivory tower. He took a look as he strode over to Robby's office. Full ride to Stanford for both her undergraduate and medical degree.
For once, he agreed with Gloria. What the hell did this candidate want to do with PTMC?
He asked her as much as he sat across the desk from her, brow furrowed in genuine curiosity. Residency interviews usually went one of two ways. The candidate was either far too cocky or so nervous they barely got a complete sentence out.
She struck the balance. She was confident. More so than some of his residents who had been out on the floor that day. She wore a dark gray wool sweater and maxi skirt set. The monochrome was only cut by the deep maroon of her belt, tights, heels, and purse. Her long hair was slicked back into a simple pony tail and her makeup was minimal, if any.
It wasn't the typical look of a medical student on a residency interview. Still completely appropriate, but far less stuffy and much more self assured.
Jack wouldn't know good style if it had slapped him in the face but he did know what hers revealed to him about herself. It was the kind of style that someone who knew who they were had. Who had spent time getting to know what they liked. Whether it was what they were reading, listening to, watching, or doing. Her style wasn’t an afterthought but she carried it with a quiet confidence that let everyone know she was not overcompensating for anything either.
It was a demeanor and style that was derivative of having a life outside of medicine - which was quite uncommon for medical students and residents alike. It was completely foreign to Jack. It intrigued him. She intrigued him.
Her body language was relaxed but respectful. One leg crossed over the other as she leaned back into the wooden chair that was probably older than she was, hands clasped in her lap. Jack doubted her heart rate had reached over 65 the whole time she had been in there.
She took a beat to answer his question which also intrigued Jack. She was not rushing to answer just to fill space. She seemed to be comfortable with the time silence gave her to craft intentional responses. Why PTMC?
A ghost of a smile that looked like it might be haunted by one appeared on her face, "My family is here."
"That's it?"
"Do you want the practiced professional answer that every other interviewer has gotten or do you want the real one?"
Jack bit back a grin at her bluntness. Ignored the stirring in his stomach that made him feel special that she may share something about herself with him that she hadn't with anyone else. He tells himself to Get. A. Grip.
"I am sure the absolute best residencies in the country are foaming at the mouth to land you and you want to come here because of your family? Give me the real reason." He let his smirk slip through as he crossed his arms over his broad chest, "I'm a captive audience after all."
The airy laugh that he got out of her almost knocked him out of his seat. What was wrong with him? He had a feeling she didn't just hand out a laugh as ethereal as that one. That she was not the kind of woman who just giggled because it was the part of the conversation where she'd been socialized to appease the man speaking that he was funny. She seemed far too smart for that. For probably everyone in the building. For him, especially.
"I have already been away in California for eight years. I could have fifty years left with my dad and my brothers and my sister in laws and my nieces and nephews or they could be gone next week," she uncrossed and recrossed her legs before continuing. Didn't rush before speaking again, "I don't want to build an unguaranteed future alone and then have no one to share it with when I get there. I wanna spend time with them now."
Jack's adam's apple bobbed in his throat. His eyes burned as he fought to hold back tears. It must have been some kind of cruel joke that right then his phantom limb pain wanted to shoot up through his thigh. Like a reminder of the time he spent wasting while he had his wife alive.
He had joined the army to become a doctor debt free. Then he had spent all of their marriage overseas, saving money for a life they never even got to spend together. He had borrowed time from the future that didn't even exist. And all he had to show for it was ironically - more money - monthly life insurance, disability, and veteran affairs checks. Oh and one and a half legs.
He blinked rapidly. He was not about to cry at work. Nevertheless while he was conducting a residency interview. He diverted the conversation away from himself, "You didn't mention your mom."
"She died. When I was a teenager, about ten years ago. After coming here actually," She coughed out a dry laugh that sounded like she dragged it up through her throat, kicking and screaming. Awfully different to the one Jack had floated out of her moments prior, "She was pregnant and they sent her away without so much as a full consultation. Just chalked her symptoms up to pregnancy and she died from an aortic dissection later that night."
Jack wanted to vomit at the almost exact recountance of how his wife had died. He was so focused on not emptying his breakfast onto Robby's desk that a tear slipped - the first in probably years.
"Oh, Dr Abbot. I didn't mean to make you emotional. I can go back to the professional answer any time you want." Another scoffed laugh, her eyes full of compassion but no tears, "Trust me - it's probably easier for both of us."
Jack really never talked about his late wife anymore. He liked to tell himself he was healed. He most definitely didn't talk about it at work. But he found himself wanting to then - with her, "No it's just - my late wife - she died the same way, about a decade ago. I was away on a stupid bachelor party trip and she didn't want to worry me so she didn't call me about it and then she, uh, never called again."
"Jesus - I am so sorry, Dr Abbot."
He noticed, appreciated, the way her head didn't tip and her eye contact didn't waver. She was not expressing her condolences out of pity or not understanding but of exactly the opposite. She knew exactly how he felt. He ignored the way his heart jumped out of his chest at the thought.
God, Robby really owed him one.
"Thank you - I am sorry about your mom. I am just impressed you still wanna work here. I could never work in the hospital that did that to my wife. The couple years after she passed - I could barely work here."
"Well, the other option was becoming one of those weirdos who swears off doctors and hospitals and science."
Jack tilted his chin at her in consideration, rubbed at the scruff there, and let out a sputtering laugh, "Are you sure that is the only other option?"
He pulled another light chuckle from her and he exhaled. Truly exhaled. For the first time in maybe ten years - like he had been underwater for so long he had forgotten what fresh air felt like.
"This is my way of letting her live on through me. To do something about what happened to her rather than using it as an excuse to sulk through life. I wanna see life as something that comes from me and not at me."
She picked at the lining of her purse that was perched in her lap. The first sign of potentially any nerves. The first time he realized that he was getting the true her. Not the front she must put up for interviews. It didn't seem much different - just a little more vulnerable.
Jack could talk. So much so he had a reputation for it in the ED. He was no stranger to being on the receiving end of a 'God do you ever shutup?' so he was a bit stunned that she had managed to shock him into silence.
He hugged his crossed arms closer to his chest as if that was even possible and just stared.
She cracked a smile, back to what was seemingly her calm and confident self, "Too esoteric for a residency interview?"
"Oh no. Not at all. I just..." Jack couldn't seem to find the right words to tell her that she had just reframed his entire outlook on his life and his grief in one sentence so he settled on, "...I uh never really thought of it that way."
"Me neither. But I have an excellent therapist."
"I will have you know, if you choose to do your residency here, I do not make it a habit of trauma dumping on my residents like I did on you today."
"I think I started that, Dr Abbot. But since I made you cry - does that mean I am in?"
That earned a genuine cackle out of Jack. A cackle. A kind of sound he wasn't even sure he was capable of making anymore but the bright, beaming smile she reciprocated made him want to do it for the rest of his life.
Maybe he owed Robby one.
Jack tried not to think about her as he got the old laptop down from his hallway closet later that night. He may never even see her again. He ignored the fact that that thought made him sick to his stomach.
Tried not to think about how Gloria had never ever personally been the residency candidate welcome committee until today while he googled 'Veteran, disabled, widower therapists near me'.
He tried not to think about how she looked the best anyone has ever looked in that emergency department as he murmured to himself, "God, that's a depressing search."
He tried not to think about how she had the most beautifully intriguing brain of anyone who had ever stepped foot into that hospital, potentially his entire life, as he booked his very first therapy appointment.
bargaining
"Remember when you told me you didn't make it a habit of trauma dumping on your residents?"
Jack didn't even have to look at her to know there was a huge smirk plastered on her face. She had been his resident for a little over a year. Although, it had taken much less time for the ribbing to start.
"Telling you about how Shen won't stop calling me 'Unc'," Jack had put air quotes around the Gen Z slang term as he continued, "is not trauma dumping."
"You seem pretty traumatized by it. You've only brought it up 85 times this shift."
"And to think - I was gonna ask you to a research breakfast after this." Jack nudged his shoulder gently with hers, tried his best to stave off the grin that played on his lips.
"And to think! You're going to anyway, old man." She nudged him right back, a little less gentle causing him to turn his shoulders and gaze towards her, feigning shock and offense.
That got the exact reaction he was fishing for - a big bright smile, loud laugh, and a second or so more of eye contact that he wouldn't have had a reason to justify otherwise.
What can he say? When it came to her - he was greedy.
"You two! I would prefer to get the hand off completed before you're both back on shift tonight. I swear you're like young and dumb medical students after shift sometimes." Dana chastised them but not without a hint of a smile.
Dana had known Jack for over ten years at this point. Seen him in a lot of different moods; but never as happy as this.
"Well, I'm young." She emphasized the 'I' with a smirk and pointed the finger that she had aimed at herself over at Jack, "He is just being dumb."
Jack barked a laugh. A sound that was no longer so foreign to him. No longer so foreign to everyone else in the ED.
He didn't miss the knowing glance Dana shot his way, a grin fighting to appear on both of their faces. He did his best to give Dana a look that said that he wasn't hopelessly infatuated with his resident. That he enjoyed spending time with each of his residents equally. He was not entirely sure he convinced Dana. He wasn't even good at convincing himself.
He could take her to breakfast if it was to help her with her research. It was most definitely not to see how many times he could pull a laugh from her. Bonus points if he got a nose scrunch or an accidental spit take of the orange juice that was already half way down her throat.
He could bring her a coffee every shift if it was to ensure his best resident was energized for her shift. It was not because of the way she looked up at him with her bright, big eyes through her lashes and said "Thank you, Dr Abbot!" like it was some sort of melody. If he started buying coffee for Dr Ellis and Dr Shen as well to make his affection less obvious - what was the difference?
He could let her do a pericardiocentesis way before anyone else her year probably should have if it was to improve her education. And because she truly was ready. He'd have bet his entire career that she was better at it than all of the surgical residents upstairs. Which meant it wasn't so totally obvious that he was staring at her in awe all of the time. Because when she was doing shit like that - everyone was. Being able to guide her hands through a procedure was just a bonus. Even if there were latex gloves between them.
He could bring extra food to shift, knowing she was going to eat half of it, if it was because he wanted to ensure his best resident was properly fueled and empowered to do her job to the best of her ability. He kept it to himself that he drove to a grocery store thirty minutes out of his way to get the specific kind of candy he knew she liked.
He could drive her home if it was to ensure his smartest resident got home safe. It was totally not because he got to spend more time with her. He definitely didn't take the long way to her apartment and he went exactly the speed limit because that was what was safe. Not because it meant extra time with her. No one else needed to know that he went at least fifteen over when she wasn't in his passenger seat.
No one also needed to know that he bought an aux cord just for her because he loved to hear what kinds of songs she liked. He definitely didn't have a playlist compiled of them all that he listened to at home now instead of his police scanner.
denial
She had been his resident for a bit over two years now and the ED was Q word tonight. No one had said it but the combined time they had all spent fucking around at the hub proved it.
Shen was on his fifth tiktok trend of the night. He thought he was being inconspicuous about the amount of time he had been spending with Javadi but his new found interest in the social media app gave him away. Jack couldn't really say anything to his new junior attending about the dangers of falling for someone that you were the superior to without blowing up his own soft spot for a certain resident.
So Shen was on his fifth tiktok trend of the night and he had roped her in.
Jack thought he knew all of her secret talents by now but he watched from behind her, amused and hands tugging at his stethoscope looped behind his neck, as Shen played various Britney Spears songs to see how quickly she could guess them.
She hadn't needed more than 3 seconds for any of them.
Then they were busy for an hour or so. A couple drunk twenty somethings with some concussions and laceration repairs - nothing too crazy. And then they were back at central. The quiet was interrupted by a gasp from Dr Shen. Which was quickly followed by Dr Ellis looking over his shoulder at his phone and then both of them dying laughing.
"I don't even want to know." Jack threw his hands up in surrender.
"Oh, yes you do! You're going viral for being hot!" Shen exclaimed.
"I don't know what viral means if it’s not to do with an infection and I already know that I’m hot thank you very much." Jack didn't even glance up from his charting as he spoke.
“For being hot and being hopelessly in love.” Ellis clarified.
That got Jack's attention. He got up, snatched Shen's phone out of his hand as he muttered, “I am not hopelessly -" he didn't even want to give the accusation a real denial to validate it, "-let me see that.” He pressed play.
It was ironic that he had been telling himself he needed to start schooling his expressions when it came to her when the same dopey smile and enamored eyes he had going in the video were on his face as he watched the video.
He knew Shen and Ellis were monitoring his reaction closely but he couldn't help but let out a laugh at the part of the video where he had guessed the song 'Lucky' before she had.
She had whipped around in the spinning chair so fast - her hair had stuck to her glossed lips, "How the hell do you know that?!" she asked surprised, a wide smile taking over her face.
Jack shuffled around in his wide stance, large hands going from the ends of his stethoscope to clasped behind his back, his chin tilted up at her as he spoke with a drawl, "I let you play your music when I drive you home, don’t I?”
In the moment, Jack had missed what was caught on camera - the knowing smirk Dr Ellis had leveled at Dr Shen off camera as she said, “Oh, I’m sure you do.”
Jack's rebuttal hadn't even had a chance to leave his mouth before Shen and Ellis were reading the comments aloud, taking turns as they went.
"WHOOOO DAT IN THE BACK!?"
"Paging Doctor biceps in the back"
"Close enough. Welcome back Lexie grey and mark sloan"
"What in the greys anatomy"
"Do the two doctor sexys know that age gap august is upon us"
"If she doesn’t wanna bite on his biceps I will"
"Does that girl know she has 30mins to claim that man before I do"
"He does not play about her!"
"A man who YEARNS is a man who EARNS"
"Dr sexy is down bad for the other doctor sexy"
"Where is this emergency room at … for research purposes"
"I want Doctor sexy to look at me like that"
"Okay, I don’t look at her like anything!" Jack hissed low in a whisper, hoping to a god he did not believe in that she was still busy with the drunk college kids and was not hearing any of this.
"Well, you definitely don’t look at me like that." Shen laughed, sucking on his Dunkin straw even though nothing had been left in his cup for hours.
"I look at you all the same." Jack deadpanned. He sat back down at his computer. An attempt to get back to charting. But not before taking a sweep of the ED and making sure she was nowhere within earshot. Not that Shen and Ellis were making it easy with their hysterics.
"Bro - if you looked at me like that I would call HR. She's just into it."
“Into what?" She asked monotonically, not even looking up from her iPad as she approached the rest of the night shift crew at the hub.
“Nothing!” Jack barely got out, grumbling and exasperatedly running a hand through his silver curls as he got up from his computer and went to chairs.
He didn't miss the raise in her brows as she looked at Shen and Ellis, silently asking 'What the hell is up with him?'.
He couldn't tell you the last time he voluntarily went out to chairs but he was hoping his fair Irish skin would be finished betraying him with the pinkness in his cheeks, ears, and neck by the time he made his way back to central.
He knew it was only a matter of time before Shen and Ellis showed her the video and he did not want to be there when they did.
So he missed the flush in her cheeks, ears, and neck that had been identical to his.
And her slightly embarrassed, definitely exaggerated, "You guys stop - he is literally our boss."
"But you're not not into it?" Ellis had pushed. If anyone was getting it out of her, it was Ellis. They had been attached at the hip since their residency began.
"It doesn't matter if I'm into it. He is our boss! He is not into it."
"God, for someone so smart you are so stupid sometimes."
Jack had waved Shen off when Shen had come out to chairs to tell him about that interaction, practically vibrating with excitement. Or maybe that was the caffeine. Jack had parroted her, tried to make a joke of it all. Said something along the lines of, "I know you guys like to pretend otherwise but I am your boss."
But once Jack was home, black out shades drawn and snug in his bed, he couldn't wipe the huge, stupid grin off of his face.
anger
Jack was not an angry man. Never had been. Very few things on this earth made him genuinely angry - one of them being the annual hospital gala. Every year they were trotted out as show ponies to raise money that the ED would never even see. You can't save patients with empty compliments and an open bar.
He had managed to avoid it the past couple years - always worked instead. So when he saw he wasn't scheduled to work the night of this year's gala, he printed out the schedule and marched right over to Robby's workstation to rectify what was surely a mistake.
"Why am I not scheduled to work tomorrow? I didn't even check the schedule until now because I just assumed that my friend would do me a solid because he owes me one-"
"Because you have to go to the gala, man." Robby interrupted Jack's rambling.
"What part of 'you owe me one' did you not understand?"
"Did you happen to see who else is not scheduled?"
Neither of them had to say anything for them both to know who's name Jack was scanning that piece of paper for.
Robby clapped him on the back, satisfied with a smile on his face as he walked away, "Go home and rest, Romeo. You got a big date tomorrow night - you’re welcome!"
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
So again, Jack was not an angry man. Never had been. But he had decided to add a new line item to the short list of things that made his blood absolutely boil. The thing being every single young, conventionally attractive, rich, tall surgeon working in his hospital hitting on his resident at this stupid fucking gala.
They hadn't even made it to dinner yet and he was sure she'd been approached over ten times. Jack had to step away after the most recent one - under the guise of getting a drink.
Jack unfortunately was very familiar with this particular suitor of hers. She was well into her last year of her residency and it had not been an uncommon occurrence for Dr Harvard from cardio thoracic surgery to make any and every excuse to come down and consult when she was on shift.
Jack made a conscious effort to forget his name. Shen and Ellis loved to remind him of it.
They'd tease him about it. They'd say that there was a plus side to it all. They never had to wait long on a cardiac surgery consultation anymore. But selfishly, Jack would wait fucking years if it meant he was chatting her ear off instead of Mr Harvard.
Jack wasn't naive. She was practically glowing. She always was. She always looked beautiful. Before tonight, he basically only ever saw her with no makeup on, hair a mess, wearing hospital issued scrubs and he still thought she was the most gorgeous person alive.
But tonight. Tonight, Jack was surprised he did not end up as a patient in his ED the first moment he had laid eyes on her. Her hair was carefully curled, framing her perfect face that was painted with just the right amount of makeup. Her lashes were more prominent than usual, her cheeks more flushed and her lips a bit more pink and a lot more glossy.
And then her dress. That damn dress. It was vintage because of course it was. Of course, she found time to vintage shop on top of the grueling hours she put in at the ED. Even in her last year of residency, she had never lost sight of being her own person both in and outside of work.
The dress reminded Jack of something from the prohibition era - celebratory. He was trying not to be so obvious in his celebration of how the structured seams of the powder blue silk created a corset shape that wasn't too tight for a work function but definitely was tight enough to have his imagination wandering.
With delicate lace panels towards the bottom of her dress and the swooping off the shoulder neckline with draped cap sleeves - Jack was being a sap but she looked like she had stepped out of a romance movie. Or off of a runway.
It was the kind of dress that reminded him of when they first met. He loved getting glimpses of her like this. Of who she was outside of the ED.
She had said she found the dress at a second hand shop on consignment. After that he had spent most of their evening dreaming about what it would be like to hold her hand and watch her shop.
Get to see the process of how she selected what she liked. Get to bring her hand up to his lips and kiss it - knowing that he was one of those things that she liked. Maybe even loved. And of course, buy everything her gaze lingered on even when she insisted not to. Especially then.
So Jack was not naive. He knew she was absolutely, positively stunning. He knew even beyond that - she was kind and funny and fucking whip smart. Smarter than anyone he had ever met and in so many different ways. If he could move into her brain - he would. So he was not naive enough to think other men wouldn't flirt with her. They would be fools not to. He just wished he could be the reason they wouldn't.
He sipped his old fashioned and did his best to pretend like he was looking anywhere but at her and Mr Harvard. He can't imagine that he was very successful. A ding from his phone took him out of his misery.
From Shen: Yo - i know you hate that gala shit. Kinda bogus robby made you go. Thought you guys were friends. Anyway, can you come help? Ellis has got a hot date. Or so she says
Jack had never been more thankful to receive a weird text from Shen in his life. He replied with a quick 'On my way' before taking one last glance over at her.
He sighed at the sight of her digging through her purse for something. He couldn’t see her expression but he sure could see Mr Harvard's. Dude couldn’t wipe the grin off of his face. Jack wished he could do it for him.
Okay chill, he reminded himself. As much as he wanted to, he figured it would be rude to interrupt her to say goodbye. She probably didn’t want her old attending cock blocking her anyways.
Jack set his half finished drink on the bar counter along with a $20 tip and turned on his good heel. He had his hands on the cold metal of the event venue's door when he heard his favorite voice behind him.
"Where the hell do you think you're going?"
Jack turned to see her and the sight made him melt. Arms crossed over her chest, brow furrowed, and lips in a stern line that was slowly slipping into a pout.
"Shen and Ellis need a cover."
"And when were you planning on telling me?" Her hands moved to her hips. Jack's hands flexed at his sides. All he wanted to do was kiss the sass out of her. But he couldn't. She was still his resident. And probably not even interested in him.
"You seemed busy. We haven’t even eaten dinner yet." Jack's response earned an eye roll out of her.
Before he could even blink, her arm threaded under his own - grabbing his bicep, "I'm coming with you."
Who was Jack to argue with that?
"How'd you get out of your conversation with Mr Harvard?"
Another dramatic eye roll. He loved it. Then the prettiest little smile he had ever seen.
"Told him my mean, scary boss said we had to leave."
He couldn't decide his opinion regarding the short walk to his SUV in handicapped parking. One part of him was thankful. He wouldn't be shocked if he had burnt holes in his suit jacket from the way his skin had heated up under her feather light touch. The blush was sure to creep up into his cheeks any moment now.
On the other hand, he could walk for miles if it meant she was touching him the whole way. She stopped at his passenger car door and turned to look at him.
"Mean, scary boss huh?" was all Jack could get out while he was under her gaze. It sounded like he had dragged his words through gravel on their way out. But with the way her eyes still shone in the moonlight and the fact that they were solely trained on his own - he was lucky he managed to get any words out at all.
"The scariest." she winked. She fucking winked. Jack had never been more thankful that he had metal for a leg because if he didn't - his legs were sure to have wobbled out from beneath him right then.
His hands were stuffed into his slack pockets. He didn't trust himself for them to be anywhere else. Her hands had given him a moment of reprieve. No longer lightly squeezing his bicep. But now they trailed up his chest, stopping to pretend to fix his tie even though Jack knew it was perfect. Military habit. Didn't matter - she could do whatever the hell she wanted if it involved touching him.
His breath hitched at her touch. He hoped she didn't notice.
"He cleans up nice though - makes up for all the mean and scary."
"Did your mean, scary boss mention you look beautiful tonight." Jack kept his hands in his pockets but took an experimental step forward. Was this really happening? Was she really hitting on him?
It was almost as if she had heard his inner monologue. Wanted to make her intentions clear as she looped her arms around Jack's neck and absentmindedly threaded her fingers through the curls at the nape there.
Ever since she had started fiddling with his suit, her eyes had dropped to anywhere but his face. Typical Jack would have dipped his head, forced eye contact but Jack right now was just trying to stand up right.
Her gaze snapped to him and this time he hadn't even tried to hide the palpitation in his heart or his breathing, "No." was all she said. Barely a whisper but Jack heard her loud and clear.
His hands immediately fell to her hips. He filed away the way she seemed to sink into his grip. Exhaled a little. Like it was muscle memory from a past life.
Her fingers circled their way higher up onto his head, fully tugging on his curls and lightly scratching at his scalp. Jack had to bite back a groan as he squeezed at her hips and pressed her fully back onto his unopened car door.
"Jack." She murmured out low somewhere between a moan and an airy breath, head tilted back in pleasure at the pressure of his fingers on her hips. Jack was fucked now that he knew what his name sounded like falling off her lips without inhibition.
The expanse of her neck now available to him was like a siren song. The past four years had felt like a siren song and he couldn't help himself any longer. One of his hands found the back of her head, gently cradling it back up for her to look at him. His other hand rubbed at her jaw in sweeping strokes of his thumb.
Neither of them could rip their gaze from the others' lips - their panting chests just a mere centimeter apart. He was finally going to do it. He was finally going to kiss her.
Until he wasn't.
Until a loud bang of the door opening broke them apart. A slew of hospital administrators spilled out behind it looking for their next smoke break. Had Jack mentioned that he fucking hated the annual hospital gala?
They flew off each other at what would have been a rather impressive speed if it hadn't felt so agonizing. What was Jack thinking? That he could make out with his resident against his car like they were a horny teenage couple while all of the people in the building a few feet away from them could have her fired for it in a heartbeat? He had to be better. At least until her residency was over with.
He had to get it together - for the both of them it seemed like. Jack cleared his throat and ran a hand over his stubble to hide the smile threatening to take over his face at the realization that she had wanted to kiss him. The way she had said his name with so much...want. Need, even. Maybe this thing wasn't so one sided after all.
He got out of his own head just in time to stop her closing of the passenger door. He wrapped his hand around the top of the door, held it open and waited for her to look up at him after she had buckled up. But the buckle clicked and her gaze stayed trained on her lap.
"Hey." He whispered softly. They both knew the eye contact he was seeking. She slowly turned her head in his direction, gazing up at where he was standing in front of her.
"You look absolutely breathtaking. You always do."
She sucked in a breath and then there she was - big bright smile, shoulders no longer slumped, no more fiddling with her purse strings just to avoid the space between them. She was back to herself.
"Just for that I'll order pizza to the hospital." His favorite.
"Thank you." He probably should have shut the door by now. Should have probably already been on their way to the hospital. But he couldn't stop fucking staring at her. What's new?
"Don't thank me. I still have your card in my DoorDash account." She giggled and all Jack could get out was good before he shut her door.
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
They ate their pizza in their gown and tux at the hub with Ellis and Shen.
Ellis raised the polaroid camera that Dana kept at the hub desk and signaled for them to get together for a photo. Jack hooked two fingers under her rolling stool and tugged her over into his side.
"Woah! Old man still has moves!"
Jack ignored Shen as he wrapped his arm over her collarbone from behind her, pulling her closer. Her head instinctively leaned toward his and her fingers delicately held his wrist as they smiled for Ellis's camera.
Jack didn't miss the look Ellis had given her. Maybe he was delusional or maybe she had gotten her best friend Ellis's advice on making a move on her attending at the gala and now Ellis was checking in on the results.
Jack also didn't miss the way her cheeks heated up and the subtle shake of her head at Ellis. As if to signal that they would talk about it later. Probably, when Jack was out of earshot.
Shen tried to get them to pose like they were going to prom. When they both refused citing unprofessionalism, Shen threw a bit of a hissy fit. Mumbling something along the lines of "Oh, now we are being professional!"
Ellis settled on writing ‘Gala Girlies' as the caption for their polaroid before taping it onto the hub counter with the rest of the pictures that had accumulated over the years. This one was definitely Jack's new favorite.
He knew exactly what Robby was going to say when he saw it tomorrow morning, “You owe me one, brother."
He was so fucked.
acceptance
Jack was bored. He never thought he'd say that but this hospital without her was straight up boring with a capital B. He worked here without her for ten years and now - the ten days of PTO she had taken before her first day as a junior attending - felt like the longest of his life. And he was only on day 6.
He wasn't even supposed to be there right now. He had come in after a Tactical EMS job gone bad. His buddy had already gone up to surgery. Before Jack could leave, Robby had roped Jack into joining him on the new day shift attending, Dr Al-Hashimi's, welcome tour.
He was waiting on a text from her. She was spending the day with her family and then she and Jack were supposed to go watch the fireworks together - alone. It was the Fourth of July after all. He had it all planned. He had practiced how he was going to profess his feelings to her in the mirror like a dork more times than he cared to admit. He had long accepted that he was in love with his resident. Now his colleague. He could work with that.
He checked his phone again. No luck. He ignored Robby's inquisitive glance. Jack had never been so interested in his phone like he had been today.
They stood at the hub as Robby droned on and on about day shift procedures that Jack was so thankful not to have to know too much about. Jack just admired the polaroids on the desk in front of them. He was still plotting a way to inconspicuously steal the one of him and her from the gala for his wallet but it had become a fan favorite in the past few months.
Dr Al-Hashimi directed her next question to Jack, pulling him out of his thoughts. She held up his second favorite polaroid with a raised brow, "Am I going to have the pleasure of meeting..." Dr Al-Hashimi squinted to read the writing below the picture, "...Abbot's Angels?"
Jack couldn't help but laugh. The photo had been taken over a year ago. Shen had begged him to take it. Handed the camera over to Jack as he maneuvered himself between the two girls. Both her and Ellis's backs to Shen. All three of them holding up finger guns to their lips with faux serious expressions.
As if her ears were ringing, Dr Ellis appeared behind Jack at the hub. Clapping him on the shoulder and extending a hand out to greet Dr Al-Hashimi, "Don't bring it up to him. He is going through withdrawals because his favorite is still out on PTO."
"Parker - I do not have favorites. You guys aren't even my residents anymore." Jack muttered in defense as he checked his phone again.
Dr Al-Hashimi clocked him, "Dr Abbot - I am good to go here and I am sure I will be seeing you. You should go. It's your day off and a holiday. I am sure you have plans."
"Yeah, what are your plans, Dr Abbot?" Ellis teased. She must have known her best friend's plans were with him for the night. Ellis was enjoying herself. Jack shot her a glare.
"I think his plans just showed up!" Robby clapped his hands together, sputtered out a laugh at the coincidence.
"Brother - I am not taking another case! I am leav-" Jack looked up from unscrewing his water bottle to follow Robby's gaze.
He spotted her mid sip and he genuinely choked on his water in a way he thought only happened in cartoons. He was ready to send Ellis out to chairs when she patted his back like she was burping a baby and suggested that there was a cooling room in North 5 if he needed it.
She was simply glowing. Wavy hair, bright eyes, sun kissed skin donning a short jean skirt and a white halter tank top that accentuated the tan lines over her collarbones left by her bikini.
"Well if it isn’t the prodigal princess of the pitt herself!" Robby goaded, grabbing a clip board and rounding the hub.
The man she was pushing in the wheelchair piped up at that, "You guys actually call her that? Seriously? I thought she was making that up. Please stop - her ego is big enough as it is."
"What do you got?" Robby asked. Jack was still staring. Who the fuck was this guy?
"Idiot male. 37 years old. Broke his ankle trying to relive his glory days coaching youth soccer practice," She was leaned over, pushing the wheelchair with all her might, "and could stand to lose a few pounds."
That pulls an almost relieved huff from Jack. Whoever this guy was - she must've not been that fond of him.
"Hey -" the man reached behind him and tugged on her hair "-my arms still work!"
Oh hell no, Jack thought. Ellis must have noticed he was about to step in and she stopped him before he could, "At ease, soldier. That is her brother."
"Well your brain clearly doesn't" she whacked him right upside the head.
Her brother imitated her, high pitched while she made a show of dramatically handing over his wheelchair to Robby so he could take him away for X-rays.
She thanked Robby as she made her way over to the hub, introducing herself to Dr Al-Hashimi and grabbing the bag of candy that Jack was offering out to her.
She looked him up and down and nodded her head at his camouflage pants, "Really? What is with the GI Jack get up? I thought you were gonna get a hobby.”
"And I thought you said you were gonna stop stealing my food."
"And I thought you said you were gonna stop buying t-shirts one size too small."
"From Walmart." Dr Ellis added.
"You guys, I told you - I do not shop at Walmart."
She giggled and gently nudged her shoulder into Ellis's, "Oh yeah Parker, how could we forget? He shops at Costco!"
"They send good coupons in the mail!" Jack defended himself
"Bro - you're a disabled, widowed veteran who makes more than half a million dollars a year. I think you can afford real clothes." Ellis deadpanned.
“Any other comments from the fashion police about my outfit?”
“Don’t threaten us with a good time.”
Jack cocked his head towards her, smirk widening. He couldn't hide how happy he was to see her. It had been a long couple of days, "And to think I was just starting to miss you."
"Just starting to!?" She raised her eyebrows in challenge, feigning offense while her eyes practically sparkled up at him. He could feel the weight of Ellis's knowing smile on them. He didn't care.
He was debating how obvious it would be for him to pull her into a hug until Dana beat him to it.
"Dr Al, you have just met one of our finest," Dana squeezed her harder, "Except you probably won't see her much because Abbot is always hogging her on nights."
She was released from Dana's grip just enough to clap a light hand on Jack's shoulder, giving him a squeeze, "He needs someone to keep him sharp in his old age."
Jack grimaced the second her hand had made contact with his shoulder and dread washed over her face. Dana fully released her now. Letting her turn all of her attention onto Jack.
“Jack…”
“I’m fine.” He avoided her probing stare and that was exactly how she knew he was not fine.
“Really?” She asked - not buying what he was selling.
“Yes!" She applied light pressure on his shoulder again and he wriggled out of her grasp with a sharp and hissed, "- ah!”
“The room right there is open. Go patch him up.” Dana pointed to the room across the hall. Shooing them in there before Jack had a chance to protest.
Jack sat on the bed as she shut the door and pulled the curtain. Her back was still turned to him as she said, "Take off your shirt."
"At least let me take you to dinner first." Jack tried to pull a laugh from her. It didn't go over well.
"Jack." She warned. Now turned toward him with her arms crossed, “What happened?”
“I was intubating in open fire and a bullet grazed my vest. I’m fine.” He shrugged as he pulled off his shirt. As if what he just said was a completely normal and frequent occurrence.
“You were shot!?” She hurried over to him, standing in between his legs as he sat on the bed.
“Shot…at."
She tilted her head at him in annoyance. Pausing her opening of the various utensils she was preparing to clean his wound.
“What?” He asked.
“Can’t you just take up tennis or golf or literally anything else? Like a normal person?”
“What fun would that be?” Jack insisted upon keeping it light. She shouldn't ever have to worry about him. That was his job.
She lathered some kind of ointment onto his open wound that was on the front of his chest, right above his collar bone. Jack was too distracted by how close they were to care and see what kind.
“There is nothing fun about me coming to work one day and finding out you’re dead because you wanted an adrenaline rush.”
“That isn’t gonna happen.”
“You don’t know that. You think you’re invincible and you’re not.”
“Is that an old joke?”
“Jack-“ her voice cracked and Jack was immediately on his feet, cupping her face in his hands.
“Woah, woah honey okay - I thought we were kidding. I’m fine.” He cooed, one hand stroked her cheek bone making sure not one tear fell while the other steadied her at her hip as she stood between his legs.
“Look at me." He tilted his chin down while he tilted hers up, holding her gaze with his own, "I’m fine. And I’m not going anywhere."
“I won’t survive you dying, Jack. I can't.” Her voice sounded wrecked as her chin wobbled. Jack felt horribly responsible. She wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him into a tight hug.
He wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer. Naturally, like they had been in this position a million times before. He murmured into the side of her hair, “Okay forget the SWAT thing. Although, you should’ve seen me earlier in my full uniform I looked pretty sick”
Jack huffed a sigh of relief as he felt her laugh vibrate through him. He pulled her back with his hands on her shoulders to get another good look at her, "There's my girl."
She wiped a sniffle with the back of her hand and lightly pushed him back down to a seat. His hands never left her. Just slid down her body until he rested them on the outsides of her upper thighs - a safe distance away from the hem of her jean skirt.
She worked in silence for a moment until Jack piped back up, “I’ll pick up tennis or golf like a normal person. I promise.”
“You don’t have to do that, Jack. I just want you to have a little more regard for your life okay? Can you please just do that for me?”
“I can’t think of anything I wouldn’t do for you.” Jack didn't even think that was an exaggeration.
“Except for wearing the correct size shirt.”
He teasingly pinched her leg and she swatted at his good shoulder, laughing. She was done helping him but they hadn't moved. Neither of them really wanted to.
“That’s for you too. Don’t think I don’t see you staring at my biceps.”
Her eyebrows rose in faux surprise as she dragged a hand down his freckled arm.
“Oh you wanna talk about staring? I must have picked that up from someone.”
“This is a teaching hospital.”
“Could’ve mistaken it for a staring one.”
“Come on - you’re always performing medical miracles while looking like that. I can’t help it. Cut a guy some slack.” Jack's hands felt like they were on fire, practically kneading her thighs. God, she really had to wear this skirt today of all days.
“You’re a flirt, you know that?”
“Only with you.”
They had about a second to jump apart at the sound of a knock on the door before the curtain was pulled back to reveal Dr Al-Hashimi.
Jack rubbed at the back of his neck. Both him and her were looking anywhere but each other. Jack wasn't planning on getting excited but he was thankful he had placed his shirt over his lap to cover himself now that they were no longer alone.
Dr Al-Hashimi cleared her throat, obviously picking up on the fact that she had interrupted something, "Sorry to uh, interrupt. But my number, Dr Abbot. Like we discussed. For that date.”
Dr Al-Hashimi handed Jack a piece of paper and then turned to her, "You have a visitor from cardio thoracic surgery outside."
Jack groaned. Could Mr Harvard have any worse timing? She shot Jack a glare and stepped outside. Jack could see the shadow of Mr Harvard who he knew was down here pretending he'd have something to do with her brother's ankle surgery just to flirt.
He caught the end of her dismissing Mr Harvard's valiant attempt at being her knight in shining armor. Jack smiled to himself as he made his way back to the hub to catch up with her. He was explaining a procedure to Whitaker as he walked, "You're gonna have to start with your finger. And then slowly over a few minutes as the wetness gathers, go deeper. All the way to the back of the knuckle."
Whitaker nodded in understanding and was on his merry way. She turned right on Jack the second he was in her vicinity.
"What the hell is your problem?!"
"Problem?" Jack asked, genuinely perplexed.
Her voice pitched down, she whispered, "Why do you have to say everything so unnecessarily slutty? You wanna ask Whitaker out too!?"
Now that - Jack was not expecting. He quirked his eyebrow up in surprise. Also in confusion.
"Ask Whitaker out? What are you-"
He was cut off by a little girl screaming her name and running right into her arms, "Look! Look! Your work is on my new soccer jersey!"
The girl couldn't be older than five. Jack recognized the little girl as her niece from photos she had shown him. He noticed who must have been her sister in law a few feet away, talking to Robby presumably about discharge instructions for her brother as he awaited surgery that he would probably have next week once the swelling went down.
"What are you talking about? Lemme see that." She plucked the jersey from her niece and examined the PTMC logo on it.
Jack knew his cheeks were ruby red. He could see the gears in her head putting it all together as she stared at the small jersey with the ironed on PTMC ED patch. A couple weeks ago, she had told him offhandedly that her niece's soccer league was going to get cancelled since they had no sponsor. So Jack called up the park district and paid for it himself. Under the guise it was the PTMC ED. It was no big deal. If her niece was happy, she was happy.
She put her niece down next to her on the ground as her eyes looked up to Jack, softening, "We don't have the budget for this."
"I know. But I do."
She opened her mouth to say something but her niece cut her off, climbing into her dad's lap on his wheelchair as he, her sister in law, and Robby joined them at the hub, "Auntie, is this Dr Sexy?"
Jack's lips immediatley preened, quirking up into an amused smirk, Dr Ellis and Robby doubled over in laughter.
"No baby - this is Dr Abbot." She tried to recover, her eyes blown wide, mouth agape and her cheeks beet red. She couldn't even look at Jack.
"But you always call him Dr Sexy when you are talking to mommy. What does sexy mean?"
"OKAY-" she said loudly, still looking anywhere but at Jack. She turned her gaze on her brother as she clapped her hands together, "-it is time for you all to leave."
"Only if Dr Sexy walks us out." Her brother teased.
She groaned, putting her head in her hands as Jack wrapped an arm around her shoulders. She hid in the crook of his neck, "I am getting a new job."
"Oh no you're not."
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
Jack met her at her car after he helped her family to theirs. “Dr Sexy, huh?”
“Shut up. I'm trying to be annoyed with you and you’re making it damn hard”
“Why are you annoyed with me?” Jack steadied himself with a wide stance, crossed his arms over his chest as she turned to look at him, leaning against her car door.
“Seriously?"
Jack just raised his eyebrows back at her in question.
She mirrored his stance, crossed arms over chest, "So you go on dates now?”
“What are you talking about? Is this about tonight? If you don't want to go anymore we don't have to-”
She imitated him and Dr Al-Hashimi from earlier, "Sorry to uh, interrupt. But my number, Dr Abbot. Like we discussed. For that date.” She emphasized the word.
Jack rubbed his hand over his face, stopping at his scruff and trying to mask the smirk that was threatening to take over his face, “Are you…jealous?”
She scoffed, trying to sound nonchalant but Jack knew her too well for that, “Me? Jealous? No, Jack I just think it’s wildly inappropriate. This is our workplace.”
“Well that’s a damn shame because I didn’t ask Dr Al on a date. I’m setting her up on one. With my army buddy actually."
Her lips formed a barely there oh, "Well…now I just feel like a bitch."
Jack laughed and stepped closer, shaking his head in refute to her statement. He let his hands find purchase on her car, caging her in.
His voice came out far more groveled than expected, "But I’ve been wanting to ask you on a date for going on, oh I don’t know almost five years now, but if you think it’s so wildly inappropri-"
“I don’t!”
“You dont? But I thought-“
He earned himself an eyeroll and a stern, “Jack.”
“You just said-" He couldn't help the huge grin spreading across his face.
“I know what I said.”
“So - let me get this straight - it’s only wildly inappropriate if it’s a date with anyone but you? Is that stated somewhere in the HR handbook or-”
"God, do you ever shutup?" And then her lips were on his.
His whole body felt like it was on fire. Her hands on each side of his face, his squeezing at her hips and pressing her up against the car. Just like that night at the gala. Except this time he actually got to kiss her. He was kissing her.
His head spun at the way her fingers circled around to the nape of his neck, tugging at his curls. He cradled her jaw in one strong hand and grabbed her waist with the other, hand pushing up the white tank she had on to make contact with her bare skin. They couldn't possible get any closer but it still didn't feel close enough.
Jack didn't want to ever stop the exploration of his hands along her body. He grabbed at the flesh on the outside of her upper thigh, hiking it up slightly around his hips. She ground herself down onto his bulge and the gasp she let out was heavenly. Jack took the chance to swipe his tongue into her mouth, as she ground down again, slower this time. Jack couldn't keep his moan from tumbling out.
He pulled back ever so slightly, their lips still practically touching as their chests heaved, "Baby, where are your keys?"
"My keys? That is what you care about right now?" She went to grind on him again but Jack's hands grabbed her hips, halting her.
"If you keep doing that I am going to come in my pants in the hospital parking garage and I would much rather come somewhere else in the comfort of my own home. I've been thinking about this for a long time. I want to take my time with you."
"How long?" She asked as she slipped her keys into Jack's front pocket.
"Inappropriatley long. Now get in the car so Dr Sexy can drive us home."
"I am never gonna live that down, am I?"
"Absolutely not."
"I hate you."
Jack grabbed her chin and peppered her face with kisses, ending with one on her lips as she giggled. Kissing her hard because he could do that now, "Somehow, I am not convinced."
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
Jack's left hand flexed hard on her steering wheel. His right hand preoccupied with a steady grip on her upper thigh. Her left hand played with his curls as he drove.
"What are you thinking about?"
"How after the gala last year I went home and touched myself. Imagined my fingers were yours." Jack choked on nothing at her words.
"Jesus Christ - I am trying not to cause a mass casualty event, honey. Can you please just wait till we get home."
She groaned his name in frustration and squeezed his fingers between her thighs, trying to find friction anyway she could.
"You're that needy?"
"Yes, Jack."
"Show me then." His voice was gritty and low as he knocked her knees apart. He batted down the sun visor on her side, sliding the mirror cover up and aiming it perfectly to reflect her lap.
She whined at the loss of contact as both of his hands now gripped the steering wheel. Her eyes screwed shut and her chest lifted, breathing heavy. The way her hard nipples were peaking through her tank top was enough to make Jack scared he was going to crash the car.
"Show me how you touch yourself when you think about me. You think you can handle that for me, baby?"
His words seemed to hit her all at once. Demanding in the way it was when he was ordering people around the ED. The tone went straight to her core as she hiked her jean skirt up over her hips and slid her small lacy black thong down her legs. She stuffed it in one of the pockets of Jack's camo pants, lightly squeezing his bulge as she did. All Jack could murmur out was a hissed fuck as she angled her center to the mirror above her, giving him a perfect view of her absolutely soaked core.
"I asked you a question."
"Yes, yes I can handle it. I promise." She rushed her words out in one run on sentence, out of breath as her chest heaved.
"Good girl, baby. Show me how you touch yourself."
She nodded as she began to rub her clit, her voice shakey as she spoke, "I start like this and I think about everything you said to me that day. When you tell me good job after a prodecure or how you order everyone around or how-"
A tumbled moan falls from her lips, cutting herself off.
"Do you play with these pretty tits?" Jack reached over and gripped the nape of her neck, tugging at the string of her halter top and letting it fall. He pulled it down, her tits spilling out as he tweaked a nipple, kneading it after with his palm.
He thought she squeaked out a soft uh huh with a nod that trailed into a moan as her right hand slipped two fingers into her center. The sound was obscene as she pushed in and out, her head falling back and her chest pushing forward into Jack's hand.
"Jack!" She was getting louder now, the pace of her fingers moving quicker. The tone of her voice filled with unabashed need.
"What else, baby?"
All she could do was babble in response. Jack's hand fell from her nipples to her pussy, giving it a slap before grabbing her chin and forcing her to look at herself in the mirror, "Do you see how pretty your pussy is? What was that you said earlier? That I say everything so slutty? Look who's the slut now."
They both saw the way her pussy contracted around her two fingers at his words. The way her already dripping core somehow managed to get even more wet at the filth he was spilling.
"Oh you like when I am a little mean, don't you?"
She could barely nod, her chest hitting her chin as her breathing became more rapid the closer she inched towards her finish line.
"You wanna come for me?"
"Please." She panted. Jack smirked to himself as he grabbed her wrist, pulled her hand from her center before she could even think about finishing, and pressed her fingers into his mouth - licking them clean.
Her head lolled against the seat, she groaned his name. A mix of frustration and want as she dazedly stared at him.
"I've waited almost five years to taste you, honey. You can wait five more minutes till we are home, yeah?"
She huffed out an, "I hate you."
"Somehow, I am not convinced." He chuckled as he placed a soft kiss on the back of her hand.
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
Jack held her hand gently as he tugged her into his house. She was practically bouncing on her heels behind him. "I'm gonna shower first and then-"
"Like hell you are." She snipped. Now she was pulling him. Through his foyer and straight to his couch where she perched herself on his lap, bracketing his hips with her thighs and grinding down on his bulge that was dying to spring out of his pants.
He pushed her skirt back up her hips and rubbed her upper thighs as she rocked her bare pussy down on him, her hands steadying herself on his neck as she leaned into press her mouth to his.
Jack's chest was heaving, "Baby, I'm all sweaty and gross from TEMS."
"I couldn't care less, Jack. You might be patient enough to wait five years but I sure as hell am not. Please touch me."
"Like this?" His fingers rubbed her clit, her head falling back in relief at him finally touching her where she needed him most.
"God, you were dripping all over your car and now you're soaking my couch? Who's got you so worked up?" She gasped as Jack entered two thick fingers in her, kissing up her neck as he did. Nipping at her jaw line as he pulled her tank top down so he could swirl his mouth around one of her sensitive nipples.
She pulled his shirt off over his head, flashing him a mischevious smirk before, "Dr Harvard from cardiac surgery."
Jack's fingers stopped immediatley. She whined and writhed in his lap at the loss of contact. Jack wrapped his other hand around her neck, squeezing slightly, "I thought you were gonna be good for me?"
"I will, I will. I am." She begged. Jack didn't know what he did in a past life to get her begging like this in his lap but he was not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"Atta girl." He cooed, adding a third finger and plunging back into her tight core, "I am gonna ask you again - what's got you so worked up?"
"You, Jack! Your voice and your arms and your curls and these stupid fucking pants."
"Oh my girl likes my uniform, yeah? Is that what had you so bratty today? Want me to fuck you in it?"
"Please." she huffed. Sweat beading at the top of her forehead as she began to rock her hips, riding his fingers.
"Come for me first."
"Yeah, thats it." Jack hissed, trying hard not to imagine what it would feel like to have his cock where his fingers were. That would surely lead to an early curtain call, "That's it. My good girl."
"Fuck, Jack" She let out a shakey laugh as she came down from her orgasm, riding it out on Jack's fingers as she threaded her fingers in his hair.
"The uniform really does it for you, huh?"
She kissed him hard, "You do it for me. The uniform is just a bonus."
Jack readjusted her in his lap, pushing her legs open further over the expanse of his thick thighs. She whined at the stretch, "Come here, baby. you're doing so good for me. Wanna take my time with you."
"You can take your time with me later. I need you to fuck me now."
"Yeah? That needy, huh?"
"Yes, Jack please." She murmured as she undid the belt on his camo pants.
"You're the boss." Jack winked. He may have been her boss at work. She may have liked him bossing her around in bed. But she was the boss in every other sense of the word.
"Funny."
"Glad you think so." Jack hissed as she wrapped her hand around his hard length, preening with pre cum at the tip. She pushed his pants and his boxers down in one go, his erection immediatley slapping up against his stomach.
Jack's head fell back onto the couch as he let out a moan, her fingers rubbing the precum from his tip down his shaft and back up again. She spit into her hand and repeated the same movement. Jack thought he might come right then and there.
"Wanna ride you, please. I'm clean and have an IUD. Need to feel you."
Jack couldn’t even get words out. He was too busy trying not to come from a handjob like a horned up teenager, "Same. Mm clean, too" He managed to get out, eyes fluttering shut as another wave of pleasure wracked his body, "Fuck, baby."
She sunk down on him in an instant, relishing the stretch and sending them both into a fit of whimpered moans. Jack used one hand on her hip to guide her motions, the other rubbing up and down her back, eventually landing in her hair as he tugged her forward into a blistering kiss. Now that he knew what her lips felt like he was never gonna go long without kissing them.
"Fuck!" She rocked down hard on him again, "You feel fucking phenomenal. So tight, So. Perfect." He emphasized his praise with kisses, "Taking me so well. Like you were fucking made for me."
He took the hand from her hair and placed it on her clit, rubbing it as she started to rock quicker. He could tell she was close again. He was in danger of spilling over at any second, "You have no business being so good at this. Fuck, I'm not gonna last long baby. Fuck, look at you." Jack brought the hand from her hip up to her mouth, pushing his thumb into her mouth, moaning as she immediatley began to suck on it.
"All these years. Had a feeling you'd get off on praise. Knew you'd wanna be so good for me. Knew you'd be such a good slut just for me, yeah?"
"Yeah, please. Just for you, I promise." Jack didn't know how he had managed to keep himself from finishing with the way she was riding him. She steadied herself on his shoulders, brought herself all the way up and then slowly rocked herself back down, taking all of him and making sure he felt every fucking inch of her velvety walls.
"If you keep doing that I am not gonna last long." He managed to grunt out.
"Then don't. Come in me, please. Want you to fill me up."
Those words alone did it for Jack as he spilled his warm release into her, continuing to rub her clit. "Give me another one baby. I know you can do it. You can do anything. You're fucking brilliant. Your brilliant fucking brain. C'mon, I feel you clenching. Let go. Come on my cock, please."
She tugged hard on his hair, mixing her own release with his as she came. Panting into Jack's mouth as he whispered, "Good girl."
Jack cradled her cheek as she rode out her orgasm on his cock, whispering praise as she did. He swiped two fingers through the mix of their arousals and brought them to her mouth.
Jacks eyes watched, mesmerized, blown out with arousal as she sucked on his fingers, released them with a pop and then, "The second I saw you in that uniform I wanted to drop to my knees in the middle of the hub and suck the soul out of you."
She wrapped her arms around his neck, laying her bare chest over his and nuzzling into his neck, peppering kisses there as he scratched her back. His laugh vibrated through her, "Jesus Christ - you can't say shit like that when I'm still inside of you."
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷
He eventually gently cleaned her up. Once she agreed to finally get off of him. He had to bribe her with kisses. He didn't mind one bit. He dragged her to the shower which lead to him having to clean her up again. Again, he didn't mind one bit.
He was at the stove now. Donning only a pair of gray sweatpants as he cooked dinner and watched her pad around his kitchen in only his tshirt and some basketball shorts with probably the dopiest smile of all time on his face.
She wrapped her arms around his waist, tucking herself into his side. He used his free hand to wrap his arm around her shoulders and tugged her closer, pressing kisses into her hair. She behaved for a moment until he felt a pair of soft lips pressing kisses across the side of his chest that was accessible to her.
He turned the burner down, dropped the spoon he had been using to stir the pasta on the counter and then grabbed her hips, trapping her against his kitchen island, "You're going to make me burn dinner."
She put her finger to her lips, pretended to think about what he had to say and then with a quick kiss to his lips she muttered against them, "Mmmm, don't care!"
He dug into his pocket, unlocked his phone and put it in her hands, "Put on music. It is already hooked up to the speaker system,"
He picked her up by her hips, causing the cutest squeal he had ever heard, and plopped her down onto his counter. He rubbed a gentle thumb against her cheek, the other against her hip as he stood between her legs, "You need to eat, baby."
She grumbled a fine. She knew when it came to taking care of her - Jack would not budge. She scrolled through his Spotify - she wanted to find something both of them would like but first she was gonna stalk what he already listened to. Of course her curiosity was gonna get the better of her.
A quiet gasp fell from her lips - causing Jack to look over from his spot in front of the stove, "What?"
She turned his phone screen to him, already spotting the flush creeping up on his chest. He recognized the playlist almost immediatley. Made up of all the songs she had played while he drove her home these past couple years - simply titled with her name. There was hundreds of songs on there.
"Did you make this? Do you listen to it?"
Jack figured now was as good a time as ever to lay out all his cards onto the table. Even if he was so embarrassed he couldn't even look up from the dinner he was cooking. He spoke fast, "Would you be entirely creeped out if I told you I replaced the police scanner with it?"
"Would you be entirely creeped out if I told you I am so beyond in love with you?"
Jack's head snapped up from the dinner. He'd never moved so quickly in his life. He was back to standing in between her legs, holding her face - just staring at her with a huge smile. The same expression was being mirrored back to him. It made his heart soar.
"You do? I mean, you are?"
She laughed, "Where have you been the past couple years?”
"Waiting for you to realize that I've been hopelessly in love with you."
"Are we the dumbest smart people alive?"
"Potentially. But doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Only you. Only us." He kissed her now. Slotted his lips over hers like the perfect final piece of a puzzle. His stomach fluttered at the sensation of her fingers finding their home in his curls. He couldn't believe that this was real. That she loved him. He already knew that the astronomical amount he loved her was very, very real.
"God, I love you." Kiss, "So much." Another kiss.
"Say it again." Jack whispered against her lips, smiling like a little kid.
"I love you, Jack."
He pulled back just a bit. Just enough to murmur how much he loved her and get a good look at her face, "Remember when you were so jealous earlier?" He teased.
"I was not-" She began to deny it but Jack leveled a look at her, "I hate you!" she giggled, swatting at his shoulder that was not bandaged up.
"Somehow, I am not convinced." He preened.
"Mmmm, good." She was kissing him again. He could do this forever. He will do this forever - if he has anything to say about it.
The ding of her phone was what made him pull away. But not by much. They both looked at the cause of the disruption, Jack planting kisses up and down her neck, jaw, and chest as she unlocked her phone.
From Robby: Doing scheduling. Can you pick up a shift next Tuesday night please? Shen needs off. You'll get to see your doctor sexy🤪
They both let out a cackle. Jack took her phone and took a selfie with his middle finger up. He sent it to Robby along with a message that read, 'Stop texting my girlfriend.'
"Girlfriend, huh?"
Jack rubbed up and down her thighs as he spoke, "Figured you might think I was insane if I said wife after just one day but trust me that is part of the plan."
"What else is in the plan?”
“Maybe a kid or two? Or four? Or zero. Really as many or as little as you’ll give me. I’m just happy to be here.”
She chuckled, kissed him while lovingly stroking his face, “I like that plan.”
“Yeah?” He asked, brimming with hope.
She nodded as her phone went off again, a message from Robby flashing across the screen. Jack kissed each of her cheeks, her forehead, and then her lips before reading it out loud - sending them both into a fit of giggles.
author's note: hey! i'm back again! thanks for the love on everything so far, all the support really means the world and it's so nice to get back into the swing of writing, please enjoy another one before I burn myself out <3
word count: 2,018
warnings: sort of suggestive, domestic bliss!!, reader is suggested to be younger than him, soft jack, medical inaccuracies as alwayssss
description: a morning spent with jack after a gruelling work week. you're both super in love etc etc etc
⏾
Your entire body is warm right now. Like, the kind of warm you feel right in the bottom of your tummy when you take the first sip of tea after a long, exhausting night shift, or the kind of warm you feel when you see a shelter dog finding his forever home after years of neglect. You can tell it's the morning, because there's this stream of light coming in through the left window where you hadn't closed the blinds all the way - it stretches across your closed eyes and across your face. Those blinds are always damn closed in this room, anyways, no harm in some light sometimes.
There's also warmth coming from a weight across your waist, heavy and grounding and solid, an arm thrown over you like it fell there sometime the night before and just decided to stay there. Your cheek is smushed up against soft curls that smell like cedarwood, antiseptic and something so distinctly him it's mind-numbing. If Robby found out that Dr Jack Abbot falls asleep with his head tucked into your neck and his leg folded across yours, you'd be screwed. That's why you keep it just your little secret. And maybe giggle about it with Victoria and Trinity when you've had just a little too much during girls' night.
You blink slowly awake, well rested and giddy to see the sunlight cutting in through the blinds after a solid week of heavy rainfall across Pittsburgh. Not that you've seen much of the outside, having been stuck inside of the ER for a grilling 6 days. Remembering where you are, under navy, soft cotton bedsheets, you look down at your sleeping boyfriend and his stupidly-cute, stupidly-open lips as light snores roll past and reverberate off of your neck. You rarely get to see Jack like this - completely vulnerable and soft and boyish - light freckles adorned across his forehead and soft lines beside his eyes remind you that he is fully human. Who is actually drooling all over you, by the way.
You shift slightly, testing the grip around you to see how much you can move, and the hold around your waist tightens automatically, a splayed hand moving across your stomach that's adorned in one of his old college t-shirts that frankly has seen better days, but you insist you wear anyways. You panic for a second, thinking you've woken him so your body goes rigid. You sigh in relief when you look down at him again and see him exactly in the same place as before. He must be exhausted. It's been one of those weeks.
For someone who claims he doesn't cuddle, he's treating you like a pregnancy pillow right now.
Your free arm reaches for your phone on the nightstand beside you, because of course you're thinking about your for you page. You swipe open the screen and see that you've got a snapchat video message from Shen, which you decide you'll leave opening till later, as it's most likely a review of a new coffee place he uber eats'd to the PTMC at 3am last night. Plus, you like to annoy Jack with stories of his residents' favourite syrup of the week.
You open the TikTok app, keeping your volume at the lowest setting, and scroll through a couple of videos. You're keeping an eye on the man that's basically on top of you to make sure he's not waking up. The one thing Jack hates more than iced vanilla lattes is interrupted sleep. Your about to scroll to the next video, when Victoria's face fills the screen immediately - Dr.J, explaining "Five Tips for your First Year Residency", in that bright, cheery voice that you're used to discussing charting struggles and Mateo-isms with.
But the second she says, "Number one-stop calling every mild tachycardia a crisis-"
Jack groans. His eyes are still closed.
"You're kidding," he mutters into your shoulder.
You grin. "You're awake."
"I was sleeping."
"You were snoring."
"I don't snore." You snort.
Victoria continues, "..if your attending looks tired, maybe consider they've been here 12 hours longer than you have-"
"Right on," he says, leaving a lazy kiss on the side of your neck that makes a shiver run up your spine.
Victoria's voice is long forgotten as you move your head to rest against Jack's soft curls on the top of his head, which he more than likely needs a haircut for. You'll remind him of that after you keep him in bed for as long as you can.
You have a few seconds of comfortable silence, afraid to say anything in the hopes of letting this moment go on forever. You're rudely interrupted by the Snapchat notification noise that rings through the room and you wince. As quick as the noise goes off, Jack has rolled onto his back, bringing you with him as a high pitched yelp comes out of your mouth.
"Sweetheart, I swear if another sound comes out of your phone I'm going to lock it in a box for a week."
You blink up at him, still half-laughing from the yelp you let out when he flipped you over.
"Violence?" you gasp dramatically. "Over a little text?"
His arms tighten around you then, pinning you more firmly as he takes your phone and throws it somewhere down the end of the bed. You think this may be an inappropriate time to comment on how his biceps look ridicously biteable right now.
"I was this close,", he says, holding his fingers barely apart, "to going back to sleep"
"You were awake the whole time?"
"I was drifiting"
"You were drooling"
He lifts himself off the bed then, moving to settle over you with those stupidly obnoxious veins in his arms bracketing you inbetween them. His expression is somewhere between grumpy and dangerously focused. You can't help but notice the sunlight cutting across his defined shoulders, or the mess of his hair from having your fingers in it all night.
You swallow.
"Okay, Jacko, I know you have this whole brooding, mysterious energy going on all the time, but this is entirely too intense for 9am"
He laughs through his nose and drops his head down to your shoulder, groaning, "Sweetheart, it is not 9am for me".
His voice vibrates warm against your skin, and you hate (love) how easily that makes your stomach flip.
"For normal people, it is," you counter, fingers instinctively moving to rest at the back of his head.
He lifts his head to look at you properly now. He looks unfairly too good and too put together for someone who just woke up. You try very hard not to stare. You fail, obviously.
His mouth tilts at the corner when he catches you doing it, that faint, almost-smirk he pretends isn't a smirk at all. The sunlight hits the line of his jaw just right, catches on the faint scar near his temple, outlines the shape of him in a way that makes you feel entirely unworthy of him.
"Stop that," he quips.
"Stop what?"
"That look."
"What look?!"
"The one where you're thinking something you shouldn't be"
You grin up at him, and notice how his eyes grow softer. You heart skips like 20 beats.
"I'm thinking extremely respectable thoughts, Dr Abbot"
"Liar"
His voice is rough with sleep and you feel it everywhere. He moves his weight just enough that you're aware of him in a way that takes your breath away and makes you feel like you've been given a double dose of epi all at once.
"You antagonise me first thing in the morning," he says quietly, studying your face. "Then you stare."
"I can't appreciate my boyfriend?"
"You can. Silently, preferably."
You hit him across the shoulder at that and he laughs, a carefree, easy laugh that shakes his shoulders and reminds you that he's still soft around the edges. He takes another exhale through his nose, but this time his hand slides from the mattress to your wait, setting it there. His thumb presses into the soft cotton of the tshirt you've stolen from him. A reminder that you're real, you're here, you're not a hallucination his brain cooked up after too many code blues.
He leans down, slower this time, his mouth brushing yours in a kiss that isn't rushed or teasing. It's warm, sleep-heavy, certain. His hand tightens again and you think you might have a bruise there from all the times his hands go back to that same spot.
"You didn't wake up once last night, you know" you whisper when you part, half-lidded eyes looking through long eyelashes right up at him. Jack thinks he might still be asleep. Dreaming.
"It's easier."
"What's easier?"
"To sleep, when you're here."
And there it is. You could cry at the admission. You almost feel your eyes welling up at the thought. Sometimes, it can be hard reading him. Like, when Dana tells you he's gone up to the roof again to take a break, but you know it's because he's beating himself up about something. He protects you from it. That dark side of him that you know listens to police scanners in hope of a distraction and finds comfort in wearing a SWAT medic vest every other week.
But here he is, above you, looking through you like he can see everything and beyond that. Admitting to you that you make it easier. You wish you could tell him that that's all you want to be.
Not a distraction, or a light to balance the dark, or something that fixes him. You just want to be a place he can rest.
"You know, I coud make it a habit. Sleeping here, I mean. Wouldn't want you losing some well needed z's"
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. I mean-if, if that's something you'd want. Like, I don't want to overstep or make you feel pressured or like I'm slowly invading you space with my skincare products and emotional support water bottle or-"
He cuts you off by kissing you. Mouth crashing against yours in a desperate, searing kiss that knocks the breath straight out of your lungs. Firm, and certain and all too quick. And when he pulls back his forehead rests against yours again.
"You know, you left your conditioner in my shower three months ago."
You blink.
"That was strategic"
"I know"
"And you didn't say anything."
"Why would I?"
You hestitate. "Because..it's your place?"
He reaches up to hold your cheek in his too big hands, thumb hooking lightly under your eye to rub away a loose eyelash thats gotten stuck there.
"You think this is just my place?" he asks.
You falter a little at that.
"I don't want to assume," you admit, softer now. "You like your space. Your routine. Your...weird old man night-shift cave"
His mouth twitches faintly in an almost smirk.
"I think it stopped being just my space the second you left that damn polka dot scrunchie on the gear stick in my truck."
You let out a small, embarassed laugh. "Okay, that was actually not intentional."
He moves then, rolling just enough so you're both at a more comfortably aligned angle on the mattress, an arm firmly around you.
"If you want to sleep here," he continues, "sleep here"
Your chest tightens, and you can't believe what you're hearing. How normal this all is.
He presses a slow kiss to your temple, then your forehead, then back to your mouth, softer each time. Like a punctuation, telling you that he wants this, wants you, wants all the weird stickers you have on your diary and the little monkey keychain that swings off your bag.
"This is all very emotionally open of you, Dr Abbot."
"Don't ruin it, kid."
You smile and tuck yourself closer against him, your leg sliding comfortably over his like it's muscle memory now. He adjusts automatically, hand settling at you hip, chin resting against the top of your head.
"You think Dr J has any tips for moving in with your attending?"
First off, I just found your account, and I'm obsessed!! I was wondering if you could write a Jack Abbot x fem!reader fic where he's struggling with his PTSD. The vibe is like fluffy angst, if that makes sense.
Scar tissue
Jack Abbot X Fem!Reader
Warnings: PTSD, nightmares, combat trauma, injury description, amputation mention, phantom limb pain, panic response, dissociation, implied suicidal ideation (non-acted), emotional vulnerability, comfort, hurt/comfort, soft ending, established relationship, Robby makes an appearance, no use of y/n
Word count: 3.7K
a/n: Awww thnks for the love hon i'm glad you liked my little corner of the internet and i'm happy to have you here 🫶🏻 hope you enjoy the fic!
Anyone who looks at him knows he’s a tough guy. Not just because of the muscles that show through every piece of clothing he wears, but because of the way he carries himself. Steady. Courageous. Cool as a cucumber.
People look at Jack Abbott and they see a soldier — a man who can handle unimaginable pain without so much as a flinch.
But you? You see the cracks in the armor. You see the soft spots beneath all that steel — the proof that Jack, much like everyone else, is still just human.
Maybe you see it because he lets you. Because he feels he doesn’t have to hide as much when he’s around you. Or maybe it’s because you’re always looking for him in a crowd—your eyes scanning every face until they land on his.
You know he has a harder time dealing with his past than he ever admits. The therapist he’s been seeing seems to help, but it’s not like you can erase everything he’s been through. You’re glad he’s getting the help he needs, and you make sure he knows he has a support system he can lean on whenever he needs it.
He has Robby, and he has you.
When things started getting serious between you and Jack, the first person he wanted you to meet was Robby. You could tell immediately, from the way they interacted, that they shared a long and heavy history. And in the short time you spent with Robby, you could see that he too carried scars from the past.
Robby liked you right away—he was genuinely happy that Jack had someone to share his life with. But beneath Robby’s gentle smile, you sensed something else. A kind of relief hidden behind the easy banter and relaxed expression.
And when he cornered you one evening, glancing around as if making sure Jack wasn’t nearby before whispering, “I’m glad he has someone by his side. I can’t always keep an eye on him with our opposite shifts and all. I’m glad you’ve got his back,” you realized Robby knew Jack in ways you had yet to discover.
It had taken you a while to understand what Robby meant, but one night shift made everything painfully clear.
You’d been searching for Jack everywhere, and you were no closer to finding him. It was unlike him to just disappear—he was the attending, after all. Your worry had started creeping in when Robby walked in and caught the look on your face.
He seemed to know exactly what you were looking for. His hand landed gently on your shoulder to get your attention, a soft look settling over his features.
“You’re looking for Abbott, right? He’s probably taking a breather.”
“No, I checked outside. He wasn’t there,” you answered, eyes still darting around the room.
Robby gave your shoulder a small, knowing squeeze.
“Might wanna go check the roof.”
Robby must’ve seen something in your face shift, because he didn’t hesitate—he just said, “Come on,” and started toward the stairwell. You followed him up the flight of stairs until the sunshine hit your face and the rooftop door thunked shut behind you.
Jack was there. Standing on the edge of the roof, on the opposite side of the railing.
Your heart lurched. Your body moved before you even thought, breath punching out of your chest. Your eyes went wide, your mouth opened—but nothing came out.
Robby’s hand snapped around your arm, steadying you before you could take another panicked step.
“Hey—hey. It’s okay,” he murmured, voice low, like he’d rehearsed this line a thousand times.
You froze, pulse thundering in your ears, as Robby walked forward with a familiarity that made your stomach twist tighter.
He leaned casually against the railing, like this wasn’t terrifying, like it wasn’t a two-story drop to concrete.
“Hey, man,” he called out. “You bird-watching or something?”
Jack jolted—just slightly—like the sound tugged him out of a fog. He turned his head, and his eyes found yours over Robby’s shoulder.
Something flickered there. Recognition. Then shame. Then something soft.
He ducked back under the railing and stepped onto the safe side. Robby clapped him on the back and stepped aside, letting Jack walk toward you.
You stood there, hands trembling before you could stop them, the image of him on the wrong side of the railing burned into your mind. When he reached you, Jack didn’t say anything—just pulled you into his chest, arms strong and shaky all at once.
“Hey,” he murmured into your hair, breathing you in. “You don’t gotta worry. I wasn’t—I wasn’t doing anything stupid. Just… needed a look around.”
You didn’t say anything. You just held onto him, trying to let your body relax beneath his arms. When you finally glanced over his shoulder, your eyes met Robby’s. His expression was soft, a little tired, and without either of you saying a word, you understood.
This was what he meant. This was why he wanted someone else watching Jack’s back.
That was the first time you saw Jack’s armor crack.
But it wouldn’t be the last.
Today had been a particularly rough shift. You were exhausted—bone-deep tired—and more than ready to go home. When you saw Robby walk into the ED for his morning shift, you mustered a smile and walked over to pull him into a hug.
“How was your night?” he asked, like he always did.
“Hell, as usual,” you sighed.
Robby gave you that knowing look, the one edged with sympathy and the kind of exhaustion only long-time trauma can carve into someone. His eyes swept the room, scanning faces out of habit.
You knew exactly who he was looking for. Who he always looked for.
“He’s upstairs,” you said, no explanation needed.
Robby’s gaze snapped back to you, understanding immediately.
“That bad, huh?”
“Yep.” Your shoulders sagged under the weight of the night. “Pretty much.”
“You want me to go get him?”
You gave his shoulder a gentle pat. “No, I got it. I was just giving him a little alone time first. You know how he gets.”
Robby nodded, expression softening. “Call me if you need me.”
You offered him a tired smile before turning and heading for the stairs—your feet already knowing the path to the roof.
Jack is in his usual spot.
Same place he always goes when the shift has taken too much out of him. Same spot where the world stretches out before him far enough that he can pretend he’s not drowning in his thoughts. In his feelings.
You ease the rooftop door open, letting it click shut behind you. He has his back to you, but you know he knows you’re here. You take a couple of slow steps toward him, leaning on the railing like Robby had the first time you’d found out about this routine of theirs.
“Anything interesting down there?” you say softly, voice drifting over to him like you’re afraid of startling him.
Jack glances over his shoulder. It’s not really a smile he gives you—more a tired twitch of his mouth that’s trying to be one. The kind he uses when he doesn’t want you to worry, even though the fact that he’s up here already tells you plenty.
“Nah,” he mutters. “Same old streets. Same old mess.”
The wind is cool up here, biting at your cheeks. Jack’s eyes stay fixed on the drop below. Yours stay glued to his profile.
“You want to talk about it?” you ask gently.
He huffs out a breath. “Not really.”
You nod, because you’re not here to force it out of him. You’ve learned that pushing makes him shut down harder. And besides—that tone? You know that one. It’s the I’m-still-in-it tone. The one he gets when some patient or some moment kicks up dust from the part of his past he tries not to look at. The part filled with dirt and gunfire and screams that don’t belong in a hospital.
Jack’s jaw flexes. You see the tension in his body. Not just the usual post–twelve-hour-shift tension, but the kind he carries from years of seeing more shit than anyone should see in their whole lifetimes. It always lingers. Waiting beneath his skin. Waiting for something to pull it out into the open. And tonight, it’s clear something had made it bubble up.
You keep your eyes forward as you ask, “Want me to go get Robby?”
It’s not jealousy. It’s not insecurity. You know how deep their history runs. Sometimes Jack needs his best friend before he needs anyone else.
But he shakes his head immediately.
“No.” His voice is low, rough. “I just… need a little quiet.”
You give another small nod. “Okay.”
And that’s it. No fixing. No prying. You just sit down, letting the silence stretch the way he needs it to. The wind whistles, cars honk far below, and Jack’s breathing slowly evens out—slowly, gradually, grounding itself in the fact that you’re here.
After a while—maybe minutes, maybe longer—you hear him shift. You watch as he ducks under the railing, stepping back toward the safe side before looking down at you from where you’re still sitting. You lift yourself off the ground, moving so you’re standing in front of him. You stay a couple of steps away for a moment before reaching your hand out.
His fingers brush yours, hesitant at first, then more sure when you curl your hand softly around his.
“Wanna go home?” you whisper.
Jack exhales—a shaky, tired sound that breaks your heart a little.
“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah… I’m ready.”
And with that, he lets you pull him back inside.
He’s quiet the whole walk home, which isn’t unusual on days like this. Still, you miss the easy chatter you usually fall into together. You miss the feeling of his hand in yours as you walk side by side, miss the silly comments he always makes just to get you to laugh.
But you know it isn’t personal. Sometimes the weight of the past is just too heavy to carry, and Jack has to put all his strength into keeping himself together. There isn’t much left over for anything else.
So on days like this, you just match your pace to his, silently following him all the way back to your shared apartment.
You walk into your apartment, keys clattering softly against the door as you push it open. Jack trails in behind you. You slip your shoes off, and he quietly closes the door, locking it before doing the same.
You head straight for the kitchen, washing your hands at the sink before opening the fridge and grabbing the food you’d set aside for the two of you. On normal days, you and Jack share the shower—taking turns helping each other wash the grime and weight of the shift away. But today… you know he won’t be up for that.
So you call out from the kitchen, loud enough for him to hear you from the entryway.
“You go first, Jack. I’ll start heating the food up.”
He passes by the kitchen doorway, giving you a small, tired nod before heading toward the bathroom.
After he gets out—looking just as tired as when he went in, but at least cleaner—you make your way to the bathroom next, focusing on washing the shift off your own skin.
You both settle down to eat afterward, the low murmur of the TV drifting across the room while you eat in silence. When you’re done, the dishes washed and teeth brushed, the two of you climb into bed.
You reach over to click the lamp off and start to settle, already preparing yourself to fall asleep without Jack’s arms around you. But just as you’re about to turn your back to him, he says your name—soft, almost hesitant.
You turn, barely able to make out his face in the dark.
“Yeah?” you answer quietly, voice barely above a breath.
“No cuddling today?” he asks, the words gentle, almost sheepish in the dark.
Your eyes soften instantly.
“Didn’t think you’d be up for it,” you whisper.
Jack reaches out, his hand brushing your cheek before gently tugging you closer until your noses touch.
“Always up to cuddle with you, baby,” he murmurs, the teasing warmth in his voice muted by exhaustion but still sincere.
You smile, pressing a soft kiss to his lips before shifting until your head rests against his chest—right where you’ve always fit perfectly.
“Goodnight, Jack,” you say softly, your voice melting into his skin.
“Night, baby,” he replies, the words low and sleepy.
He can feel the sweat against his temple. Can feel it run down his neck and seep into his uniform. He can smell the dirt and blood and gunpowder. Can hear the explosion, the screams, the bullets ricocheting.
His feet pound against the ground as he runs, bag rattling against his back with every step. There’s a rifle in his hand—he can feel the weight of it, the metal pressed beneath his fingers. The sound is muffled, but he can still make out orders being shouted somewhere beside him. He takes another step.
And that’s when it happens.
He doesn’t even have time to react before his body is launched backward. His back hits the ground and, for a moment, he can’t hear anything. The explosion blows out everything else, dust filling the air and swallowing what little he could see.
And then it hits him.
Pain.
Searing pain, shooting through him so fast he doesn’t even have time to scream.
The world tilts. His vision blurs. When he finally manages to bring it into focus, his eyes trail downward to assess the damage.
He catches it immediately.
Blood. Shredded fabric. Jagged bone.
The panic settles in instantly, and the scream that rips from his throat makes his lungs burn. Hands grab at him—soldiers barking his name, trying to drag him away—but everything blurs, their faces smearing together.
His vision tightens, tunneling. He feels the blood pumping out of him, warm and fast.
And then darkness surrounds him.
Jack jerks awake with a gasp so sharp it almost sounds like a sob.
The room is dark. Quiet. Safe. But his body doesn’t know that—his heart is racing like he’s still on that damn battlefield. His hands fist at the sheets, tugging them off him in a panic. His eyes land on the place where his leg should be and, even though it’s not there—even though it’s been years—he can still feel the pain as if it had happened just now.
He’s so focused on the sight in front of him that he doesn’t feel you stir in bed. Doesn’t even remember you’re there next to him until your hand finds the center of his back.
His head snaps toward you, panicked eyes locking onto your worried gaze. The sight of you seems to pull him back into the present, inch by inch. He lets out a shaky breath just as you say his name again—because he didn’t hear it the first time.
“Jack? Hey — talk to me. What happened?”
He swallows. It’s hard. His throat feels tight, scraped raw.
“I… it was my leg.” His voice trembles in a way he hates. “I was back there. I saw it happen again.”
His breath stutters. He drags a trembling hand over his face, trying to wipe away the nightmare like it’s something he can physically scrape off his skin. You shift closer, slow and gentle, giving him every chance to pull away. He doesn’t. If anything, he leans toward you without realizing it, like his body is reaching for something solid to anchor to.
“Is it hurting?” you whisper.
He nods, jaw clenched. “Feels like… like it’s still there. Like it’s still being blown off.” A shaky laugh slips out, humorless. “Stupid, right?”
You shake your head, reaching out to take his hand — letting him decide if he wants to hold on.
“That’s not stupid,” you whisper. “Phantom pain isn’t imaginary. And neither is what you lived through.”
His fingers curl around yours. Tight. Desperate.
For a moment, he just breathes. Eyes closed. Shoulders trembling.
Then he lets out a quiet confession, barely audible:
“I hate waking up like this. I hate that you have to see it.”
Your shoulders sag at the words. You know he struggles with being vulnerable, know he hates making you worry. But it doesn’t bother you — in fact, you’re glad to know he isn’t alone. Glad that you can be there for him when he needs someone, even if he tries to avoid it as much as he can.
You press your forehead gently to the side of his, grounding both of you.
“I’d rather be here with you through the bad,” you murmur, “than miss the chance to be here for the good.”
Jack lets out a sound that borders on a sob and a sigh. He shifts his head to the side so that your foreheads touch. Your hand moves up to cradle his cheek, making his eyes close.
“I’m here,” you murmur against his hair. “I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
He leans into your touch like he’s been holding himself upright for too long, like the simple act of your hand on his cheek is the one thing keeping him anchored.
You stay like that for a moment, his uneven breathing fanning across your face as your thumb continues to caress his skin. His hands move forward, grabbing onto your hips as if he needs to make sure you’re real.
“Sorry,” he whispers, voice raw. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”
You shake your head gently, brushing your thumb over his cheekbone.
“Jack… you don’t have to apologize for having nightmares.”
His jaw tightens like he wants to argue, but the fight leaves him before it ever really forms. His shoulders slump, exhaustion settling back over him like a heavy blanket.
“It felt so real,” he admits, the words barely catching the air between you. “Every time it happens, it feels like… like I’m right back there. Like I’m losing it all over again.”
Your heart twists. Not out of pity — never pity — but out of that deep ache that comes from loving someone who’s been hurt in ways you can’t erase. You angle his face toward yours, gently guiding him until his eyes meet yours in the dark.
He gives you a look that almost makes your heart shatter in your chest. For a moment, you don’t see the Jack everyone else sees — the chill Jack who makes jokes and walks around like nothing ever gets to him. You see the man beneath the armor. The real Jack. The one who carries the world on his shoulders, the one who keeps going even when the pain gets unbearable.
You see your Jack.
The one you love with every fiber of your being.
You can’t promise him the nightmares won’t come. Can’t take the pain from him. Can’t promise that nothing will ever hurt him again.
So you say the only thing you can — the thing you feel every time you see him like this.
“I’m so sorry, Jack.”
Jack’s brows pull together at your words — not in frustration, not in dismissal, but in something softer. Sadder. He shakes his head almost immediately, hands tightening on your hips as if anchoring you in place.
“Don’t be,” he whispers, voice barely holding itself together. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
You swallow, but the ache in your chest doesn’t ease.
“I know. I just… I hate that you went through that. I hate that you still have to.”
You sigh softly, the sound threading through the quiet of the room.
“I wish I could make it better.”
Jack pulls back just enough to see your face, his hand moving from your hip to your cheek, warm and steady as his thumb brushes your skin.
“You do,” he whispers.
You give him a sad smile and lean forward to press a soft kiss to his lips. He accepts it immediately, sinking into the tenderness, savoring the love you pour into him—trying to commit the feeling to memory.
When you pull back, he follows you, leaning in until his forehead rests against your collarbone. You wrap your arms around him instinctively, holding him close, cradling him as his fingers curl into the fabric of your shirt.
For a long moment, neither of you speaks. It’s just the two of you breathing in the dark, his heartbeat slowly finding its rhythm again, your hands moving up and down his back in calm, soothing strokes.
Eventually, Jack exhales — a low, weary sound that seems to release a little of the weight crushing him.
“Thank you,” he murmurs, voice muffled against your chest.
You run your fingers through his hair, soft and steady.
“For what?” you ask gently.
“For staying,” he breathes. “For… not being scared of me. Or of this.”
You press a kiss to the top of his head.
“Jack,” you whisper, “I’m not going anywhere.”
He holds onto you tighter after that—the kind of hold that says he believes you, even if it scares him to. He presses a kiss to your neck, lips soft against your skin.
“I love you,” he whispers.
“I love you too, Jack.”
He lifts his head just enough to look at you, and you offer him a tender smile.
“Wanna try and get some sleep?”
He breathes shakily against you, the fear of the nightmares creeping back in making him never want to sleep again. You can sense his apprehension, so your hand moves gently to hold his face.
“Don’t worry. I’m right here. I’ll keep you safe.”
Jack can’t help but smile at your words—because he can hear in your voice that you genuinely mean them, and that makes him believe them too. He unlatches from your body, moving to lie back down on the bed. You settle beside him, tugging the sheets over your bodies as you inch closer.
You tuck yourself against him, your fingers drawing slow circles along his ribs, a steady rhythm he can follow back into calm.
“Stay… right here,” he murmurs, voice thick and low.
“I’m not moving,” you promise. “Sleep if you can. I’ve got you.”
Jack exhales, the sound shaky but softer than before. His chin rests lightly atop your head, his heartbeat gradually syncing with yours. His hand slips around your waist, pulling you closer as though he’s trying to merge the last of the fear out of his body and into your warmth.
And little by little, you feel his body start to relax against yours, the nightmare losing its grip as he lets himself rest in the one place he still feels safe.
With you.
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