summary: when you go against medical advice after a nasty fall down the stairs, dr. park takes matters into his own hands.
content warnings/description: 18+ MDNI, AFAB reader, forced proximity (but it’s just park making himself at home with reader because he wants to), mildly dubious consent, light stalking, light exhibitionism, mean!park who is a softie underneath it all (kind of), divorced!park, unprotected (PIV) sex, oral sex, anal fingering (fem!receiving) (like, one sentence of it), park can carry/lift reader, wrist and clavicle fractures, medical inaccuracies
author’s note: the ending is rushed, and i apologize. i just wanted to be done with this! also, i didn’t feel like writing a long, drawn-out smut scene, so i hope what i did instead (multiple, shorter scenes) is okay. i hope you enjoy!
It was stupid. Something that was preventable and would not have landed you in the E.R. or required surgery if you had just used your brain.
But you didn’t use your brain, and in the rush to get to work, after the elevator in your apartment went out of service one morning a week ago, you rushed down several flights of stairs.
You had almost made it out of the building without so much as a scratch until the last flight, when you tripped on your new pair of heels and flew over tens of steps until you reached the bottom floor with a thud. And that wasn’t the worst of it. No, you had instinctively reached your arm out to grab the railing a little too late and landed on your dominant arm, the force of the impact snapping your wrist, radiating up to your clavicle, and snapping it as well into several pieces.
Or so the E.R. physicians explained as they stabilized you as best they could, referred you to surgery, and sent you home with a splint and a sling.
A week now since your fall, the orthopedic surgeon operating on you recounts to his students the events that led you to his table as well as the injuries you sustained. You’ve been given a nerve blocker for the pain, and you don’t feel your wrist and clavicle shattered into the small pieces I’ll be putting back together. Understand? Nod your heads if you understand, Dr. Park barks to them, drawing you from your thoughts.
He is not the nicest person. You got a sense of that during your pre-op consultation with him two days ago, but, to be honest, all you care about is getting through this surgery.
You do feel sorry for his students, though.
Once Dr. Park finishes his lecture, he addresses you, telling you, we’re about to start. Take some deep breaths.
Glancing at the diagnostic display by your side, the x-rays of your wrist and clavicle in full view, you breathe in and out through your nose. With a flourish of Dr. Park’s hand, you’re told to count down from ten and are put to sleep by the anesthesiologist. As you count down, the last thing you see is the intense cut of Dr. Park’s eyes and his harsh brows, the bulk of him taking up space in what feels like a cramped operating room, a nurse handing him a clamp—
and then it’s lights out.
He goes over post-op care with you once you wake up, lying in the bed of one of the patient recovery rooms, which you find odd, as this is not something you would expect the booked and busy surgeon to do.
You’ll need to keep your wrist in the cast for two weeks and your arm in the sling for six weeks. After two weeks, we’ll switch the cast into a brace. There’ll be a follow-up around the four-week mark to check your progress. Remember that someone will have to drive you home tonight. Take the medication prescribed to you if you find the pain to be too severe.
“You have someone, right?”
“Huh? Someone…?” The lingering effects of the anesthesia are affecting your concentration. You were so focused on trying to pay attention that you weren’t paying attention.
His eyes narrow. Dr. Park is the embodiment of impatience, but you suppose surgeons have better things to do than repeat themselves, and, from the looks of the dark circles under his eyes, a feature you admittedly find attractive and intimidating, he’s running on fumes.
“Do you have someone to take you home. No one came in with you.”
“Sorry, I—” You shake your head. “—my neighbor... he’ll be picking me up this evening.”
Dr. Park raises a furrowed brow. “Your neighbor. The one that found you on the ground?”
“My friends... well, they all had plans tonight, but he was available.”
“What about a boyfriend. Roommates.”
“I’m single. And I live alone.”
The room goes deathly quiet, and all you can hear is the beeping of monitors, the rolling of carts from the hallway outside, and your own breaths. Dr. Park watches you for a second, and you shift in the bed, uncomfortable being the subject of his scrutiny. But the silence doesn’t stretch for long. He speaks again, and it’s as if no time has passed.
“As long as someone takes you home. We’ll set you up for discharge—” He checks his watch. Your eyes travel from his wrist up his arm to his bicep, huge, as wide as your head, “—around seven p.m. A nurse will see you out.”
“Okay. Thank you, Dr. Park.”
He stands up from the comically small stool by the side of your bed and stares his nose down at you.
All he says before leaving the room, shouldering past a fresh-faced and green observing intern, is, “don’t run down the stairs again.”
Curbside in a wheelchair, you wait for the neighbor who called for and rode in the ambulance with you last week to pick you up.
You’ve bothered him enough; you nearly gave him a heart attack when he found you splayed out, crying on the ground and clutching your forked wrist, but despite it all, he was more than happy to do you this favor.
But... he’s late.
The nurse, overworked and past the time for her to clock out for the end of her shift, grinds her teeth and taps her foot against the pavement as she waits with you.
“I’m so sorry for holding you up. I can just wait here alone,” you say, glancing up at her over your shoulder. “He should be here soon.”
“I can’t leave until you’re picked up.”
“I won’t say anything if you don’t.”
She thinks on it for a second, chewing on her lower lip. Sighing, she says, “alright. Just sit tight. I’ll see if I can find another nurse to wait with you. If he gets here before then, then problem solved.”
You nod. “I will.”
Five, ten, fifteen minutes pass, and your neighbor’s nowhere to be seen. He hasn’t answered your texts. Another nurse hasn’t come by, either.
You’re about to give up hope and just call yourself an Uber home when—
what are you still doing here?
You turn your head to find Dr. Park approaching you. Though you know the logical explanation is that his shift is over and he’s leaving, you can’t help but ask, “Dr. Park? What—what are you doing here?”
“I asked you first,” he throws back.
“I’m, uh, waiting for my ride home. Josh, my neighbor… he’s late.”
“Late, huh.” He stands still, giving you the once-over, before pulling his keys out of his scrub pocket, telling you to “just wait here,” and walking off into the lot.
You were already waiting, so nothing new there. But, suddenly, you hear the rev of an engine and watch as a big, shiny truck pulls out of its parking spot, one of the ones designated for employees, and circles the entrance before coming to a stop in front of you.
The passenger-side window rolls down, and from across the seat you can hear his voice.
“Get in.”
Oh.
This… hm.
You have no doubt that this is against the rules. But, at the same time, you would like to get home. And not have to spend a fortune on an Uber, or if worse comes to worst, figure out what buses you need to take to get you home.
“Do you need help, or can you get in yourself like a big girl?” he asks, impatience clipping his tone, after you take too long staring at his shadowed figure.
He rolls the window back up, blocking himself from your sight.
You stand from the wheelchair, a little loopy still, but manage to close the distance to open the passenger door with your free hand and settle in your seat. You struggle with your seatbelt, and he pulls off before you hear it click.
The ride home is uncomfortable.
You told him your address immediately after getting in, but after that it has been complete silence between you two. Words don’t come easy.
From the moment you met during your pre-op consultation, you’ve been on a cliff’s edge with him. He has a somewhat stifling energy. You would roll down the window to cut some of the tension, give yourself air to breathe, but you’re sure that would earn you one of the glares you’ve become familiar with.
After a series of oppressive red lights, he speaks up when you reach the front entrance of your apartment building.
“Give me your phone.”
You’re a little shocked by the suddenness of his demand. “Uh... why?”
“I’m giving you my personal number. Patients tend to have questions during their recovery. Better to ask me instead of strangers on the internet.”
That’s actually quite... thoughtful of him.
“Oh, that makes sense.” You dig your phone from your purse, unlock it, and hand it to him. “Do you do this with all your patients?”
Drive them home after their surgery, give them your personal number, make them feel as if they’re the snow in a snow globe, shaken up and studied.
“You’re not special, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Your mouth parts in offense, and you see the corner of his mouth lift as if he were about to laugh. It is odd that him saying that makes you feel... not so good, like it matters what he thinks of you.
“Do you think you are?” he asks.
“What?”
“Is it the anesthesia, or are you always this scatterbrained? Do you think you’re special,” he repeats.
Holding back your scowl proves impossible. And you thought he was being nice in offering you his number. You answer carefully, lips drawn in a straight line, “no, I know I’m just another patient. If anything, I’m being a burden. Thank you for driving me home. I do appreciate it.”
He grunts in response as he creates his contact in your phone. The electronic device barely fits in his hands, and you can’t help but wonder what they would look like on your body. It frustrates you that the thought crosses your mind.
He’s not worthy of a crumb of your attention. He’s strict and borderline cruel. Like a cutthroat surgeon would be. And you’re his patient. You don’t want to think about what he might be like with someone he hates. Or loves enough to be more of himself in front of, if he is capable of such a thing.
When he’s finished, he casually tosses your phone back into your lap and then dismissively says, “we’re done here. See you soon.”
You hop out of the car and turn around to say goodbye, with a lightness and a kindness he does not deserve.
“Well, hopefully not too soon, right?”
He watches you for a moment, his eyes searching your face and down your body to the strap of the sling on your shoulder and the cast on your arm and lower. To your croc-and-sock-covered feet and back up to your eyes. All in a blink. So fast you might have imagined it. Then he reaches over to close the passenger door himself, throws out a quick “if you do as you’re told, we won’t have a problem,” and peels off, nearly running over your feet and landing you another visit to the E.R.
He’s a strange one, Dr. Park.
As you make your way up to your floor—the elevator was restored to working order soon after your accident—you scroll through your contacts list and do a double take.
Did he not make one for himself?
But, upon further inspection, you realize his name, Brendon Park, with a shark emoji right next to it, one you know for certain doesn’t belong to anyone you know, is in your phone.
Brendon Park.
Not Dr. Park.
Your surgery was performed Friday afternoon, so you take the weekend to recover, hoping against hope that you will feel well enough to at least get yourself to work on Monday. You stay home and don’t push yourself. Saturday night, you order takeout instead of dining on microwave meals.
When you make your way downstairs to pick up your food, you feel eyes on you through the lobby glass, as if someone were outside in wait to watch you and specifically you. But you don’t see anything but shadows and chalk the feeling up to nerves. Having been home all day watching true crime doesn’t help your paranoia.
It’s the same thing Sunday night. You treat yourself to a second night of takeout, and again, you feel eyes on you as you pick up your food. But you ignore them.
Before you head to bed, you make sure the door to your unit is locked, though. Checking once, twice, three times. Just in case.
Your boss, as was expected when you had told him about your accident over the phone last week, was not happy that you missed work without the required notice for time off.
In the morning, you get ready and drive one-handed to the office, which, granted, goes against the medical advice that Park gave you. But it’s a close drive, and all you do is ride a desk.
It isn’t worth your job or getting on your boss’ bad side if you can manage fine. The brain fog from the anesthesia has worn off by now, and your days are mostly filled with phone calls and meetings, so your injuries aren’t detrimental to your productivity. The work you do serves as a nice distraction for the persisting itch of the cast padding rubbing against your dry skin.
You’re pushing yourself, though. The pain creeps up, sharp and sinister, closer to the end of the day. You swallow down some of the painkillers prescribed to you to alleviate it. The post-op pain is dreadful compared to the pre-op pain, which had already lessened after a week of waiting at home.
Once the workday is done, you step out of the office to head to the parking lot, your purse slung over your shoulder and your car keys in your free hand.
You don’t expect to see his truck pulled up right by the side of the building.
Park steps out and stalks toward you, a deep frown on his face. The sun sets earlier in the day, and his figure casts a long shadow to the side of him.
“What the hell are—” you start.
“—What am I doing here? What are you doing here?”
You have the urge to throw his words from the other night back in his face, but you’re, frankly, too flustered to.
“This—this is where I work.”
“You aren’t supposed to be working. You’re supposed to be resting,” he grits out.
“How did you know I was here?” you exclaim, throwing your hand up.
A few of your colleagues step out of the building behind you, and you temper your frustrations to avoid a scandal. Maybe there is a reasonable explanation for this, but you’re coming up blank.
He grabs you by your free arm and leads you to his truck, opening the passenger door, and essentially manhandles you in, buckling you in to your seat—only because of the cast and the sling and because he’s impatient, because otherwise it’d be too kind of him to do so.
If it weren’t for the fact that he’s a surgeon, your surgeon, the one that had his hands inside you and fixed your clavicle and wrist, you would be kicking and screaming right now.
“I’m taking you home,” he says once he slides into his seat and starts up the car. “Couldn’t sit still for two fuckin’ weeks?”
“Are you going to answer my question?” you ask, voice pitched high and incredulous. “I think you should answer my question, doctor.”
You regret the sass immediately. He pierces you with a glower, and you shrink in the soft leather of the passenger seat. It molds to your shape, as if you’re the last person to have sat here.
As he peels off in the direction of your apartment, he answers, “I check up on all my patients. Part of the job. Would’ve been here earlier if I didn’t have surgeries I couldn’t get out of.”
You don’t think it is a part of the job. Not to this extent. And it doesn’t explain how he knows where and when you work or that you returned to the office in the first place.
You rack your brain trying to recall if you had mentioned anything of the sort during your pre- and post-op meetings with him, but it’s either still fuzzy from the anesthesia or there is nothing to recall. It’s possible you could have said something while under, but you doubt it would have been something as coherent as the details of your employment.
And speaking of employment—
“So, are you not supposed to be at the hospital right now?”
“I cleared the rest of my afternoon. I didn’t think you’d go AMA. I bet you’re in pain, huh.”
“No,” you murmur, turning your body to face the window. “I’m fine.”
He scoffs, glancing at you quickly before returning his eyes to the road.
“You were crying your eyes out when you were brought into the E.D. I bet you were crying at your desk today too. Boss should’ve sent you home in your condition. Would’ve saved me the trouble.”
“I fell down the stairs and shattered bone. Who wouldn’t cry?”
Your face feels hot. You don’t like his patronizing tone, though you’re just as amazed you made it through the workday without feeling sorry for yourself and shedding a tear or two.
You don’t get it. What any of this means. But you’re afraid to hear the answer, so you’re almost glad he keeps his mouth shut on that front.
All you dare ask is, “what about my car?”
“I’ll pick it up later.”
The rest of the ride is silent.
This time, Park does not simply drop you off at the entrance to your apartment building.
He parks his truck in guest parking, follows you into the building, and with a searing paw on your hip, you ride the elevator up to your floor, and he walks in behind you through the front door.
It isn’t until you’re standing in the middle of your living room when you ask, “stalking isn’t something in the job description, is it? Because that’s what this feels like. You stalked me, and now—and now you’re in my apartment.”
You’re aware you didn’t put up much of a fight, but what were you supposed to do against the wall that is Brendon Park?
He crosses his arms over his chest, a loose strand of hair broken free from the cast of gel coating his scalp, casting a shadow over his eyes.
“You disobeyed my rules. I’m here to babysit you.”
He seems to think that is enough of an explanation and takes the opportunity to look around your apartment. From the look on his face, he is disgusted.
You do what you can to spruce it up with an assortment of plants, thrifted vintage decor, fairy lights, but ultimately, you’re not living in the best Pittsburgh has to offer.
The walls are stained with cigarette smoke from the previous tenant and are peeling. The heater is on its last leg and makes a clanking sound every other second. Your restroom and bedroom down the hall are a claustrophobe’s worst nightmare, the latter barely fitting your bed, dresser, and desk.
Park trudges into the open kitchen and looks inside your fridge and through your cabinets, scowling.
“This place is a shithole. How do you live like this?”
You ignore his comment and instead ask, “what do you mean by ‘babysit’?”
You watch, jaw going slack, as he opens your freezer and proceeds to peel back the plastic seal, tossing out all your instant meals in the nearby trash can.
“I need to make sure you don’t undo all my hard work. Better get used to me hanging around these next two weeks, Trip.”
“You’re not welcome here. And don’t call me Trip.” Raising your palm in surrender, you say, “I’ll stay home for the next two weeks as advised, alright? Please, just... get out.”
“I’ll make sure of it, because I’m sticking around; that’s final.”
Your eyes nearly pop out of their sockets.
“But... why? Are you not—do you not have a family or… or a wife to go back home to? A pet or something? What about work?”
“I’m divorced,” he grunts. “I’m still clocking in for my shifts, but I’ll be coming home to you. Spending my days off here. Really, I’m doing you a kindness.”
The fact that he’s a divorced man doesn’t come as a surprise to you. Not that what you feel about it matters.
“This is absolutely absurd.”
“You should’ve listened to orders.”
He’s an immovable object. He won’t listen to reason. He is also literally immovable, and three of you couldn’t move one of him out of here.
You chew on your lower lip and hang your head, defeated, but it won’t lead to a different outcome. You don’t see him changing his mind.
Apparently done taking inventory of your kitchen, he walks back into the living room, closing in on you, and gestures for you to give me your keys. I’ll pick up your car.
You mindlessly toss them to him—the confusion of how he knows what your car looks like distant in your head—while working out the logistics of this. The how and why of it all still nags at you, but before you can ask him, yet again, for proper answers, he says, “I’ll be back,” and walks out the door.
By the time you hear his footsteps outside the door, it’s been a little over an hour. You’re not sure how he got there, if he’d called a rideshare or something, but the office is a ten-minute drive from your apartment. You suppose with rush hour traffic and having to go back and forth, it would take him longer to get back. You instinctively locked the door after he’d left, and you can hear him jangling your set of keys, figuring out which one is the one to your unit.
You haven’t done much except text your boss and overthink on the couch, picking at a loose thread on the sweats you changed into. You thought you might order takeout again since Park tossed your instant meals, but, being the kind person you are, you thought to wait for him to return to see if he wanted anything.
It’s ridiculous of you to have done so because he’s your surgeon and is forcefully squatting at your place because you can’t “follow orders,” and yet, you are willing to consider what he wants for dinner.
You heard about him and his reputation from some of the nurses during your short stay at PTMC. Park the Shark. He’s a good doctor despite his character flaws, someone you avoid if you can, or you risk getting bit.
As unconventional as this situation is, though, he’s not here to put you in any harm. Quite the opposite, in fact, if he’s to be believed.
As he walks through the door, you notice that he’s in different clothes; is holding multiple bags of groceries—the paper handles twisted up between his fingers; has his backpack slung over his shoulder; a drawstring bag slung over the other; as well as a duffel bag halfway zipped and spilling out with what seem to be his personal effects.
It is then that you realize why he had taken so long to get back. He must’ve made a stop for groceries and his place to get his things.
He leaves his stuff littered on the floor by your feet and starts to put away the groceries.
“I parked your car right out front where you’ll see it. Not that you’ll be goin’ anywhere.”
“Thank you for that, I guess,” you mumble, standing from the couch and joining him in the kitchen. “I see you got… groceries.”
“For dinner. All you got are frozen food and snacks. How are you alive?”
Through the crinkle of the paper bags he sets down on the countertop and rifles through, you can hear the judgment in his voice.
“I’m not much of a cook,” you say, slightly embarrassed, shifting on your feet. “And I thought I would just order something.”
“You’re eating what I make you.”
“It’d better be good then,” you throw back, rolling your eyes.
You’re not sure what to do. Hover or give him space? Is it worth trying to make conversation? Ostensibly, he’s your roommate for the next two weeks. A board-certified roommate that will make sure you don’t fuck up the screws holding your distal radius and clavicle together.
“Do you want me to leave you to it?” you ask, hesitant.
He doesn’t look at you when he responds, instead focusing on the slabs of meat he’s seasoning with your condiments.
Garlic and onion powder. Black pepper and salt.
He opens your fridge and pulls out a stick of butter to melt into a bowl and then washes his hands in the sink. Scrubbing down his wrist and beneath his nails, like he’s prepping for surgery.
“It’s your place. Do what you want,” he says, voice flat and uninterested. “I’ll call you when it’s time to eat. In the meantime, rest. Keep your arm elevated.”
“I know. I’ve been doing that for the past three days. Since you discharged me?”
He says nothing, his attention focused on his hands. His fingernails are clipped and neat, fingers thick, knuckles littered with patches of light hairs, working deftly to coat the meat in the seasonings.
For someone who is adamantly encroaching on your space, he seems to not want you to be here. You don’t want to subject yourself to his prickliness, so you hide in your bedroom and scroll on your phone until dinner is ready.
This is so weird. So, so weird.
When dinner is served, you take a seat at the dining table, where he is already seated beside you. Awkwardly staring at your plate, fork in hand, you’re unable to draw up conversation.
At least, this is awkward for you. You think Park prefers not speaking after spending so much time with colleagues and patients. You wonder if he performed your surgery in absolute silence. There hadn’t been any music on before you were put to sleep, but if there had been, you could take a good guess for some sort of heavy metal or rock.
When you first noticed your dinner plate, you were a bit taken aback. He had cut your steak up into pieces for you, mindful of your physical limitations.
“Do you need help,” he asks when you don’t make a move to eat.
“No, I think I can manage a fork just fine, thank you,” you answer, stabbing at a piece and taking a bite.
“Can you?”
With the sling and short arm cast on your dominant side, you’ve been forced to rely on your non-dominant hand, and Park can apparently pick up on the slight lack of finesse you have with it because he thinks you’re eating wrong, if that’s even possible.
“You’re as helpless as a baby.”
He takes your fork from you, guiding a piece of steak that he mixes with a helping of mashed potatoes to your mouth.
But you object because you’re well capable of feeding yourself. Smashing your lips together and turning your head away from the fork only irritates him more, however. With his other hand, he grips your chin with his thumb and forefinger, curling them inward to secure you in place.
“Don’t make this harder than it has to be,” he grunts. “I’m not against shoving this down your throat if I have to.”
So, you give in. It’s humiliating to be fed like this, but he’s doing this because he’s a good doctor, you think, to make sense of his behavior in your head, and eating well is important for your recovery.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” you ask between shoveled mouthfuls. You’re not sure if the crease in his brow is because of your noisy chewing or what, but you don’t care. It’s his fault for feeding you like he’s being chased.
“Not now.”
With only a few bites of it remaining, it is safe to say that the meal is delicious. A lot better than what you had expected. Judging by his bulky and muscular form, you knew he must eat well to maintain it, but you didn’t think he’d be a decent cook.
After he washes and puts away the dishes, you ask from your seat at the dining table, “you’re not actually staying the night, right?”
Though unlikely, you ask on the off chance that he’s had a change of heart. You don’t know him. Not well enough to allow him to stay here overnight, and it would weigh on your conscious if you didn’t at least try to make him reconsider.
“If you insist on monitoring me, maybe you could just visit me once a day. Or I could check in with you over text. While you were out, I texted my boss. After seeing how I was today, he agreed that it’d be best I follow medical advice. I’ll be sitting at home for the next two weeks, not fucking up your hard work.”
He watches you, wiping his hands on your dish towel, and then throws it on the counter. “I’m sleeping on the couch.” He walks past you to the living room to pick up his drawstring bag, slinging it over his shoulder, and heads to the door.
You’re shocked into a short silence after being dismissed so rudely. After a beat, you ask, “where are you going?”
“The gym.”
From his pocket he pulls out and shakes your keys, taunting you with them. You forgot he still had them. If it came down to it, though, you think he’d probably pick the lock on the front door.
“In case you lock me out again.”
The door slams shut behind him, and, though he just left for the second time tonight, the reality is dawning on you that he is here to stay.
You’re in the restroom about to take a shower when you hear your front door open and close. Not but a moment later, Park barges in, and you whip around to face him, holding your towel tighter against yourself, your cast wrapped up in plastic.
He worked up a sweat at the gym. His muscle tee is drenched, and he is shiny with that post-workout glow. Your eyes drift over the corded muscle of his arms, the veins in his forearms leading to the ones on the back of his hands, a prominent blueish-green against his pale skin.
“I need to shower.”
“Well,” you make a little high-pitched noise in the back of your throat, annoyed, “so do I. Your gym doesn’t have one you could’ve used?”
He can afford the luxury of a gym that has a sauna and a shower integrated all in one, let alone just a plain shower. Why he would come back and want to use yours is beyond you.
He looks you up and down, spending a particularly long time staring at your feet, toes polished with a light pink.
“Cute,” he says, teasing.
You chew on your lower lip and shrink in on yourself, hating the attention he gives you in such a vulnerable state.
He meets your eyes again and crowds in on you, your back digging into the towel rack behind you.
“Makes more sense if we take one together. I can help scrub you down,” he offers nonchalantly.
You have the feeling this isn’t as much of an offer as it is a demand. The audacity and confidence with which he says the most out-of-this-world things is quite astounding.
All you can squeak out is “what?”
“You heard me. I really hate repeating myself. Stop making me do it.”
He steps forward and wrenches your towel away from you, hanging it on the rack.
You screech, “Dr. Park!” covering what you can with your hand, but it’s a pointless thing.
“Brendon,” he growls out. “That’s the name I put in your phone, isn’t it? I couldn’t give less of a fuck about you naked.”
He says that, and yet, you can see his eyes not-so-discreetly raking over your bare breasts and cunt, his tongue moving beneath his lips and scraping over his teeth as if he’s looking at you like he wants to eat you.
You aren’t overreacting as much as reacting to the behavior of a hungry predator.
He reaches past you to start the water, opening the shower curtain, and guides you in with a hand on your lower back. You squeal when the water hits your skin.
“Cold! It’s fucking cold!”
He huffs a laugh, undressing himself and joining you, amused by your suffering, apparently.
“Means we’ll get out faster.”
While you two are under the spray, you don’t dare look at him. Your back is facing him, and your eyes are screwed shut. At least he has the sense to keep some distance between you two so you don’t feel him pressing up on you.
You learned his first name a few nights ago. Today he’s divorced.
You’re curious as to how recent it was. Though there’s the obvious lack of a ring, you made out the faintest tan line that hasn’t faded away just yet on his ring finger as he was cleaning up in the kitchen earlier.
And now, as doctor and patient, you’re showering together, medical ethics be damned. You haven’t even considered the fact that he’s around two decades older than you.
At least you think he is.
“How old are you?” you ask suddenly.
“Why.”
“I just—I just want to know. You know my age. Where I live. Where I work. My medical history. What I look like naked. It’s only fair you tell me a bit about yourself.”
“Forty-one.”
So, he’s not quite two decades older than you—you suppose the stress of his job makes him look a bit older than he is—but the point stands.
He’s old enough to be a young father of yours.
You worry his wanting to shower together is coming from a place of ill intent, but if he does have such intentions, he makes no sign of it. All he does is as he said he would, which is help you.
He scrubs with your washcloth, with a harsh and heavy hand, down your back and places that would take twice as long to scrub if you did it on your own. But as helpful as he may be, you can’t get over how flustered you feel that this is happening to begin with.
“Thank you,” you murmur once you’re both squeaky clean, apprehensively turning around. You make a conscious effort to keep your eyes on his and not anywhere else on his body.
His expression is neutral as he reaches over your shoulder and shuts off the water, your nipples pressing into his chest. You hold back something that is a strange mix between a moan and a noise of discomfort. He opens the curtain and reaches for your towel from the rack, carefully wrapping it under your arms and around you. He doesn’t shy away from looking at your bare body, but you keep your eyes on his.
“Showering has been time-consuming, to say the least.”
“Need help gettin’ dressed too?” he asks, oh-so casually.
Your mind’s image of him, on his knees, helping you step into your underwear, makes a heat creep up your cheeks.
“No, no, I’ve got it. Thanks.”
He hums in acknowledgement, stepping out, wrapping the other towel on the rack around his waist, and leaves you in the restroom.
You try not to imagine him from the waist down, naked, getting dressed in your living room.
You sleep in your bed a hallway away while he sleeps on your couch. This entire day has already felt like a dream.
The first few days of your cohabitation go by shockingly smoothly.
Not without some initial bumps, of course. Namely, being awoken by Brendon blending his morning protein shakes and then being poked and prodded at when he bursts into your room to check up on your wrist and clavicle if you had rolled to your side in your sleep or if your sling had fallen off overnight.
You don’t have the irrational fear anymore, though maybe you should, that he’s going to murder you in your sleep. That is to say, you’re finding you somewhat enjoy his company. Whether that’s due to being cooped up with little to do or you’re lonelier than you thought, you don’t know.
You don’t know much about Brendon, either, still, but at the very least you’ve learned about his habits living with him and a few things here and there from what scraps he gives you when he comes back from work and tells you about his day. For the most part, though, he’s quiet. He reserves his energy to speak for when he’s checking up on you in the mornings and before bed or when you can’t stand the silence during dinner and blurt out something that he cares enough to respond to.
You managed a chuckle out of him last night when you had told him how unreasonably hot you found all the staff at PTMC to be. When he’d asked who you found the hottest, you, of course, answered that he was. If only to not be fed like a bird, like he’d threatened.
Correct, he’d said.
Every evening since he’s been here, he’s gone to the gym, and by the time he gets back, you’re in bed, ready to fall asleep. Sometimes you’re not, though, and while he prepares and eats his dinner, you watch television.
Over the past two nights he has brought it to the couch to eat and begrudgingly watched your show with you.
But tonight, the fifth night of his stay, he lets it be known his distaste for your choices.
“This is your idea of entertainment. A dating show,” he asks. “Where everyone is cheating on their partners with other people?”
“I get what you’re saying, but it’s not really cheating. I mean, these couples are already in dire straits if they’re signing up to be there. It’s entertainment. Don’t take it too seriously.”
“It’s ridiculous, is what it is.”
“What do you consider entertainment, then, Shark? Nature documentaries, maybe? World’s Deadliest. You’re a blood and gore kind of guy, aren’t you. You obviously like bones.”
He sets his plate down on the coffee table with a clatter, and you know you should’ve just kept your mouth shut.
He drags you down the couch by your ankles, his big hands wrapped like shackles around them, and rearranges you so that your head is resting in his lap. It happens so quickly and with ease and without jostling your slung arm that you’re not only out of breath afterward but also worryingly turned on.
It isn’t the first time he’s shown off his strength in the past few days. He doesn’t lose his breath lugging your big and heavy vacuum across your carpet while vacuuming, for one. For two, you’ve slowly started to come out of hiding while he cooks dinner, and instead of watching from the dining table, he lifts you onto the countertop so you can watch him work his magic right there in the kitchen.
Watch closely; you might learn somethin’, he’d said, your calves banging against the lower cabinets as you kicked your feet.
You’re not complaining, per se; he’s not flaunting just to flaunt, but you don’t think you should enjoy it—him—this much, given the circumstances, and yet you do.
He retrieves the remote trapped between the cushions and flips through the channels, landing on a nature documentary.
As luck would have it, the segment is covering great white sharks.
“Are we seriously watching this?” you ask, head turning to the side to watch the TV instead of his face.
“You brought it up. And better this than that reality TV crap.”
Your heart skips a beat when he starts to pet your head, digging his fingers in slightly to massage your scalp. It feels... nice. Relaxing. Not something you thought you could feel around him—relaxed. A few more minutes and you’re about to fall asleep, but you open your lidded eyes and watch the screen when he says, “look. It’s us.”
Another segment. A lion encounters an injured gazelle. They’re opportunistic feeders, so he’ll eat her.
You’re not sure if he’s suggesting you’re his next meal or if he sees you as a frail thing to nurture back to health. It’s clear he’s the lion in this scenario.
Either way, it’s a fitting comparison, you think.
It’s not like you want to be stuck with him day after day in this domestic thing you two have going on, sorting laundry together on his day off, you putting it into separate piles, and him folding once it’s out of the dryer.
(Why’d you and your wife get divorced?
Why’re you asking?
I’m just curious.
We weren’t in love anymore. Simple as that.
...Do you think you’ll ever get remarried?
...Not yet. It’d be too soon.)
It’s been hard to make plans with your friends, and Brendon has made it clear that any outing comes with the risk of injuring yourself and setting your recovery back. But maybe you’re partly to blame for your isolation. You’ve been relying on him too much. He does the heavy lifting of the chores and pays for your food and answers the questions you have about your injury. There’s no need for you to go out or do much of anything when he’s here to do the hard stuff for you.
You’ve been a bit of a vampire during this time, but it is kind of nice to be such a sloth while you’re at it.
Brendon continues to hop in the shower with you with the excuse that it is time and resource efficient. He likes to shower in the mornings before his shift and again after his gym sessions, and he’d rather you take it with him in the mornings so he can get helping you out of the way. It is an odd routine to share with someone you have only known for a short time, but you have yet to see anything below his waist—though your resolve not to is fracturing quite pathetically—and he isn’t making passes at you under the guise of cleaning you up. He’s just scrubbing where you can’t and making sure you don’t trip in the shower, Trip.
You’ve convinced him to change the ice-cold temperature to lukewarm, at least.
During the day you graze and laze like an animal, but a week into this arrangement with him, a childhood friend of yours has some free time and makes plans with you for lunch.
It has been a week of sitting at home with Brendon, and you use the opportunity to slip away as a distraction from rubbing the itchy skin under your cast raw. Just under a week and you can switch into your brace and slowly start using your sling less and less, but even this past one has felt like ages.
Today’s a warm winter day, and you and your friend sit outside a little cafe walking distance from your apartment, eating lunch. You make idle conversation, catch up on life, and discuss high school drama that you’re beyond over by now but find entertaining to rehash every once in a while.
As you take a sip of your lemonade, the fine hairs on your nape rise, and you feel a presence coming up from behind you. Then he pulls up a chair and sits at the table.
Your friend is surprised but not necessarily annoyed by his intrusion. If anything, and by anything you mean the batting of her lashes and the giggly offer of her name, which Brendon ignores, his eyes locked on yours, you think she’s attracted to him.
“You’re here,” you say, polite but in a shrill tone. Your eyes widen, and you hope he can understand what you’re thinking.
You shouldn’t be here.
He doesn’t say anything to you and instead turns to your friend. “I’m taking her home. I’ll pay for lunch.”
“Oh, are you two...?” Her question goes unasked. She gives you a quick glance, pushing her chair back to stand, a crease between her brows. “Well, alright, then.”
“You don’t have to—”
She shakes her head and peeks at the time on her phone. “—It’s fine. I have an appointment I need to get to soon, anyway. Let’s meet up again once you’re healed up, yeah?”
She packs her phone into her purse and walks down the sidewalk, turning the corner and disappearing from view.
You face Brendon with a scowl. “If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to call the hospital and get you fired for harassing your patient.”
Which, to be fair, you should have done just that a week ago.
“You’re being dramatic.” He pauses, stealing a fry from your tray, then answers, “I turned on location sharing when I put in my phone number. That’s how I knew you went to work that Monday and how I know you’re here today. I don’t have a lot of time to spare, so let’s get going.”
You blink.
Location sharing?
And then check your phone to confirm that what he says is the truth.
Which it is.
Had he planned to crash at your place from the start? He couldn’t have, because he had only come to you when you went to work that Monday. But now you’re remembering the eyes you felt on you in the lobby over the weekend and—
you don’t know.
If you had just stayed put like he’d ordered, would he have left you alone?
“Wow. I don’t... I don’t even know what to say.”
“Are you gonna throw a temper tantrum? I deal with enough of those with my other patients.”
As much as you should throw one and run in the opposite direction, he has been helpful thus far. You could go as far as to say that you’re thankful he’s been around. He wants to keep you on the road to recovery, however stubborn and unyielding he is about it, and, beyond this week, he has no intention of sticking around any longer.
He pays for lunch, and you both walk back to your place.
He holds you with a firm grip on the wrist and walks in front of you, possessive, dragging you along like his prized possession, his injured gazelle.
After a week of sleeping on your couch, Brendon has well and truly ruined it. He’s just so bulky and heavy that the cushions have completely deflated under his weight.
That night, a few hours after you get walked home and when Brendon returns from his shift, you offer reluctantly to share your bed with him.
“You’re sure.”
“Yes.”
When it happens, you let it.
Because you’ve been living so close to one another.
You’ve showered together. Shared meals together. He’s fed you with his bare hands and helped you floss the remains from your teeth after he had said waiting to use the restroom so you could finish your lengthy nighttime routine was stupid, deciding rather to use it at once.
Once, he took a piss as you gargled mouthwash, and he grunted, you can look if you want.
You didn’t, but you did want to.
You wake up with a chill.
The heat is out, broken like the elevator was two weeks ago, and though Brendon is next to you, the furnace that he is, you’re cold.
Your bed is a queen, but considering how large he is, you knew that in offering to share it with him, you would be stuck to each other like glue.
He grumbles, and you realize he’s awake. Or at least partially awake.
He doesn’t say anything, though. Just turns on his side and hooks an arm over your waist and pulls you in closer, warming you up, the heat of his palm seeping through your night slip.
It seems he’s too hot. In a second, you’re jostled as his shirt gets discarded, thrown over the edge of the bed.
You are still cold.
“You’re shivering,” he mumbles.
“Because it’s freezing in here.”
He hums. “I know a way I can warm you up.”
“How?”
“You always ask such stupid questions,” he puffs against the side of your neck. You shiver. “Isn’t this what you wanted to happen?”
You gasp when he lifts the hem of your slip and the pads of his fingers tease the fabric of your underwear.
“Brendon,” you warn, though it is a weak attempt.
Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth, your limbs limp. With your free hand you encircle his wrist to stop him, so thick you can barely touch middle finger to thumb.
“Shut up. Lemme do this.”
His words are slurred. He is on the brink of falling back asleep.
He rubs your clit through your underwear slowly, just teasing, before pulling your underwear to the side.
“Brendon—”
He shushes you, throwing the closer of your legs over his waist, exposing your cunt to the room, his fingers dimpling the skin of your thigh. Then, with the same hand, he frees himself from his boxers and guides his cock to your hole, sinking in to the root.
You pant into your shoulder, breath wet and hot.
The position is awkward: on your back, one of your legs spread over his waist, the other over the opposite side of the bed, half seated in his lap, impaled on a fat cock.
“Jesus,” he grunts. “Just slid in. Are you always this wet?”
“S-sometimes.”
“Yeah? With the right person, maybe?”
Your traitorous cunt clenches down on him as if answering, with you, in the affirmative.
“Keep doing that, Trip, and see what happens.”
“I can’t—I can’t help it, you’re—”
“My cock feel too good for you?”
He rubs your clit, and your pussy flutters around his rigid cock.
“Stop, wait—Brendon.”
You can feel his cock twitching inside you with every pulse of your cunt.
If he doesn’t stop touching you like that, you’ll—
Your cunt spasms with the pressure he applies persistently to your clit, and you come with a pathetic whine.
“That’s it. Jus’ like that.”
Your cunt clenches down on his length, and, in turn, his cock jerks inside of you.
When he comes, his release is thick and sticky and so much that it seeps around his cock and down between your legs.
This is okay, you think distantly, tiredness and the sticky heat of your orgasm pulling you toward the edge of sleep. He’s your doctor. He knows you’re on birth control.
“Should be warm enough now.”
He pulls out, and you fall asleep with a cunt full of fresh come.
You don’t speak about it in the morning. But when you two shower, you know things have already irrevocably changed.
Facing the showerhead, you turn around to face him instead and look down at it. At the cock that was inside you just several hours ago.
There’s no point in not doing it at this point. And you’re curious.
Your suspicions are confirmed when you see that he is both big and thick.
You felt it, after all.
The hair on his pubic bone is trimmed and neat, darker at the base of his shaft. His cock jerks against his thigh from your rapt attention to it.
He grunts out, voice husky with remnants of sleep, “touch me.”
Your face heats, and you hesitate for a moment but ultimately wrap your fingers around his hardening shaft. Even at half hardness, it’s so heavy that when you let it go, it droops and sticks to his inner thigh.
You clench your thighs, remembering that it was stuffed to the hilt inside your cunt.
You slowly pump him to full mast, and he groans, squeezing one of your soapy, slippery breasts in one hand and the nape of your neck in the other, pulling you closer to him so he can lean down and suck bruises into the side of it. You almost get down on your knees but think better of it. Not in the shower and without your other hand to stabilize you to the wall.
He gently pushes you by your hips to the wall of the shower, plastering you to it. He steps close, grips himself, and presses inside you, water droplets dripping from his hair onto your chest, his come from last night still inside you, lubricating his way.
You fall apart when his pelvis grinds against your clit with every thrust of his hips.
Too easily, you note to yourself.
He’s not even touching you. His hands are on the shower wall by your sides, his mouth panting by your ear, interrupted by the occasional groan or curse of fuck, baby, sound so pretty when you come.
He comes inside you, scrubs himself and your shaking body down, and then leaves you alone in the shower to watch his seed drip out of you and stick to the shower drain.
In a few minutes he returns, fully dressed, shuts off the water, and towels you dry.
“Wear this.”
He pulls one of his cotton t-shirts, left hanging on the towel rack, over your head and your arms through the holes, careful to avoid bumping your slung arm.
“No underwear. We clear?”
The rest of week two passes by in a haze. When he’s not at work, he takes you all over the apartment.
You wake to him heavy and hard behind you, lifting your leg over his waist as he drives home, barely awake though he’s been up for hours watching you sleep.
So good, you’re so good, he slurs. All mine. Mine, mine, mine.
You can barely understand what he’s saying over the sound of skin on skin, your brain mush from sleep. Brendon, he… he doesn’t know what he’s saying. It’s just dirty talk.
This is just… temporary. To pass the time.
Isn’t it?
Regardless, being fucked awake on his cock isn’t a bad way to start the morning. Moreover, when he presses his fingers to your clit and strokes your swollen bud until you pulse around him with a broken chant of his name.
While making you both dinner, he couldn’t help himself. You were seated on the counter, watching him prepare the veggies and red meat for dinner, the outline of your cunt visible through the short shorts that had ridden up your thighs.
At some point, they were torn away, and you were pasted to the fridge.
The backs of your thighs are slung over his forearms, and the whole fridge shakes with every one of his thrusts, knocking down boxes of cereal. Cocoa Puffs and Frosted Flakes, along with his healthy alternative, Raisin Bran. You can barely stabilize yourself, your free hand gripping the fridge handle, the other with its fist clenched within your cast.
He can bear your weight, though, so, despite the fridge threatening to topple over at any moment, all you have to worry about is taking his cock like a good fuckin’ girl.
On the couch, your back laid against the armrest, your legs thrown over his shoulders as he eats you out, someone knocks on the door.
Maybe—maybe I should—ngh—get that.
You make to move, but Brendon harshly squeezes your hips, locking you in place. Your eyes widen when they meet his, deadly and pointed, his upper body sprawled over the couch and his lower half, what with how massive he is, on the floor, his mouth shiny with your slick.
Don’t you fuckin’ dare.
But the knocking persists, so with a slap to your slick cunt telling you to stay put, he unwillingly separates from you with a growl and prowls to the door, roughly opening it without so much as a thought as to who it might be.
In your lust-drunk, on the verge of orgasm daze, you gather enough willpower to peek at the doorway. Brendon’s body is blocking the entrance, but you can tell from the visitor’s voice that it’s your neighbor.
He’s a bit older than you but younger than Brendon. Kind.
You thought he had a crush on you as recently as when he had offered to drive you home from your surgery, but when he didn’t show up or bother following up with an excuse as to why he hadn’t, you dismissed that thought.
He asks for you.
“Hi... is—is she here? I wanted to check up on her. See how she was doing.”
“You were supposed to pick her up, weren’t you, Josh?” Brendon asks, ice in his tone.
“Uh, who are you?”
“Her friend,” Brendon answers. “She’s fine. I’ve been taking good care of her.”
Brendon moves to the side, and Josh, confusion etching his features, takes a look inside to see you, half naked on the couch, scrambling to get decent, your shorts hanging off one ankle.
Brendon then slams the door in his shocked face, huffing a laugh.
Fuckin’ Josh.
“Have you ever taken a cock in here, Trip?”
His hand disappears from wrapped around your neck and reappears near your rump, his fingers brushing over your puckered hole when he leans over you on his other elbow and fists a handful of your ass in his palm, spreading your cheek.
Your cunt flutters around his cock. Your fingers clench the sheets. Your body is sore.
The itch under your cast is unrelenting, but the pain and the pleasure help to quiet the urge to scratch.
For as long as Brendon kept you from the outside to keep you from stalling your recovery, he sure likes to push your body to its limits.
“N-no,” you whimper as he continues to thrust into you, your legs wrapped around his waist, toes curling.
He brings his thumb up to his mouth and sucks, covering it in his saliva, before pulling out of you with a wet slap of his cock against his thigh and sinking it slowly inside your hole.
You mewl at the foreign but not unwelcome feeling.
“We’ll work up to it.”
The night before you’re free of your cast, the end of week two, what should be the end of this... arrangement, he fucks your throat and cunt sore on the carpeted floor before hauling your used and come-leaking, sweat-slick body to bed.
In the face of all the emotions overwhelming you, you ask something stupid before either of you has the chance to fall asleep.
“What happens tomorrow?”
“We wake up, fuck, I make us breakfast, and then we head to PTMC to get your cast switched out for a brace.”
You sit with that for a moment.
“And... after?”
“Don’t worry about it. Go to sleep.”
Then, pressing a chaste kiss to the side of your neck, he whispers when he thinks you have dozed off, “I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
The next morning, in his office at PTMC, he double-checks and ensures that the cast did its job over the past two weeks and that the new brace is well-fitted to your wrist.
Your wrist is recovering as it should, and so is your clavicle, though you will need to wear the brace and continue with the sling for another four weeks.
Now seated across from each other at his desk, he confirms, “you don’t need the cast anymore, and the brace is good to go.”
You don’t need me anymore, is what you think he’s really saying.
It makes you more sad than you’d like to admit that this is over. You’ll go back to work on Monday and come home to an apartment without Brendon.
Your shoulders droop, and you sink a little further into the plush leather of the chair. “So, our... living situation. We—it’s done, right?”
His brows furrow. His jaw ticks. He looks almost angry. “Is that what I said?”
“No, but—”
“—Don’t make assumptions. I called you an Uber home. Pack a bag and wait for me to get back. We’re staying at my place tonight.”
“Your place,” you parrot, confused.
“Can’t stand that shithole apartment of yours anymore.”
You shake your head. “You... you want to keep seeing me?”
“What do you think,” he asks, cocking his head at you.
“I think... you planned this from the very start.”
He huffs a laugh. “Things just happened, Trip. ’s not like this was some elaborate scheme to steal your heart.”
You scoff but don’t deny that he may have taken a small piece of it, at least.
“Maybe. But you certainly took advantage of my situation.”
“You complaining?”
“Nope.” Grinning, you add, “I really am special, aren’t I?”
The solitary great white shark, too, can feel lonely, you suppose.
summary: when you go against medical advice after a nasty fall down the stairs, dr. park takes matters into his own hands.
content warnings/description: 18+ MDNI, AFAB reader, forced proximity (but it’s just park making himself at home with reader because he wants to), mildly dubious consent, light stalking, light exhibitionism, mean!park who is a softie underneath it all (kind of), divorced!park, unprotected (PIV) sex, oral sex, anal fingering (fem!receiving) (like, one sentence of it), park can carry/lift reader, wrist and clavicle fractures, medical inaccuracies
author’s note: the ending is rushed, and i apologize. i just wanted to be done with this! also, i didn’t feel like writing a long, drawn-out smut scene, so i hope what i did instead (multiple, shorter scenes) is okay. i hope you enjoy!
It was stupid. Something that was preventable and would not have landed you in the E.R. or required surgery if you had just used your brain.
But you didn’t use your brain, and in the rush to get to work, after the elevator in your apartment went out of service one morning a week ago, you rushed down several flights of stairs.
You had almost made it out of the building without so much as a scratch until the last flight, when you tripped on your new pair of heels and flew over tens of steps until you reached the bottom floor with a thud. And that wasn’t the worst of it. No, you had instinctively reached your arm out to grab the railing a little too late and landed on your dominant arm, the force of the impact snapping your wrist, radiating up to your clavicle, and snapping it as well into several pieces.
Or so the E.R. physicians explained as they stabilized you as best they could, referred you to surgery, and sent you home with a splint and a sling.
A week now since your fall, the orthopedic surgeon operating on you recounts to his students the events that led you to his table as well as the injuries you sustained. You’ve been given a nerve blocker for the pain, and you don’t feel your wrist and clavicle shattered into the small pieces I’ll be putting back together. Understand? Nod your heads if you understand, Dr. Park barks to them, drawing you from your thoughts.
He is not the nicest person. You got a sense of that during your pre-op consultation with him two days ago, but, to be honest, all you care about is getting through this surgery.
You do feel sorry for his students, though.
Once Dr. Park finishes his lecture, he addresses you, telling you, we’re about to start. Take some deep breaths.
Glancing at the diagnostic display by your side, the x-rays of your wrist and clavicle in full view, you breathe in and out through your nose. With a flourish of Dr. Park’s hand, you’re told to count down from ten and are put to sleep by the anesthesiologist. As you count down, the last thing you see is the intense cut of Dr. Park’s eyes and his harsh brows, the bulk of him taking up space in what feels like a cramped operating room, a nurse handing him a clamp—
and then it’s lights out.
He goes over post-op care with you once you wake up, lying in the bed of one of the patient recovery rooms, which you find odd, as this is not something you would expect the booked and busy surgeon to do.
You’ll need to keep your wrist in the cast for two weeks and your arm in the sling for six weeks. After two weeks, we’ll switch the cast into a brace. There’ll be a follow-up around the four-week mark to check your progress. Remember that someone will have to drive you home tonight. Take the medication prescribed to you if you find the pain to be too severe.
“You have someone, right?”
“Huh? Someone…?” The lingering effects of the anesthesia are affecting your concentration. You were so focused on trying to pay attention that you weren’t paying attention.
His eyes narrow. Dr. Park is the embodiment of impatience, but you suppose surgeons have better things to do than repeat themselves, and, from the looks of the dark circles under his eyes, a feature you admittedly find attractive and intimidating, he’s running on fumes.
“Do you have someone to take you home. No one came in with you.”
“Sorry, I—” You shake your head. “—my neighbor... he’ll be picking me up this evening.”
Dr. Park raises a furrowed brow. “Your neighbor. The one that found you on the ground?”
“My friends... well, they all had plans tonight, but he was available.”
“What about a boyfriend. Roommates.”
“I’m single. And I live alone.”
The room goes deathly quiet, and all you can hear is the beeping of monitors, the rolling of carts from the hallway outside, and your own breaths. Dr. Park watches you for a second, and you shift in the bed, uncomfortable being the subject of his scrutiny. But the silence doesn’t stretch for long. He speaks again, and it’s as if no time has passed.
“As long as someone takes you home. We’ll set you up for discharge—” He checks his watch. Your eyes travel from his wrist up his arm to his bicep, huge, as wide as your head, “—around seven p.m. A nurse will see you out.”
“Okay. Thank you, Dr. Park.”
He stands up from the comically small stool by the side of your bed and stares his nose down at you.
All he says before leaving the room, shouldering past a fresh-faced and green observing intern, is, “don’t run down the stairs again.”
Curbside in a wheelchair, you wait for the neighbor who called for and rode in the ambulance with you last week to pick you up.
You’ve bothered him enough; you nearly gave him a heart attack when he found you splayed out, crying on the ground and clutching your forked wrist, but despite it all, he was more than happy to do you this favor.
But... he’s late.
The nurse, overworked and past the time for her to clock out for the end of her shift, grinds her teeth and taps her foot against the pavement as she waits with you.
“I’m so sorry for holding you up. I can just wait here alone,” you say, glancing up at her over your shoulder. “He should be here soon.”
“I can’t leave until you’re picked up.”
“I won’t say anything if you don’t.”
She thinks on it for a second, chewing on her lower lip. Sighing, she says, “alright. Just sit tight. I’ll see if I can find another nurse to wait with you. If he gets here before then, then problem solved.”
You nod. “I will.”
Five, ten, fifteen minutes pass, and your neighbor’s nowhere to be seen. He hasn’t answered your texts. Another nurse hasn’t come by, either.
You’re about to give up hope and just call yourself an Uber home when—
what are you still doing here?
You turn your head to find Dr. Park approaching you. Though you know the logical explanation is that his shift is over and he’s leaving, you can’t help but ask, “Dr. Park? What—what are you doing here?”
“I asked you first,” he throws back.
“I’m, uh, waiting for my ride home. Josh, my neighbor… he’s late.”
“Late, huh.” He stands still, giving you the once-over, before pulling his keys out of his scrub pocket, telling you to “just wait here,” and walking off into the lot.
You were already waiting, so nothing new there. But, suddenly, you hear the rev of an engine and watch as a big, shiny truck pulls out of its parking spot, one of the ones designated for employees, and circles the entrance before coming to a stop in front of you.
The passenger-side window rolls down, and from across the seat you can hear his voice.
“Get in.”
Oh.
This… hm.
You have no doubt that this is against the rules. But, at the same time, you would like to get home. And not have to spend a fortune on an Uber, or if worse comes to worst, figure out what buses you need to take to get you home.
“Do you need help, or can you get in yourself like a big girl?” he asks, impatience clipping his tone, after you take too long staring at his shadowed figure.
He rolls the window back up, blocking himself from your sight.
You stand from the wheelchair, a little loopy still, but manage to close the distance to open the passenger door with your free hand and settle in your seat. You struggle with your seatbelt, and he pulls off before you hear it click.
The ride home is uncomfortable.
You told him your address immediately after getting in, but after that it has been complete silence between you two. Words don’t come easy.
From the moment you met during your pre-op consultation, you’ve been on a cliff’s edge with him. He has a somewhat stifling energy. You would roll down the window to cut some of the tension, give yourself air to breathe, but you’re sure that would earn you one of the glares you’ve become familiar with.
After a series of oppressive red lights, he speaks up when you reach the front entrance of your apartment building.
“Give me your phone.”
You’re a little shocked by the suddenness of his demand. “Uh... why?”
“I’m giving you my personal number. Patients tend to have questions during their recovery. Better to ask me instead of strangers on the internet.”
That’s actually quite... thoughtful of him.
“Oh, that makes sense.” You dig your phone from your purse, unlock it, and hand it to him. “Do you do this with all your patients?”
Drive them home after their surgery, give them your personal number, make them feel as if they’re the snow in a snow globe, shaken up and studied.
“You’re not special, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Your mouth parts in offense, and you see the corner of his mouth lift as if he were about to laugh. It is odd that him saying that makes you feel... not so good, like it matters what he thinks of you.
“Do you think you are?” he asks.
“What?”
“Is it the anesthesia, or are you always this scatterbrained? Do you think you’re special,” he repeats.
Holding back your scowl proves impossible. And you thought he was being nice in offering you his number. You answer carefully, lips drawn in a straight line, “no, I know I’m just another patient. If anything, I’m being a burden. Thank you for driving me home. I do appreciate it.”
He grunts in response as he creates his contact in your phone. The electronic device barely fits in his hands, and you can’t help but wonder what they would look like on your body. It frustrates you that the thought crosses your mind.
He’s not worthy of a crumb of your attention. He’s strict and borderline cruel. Like a cutthroat surgeon would be. And you’re his patient. You don’t want to think about what he might be like with someone he hates. Or loves enough to be more of himself in front of, if he is capable of such a thing.
When he’s finished, he casually tosses your phone back into your lap and then dismissively says, “we’re done here. See you soon.”
You hop out of the car and turn around to say goodbye, with a lightness and a kindness he does not deserve.
“Well, hopefully not too soon, right?”
He watches you for a moment, his eyes searching your face and down your body to the strap of the sling on your shoulder and the cast on your arm and lower. To your croc-and-sock-covered feet and back up to your eyes. All in a blink. So fast you might have imagined it. Then he reaches over to close the passenger door himself, throws out a quick “if you do as you’re told, we won’t have a problem,” and peels off, nearly running over your feet and landing you another visit to the E.R.
He’s a strange one, Dr. Park.
As you make your way up to your floor—the elevator was restored to working order soon after your accident—you scroll through your contacts list and do a double take.
Did he not make one for himself?
But, upon further inspection, you realize his name, Brendon Park, with a shark emoji right next to it, one you know for certain doesn’t belong to anyone you know, is in your phone.
Brendon Park.
Not Dr. Park.
Your surgery was performed Friday afternoon, so you take the weekend to recover, hoping against hope that you will feel well enough to at least get yourself to work on Monday. You stay home and don’t push yourself. Saturday night, you order takeout instead of dining on microwave meals.
When you make your way downstairs to pick up your food, you feel eyes on you through the lobby glass, as if someone were outside in wait to watch you and specifically you. But you don’t see anything but shadows and chalk the feeling up to nerves. Having been home all day watching true crime doesn’t help your paranoia.
It’s the same thing Sunday night. You treat yourself to a second night of takeout, and again, you feel eyes on you as you pick up your food. But you ignore them.
Before you head to bed, you make sure the door to your unit is locked, though. Checking once, twice, three times. Just in case.
Your boss, as was expected when you had told him about your accident over the phone last week, was not happy that you missed work without the required notice for time off.
In the morning, you get ready and drive one-handed to the office, which, granted, goes against the medical advice that Park gave you. But it’s a close drive, and all you do is ride a desk.
It isn’t worth your job or getting on your boss’ bad side if you can manage fine. The brain fog from the anesthesia has worn off by now, and your days are mostly filled with phone calls and meetings, so your injuries aren’t detrimental to your productivity. The work you do serves as a nice distraction for the persisting itch of the cast padding rubbing against your dry skin.
You’re pushing yourself, though. The pain creeps up, sharp and sinister, closer to the end of the day. You swallow down some of the painkillers prescribed to you to alleviate it. The post-op pain is dreadful compared to the pre-op pain, which had already lessened after a week of waiting at home.
Once the workday is done, you step out of the office to head to the parking lot, your purse slung over your shoulder and your car keys in your free hand.
You don’t expect to see his truck pulled up right by the side of the building.
Park steps out and stalks toward you, a deep frown on his face. The sun sets earlier in the day, and his figure casts a long shadow to the side of him.
“What the hell are—” you start.
“—What am I doing here? What are you doing here?”
You have the urge to throw his words from the other night back in his face, but you’re, frankly, too flustered to.
“This—this is where I work.”
“You aren’t supposed to be working. You’re supposed to be resting,” he grits out.
“How did you know I was here?” you exclaim, throwing your hand up.
A few of your colleagues step out of the building behind you, and you temper your frustrations to avoid a scandal. Maybe there is a reasonable explanation for this, but you’re coming up blank.
He grabs you by your free arm and leads you to his truck, opening the passenger door, and essentially manhandles you in, buckling you in to your seat—only because of the cast and the sling and because he’s impatient, because otherwise it’d be too kind of him to do so.
If it weren’t for the fact that he’s a surgeon, your surgeon, the one that had his hands inside you and fixed your clavicle and wrist, you would be kicking and screaming right now.
“I’m taking you home,” he says once he slides into his seat and starts up the car. “Couldn’t sit still for two fuckin’ weeks?”
“Are you going to answer my question?” you ask, voice pitched high and incredulous. “I think you should answer my question, doctor.”
You regret the sass immediately. He pierces you with a glower, and you shrink in the soft leather of the passenger seat. It molds to your shape, as if you’re the last person to have sat here.
As he peels off in the direction of your apartment, he answers, “I check up on all my patients. Part of the job. Would’ve been here earlier if I didn’t have surgeries I couldn’t get out of.”
You don’t think it is a part of the job. Not to this extent. And it doesn’t explain how he knows where and when you work or that you returned to the office in the first place.
You rack your brain trying to recall if you had mentioned anything of the sort during your pre- and post-op meetings with him, but it’s either still fuzzy from the anesthesia or there is nothing to recall. It’s possible you could have said something while under, but you doubt it would have been something as coherent as the details of your employment.
And speaking of employment—
“So, are you not supposed to be at the hospital right now?”
“I cleared the rest of my afternoon. I didn’t think you’d go AMA. I bet you’re in pain, huh.”
“No,” you murmur, turning your body to face the window. “I’m fine.”
He scoffs, glancing at you quickly before returning his eyes to the road.
“You were crying your eyes out when you were brought into the E.D. I bet you were crying at your desk today too. Boss should’ve sent you home in your condition. Would’ve saved me the trouble.”
“I fell down the stairs and shattered bone. Who wouldn’t cry?”
Your face feels hot. You don’t like his patronizing tone, though you’re just as amazed you made it through the workday without feeling sorry for yourself and shedding a tear or two.
You don’t get it. What any of this means. But you’re afraid to hear the answer, so you’re almost glad he keeps his mouth shut on that front.
All you dare ask is, “what about my car?”
“I’ll pick it up later.”
The rest of the ride is silent.
This time, Park does not simply drop you off at the entrance to your apartment building.
He parks his truck in guest parking, follows you into the building, and with a searing paw on your hip, you ride the elevator up to your floor, and he walks in behind you through the front door.
It isn’t until you’re standing in the middle of your living room when you ask, “stalking isn’t something in the job description, is it? Because that’s what this feels like. You stalked me, and now—and now you’re in my apartment.”
You’re aware you didn’t put up much of a fight, but what were you supposed to do against the wall that is Brendon Park?
He crosses his arms over his chest, a loose strand of hair broken free from the cast of gel coating his scalp, casting a shadow over his eyes.
“You disobeyed my rules. I’m here to babysit you.”
He seems to think that is enough of an explanation and takes the opportunity to look around your apartment. From the look on his face, he is disgusted.
You do what you can to spruce it up with an assortment of plants, thrifted vintage decor, fairy lights, but ultimately, you’re not living in the best Pittsburgh has to offer.
The walls are stained with cigarette smoke from the previous tenant and are peeling. The heater is on its last leg and makes a clanking sound every other second. Your restroom and bedroom down the hall are a claustrophobe’s worst nightmare, the latter barely fitting your bed, dresser, and desk.
Park trudges into the open kitchen and looks inside your fridge and through your cabinets, scowling.
“This place is a shithole. How do you live like this?”
You ignore his comment and instead ask, “what do you mean by ‘babysit’?”
You watch, jaw going slack, as he opens your freezer and proceeds to peel back the plastic seal, tossing out all your instant meals in the nearby trash can.
“I need to make sure you don’t undo all my hard work. Better get used to me hanging around these next two weeks, Trip.”
“You’re not welcome here. And don’t call me Trip.” Raising your palm in surrender, you say, “I’ll stay home for the next two weeks as advised, alright? Please, just... get out.”
“I’ll make sure of it, because I’m sticking around; that’s final.”
Your eyes nearly pop out of their sockets.
“But... why? Are you not—do you not have a family or… or a wife to go back home to? A pet or something? What about work?”
“I’m divorced,” he grunts. “I’m still clocking in for my shifts, but I’ll be coming home to you. Spending my days off here. Really, I’m doing you a kindness.”
The fact that he’s a divorced man doesn’t come as a surprise to you. Not that what you feel about it matters.
“This is absolutely absurd.”
“You should’ve listened to orders.”
He’s an immovable object. He won’t listen to reason. He is also literally immovable, and three of you couldn’t move one of him out of here.
You chew on your lower lip and hang your head, defeated, but it won’t lead to a different outcome. You don’t see him changing his mind.
Apparently done taking inventory of your kitchen, he walks back into the living room, closing in on you, and gestures for you to give me your keys. I’ll pick up your car.
You mindlessly toss them to him—the confusion of how he knows what your car looks like distant in your head—while working out the logistics of this. The how and why of it all still nags at you, but before you can ask him, yet again, for proper answers, he says, “I’ll be back,” and walks out the door.
By the time you hear his footsteps outside the door, it’s been a little over an hour. You’re not sure how he got there, if he’d called a rideshare or something, but the office is a ten-minute drive from your apartment. You suppose with rush hour traffic and having to go back and forth, it would take him longer to get back. You instinctively locked the door after he’d left, and you can hear him jangling your set of keys, figuring out which one is the one to your unit.
You haven’t done much except text your boss and overthink on the couch, picking at a loose thread on the sweats you changed into. You thought you might order takeout again since Park tossed your instant meals, but, being the kind person you are, you thought to wait for him to return to see if he wanted anything.
It’s ridiculous of you to have done so because he’s your surgeon and is forcefully squatting at your place because you can’t “follow orders,” and yet, you are willing to consider what he wants for dinner.
You heard about him and his reputation from some of the nurses during your short stay at PTMC. Park the Shark. He’s a good doctor despite his character flaws, someone you avoid if you can, or you risk getting bit.
As unconventional as this situation is, though, he’s not here to put you in any harm. Quite the opposite, in fact, if he’s to be believed.
As he walks through the door, you notice that he’s in different clothes; is holding multiple bags of groceries—the paper handles twisted up between his fingers; has his backpack slung over his shoulder; a drawstring bag slung over the other; as well as a duffel bag halfway zipped and spilling out with what seem to be his personal effects.
It is then that you realize why he had taken so long to get back. He must’ve made a stop for groceries and his place to get his things.
He leaves his stuff littered on the floor by your feet and starts to put away the groceries.
“I parked your car right out front where you’ll see it. Not that you’ll be goin’ anywhere.”
“Thank you for that, I guess,” you mumble, standing from the couch and joining him in the kitchen. “I see you got… groceries.”
“For dinner. All you got are frozen food and snacks. How are you alive?”
Through the crinkle of the paper bags he sets down on the countertop and rifles through, you can hear the judgment in his voice.
“I’m not much of a cook,” you say, slightly embarrassed, shifting on your feet. “And I thought I would just order something.”
“You’re eating what I make you.”
“It’d better be good then,” you throw back, rolling your eyes.
You’re not sure what to do. Hover or give him space? Is it worth trying to make conversation? Ostensibly, he’s your roommate for the next two weeks. A board-certified roommate that will make sure you don’t fuck up the screws holding your distal radius and clavicle together.
“Do you want me to leave you to it?” you ask, hesitant.
He doesn’t look at you when he responds, instead focusing on the slabs of meat he’s seasoning with your condiments.
Garlic and onion powder. Black pepper and salt.
He opens your fridge and pulls out a stick of butter to melt into a bowl and then washes his hands in the sink. Scrubbing down his wrist and beneath his nails, like he’s prepping for surgery.
“It’s your place. Do what you want,” he says, voice flat and uninterested. “I’ll call you when it’s time to eat. In the meantime, rest. Keep your arm elevated.”
“I know. I’ve been doing that for the past three days. Since you discharged me?”
He says nothing, his attention focused on his hands. His fingernails are clipped and neat, fingers thick, knuckles littered with patches of light hairs, working deftly to coat the meat in the seasonings.
For someone who is adamantly encroaching on your space, he seems to not want you to be here. You don’t want to subject yourself to his prickliness, so you hide in your bedroom and scroll on your phone until dinner is ready.
This is so weird. So, so weird.
When dinner is served, you take a seat at the dining table, where he is already seated beside you. Awkwardly staring at your plate, fork in hand, you’re unable to draw up conversation.
At least, this is awkward for you. You think Park prefers not speaking after spending so much time with colleagues and patients. You wonder if he performed your surgery in absolute silence. There hadn’t been any music on before you were put to sleep, but if there had been, you could take a good guess for some sort of heavy metal or rock.
When you first noticed your dinner plate, you were a bit taken aback. He had cut your steak up into pieces for you, mindful of your physical limitations.
“Do you need help,” he asks when you don’t make a move to eat.
“No, I think I can manage a fork just fine, thank you,” you answer, stabbing at a piece and taking a bite.
“Can you?”
With the sling and short arm cast on your dominant side, you’ve been forced to rely on your non-dominant hand, and Park can apparently pick up on the slight lack of finesse you have with it because he thinks you’re eating wrong, if that’s even possible.
“You’re as helpless as a baby.”
He takes your fork from you, guiding a piece of steak that he mixes with a helping of mashed potatoes to your mouth.
But you object because you’re well capable of feeding yourself. Smashing your lips together and turning your head away from the fork only irritates him more, however. With his other hand, he grips your chin with his thumb and forefinger, curling them inward to secure you in place.
“Don’t make this harder than it has to be,” he grunts. “I’m not against shoving this down your throat if I have to.”
So, you give in. It’s humiliating to be fed like this, but he’s doing this because he’s a good doctor, you think, to make sense of his behavior in your head, and eating well is important for your recovery.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” you ask between shoveled mouthfuls. You’re not sure if the crease in his brow is because of your noisy chewing or what, but you don’t care. It’s his fault for feeding you like he’s being chased.
“Not now.”
With only a few bites of it remaining, it is safe to say that the meal is delicious. A lot better than what you had expected. Judging by his bulky and muscular form, you knew he must eat well to maintain it, but you didn’t think he’d be a decent cook.
After he washes and puts away the dishes, you ask from your seat at the dining table, “you’re not actually staying the night, right?”
Though unlikely, you ask on the off chance that he’s had a change of heart. You don’t know him. Not well enough to allow him to stay here overnight, and it would weigh on your conscious if you didn’t at least try to make him reconsider.
“If you insist on monitoring me, maybe you could just visit me once a day. Or I could check in with you over text. While you were out, I texted my boss. After seeing how I was today, he agreed that it’d be best I follow medical advice. I’ll be sitting at home for the next two weeks, not fucking up your hard work.”
He watches you, wiping his hands on your dish towel, and then throws it on the counter. “I’m sleeping on the couch.” He walks past you to the living room to pick up his drawstring bag, slinging it over his shoulder, and heads to the door.
You’re shocked into a short silence after being dismissed so rudely. After a beat, you ask, “where are you going?”
“The gym.”
From his pocket he pulls out and shakes your keys, taunting you with them. You forgot he still had them. If it came down to it, though, you think he’d probably pick the lock on the front door.
“In case you lock me out again.”
The door slams shut behind him, and, though he just left for the second time tonight, the reality is dawning on you that he is here to stay.
You’re in the restroom about to take a shower when you hear your front door open and close. Not but a moment later, Park barges in, and you whip around to face him, holding your towel tighter against yourself, your cast wrapped up in plastic.
He worked up a sweat at the gym. His muscle tee is drenched, and he is shiny with that post-workout glow. Your eyes drift over the corded muscle of his arms, the veins in his forearms leading to the ones on the back of his hands, a prominent blueish-green against his pale skin.
“I need to shower.”
“Well,” you make a little high-pitched noise in the back of your throat, annoyed, “so do I. Your gym doesn’t have one you could’ve used?”
He can afford the luxury of a gym that has a sauna and a shower integrated all in one, let alone just a plain shower. Why he would come back and want to use yours is beyond you.
He looks you up and down, spending a particularly long time staring at your feet, toes polished with a light pink.
“Cute,” he says, teasing.
You chew on your lower lip and shrink in on yourself, hating the attention he gives you in such a vulnerable state.
He meets your eyes again and crowds in on you, your back digging into the towel rack behind you.
“Makes more sense if we take one together. I can help scrub you down,” he offers nonchalantly.
You have the feeling this isn’t as much of an offer as it is a demand. The audacity and confidence with which he says the most out-of-this-world things is quite astounding.
All you can squeak out is “what?”
“You heard me. I really hate repeating myself. Stop making me do it.”
He steps forward and wrenches your towel away from you, hanging it on the rack.
You screech, “Dr. Park!” covering what you can with your hand, but it’s a pointless thing.
“Brendon,” he growls out. “That’s the name I put in your phone, isn’t it? I couldn’t give less of a fuck about you naked.”
He says that, and yet, you can see his eyes not-so-discreetly raking over your bare breasts and cunt, his tongue moving beneath his lips and scraping over his teeth as if he’s looking at you like he wants to eat you.
You aren’t overreacting as much as reacting to the behavior of a hungry predator.
He reaches past you to start the water, opening the shower curtain, and guides you in with a hand on your lower back. You squeal when the water hits your skin.
“Cold! It’s fucking cold!”
He huffs a laugh, undressing himself and joining you, amused by your suffering, apparently.
“Means we’ll get out faster.”
While you two are under the spray, you don’t dare look at him. Your back is facing him, and your eyes are screwed shut. At least he has the sense to keep some distance between you two so you don’t feel him pressing up on you.
You learned his first name a few nights ago. Today he’s divorced.
You’re curious as to how recent it was. Though there’s the obvious lack of a ring, you made out the faintest tan line that hasn’t faded away just yet on his ring finger as he was cleaning up in the kitchen earlier.
And now, as doctor and patient, you’re showering together, medical ethics be damned. You haven’t even considered the fact that he’s around two decades older than you.
At least you think he is.
“How old are you?” you ask suddenly.
“Why.”
“I just—I just want to know. You know my age. Where I live. Where I work. My medical history. What I look like naked. It’s only fair you tell me a bit about yourself.”
“Forty-one.”
So, he’s not quite two decades older than you—you suppose the stress of his job makes him look a bit older than he is—but the point stands.
He’s old enough to be a young father of yours.
You worry his wanting to shower together is coming from a place of ill intent, but if he does have such intentions, he makes no sign of it. All he does is as he said he would, which is help you.
He scrubs with your washcloth, with a harsh and heavy hand, down your back and places that would take twice as long to scrub if you did it on your own. But as helpful as he may be, you can’t get over how flustered you feel that this is happening to begin with.
“Thank you,” you murmur once you’re both squeaky clean, apprehensively turning around. You make a conscious effort to keep your eyes on his and not anywhere else on his body.
His expression is neutral as he reaches over your shoulder and shuts off the water, your nipples pressing into his chest. You hold back something that is a strange mix between a moan and a noise of discomfort. He opens the curtain and reaches for your towel from the rack, carefully wrapping it under your arms and around you. He doesn’t shy away from looking at your bare body, but you keep your eyes on his.
“Showering has been time-consuming, to say the least.”
“Need help gettin’ dressed too?” he asks, oh-so casually.
Your mind’s image of him, on his knees, helping you step into your underwear, makes a heat creep up your cheeks.
“No, no, I’ve got it. Thanks.”
He hums in acknowledgement, stepping out, wrapping the other towel on the rack around his waist, and leaves you in the restroom.
You try not to imagine him from the waist down, naked, getting dressed in your living room.
You sleep in your bed a hallway away while he sleeps on your couch. This entire day has already felt like a dream.
The first few days of your cohabitation go by shockingly smoothly.
Not without some initial bumps, of course. Namely, being awoken by Brendon blending his morning protein shakes and then being poked and prodded at when he bursts into your room to check up on your wrist and clavicle if you had rolled to your side in your sleep or if your sling had fallen off overnight.
You don’t have the irrational fear anymore, though maybe you should, that he’s going to murder you in your sleep. That is to say, you’re finding you somewhat enjoy his company. Whether that’s due to being cooped up with little to do or you’re lonelier than you thought, you don’t know.
You don’t know much about Brendon, either, still, but at the very least you’ve learned about his habits living with him and a few things here and there from what scraps he gives you when he comes back from work and tells you about his day. For the most part, though, he’s quiet. He reserves his energy to speak for when he’s checking up on you in the mornings and before bed or when you can’t stand the silence during dinner and blurt out something that he cares enough to respond to.
You managed a chuckle out of him last night when you had told him how unreasonably hot you found all the staff at PTMC to be. When he’d asked who you found the hottest, you, of course, answered that he was. If only to not be fed like a bird, like he’d threatened.
Correct, he’d said.
Every evening since he’s been here, he’s gone to the gym, and by the time he gets back, you’re in bed, ready to fall asleep. Sometimes you’re not, though, and while he prepares and eats his dinner, you watch television.
Over the past two nights he has brought it to the couch to eat and begrudgingly watched your show with you.
But tonight, the fifth night of his stay, he lets it be known his distaste for your choices.
“This is your idea of entertainment. A dating show,” he asks. “Where everyone is cheating on their partners with other people?”
“I get what you’re saying, but it’s not really cheating. I mean, these couples are already in dire straits if they’re signing up to be there. It’s entertainment. Don’t take it too seriously.”
“It’s ridiculous, is what it is.”
“What do you consider entertainment, then, Shark? Nature documentaries, maybe? World’s Deadliest. You’re a blood and gore kind of guy, aren’t you. You obviously like bones.”
He sets his plate down on the coffee table with a clatter, and you know you should’ve just kept your mouth shut.
He drags you down the couch by your ankles, his big hands wrapped like shackles around them, and rearranges you so that your head is resting in his lap. It happens so quickly and with ease and without jostling your slung arm that you’re not only out of breath afterward but also worryingly turned on.
It isn’t the first time he’s shown off his strength in the past few days. He doesn’t lose his breath lugging your big and heavy vacuum across your carpet while vacuuming, for one. For two, you’ve slowly started to come out of hiding while he cooks dinner, and instead of watching from the dining table, he lifts you onto the countertop so you can watch him work his magic right there in the kitchen.
Watch closely; you might learn somethin’, he’d said, your calves banging against the lower cabinets as you kicked your feet.
You’re not complaining, per se; he’s not flaunting just to flaunt, but you don’t think you should enjoy it—him—this much, given the circumstances, and yet you do.
He retrieves the remote trapped between the cushions and flips through the channels, landing on a nature documentary.
As luck would have it, the segment is covering great white sharks.
“Are we seriously watching this?” you ask, head turning to the side to watch the TV instead of his face.
“You brought it up. And better this than that reality TV crap.”
Your heart skips a beat when he starts to pet your head, digging his fingers in slightly to massage your scalp. It feels... nice. Relaxing. Not something you thought you could feel around him—relaxed. A few more minutes and you’re about to fall asleep, but you open your lidded eyes and watch the screen when he says, “look. It’s us.”
Another segment. A lion encounters an injured gazelle. They’re opportunistic feeders, so he’ll eat her.
You’re not sure if he’s suggesting you’re his next meal or if he sees you as a frail thing to nurture back to health. It’s clear he’s the lion in this scenario.
Either way, it’s a fitting comparison, you think.
It’s not like you want to be stuck with him day after day in this domestic thing you two have going on, sorting laundry together on his day off, you putting it into separate piles, and him folding once it’s out of the dryer.
(Why’d you and your wife get divorced?
Why’re you asking?
I’m just curious.
We weren’t in love anymore. Simple as that.
...Do you think you’ll ever get remarried?
...Not yet. It’d be too soon.)
It’s been hard to make plans with your friends, and Brendon has made it clear that any outing comes with the risk of injuring yourself and setting your recovery back. But maybe you’re partly to blame for your isolation. You’ve been relying on him too much. He does the heavy lifting of the chores and pays for your food and answers the questions you have about your injury. There’s no need for you to go out or do much of anything when he’s here to do the hard stuff for you.
You’ve been a bit of a vampire during this time, but it is kind of nice to be such a sloth while you’re at it.
Brendon continues to hop in the shower with you with the excuse that it is time and resource efficient. He likes to shower in the mornings before his shift and again after his gym sessions, and he’d rather you take it with him in the mornings so he can get helping you out of the way. It is an odd routine to share with someone you have only known for a short time, but you have yet to see anything below his waist—though your resolve not to is fracturing quite pathetically—and he isn’t making passes at you under the guise of cleaning you up. He’s just scrubbing where you can’t and making sure you don’t trip in the shower, Trip.
You’ve convinced him to change the ice-cold temperature to lukewarm, at least.
During the day you graze and laze like an animal, but a week into this arrangement with him, a childhood friend of yours has some free time and makes plans with you for lunch.
It has been a week of sitting at home with Brendon, and you use the opportunity to slip away as a distraction from rubbing the itchy skin under your cast raw. Just under a week and you can switch into your brace and slowly start using your sling less and less, but even this past one has felt like ages.
Today’s a warm winter day, and you and your friend sit outside a little cafe walking distance from your apartment, eating lunch. You make idle conversation, catch up on life, and discuss high school drama that you’re beyond over by now but find entertaining to rehash every once in a while.
As you take a sip of your lemonade, the fine hairs on your nape rise, and you feel a presence coming up from behind you. Then he pulls up a chair and sits at the table.
Your friend is surprised but not necessarily annoyed by his intrusion. If anything, and by anything you mean the batting of her lashes and the giggly offer of her name, which Brendon ignores, his eyes locked on yours, you think she’s attracted to him.
“You’re here,” you say, polite but in a shrill tone. Your eyes widen, and you hope he can understand what you’re thinking.
You shouldn’t be here.
He doesn’t say anything to you and instead turns to your friend. “I’m taking her home. I’ll pay for lunch.”
“Oh, are you two...?” Her question goes unasked. She gives you a quick glance, pushing her chair back to stand, a crease between her brows. “Well, alright, then.”
“You don’t have to—”
She shakes her head and peeks at the time on her phone. “—It’s fine. I have an appointment I need to get to soon, anyway. Let’s meet up again once you’re healed up, yeah?”
She packs her phone into her purse and walks down the sidewalk, turning the corner and disappearing from view.
You face Brendon with a scowl. “If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to call the hospital and get you fired for harassing your patient.”
Which, to be fair, you should have done just that a week ago.
“You’re being dramatic.” He pauses, stealing a fry from your tray, then answers, “I turned on location sharing when I put in my phone number. That’s how I knew you went to work that Monday and how I know you’re here today. I don’t have a lot of time to spare, so let’s get going.”
You blink.
Location sharing?
And then check your phone to confirm that what he says is the truth.
Which it is.
Had he planned to crash at your place from the start? He couldn’t have, because he had only come to you when you went to work that Monday. But now you’re remembering the eyes you felt on you in the lobby over the weekend and—
you don’t know.
If you had just stayed put like he’d ordered, would he have left you alone?
“Wow. I don’t... I don’t even know what to say.”
“Are you gonna throw a temper tantrum? I deal with enough of those with my other patients.”
As much as you should throw one and run in the opposite direction, he has been helpful thus far. You could go as far as to say that you’re thankful he’s been around. He wants to keep you on the road to recovery, however stubborn and unyielding he is about it, and, beyond this week, he has no intention of sticking around any longer.
He pays for lunch, and you both walk back to your place.
He holds you with a firm grip on the wrist and walks in front of you, possessive, dragging you along like his prized possession, his injured gazelle.
After a week of sleeping on your couch, Brendon has well and truly ruined it. He’s just so bulky and heavy that the cushions have completely deflated under his weight.
That night, a few hours after you get walked home and when Brendon returns from his shift, you offer reluctantly to share your bed with him.
“You’re sure.”
“Yes.”
When it happens, you let it.
Because you’ve been living so close to one another.
You’ve showered together. Shared meals together. He’s fed you with his bare hands and helped you floss the remains from your teeth after he had said waiting to use the restroom so you could finish your lengthy nighttime routine was stupid, deciding rather to use it at once.
Once, he took a piss as you gargled mouthwash, and he grunted, you can look if you want.
You didn’t, but you did want to.
You wake up with a chill.
The heat is out, broken like the elevator was two weeks ago, and though Brendon is next to you, the furnace that he is, you’re cold.
Your bed is a queen, but considering how large he is, you knew that in offering to share it with him, you would be stuck to each other like glue.
He grumbles, and you realize he’s awake. Or at least partially awake.
He doesn’t say anything, though. Just turns on his side and hooks an arm over your waist and pulls you in closer, warming you up, the heat of his palm seeping through your night slip.
It seems he’s too hot. In a second, you’re jostled as his shirt gets discarded, thrown over the edge of the bed.
You are still cold.
“You’re shivering,” he mumbles.
“Because it’s freezing in here.”
He hums. “I know a way I can warm you up.”
“How?”
“You always ask such stupid questions,” he puffs against the side of your neck. You shiver. “Isn’t this what you wanted to happen?”
You gasp when he lifts the hem of your slip and the pads of his fingers tease the fabric of your underwear.
“Brendon,” you warn, though it is a weak attempt.
Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth, your limbs limp. With your free hand you encircle his wrist to stop him, so thick you can barely touch middle finger to thumb.
“Shut up. Lemme do this.”
His words are slurred. He is on the brink of falling back asleep.
He rubs your clit through your underwear slowly, just teasing, before pulling your underwear to the side.
“Brendon—”
He shushes you, throwing the closer of your legs over his waist, exposing your cunt to the room, his fingers dimpling the skin of your thigh. Then, with the same hand, he frees himself from his boxers and guides his cock to your hole, sinking in to the root.
You pant into your shoulder, breath wet and hot.
The position is awkward: on your back, one of your legs spread over his waist, the other over the opposite side of the bed, half seated in his lap, impaled on a fat cock.
“Jesus,” he grunts. “Just slid in. Are you always this wet?”
“S-sometimes.”
“Yeah? With the right person, maybe?”
Your traitorous cunt clenches down on him as if answering, with you, in the affirmative.
“Keep doing that, Trip, and see what happens.”
“I can’t—I can’t help it, you’re—”
“My cock feel too good for you?”
He rubs your clit, and your pussy flutters around his rigid cock.
“Stop, wait—Brendon.”
You can feel his cock twitching inside you with every pulse of your cunt.
If he doesn’t stop touching you like that, you’ll—
Your cunt spasms with the pressure he applies persistently to your clit, and you come with a pathetic whine.
“That’s it. Jus’ like that.”
Your cunt clenches down on his length, and, in turn, his cock jerks inside of you.
When he comes, his release is thick and sticky and so much that it seeps around his cock and down between your legs.
This is okay, you think distantly, tiredness and the sticky heat of your orgasm pulling you toward the edge of sleep. He’s your doctor. He knows you’re on birth control.
“Should be warm enough now.”
He pulls out, and you fall asleep with a cunt full of fresh come.
You don’t speak about it in the morning. But when you two shower, you know things have already irrevocably changed.
Facing the showerhead, you turn around to face him instead and look down at it. At the cock that was inside you just several hours ago.
There’s no point in not doing it at this point. And you’re curious.
Your suspicions are confirmed when you see that he is both big and thick.
You felt it, after all.
The hair on his pubic bone is trimmed and neat, darker at the base of his shaft. His cock jerks against his thigh from your rapt attention to it.
He grunts out, voice husky with remnants of sleep, “touch me.”
Your face heats, and you hesitate for a moment but ultimately wrap your fingers around his hardening shaft. Even at half hardness, it’s so heavy that when you let it go, it droops and sticks to his inner thigh.
You clench your thighs, remembering that it was stuffed to the hilt inside your cunt.
You slowly pump him to full mast, and he groans, squeezing one of your soapy, slippery breasts in one hand and the nape of your neck in the other, pulling you closer to him so he can lean down and suck bruises into the side of it. You almost get down on your knees but think better of it. Not in the shower and without your other hand to stabilize you to the wall.
He gently pushes you by your hips to the wall of the shower, plastering you to it. He steps close, grips himself, and presses inside you, water droplets dripping from his hair onto your chest, his come from last night still inside you, lubricating his way.
You fall apart when his pelvis grinds against your clit with every thrust of his hips.
Too easily, you distantly note to yourself.
He’s not even touching you. His hands are on the shower wall by your sides, his mouth panting by your ear, interrupted by the occasional groan or curse of fuck, baby, sound so pretty when you come.
He comes inside you, scrubs himself and your shaking body down, and then leaves you alone in the shower to watch his seed drip out of you and stick to the shower drain.
In a few minutes he returns, fully dressed, shuts off the water, and towels you dry.
“Wear this.”
He pulls one of his cotton t-shirts, left hanging on the towel rack, over your head and your arms through the holes, careful to avoid bumping your slung arm.
“No underwear. We clear?”
The rest of week two passes by in a haze. When he’s not at work, he takes you all over the apartment.
You wake to him heavy and hard behind you, lifting your leg over his waist as he drives home, barely awake though he’s been up for hours watching you sleep.
So good, you’re so good, he slurs. All mine. Mine, mine, mine.
You can barely understand what he’s saying over the sound of skin on skin, your brain mush from sleep. Brendon, he… he doesn’t know what he’s saying. It’s just dirty talk.
This is just… temporary. To pass the time.
Isn’t it?
Regardless, being fucked awake on his cock isn’t a bad way to start the morning. Moreover, when he presses his fingers to your clit and strokes your swollen bud until you pulse around him with a broken chant of his name.
While making you both dinner, he couldn’t help himself. You were seated on the counter, watching him prepare the veggies and red meat for dinner, the outline of your cunt visible through the short shorts that had ridden up your thighs.
At some point, they were torn away, and you were pasted to the fridge.
The backs of your thighs are slung over his forearms, and the whole fridge shakes with every one of his thrusts, knocking down boxes of cereal. Cocoa Puffs and Frosted Flakes, along with his healthy alternative, Raisin Bran. You can barely stabilize yourself, your free hand gripping the fridge handle, the other with its fist clenched within your cast.
He can bear your weight, though, so, despite the fridge threatening to topple over at any moment, all you have to worry about is taking his cock like a good fuckin’ girl.
On the couch, your back laid against the armrest, your legs thrown over his shoulders as he eats you out, someone knocks on the door.
Maybe—maybe I should—ngh—get that.
you make to move, but Brendon harshly squeezes your hips, locking you in place. Your eyes widen when they meet his, deadly and pointed, his upper body sprawled over the couch and his lower half, what with how massive he is, on the floor, his mouth shiny with your slick.
Don’t you fuckin’ dare.
But the knocking persists, so with a slap to your slick cunt telling you to stay put, he unwillingly separates from you with a growl and prowls to the door, roughly opening it without so much as a thought as to who it might be.
In your lust-drunk, on the verge of orgasm daze, you gather enough willpower to peek at the doorway. Brendon’s body is blocking the entrance, but you can tell from the visitor’s voice that it’s your neighbor.
He’s a bit older than you but younger than Brendon. Kind.
You thought he had a crush on you as recently as when he had offered to drive you home from your surgery, but when he didn’t show up or bother following up with an excuse as to why he hadn’t, you dismissed that thought.
He asks for you.
“Hi... is—is she here? I wanted to check up on her. See how she was doing.”
“You were supposed to pick her up, weren’t you, Josh?” Brendon asks, ice in his tone.
“Uh, who are you?”
“Her friend,” Brendon answers. “She’s fine. I’ve been taking good care of her.”
Brendon moves to the side, and Josh, confusion etching his features, takes a look inside to see you, half naked on the couch, scrambling to get decent, your shorts hanging off one ankle.
Brendon then slams the door in his shocked face, huffing a laugh.
Fuckin’ Josh.
“Have you ever taken a cock in here, Trip?”
His hand disappears from wrapped around your neck and reappears near your rump, his fingers brushing over your puckered hole when he leans over you on his other elbow and fists a handful of your ass in his palm, spreading your cheek.
Your cunt flutters around his cock. Your fingers clench the sheets. Your body is sore.
The itch under your cast is unrelenting, but the pain and the pleasure help to quiet the urge to scratch.
For as long as Brendon kept you from the outside to keep you from stalling your recovery, he sure likes to push your body to its limits.
“N-no,” you whimper as he continues to thrust into you, your legs wrapped around his waist, toes curling.
He brings his thumb up to his mouth and sucks, covering it in his saliva, before pulling out of you with a wet slap of his cock against his thigh and sinking it slowly inside your hole.
You mewl at the foreign but not unwelcome feeling.
“We’ll work up to it.”
The night before you’re free of your cast, the end of week two, what should be the end of this... arrangement, he fucks your throat and cunt sore on the carpeted floor before hauling your used and come-leaking, sweat-slick body to bed.
In the face of all the emotions overwhelming you, you ask something stupid before either of you has the chance to fall asleep.
“What happens tomorrow?”
“We wake up, fuck, I make us breakfast, and then we head to PTMC to get your cast switched out for a brace.”
You sit with that for a moment.
“And... after?”
“Don’t worry about it. Go to sleep.”
Then, pressing a chaste kiss to the side of your neck, he whispers when he thinks you have dozed off, “I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
The next morning, in his office at PTMC, he double-checks and ensures that the cast did its job over the past two weeks and that the new brace is well-fitted to your wrist.
Your wrist is recovering as it should, and so is your clavicle, though you will need to wear the brace and continue with the sling for another four weeks.
Now seated across from each other at his desk, he confirms, “you don’t need the cast anymore, and the brace is good to go.”
You don’t need me anymore, is what you think he’s really saying.
It makes you more sad than you’d like to admit that this is over. You’ll go back to work on Monday and come home to an apartment without Brendon.
Your shoulders droop, and you sink a little further into the plush leather of the chair. “So, our... living situation. We—it’s done, right?”
His brows furrow. His jaw ticks. He looks almost angry. “Is that what I said?”
“No, but—”
“—Don’t make assumptions. I called you an Uber home. Pack a bag and wait for me to get back. We’re staying at my place tonight.”
“Your place,” you parrot, confused.
“Can’t stand that shithole apartment of yours anymore.”
You shake your head. “You... you want to keep seeing me?”
“What do you think,” he asks, cocking his head at you.
“I think... you planned this from the very start.”
He huffs a laugh. “Things just happened, Trip. ’s not like this was some elaborate scheme to steal your heart.”
You scoff but don’t deny that he may have taken a small piece of it, at least.
“Maybe. But you certainly took advantage of my situation.”
“You complaining?”
“Nope.” Grinning, you add, “I really am special, aren’t I?”
The solitary great white shark, too, can feel lonely, you suppose.
↳ warnings: dex being a creepy great neighbour. obsessive tendencies. gn reader. otherwise it's pretty wholesome, i'd say c: not an established romantic relationship.
↳ notes: i fuck with the neighbours au.
he is quiet. well, for the most part. there's no loud music blasting in the ungodly hours, no friends coming over to party until dawn, no unholy noises suggesting a relationship or even a random hook-up, no back-and-forth yelling between himself and some stubborn ex. it's oddly refreshing. in fact, it's so refreshing that the occasional sound of door slamming or something breaking — "that sounded like a plate..." — is the least of your concerns. we all shatter some dishes every now and then, don't we? although, he seems to have bruised knuckles sometimes... there's no small talk about the weather or your job or your relationship status like there was with the old couple living next to you at your previous place. dex greets you with a scarce "morning," for the most part, but every now and then he is in an awfully good mood where he offers you a wide grin that doesn't quite reach his eyes, "have a wonderful day."
he is neat. you catch a glimpse of his living space one morning when he answers the door to you, black cotton t-shirt and denim jeans already on. "i'm sorry to bother you, but would you happen to have an egg?" you asked, because your last one rolled off the kitchen counter and onto your tiles. he furrows his brows for a moment, as if processing the question before answering, "yeah... yeah, i have one," and he doesn't bother closing the front door as he walks over to the fridge. you notice that there's no clutter; no random wraps or leftovers littering his kitchen counter, no stray socks on the vacuumed floor ( come to think of it, you recall hearing the vacuum rather often ). you noticed him straightening the news papers and advertisments in the news papers box upon entering the building once, "they just threw them in," he commented, as if it was offensive.
he is helpful. he'd held the door open for you and taken the heavy grocery bag out of your hand. carried it to your door and set it on the floor of your hallway when you unlocked the apartment. he took a look around, casually, his eyes trailing across the walls and doors as if checking for exits. he observed the way afternoon light burst in with its golden glow through the windows. you caught it, but hey, it's natural to be compelled to catch a glimpse or two. when you thanked him, he smiled, "don't mention it." he seemed happy with himself. he casually drops off a can of cat food for the feline you'd never told him you have. "i hear it meow sometimes," he said. one time, he'd given you a ride home — it started pouring, you'd had no umbrella and dex happened to be at the mall at the same time. you noticed the monocular in the pit between the driver and passenger seat, "what's that for?" he glanced over to what you were pointing your finger at, his jaw clenching as he looked back onto the road, "it comes with the job."
he is attentive. when you run into each other in the hallway first thing in the morning — which seems to happen often — he asks you about your night, "is everything okay? you came home late," he pauses, "fumbled with your keys. it made some noise." he nods his head when you mention losing track of time with a friend of yours. at some point, you've brought up a trip and how you need to call a friend to ask them to water your plant while you're away, "your peace lily? i can water it for you. if you want." you raised your brow, "how'd you know i have peace lily?" and dex pauses, and shrugs, "saw you bring it in. they're easy to recognise." there was an old man living two floors above and he would continuously throw some sleazy comments your way when you checked your mailbox at the same time — nothing obscene, but just enough to be uncomfortable. dex happened to be there once, "this guy bothering you?" he asked, and you sighed, "he's just... creepy and annoying. the usual..." dex shakes his head lightly, "must be annoying." it was a good riddance that he was found dead three days later. hit his head or something. sounded unfortunate.
he is around. you find yourself walking back home with him more often. it's such a funny coincidence, you think, that you ran into him in the coffee shop earlier that week, and then at the parking lot, and now at the grocery store down the block. the world's a small place, indeed. it's decent quality time; you get to know him and his quirks better. like the fact that he seems to get a joke a second too late, for example. you don't really know it — and you shrug off the odd sensation of being watched — but he's around even when you don't see him. his eye is behind the peephole when you come home from work, taking your keys out of your pocket. he looks through his window to spot your route on the days you go out outside of the pattern — for a sudden ice cream craving, an unexpected emergency meet-up with a friend, that meeting you forgot about. he knows the 'why' behind your trip by the end of the day — he's observed you from the car, after all. you get a text whilst out one day, "you've got a package. want me to bring it in?" and your brows furrow, "dex? sure. thanks." when he hands you the delivery several hours later, you ask him about how he got your phone number. he reminds you that you're in the inactive group for the building's residents.
he is the best. he knocked onto your door one evening. he seemed pale, thirsty breaths coming in and out of his mouth like his lungs couldn't get their fill of the oxygen. knuckles painted crimson, sweat on his forehead, words a mess that he barely spat off his tongue, "please, i—" he swallows, "it's bad, i'm bad, and i just need... i need you." he ends up in your kitchen chair, wincing slightly as you dab the soaked cotton over the back of his hand, one fist clenched against his thigh as he looks at you, "sorry for the trouble, it's just... been a rough day," but you cut him off, "hey, dex. it's okay. you're good," and his mouth goes dry. your gaze drops back to his bloodied hand, but he remains looking at you before his mouth twitches into a smile, "you... you think i'm good?" and you look up, brow raised, "yeah. you're definitely the best neighbour i had."
pairing: benjamin ‘dex’ poindexter/bullseye x reader
sum.: a familiar face finds it’s way in your door in the middle of the night. he finds a secret you never thought he’d find while he’s there.
warnings: very self indulgent and probably ooc dex (don’t come for me lol), a child, kinda secret pregnancy but kinda not?? i think that’s it but please let me know if something needs added.
notes: ughhh i need him so bad. i may come back to this concept later and make a longer fic, and i do kinda wanna explore this plot more of like before dd season 3, but we shall see! idk i don’t have much else to say except i hope you enjoy!!!! i have not nor will i ever use any ai for my work. MINORS PEASE DNI WITH MY WORK. unedited so apologies for any grammar or spelling errors. as always, any feedback is extremely appreciated, but especially comments or reblogs (it tells me you liked it!!), it helps keep me motivated.
wc: idk i wrote this here lol. pretty short!
Aside from his large frame taking up what feels like your entire living room, the first thing you notice is the blood. It’s all over him.
Nausea creeps in as you wonder if it’s his, or someone else’s.
You haven’t seen him in almost six years, not since you’d discovered what he’d done in the name of Wilson Fisk as the FBI raided the apartment the two of you had shared.
How stupid you had been, back then.
For a long time you’d wondered how you hadn’t known that your boyfriend had been running around pretending to be Daredevil. Murdering people.
But then again, you didn’t know he had been stalking you for months before you had “met” and was the reason your old apartment flooded and you moved in with him in the first place.
That part had stung more than anything. Feeling like he’d orchestrated every aspect of your relationship.
Deep down you knew him. You knew that wasn’t exactly the case.
But it didn’t change how it felt.
You didn’t go see him in the hospital after. Didn’t go to his trial. Returned his letters and moved the second you could. You couldn’t stomach the thought of how he would justify things to you.
It didn’t matter then. And it doesn’t matter now.
He’s breathing stutters slightly. Not just from the throbbing pain in his ribs, but from seeing you up close again.
So much the same, but so different.
“Hey, baby.” His voice is deeper, but the words come out a little wheezy.
You take a deep breath before speaking quietly, “Hi, Dex.”
He closes his eyes at the sound of your soft voice saying his name again.
The two of you sit in silence for a few minutes. You wonder if he can tell you’re fighting the urge to look towards the cracked door behind him.
Licking your lips, you shake your head, “What are you doing here?”
His head cocks to the side, wondering if you mean out of the facility he was stuck in or if you mean your apartment.
“Got in a pretty bad fight a few blocks away. I,” he lets out a pained grunt, “I saw you a couple days ago,”
He doesn’t say the quiet part out loud. The fact that he’d seen you and then followed you back here.
Old habits die hard.
You tense, not bothering to hide it, “Just me?”
His lets out a bitter laugh, shaking his head, “What? Worried I saw your boyfriend?”
Now it’s your turn to let out a bitter laugh, “I don’t think I could ever trust another guy after what you did.”
That causes him to frown, chest clenching painfully, “I loved you more than anything.”
You bite your lip, nodding, “Right. Just not enough to not get manipulated by a psychopath and then kill a bunch of people. Not to mention the more recent ones.”
He flinches as if you’d struck him, “Yo-you don’t understa-“
You raise your hand, cutting him off, “And I don’t want to,”
He nods, looking down and nodding, “Right, I- uh- I get it.”
When he doesn’t get a response he turns away from you, “This was stupid, I shouldn’t have come here.”
He goes to leave, but stops as a small, sleeping figure catches his eye through the crack in the door next to him.
You watch as his back tenses, fists clenching slightly, bracing yourself for the worst.
His mind is running wild as he looks at her sleeping face in the faint yellow light of the nightlight plugged in across the room.
She’s so small, her brows furrowed and lips pouted in an all too familiar way.
“She sleeps just like you do.” It comes out strained, as if he wants to say a million other things, but can’t.
“Dex,” uncertainty laces your tone as you look at his back.
Finally, he looks back at you, “How old is she?” Despite the blank look in his eye, the small crack in his voice gives him away.
“Five,” your voice cracks, “she’s five.”
A firm nod is all you get as he sniffs, hand running down his face.
“Did you know? When I,” he cuts himself off, “when everything happened?”
You shake your head, “I found out right before your trial. I, I didn’t know what I was going to do and,” you trail off, a little unsure where you’re going with it.
He just nods, “I get it.”
Really, he does.
Part of you wishes he didn’t.
Before you can speak up, he looks at you in a way that reminds you of when you were dating all those years ago, “I guess I better leave,”
Worry spikes as you eye the hand his side “But you’re-“
He shakes his head, “T’s just a scratch. I’ll be fine.”
Quietly, you watch him walk towards the door and open it. He hesitates for half a second before continuing on.
After he leaves, you unexpectedly feel a hole you haven’t felt since before your daughter was born.
pairing: benjamin ‘dex’ poindexter/bullseye x reader
sum.: the devil of hell’s kitchen saves your life. or, at least he looks like him.
warnings: mugging, reader is held at gunpoint, attempted sexual assault(all that happens is her shirt is ripped off and skirt bunched up, there is no graphic sexual assault and not dex to reader), murder, mentions of blood, heavily implied stalking (dex to reader lol), obsession, maybe ooc dex?, daredevil imposter dex, (there may be more, please let me know if i missed anything)
notes: oh my god. i am so so obsessed with this man oh my god. i literally started daredevil season 3 (i have never seen daredevil LOL) after seeing a tiktok edit of this guy and this was born. i really want to write more and explore his character more. i genuinely am so down bad for dex omg. i have not nor will i ever use any ai for my work. MINORS PEASE DNI WITH MY WORK. briefly proofread (if i read it again i will come to hate it) but unedited so apologies for any grammar or spelling errors. as always, any feedback is extremely appreciated, but especially comments or reblogs (it tells me you liked it!!), it helps keep me motivated.
wc: roughy 1.6k
Sometimes you feel like you’re being followed.
You’ve managed to convince yourself that you’re probably just paranoid. Living in New York City and walking everywhere every day, you’re bound to recognize the people around you. Just because some guy visits the same bodega as you every morning at the same time, doesn’t mean he’s following you, he probably just has a good routine, like you.
Walking home alone at night scares you, though, and you don’t think you’ll ever get used to it.
You should have worn warmer tights, and packed better walking shoes. Your heels do you no favors in this weather.
It’s freezing, snow is falling and flurries are sticking to your hair.
Two more blocks, you tell yourself, two more blocks and you can curl up with the cat under your new blanket and watch sex and the city.
A large had grips your forearm and pulls you into a dark alleyway as you pass by, fingers digging into your arm painfully as you immediately begin to struggle against the man as he pulls you deeper.
The mans other hand quickly covers your mouth when you start to scream, “Shut the fuck up.” fingers digging painfully into your cheeks.
His voice is terrifying.
You use all of your body weight to try to push yourself away from him. Shoving off his body with all your strength as your free elbow flails behind you, trying to nail him so you can get free run away.
He drags you a little further before shoving you up against the cold brick wall, fingers still digging painfully into your bicep as he pulls a gun out of his jacket.
“Oh my god.” Tears well up in your eyes as you look between him and the barrel. His eyes are dark, and despite the cold, his forehead is covered in sweat.
You didn’t put up that much of a fight, did you? He’s got at least a head of height on you and his breath is stuttered, as if he didn’t expect to get this far.
Your hands are shaking, or maybe your whole body is? You aren’t sure.
It’s that moment that you realize your left foot is soaking wet, you lost a shoe somewhere in your struggle.
You don’t take your eyes off of him, mind running a mile a minute as you try take in the situation.
You don’t recognize this man at all. Is this random? Are you just that unlucky?
The mans hand moves from your bicep to your shoulder, where the strap of your purse is, ripping it away from you.
You let him.
Maybe if you let him have it, he’ll let you leave.
You can’t forget your shoe. Don’t forget your shoe.
You watch as he dumps the contents of your bag on the ground. Lip gloss, lip liner, lipstick, a satin scrunchie, your wallet and all other contents spill out and onto the dirty concrete .
He throws your purse down and dives for your wallet, flipping it open with one hand as he keeps the gun trained on you.
He frowns at the contents, eyes darkening as he looks at you.
“Seriously? $45?”
“What?”
He grits his teeth, “You only have forty five fucking dollars?”
Tears fall down your face as you try to stutter out a response, “I- I don’t k-keep cash on me.”
He lets out a growl as he throws the wallet down on the ground, “FUCK!”
You flinch at the sound as it echoes off the alley walls, willing yourself to stay still.
Finally, he looks back at you, his eyes a different kind of dark now, “You’re going to just have to give me something else then.”
Your heart stops, blood running cold, “What?” you wonder if he even heard you, the question so quiet.
“I said,” he’s close enough that you feel his breath on your face, “you’re going to give me something else then.”
“Yo- I have credit cards. Th-that you can take.”
He gives you a once over, actually looking at you for the first time maybe, a sadistic gleam now in his dark eyes as he shakes his head, “No, no. You can give me something better.”
It happens so fast.
One second, you’re crying, begging, pleading with him to let you go, not to hurt you, sobbing as he yanks your jacket off your shoulders and rips your top open so hard buttons come flying off.
The moment changes quickly, once his hand starts inching your skirt up your thighs, the air shifts.
You’re pressing yourself as far into the wall as physically possible, eyes closed as tears streaming down your face and you choke on sobs as the reality of this moment sets in.
There’s a sudden swoosh through the air, and then something warm and wet splatters against your face, causing you to gasp in surprise.
Then, his hands are off of you, a thud sounding to your right.
You’re still shaking, eyes refusing to open as you wait for him to get back up.
He doesn’t. There’s no sound in the alleyway except your heavy breathing, the cars on the street, and footsteps?
The sound has your eyes to shooting open, face jerking to the left as you find the source.
There, standing maybe two feet away from you, his own chest rising and falling in heavy breaths, jaw clenched in a way that makes you know if you could see his eyes, there would be a murderous glint in them, stands Daredevil.
You’ve never seem him in person before, never even thought you would. He spends his time taking down big bads, like Wilson Fisk, the Punisher.
What is he doing here, saving you?
He drops the baton in his hand on the ground, keeping both of his palms facing you as he approaches you slowly.
Dex’s mind is moving a mile a minute. Body thrumming with a rush of adrenaline, blood hot as he looks between you and the fucker with a knife in his skull.
He saved you.
Your eyes are still wide with fear, body still shaking, face covered in that bastards blood.
“Y-you?”
He tilts his head to the side, almost like a puppy, a small smile on his face, “Me.”
Warily, you watch as he bends down, picking up the discarded contents of your purse and putting them back into it, zipping it up as he stands back to his full height.
He’s taller than you imagined, towering over you as he looks you over.
Rage fills his body as he looks you over, coat hanging off your shoulders, shirt ripped open and exposing your bra covered chest, skirt bunched up at your upper thighs.
He wishes he could kill the sorry son of a bitch a million times over.
Cautiously and carefully, moving slowly as if approaching a baby deer, his gloved hands adjust your skirt, touching only the fabric and not your thighs.
You’re still stiff as a board, eyes wide as you watch his every move.
Gently, he wraps your coat securely around your body, buttoning it up to your neck, never letting his hands linger despite every bone in his body telling him otherwise.
Your heart is beating erratically in your chest as you watch him take a step back once he deems you situated, palms back facing you.
“Are you okay?”
You glance down, eyes finding the buttons from your shirt on the concrete, briefly looking at your attacker. Bile rises in your throat as you see the knife embedded in the side of his head.
You look away, back to the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen.
“My shoe is missing.”
The head tilt is back, “What?”
Your voice shakes slightly, “I must’ve lost my shoe in the struggle, I, I can’t walk home without my shoes.”
He stares at you a moment longer before giving you a firm nod, glancing back down the alleyway to find it.
Once he finds the black heel, he’s back in front of you, and much to your shock, he kneels down, hands still gentle as he grabs your ankle, guiding the heel on it.
This is the closest he’s ever been to you, at least, the closest he’s been with the opportunity to talk to you. He wishes the circumstances were better.
But, he’s thankful he was here tonight. Thankful he was able to save you.
At the end of the day, all that will ever matter to him is your safety. Even if you’ll never know it.
“You should be more careful, walking alone at night.” His voice is smooth, maybe familiar. You couldn’t imagine where you would know Daredevil from.
You nod, “I don’t usually come home this late, my boss- I had to finish something at work and it had to be done tonight.”
He nods, knowing what a prick your boss is already. He’d kill him if he could, for making your life difficult.
“Why don’t you let me walk you home? Just to make sure you get there safe.”
You nod, eyes still distant. You’re probably in shock.
He hates to see you in this state, but can’t think of how much easier it makes this.
A firm hand at your back guides you out of the alleyway, the remaining block and a half to your apartment and all the way to your door. He leaves you with a smile, telling you that he’ll see you soon and to make sure you lock the door.
Your mind doesn’t catch up until he’s gone and you’re sitting in the shower.
please please please could you do a pre-canon (season 3) yandere-like one-shot, he’s so hot when he’s in his fed era (aside from becoming fisk’s henchman but like him in a suit 🤤🤤🤤🤤🤤🤤🤤)
HI FRIEND!!!
no literally same i literally love him so much already. pookie can do no wrong in my eyes.
genuinely did you read my mind?? because you literally will not believe what i just started working on actually
