Chapter Text
i know it’s hard looking in / knowing that tomorrow you’ll be back again
“So uber it to his house.”
Samira is still disoriented. She’d come into the room expecting to find Mr. Diaz, waiting like he’d promised. Instead she found Jack Abbot, shirtless and just as surprised to see her. She was still trying to process when Jack made the suggestion like she was stupid not to have thought of it already, the bag of homecare supplies now on the floor at her feet.
“Yeah.” She practically scoffs because time is an expense in this place. Today has been the fucking worst. “Is the hospital gonna pay for that?”
“I’ll pay for it.”
Samira looks up at Jack to see him tending to his wound, trying and failing to get the right angle. He says it like it’s nothing. He’ll pay for it. No big deal. Casual. But there’s something about the way he says it that sparks heat in her chest. Makes her feel less shitty. She considers how, even on his day off, he’s here, literally putting himself in the line of fire to help people. She’s reminded how she has always thought of Jack as a kindred spirit at PTMC and that’s one of the reasons she rises to her feet and makes her way across the room.
“What are you doing?”
“What you clearly can’t.” She pulls a pair of fresh gloves out of the box and snaps them on, turning to hold her hand out for the cotton swab. Jack doesn’t look too pleased when he hands it to her, but she can tell he’s weighed his options and the preference is to avoid infection.
“Did you make a chart?” She already knows the answer. Jack has a habit of sidestepping protocol or ignoring it entirely and Samira doesn’t have to see him in tactical gear to know he gets a kick out of the chaos of it. She first learned it during the Pittfest shooting, when he’d put a pigtail catheter in her hand and basically told her to find god.
“No. This can stay off the books. Don’t need the paperwork from the hospital or the police department.” She can hear how strained his voice is, knows it’s because he’s been yelling to be heard above gunfire in a warehouse.
“Okay. Our little secret.” It comes out before she can even think twice about it. It’s only in the silence that settles between them that Samira feels her cheeks burn. Jack sits with his arms folded across his bare chest. He smells like sweat and pine. There’s a spattering of freckles across his shoulder. When he turns his head to the side, she pretends she wasn’t looking at them.
Samira glances up just as Robby comes in and out of view in the doorway. Even just the sight of him fills her with dread today.
“So you work nightshift in this place and then you spend your days getting shot at?” Her focus returns to the graze on Jack’s shoulder.
“I contain multitudes.”
“Mm. Maybe I’ll put in a neurology referral. Have them check your frontal lobe.”
He huffs a laugh, shoulders rising and falling slightly with the sound. “Bedside manners, Mohan. Is this why your patient satisfaction scores are so high?” He knows she’s smiling.
Samira dresses the cleaned wound with care, fingers smoothing over the edges to make sure the adhesive is sealed against his skin before she pulls her gloves off just as Dana appears with a fresh scrub top. “I don’t wanna know anything about anything.” She thrusts it into Jack’s hands and leaves as quickly as she entered.
Jack pulls it over his head as Samira discards the gloves and pumps some sanitizer onto her hands. She wonders briefly if he’s forgotten about his offer to help with Mr. Diaz, but as he collects his blood stained jacket, he nods in the direction of the door.
“C’mon.”
Of course he wouldn’t forget. Everything with Jack is intentional.
Later, when Samira is pulling up the chart on the screen, she takes note of how comforting she finds his presence, especially on days like today. They’re close as her finger hovers over the patient's address to keep Jack right as he types it into his phone, so close that when Jack leans forward to squint slightly at the screen, Samira’s shoulder presses into the center of his ribcage. She feels herself freeze, not sure what to do with the proximity of it, with how her mind wanders back to the quietness of that trauma room and Jack sans shirt. When he straightens up and glances at her, she wonders if he noticed.
"Sorry.” He says it like it was an intrusion of her personal space, like it didn’t just spark something in the base of her stomach that felt new and good. She just shakes her head as if she doesn’t know what he’s talking about. “I appreciate it, Dr. Abbot. Really.”
“Don’t mention it.” She offers him a tired smile and Jack’s mouth is a tight line. “Get back to work.” He slips back into attending mode with ease. “Board won’t clear itself.”