Work Text:
The arguing in bay 2 north can be heard though the whole ER. The few words that can be made out occasionally, give very little idea to what the actual argument entails. It’s now almost 15 minutes since Jack hauled Robby by the arm and slammed the door closed, the yelling started almost immediately. Dana knows. She’s timing it, almost like an ill presenting seizure. Like she is getting ready to administer the lorazepam when it passes the 5-minute mark, before permanent damage occurs.
Lena had come strolling in 10 minutes into the scene. She looked at Dana as if to say “do I want to know? Dana just shook her head, replying no you really don’t. The tension between the two attending’ had been obvious the moment Jack had met them at the hub to do handover. It had been a long day and not the good kind, Dana had shot Jack a look, trying to convey her worry for their friend. Hopefully the rumors of Robby’s lack of helmet lately have finally caught up to him. If there’s anyone that can battle Robby’s stubbornness, it’s Jack.
She had watched as the two men spoke quietly over a chart, although the subject matter clearly not about work. She could see the worry rushing through Jack the more (or more accurately, less) Robby said. The bags under his eyes were deep and darker than she’d seen in a while, they’d had a lot of loss today, sometimes even death was inevitable.
The loud voices suddenly become clearer, drawing Dana back to the present where Robby is pushing his way past Jack and out of the room. Voice loud and clearly frustrated “Leave it, Jack” he yells as he marches past the hub to his locker, pulling his bag out and slamming the metal door. Jack is right behind and Dana is sure she hears something along the lines of “would you please just think for a second, Robby. You’re chasing a fucking suicide mission”
His words are laughably banal, something Dana has heard a similar version of countless times. This time it’s Jack’s tone that makes the hair on her nape stand. He sounds scared, even terrified. Robby stays silent as he scans himself out and continues his walk towards what appears to be the ambulance bay.
“Michael” Rings out, the ER chatter going quiet. Suddenly it becomes clear to everyone that something is very wrong.
Robby freezes, every muscle in his body pulled taut. His throat feels thick as he swallows, Jack only calls him Michael when nothing else gets through and never in public, this is beyond his usual tactics.
“Listen, we don’t do this heart-to-heart stuff, I know that. But shit if you need to hear the words, I’ll say them.” Jack pulls in a big breath, visibly gearing up to what he is about to say. “I love you. You are my best friend and the most important person left in my life. You know how close losing Liz was to killing me, I- losing you, I’m not sure I’d survive it.” The steadiness in his voice deteriorates slightly as he speaks.
Robby turns to face him, taken aback. His carefully controlled expression now gone, replaced with open fury, his voice sharp, echoes through the ER as he spits back at Jack “I’m not your fucking wife”
Jack takes a careful step towards him “No shit man, you’re my best friend- “Before he can finish Robby interrupts, his face filled with disbelief.
“Wow, dude there is no way you are comparing me to Liz right now, the woman you married.” He drawls, then spins on his heels picking up a brisk walk towards the sliding doors leading out to the ambulance bay.
Jack is rooted in place and for a second, he looks defeated, then his expression flashes with resolve as he seemed to realise something- fuck it “I know they’re in your pocket” Jack says, voice calm, knows the reaction it’ll draw
Again, Robby freezes, halfway between the nurses’ station and the sliding doors. His jaw dropped, he faces Jack again. In the back of his mind he wonders if the x-ray vision is another leftover from Jack’s time in the Middle East or if it’s just one of his ‘Robby special’ abilities.
“It’s my dog tags, the once I gave you over a decade ago” Jack stops. The silence lingers for a beat. “And I know you wouldn’t have brought them today if you were planning on coming back. What you don’t know, what I never told you, was what it meant that I gave them to you. Which obviously was a mistake when you clearly needed to know.” He says with a sour laugh, running a hand through his hair.
For half a second Jack’s forced smile waivers, quickly enough that most would miss it. Even then his tone coming out defeated makes it clear, he never intended for Robby to know this. “Liz didn’t like wearing rings” Jack sighs, scrubbing his hand down his face “When we were planning our marriage she rejected the idea of a wedding ring in the traditional sense. Wanted something to honor us as people instead of our relationship together”
He waives a hand dismissively, as if to say that that wasn’t important, apparently unsure how he’s supposed to continue the story from there. Then the tension in his body cut. “The day we got married it wasn’t a ring I put on her finger, but a chain around her neck, the one that’s now in your pocket.”
The air around them shifts turning heavy as Robby sucks in a breath. The silence is deafening, as if everyone around them has suddenly realized the severity of the conversation unfolding. Robby’s focus zeros in on the faint sound of the heartbeat monitors in the ER, his own not following the supposed tempo.
Jack stands up straight pulling himself back together. He rolls his shoulders as he takes a step towards Robby. Dipping his head to force eye contact, he says low and harsh
“So no Robby, you are not my wife, but don’t you dare act like the way we define our relationship has any impact on how much you mean to me”
Robby eyes widen, shining slightly in the fluorescent hospital light. His head drops as he pulls out the chain, the dog tags lying flat in his palm while he stares at them. Robby looks back up, so many emotions in his eyes telling them apart is near impossible. “Jack- “
Jack cut him off with a tiny smile, walking up to Robby, he reaches out with his open hand and says softly. “Will you please give me your keys to the bike? Go to my apartment, take a shower, eat something with actual nutritional value and sleep, we’ll talk when I get home from my shift because man, you are in no state to drive right now.”
Robby stares, then nodding slightly, he swings his bag off his shoulder to the floor, crouching down, he digs out his keys and drops them into Jack’s right hand. His own holds tightly around the dog tags digging them into his palm. Then he seems to remember the newly laid plan and pulls his bag back up, saying a soft goodbye. Turning around, head down, he walks into the dark night.
Lena yells out about the next incoming trauma and Jack is quickly pulled into the nightly ER rush. Everyone slowly gets back on track. The atmosphere still lingers and Jack feels rather than sees the looks his coworkers shoots him, but he ignores them in favor of diving straight into the endless flow of patients in the waiting room. Anything to keep his mind busy.
Around 9pm his phone vibrates.
Got home fine. Ordered dinner, leftovers in the fridge for you.
Jack lets out a sigh, feeling like he can finally breathe, now knowing Robby is home, he feels the word shivering down his spine. Robby is safe, now Jack just has to figure out how to keep it that way. Parker calls for his help with a patient, he throws back a thumbs up and puts his phone away, getting his head back in the game.
At 3am the rush has finally settled and the normal nightly calm has returned over nightshift. Jack is leaning against the nurses’ station, black coffee in hand, although lukewarm at best. He doesn’t mind much, caffeine is, after all, the same at every temperature. To his left Parker comes out from checking on a patient, she catches his eyes and nods signaling him to follow along. Jack tips his head towards the chart in her hand “How’s Mr. Charter doing?”
Parker makes a humming sound, like she can read right through his deflection tactics. She meets his eyes with a playful smile “Much better after a little morphine, I advised him to consider a condiment with at flared base in the future. You think he’s learned his lesson?” Jack huffs a laugh “That is highly unlikely”
The silence between them stretches as they are met with the chilly night air. It’s not quite uncomfortable but Jack knows she’s curious. Parker breaks after a few minutes of standing in the ambulance bay. “So, did you mean to go confessing your love to your best friend, in front of all your coworkers?” She says with a taunting smile. He laughs slightly, rubbing the back of his neck. “You can’t even act like you care to protect my feelings, can you?”
“Nope” she drags popping the p extra. Jack leans back against the brick wall of the ambulance bay, staring out into the darkness he grumbles in frustration. “I don’t even know where it all came from. It’s not like I’ve had some kind of secret crush since joining PTMC or something. It’s just a mess- i mean fuck we’re both straight. Or well, I guess, I assumed I was.” He sighs, torn at that.
“Sexuality is fluid” Parker reminds gently “You love him, so maybe let that be enough” Jack smiles softly at that murmuring “That I do”
Parker stares up at the stars, barely visible from the amount of light flowing through the ambulance bay. “You think he’ll be, okay?” She hedges. Jack contemplates the question for a moment, wishing desperately that the answer could be as easy as saying yes “I wish I knew-“ he tapers off, the silence does indeed communicate better at times.
Parker straightens, done with the heartfelt moment and with a glint in her eyes she says “Well you did in a roundabout way tell him you proposed years ago” then she starts laughing like the thought just dawned on her. Jack huffs something that probably is meant as disagreement, as a light blush covers his face. Then he pushes away from the wall walking back inside, the night is far from over.
By 6:30am Jack is more than ready to head home. His phone has been silent since Robby texted, he’s convincing himself that it’s a good thing, means he’s probably sleeping, hopefully. Looking at the board, slightly zoned out, he hears what is without a doubt Dana coming in to get an early start on her day shift. The ER isn’t actually quiet, not that Jack is overly superstitious, but he likes to be on the right side of caution.
Even then the air seems heavier than usual and it’s like the patients notice as well. Today the hospital is being shaded by a gray cloud. Or maybe Jack has just let his brain filter out all the ER noise he’d normally be keeping one ear out for. He feels a warm hand on his back and turns to see Dana regard him with a small smile. She has two coffees from that nicer place down the street and a bag with something that is undeniably better than the protein bars he has been surviving on through the night.
He grabs his coffee from her hand with a small thanks and then they make their way towards the break room together. The door closes behind them, Jack lets out a big yawn, finding a chair and sitting down to ease his prosthetic. The past 12 hours on his legs can definitely be felt. Dana looks at him expectantly and Jack starts explaining yesterday’s heated conversation as he pulls out two buns with slices of strong cheese from the paper bag, she knows him so well he thinks.
After recounting the conversation between Jack and Robby, he thinks back to the specific energy around Robby, something Jack has seen before in the terrors of war. Young men struggling to find what it takes to stay afloat in a world where your expiration and the expiration of those you love is the only certainty. Alas some never manage as they lose themselves to the idea that death is the painless way out. The thought makes him tremble as a cold feeling spread across him.
Jack looks up at Dana breaking their newfound silence “How do you save a drowning person when they’ve stopped swimming. “ She smiles at him with so much sympathy it makes him feel see-though, like she has a preview to his deepest darkest thoughts. Dana stands and walks around to squeeze his shoulder “You keep them afloat until they’re ready to swim by themselves again.” She says light, then she heads out to start her shift.
Jack finishes and heads out, handing off to Dr. Khan who’s scheduled for today, then packs his things and walks out of the emergency department. Walking home he watches the sky, it’s gray and the air is filled with rain dust. The leaves are yellowing as autumn takes a hold of the world for good. How bizarre that while people are dying the world just keeps spinning. Jack shakes his head laughing quietly at his own thoughts, then he speeds up his pace, there is someone waiting back home.
Jack reaches his apartment complex a little past seven. He takes the stairs even while the perfectly good elevator is right on his left side. He reaches his door, unlocking it and walking inside, instantly moving to pull off his shoes and jacket. Robby is sitting on his couch watching him with a small smile. His eyes don’t look much better, and Jack wonders if he has slept at all.
“Brother you should have crashed in my bed, we’re too old to sleep on couches” he jokes, while taking of his prosthetic, quickly checking over his residential limb and grabbing his crutches moving towards the kitchen. Robby shrugs at the attempt to lighten the mood but the corner of his lip curls. “So what conversation are we starting with, coffee or beer, maybe bourbon” Jack muse, mostly to himself it seems. Robby takes him up on the beer anyways, 8am Is an early start but it’s technically dinner time for Jack, go figure.
They manage to end up each in a corner on the couch, some sports documentary is playing quietly on the TV. Jack’s not sure what sport it is, almost looks like hockey but underwater, maybe the sleep deprivation he’s been working on is worse than he thought. Jack turns his head trying to catch Robby’s eyes, whose head is in his hands. He sighs “Talk to me man, what going on in that head of yours?”
The quiet almost feels louder than the splashing sounds from the TV echoing in the room. Then Robby lifts his head and takes a deep breath. “I don’t know Jack, it feels like the only task I’m really good at is keeping everyone from being hurt by my pain, and now I’m fucking falling at that too” he waves a hand weakly towards Jack.
This time it’s Jack’s turn to be stunned speechless, Robby confiding in him without serious nudging is unusual. The silence must feel crushing because Robby chokes out a barely audible “I wish I could save you from myself”
Jack taps his finger on Robby’s knee once, just to get his eye contact before he speaks. “Look what I told you yesterday wasn’t a lie, I love you, and that means carrying our burdens together. We’re friends’ man, we look out for each other, it’ll be easier to carry if we both lift.”
Robby chews on that for a moment, looks up at Jack with a small smile and jokes wry “Really, friends?” Jack raises an eyebrow silently asking if Robby is really trying to deflect from one hard conversation to another, which makes them chuckle and some of the tension in the room finally bleeds out.
Jack takes a deep breath and throws them into the deep end. “Robby you are allowed to be selfish for once in your life, asking for help isn’t a weakness” Robby looks back and him annoyed, like he didn’t expect Jack to go that far, then shots back dryly “Not when everyone else has to suffer with the consequences of being selfless”
Jack huffs a small laugh, looking at Robby like he’s being ridiculous “You can’t keep trying to be more than what you are man. You’re a good doctor Robby, but you’re no saint and trying to be one, it’s killing you”
That makes Robby look away, his graze focusing out the window at the world that’s slowly waking up, it’s Saturday morning after all. “I see them every waking moment, the ones I’ve lost” he says quietly, fingers rhythmically tapping on the beer bottle in his hand “I look back all the time and try to find a way to save them. I’m supposed to be able to save them, that’s what a good doctor should be able to do” he wills his voice to sound stubborn, but it comes out, pleading.
Jack nods absentmindedly, all doctors can relate to that feeling, most more than they’d like. “Look we’ll always remember the patients we lose but you can’t keep holding on to their pain, it’s not yours to keep. You don’t deserve it, no matter how much you think it’s your punishment for losing them.”
“It’s part of the human experience to feel pain” Robby bites back. Jack knows he’s hit a nerve, so he lets him stew in his thoughts for a bit turning back to the TV. Trying to understand the oddness of a sport like underwater hockey, he wonders if it’s classified as an exstreme-apnoea sport, scribbling a reminder in the back of his brain to look that up later.
Time passes as Robby tries to put words together. The birds are active outside Jack’s window and it’s an oddly calming scene, considering the conversation happening just inside. He takes a deep breath, then lets the words go. “It’s like I’ve become obsessed with the idea of death hiding and waiting for me in ambush and it doesn’t even make the notion of death feel more real, it just makes life feel less” Robby sighs, slumping down in the couch finally admitting it making something loosen inside of him.
Jack sucks in a startled breath, but Robby keeps going “I love my bike, as a kid I dreamed of buying a donor and fixing it up on my own, bubbe thought it was a terrible idea.” He shakes his head with a tiny smile. “But you were right when you questioned me. My intention wasn’t to be safe, I was planning on riding out without a helmet, as far as it would take... Eventually something had to make it stop”
Jack stares, not sure if Robby is talking about his life, the bike or the pain. He closes the space between them a bit, just so he can throw his arm over Robby’s shoulders, not even sure who he’s trying to comfort. “Robby please listen to me” he begs “Stop talking like you’re invincible, you’re not. We see it all the time man, people think It takes a lifetime to die, but really it takes a second, which is no time at all”
Robby turns his head and stares into his eyes, they’re so close suddenly. Jack uses it to his advantage and continues “I don’t want to fear that every handover, every goodnight, might as well be a goodbye” his voice trembles and Robby’s eyes flicker down to his lips, a second, and then he coughs straightening himself up and free of Jack’s arm. “I keep making mistakes, losing people; Adamson, Leah.” Robby falters, turning his head away from Jack’s gaze.
“you’re not supposed to be perfect Robby, I don’t need you to be perfect, just to refine” Jack says, staring at side of Robby’s head, who’s fingers are turning white as he tightens his grip on the beer.
“Michael” he tries gently.
It’s works, Robby snaps his head around eyes blazing and spits “Why’d you give me your dog tags Jack, they weren’t even yours they were Liz’s, you’re wife. What did you even mean with it, fuck.”
Jack hums softly while collecting his thoughts “We agreed we didn’t need rings to show commitment; I like wearing them, so she got me one, but they didn’t- they weren’t a sign of our marriage in the traditional sense. It was a way to honor each other. That’s why I gave it to you. Because I admire you, as a doctor and as a person”
A beat, then Jack continues
“You know Robby the last decade we’ve been friends, i realized somewhere, that to be happy I don’t actually require much more than this” He takes a breath feeling the truth settle in him. “So, whatever this is, whatever we make this, it’s enough”
Robby meets his eyes, they are red-rimmed and he looks so deeply conflicted. “You’re seeing me through this illusion of reality Jack, it’s not true. I’m not- you deserve so much better than me. You shouldn’t settle for this” His voice cracks, and he winces like it physically hurts him to suggest Jack leaving.
“Man, it’s like your blood is in my fucking veins, tell me how I’m supposed to want anything else” Jack’s tone is steady and not up for discussion.
“How are you so fucking calm about this?!”
“Of course, I’m scared of this” Jack gestures loosely between them “but what really terrifies me is losing you”
Robby stares, panting slightly, having turned his body now facing Jack, beers empty and discarded, the TV long forgotten. “What do you want Robby?” Jack questions, tracing over Robby’s face with new eyes.
“I don’t know” it’s weak barely a whisper and if Jack wasn’t sitting less than a meter from Robby, he would probably have missed it.
“Okay-” sucking in a breath Jack tries again “okay, let me- I’ll try something okay just” Jack scoots closer lifting his hand and cupping Robby’s cheek, swiping his thumb slowly over the dark circles under his eyes. “You need sleep” Jack mumbles as Robby sighs, closes his eyes and leans into the contact.
They stay like that for a while, transfixed in the moment of peace. Jack’s other hand comes up to rest on Robby’s neck idly playing with the hair on his nape. Then Jack taps Robby’s cheek twice, drawing his attention back. “Can I try?” Jack whispers softly, watches as Robby’s eyes widen when the meaning clicks, but then his head dips in a small nod.
He uses his leverage on Robby’s neck to drive their foreheads together, slowly closing the distance. The first kiss is soft, barely a brush. Then Jack leans in again. They stay like that sharing small hesitant kisses, really, it’s almost laughable with the total years of experience between them. Jack pulls away just enough to look Robby in the eyes. Emotion flickers through them too fast to distinguish the meaning behind them. He imagines Robby sees it mirrored in his own expression.
Suddenly determination shines clearly through Robby’s face and this time it’s Jack who is pulled back in. This kiss is more confident, exploring. Robby’s hands find Jack’s waist and pull him closer; they find way under Jack’s scrubs lightly running along his sides. Jack makes a tiny encouraging noise sliding his hand into Robby’s hair, gripping to anchor himself. Robby sucks in a stuttering gasp and Jack uses the moment to deepen the kiss; he licks into Robby’s mouth and hums in satisfaction at the tiny whimper it drags out of Robby.
They make out together on the couch, exploring each other’s mouths. Once air becomes a necessity, Robby breaks the kiss, chest heaving, he tips his head, so their foreheads knock together. “I don’t know what this is” he whispers so close their lips touch with each word “I don’t know what this means”
Jack pulls back so he can look at Robby, he looks small, his eyes wide and swimming with uncertainty, but he’s smiling, open and intimate. It’s not a smile Jack has seen often and he quickly decides, he’s never letting it go “Whatever you want Misha; I’ll give you whatever you want” Jack whisper and Robby shivers at his use of his childhood pet name.
“For now, let’s just start by trying?” Robby hesitantly responds.
“Yeah?” Jack says smiling, Robby pulls him in and kisses him again. “Yeah”
“We’ll make the most of it” Jack agrees.