Chapter Text
It may have been the shift in the energy of the crisp air, it may have been just because it’s her, but Jack knows Samira is walking back into his life even before he hears the click of her summer sandals – her stride familiar as always – on the wide concrete squares that lead as a path from the street and into his backyard.
“Jack?” he hears her call, and absently, eyes still on the work he’s yet in front of him, he hears himself respond, loud enough to direct her, “Back here.”
Grateful he’d been granted that small warning of her voice in arrival, grateful for small mercies at least, he listens for her even while considering the small patio set that sits just outside the sliding doors that lead to his kitchen. The set is a nice one, he thinks again. Good quality, sturdy, stylish in an understated, classic way. It is old at this point; Michelle had picked it out even before she’d gone into hospice care, so it’s got to be ten years old at least, but it’s stood the test of time. He hates to just get rid of it. Nodding to himself, he takes a few photos and mentally assigns the patio set to the trailer he’s planning on renting to pull along behind his old Land Rover. His sister already has a patio set she loves, so he’ll send the photos to his niece; assuming she wants it, he’ll drop it off at her condo on his way through Baltimore. It would fit nicely in with her decor. It is convenient, he thinks again, that what’s left of his family lives so close to one another.
He’s looking up just as Samira Mohan careens – there’s no other word for it, really – into his presence, her person so beautifully vibrant in a green dress fit for the late summer season, he has to stare. It’s been nearly three months since he’s seen her in person; sometimes, he forgets how stunning she is until she stands in front of him – or rather, he had forgotten how striking an effect she has on him.
It’s unfortunate how he can’t hide it; he’s out of practice pretending it doesn’t affect him having her there.
“Hey.”
She’s hardly in the mood for quiet, cordial reunions or small talk, though.
“There’s a ‘For Sale’ sign in your front yard.”
There is. He had put it there, or rather, had had the realtor do so, a month or so ago now. Nodding absently his acknowledgement of her statement of the obvious, he opens his mouth to offer her tea – he is pretty sure he still has some of the kind she prefers in the pantry, he found it on the back of one of the shelves the other day when he was cleaning out that part of the kitchen. Plus, since he hasn’t really gotten started on packing up the kitchen as of yet – it’s still mostly untouched – he’s pretty sure he can find the electric kettle she’d bought him as a Christmas present (she’d bought it for herself, really, for those nights she’d spent there. Not that he’d been complaining either now or especially at the time; he’d just been so happy at how happy she was moving to insert herself and her needs into his space).
She’s cutting him off before he can begin, though, uncharacteristic in how she interrupts him, more so in how the profanity she uses slips from her lips.
“It says fucking ‘SOLD’.”
It does, because it has been – the house he stands outside of is not his anymore, not really. He’s happy with the result, though it had at the moment thrown him for a bit of a loop; it has been sold to a nice couple from Cleveland – schoolteachers, it turns out – they had put in the offer last week, a generous one. Indeed, the amount they had offered had surprised him, actually, especially as the offer had come with only minimal conditions (financing, house inspection) and attached to a possession date that had fit well with his future plans. After the moment of shock had passed, he’d accepted immediately; the inspection is scheduled for tomorrow, not that he’s worried, and then that will be that. He’ll be out by November, plenty of time for that nice couple to settle in before Thanksgiving. He’s happy for them.
He’s only a little bit sad, melancholy, about the house, at least, but well, he’s used to that.
“Yes, it closed last week,” he tells Samira now, more slowly than he means, again a bit bemused by her presence here. But then, as always, he’s a little awestruck by her presence, so he’s a little awkward, stumbling over simple words that should come easily, even around her. “It’s done, it’s sold.”
Watching her as he speaks, he sees how that little wrinkle over the bridge of her nose, that little wrinkle that is a sign of anger and confusion as it appears - he loves it – that small sign that so often appears across her expressive face as it moves in ways he doesn’t know if she even realizes. Knowing her so well, he knows her face and all the expressions that pass across it; though, even knowing as he does, even as he watches her mouth open, he could never have anticipated the words that come out next.
Because he knows her, and he knows her speech patterns.
Samira Mohan does not say ‘fuck’. She does not use the word as a noun and verb, as an adverb and a conjugating adjective. She does not put it into words to give them inflection as Santos does (‘absolufuckinglutely’), and as he does sometimes when he’s tired. Samira Mohan does not swear; he thinks he’s heard her say ‘shit’ twice, and those were under very extenuating circumstances. It’s not that she can’t, or won’t, or thinks it inappropriate or judges people who do. It’s just not her style; she’s too precise, too kind, too concerned with other people’s feelings to shock them for reasons beyond that which she needs.
She can swear, he knows, she just chooses not to.
“Well, un-fucking-sell it, then,” she says then, the words coming out in a growl, even as, while he stares at her in shock, she continues before he can respond, apparently too impatient to wait for him to catch up with her anger.
“Never mind, I’ll do it. Give me your phone, Abbot, I’m calling the realtor,” she says, reaching for it, demanding even as he stands there mute – she never calls him ‘Abbot’, he thinks, not anymore, she hasn’t for months, indeed, honestly, those last months they’d worked together, she hadn’t called him anything at all, not unless pressed, she had just looked over in his general direction to summond him before presenting her treatment plan, calling him ‘Dr. Abbot,’ if she absolutely had to call him anything at all.
“Give me your phone, Abbott,” she says now, though, and stares at him when he makes no move to comply.
Moving closer, watching as he simply gazes at her in confusion, she tries again.
“Jack. Phone. I’m fixing this.”
She’s close enough now that he can get a good look in her eyes, currently fiercely narrowed, and he’s not ashamed to say that he takes a long look, takes full advantage of her being there. It’s been forever since she had let him get this close or let him stand with her so long. It had been so long since she’d looked him directly in the eye, rather than moving to dodge out of his eyeline or speeding out of his sight. It’s been three months since she left the Pitt, off to Presby and her future; the almost three months before that, she’d avoided him like the plague unless forced by circumstance beyond her control into his orbit.
He’s let her; what Samira Mohan needs, she gets
Still not completely understanding her presence here – now, here, today, in his backyard, willingly engaging with him, speaking with him as though the last six months, hell, the last ten, hadn’t happened – he doesn’t give her his phone, but neither does he step back from her, and neither does he look away.
“What are you doing here, Samira?”
She breaks their eye contact before he does, stepping away and back from him, dodging his gaze once again the way he’d grown used to, her eyes falling to his neatly mowed grass. She looks away from him once again; he mourns the way she hides her gaze from him; it hurts. Still, he’s almost used to the pain by now – after all, he carries it everywhere he goes.
“I’m still in group chat with some of the others, Heather, Parker, Frank, McKay, Mel, Santos, Vic,” a small, wry smile to her voice as she continues to add one last name, perhaps surprising in its inclusion, perhaps not. “Whitaker.”
Okay, he’s far from surprised she’s still in touch with the people she worked with during the tumultuous day of the PittFest mass casualty. The bonds forged by working together in an intense, often traumatic environment like an emergency department can be strong, resilient, and long-lasting, and can last the length of a career. That still doesn’t explain what she’s doing here, today, standing in his backyard, standing with him, though.
“When I left the Pitt,” she’s saying, “I may have left the general chat–” This he knows, it had been a relief, almost, to see the little notification that said ‘Samira Mohan, M.D., BCEM, has left the chat’, to know that he wouldn’t have to see her name pop up and forget for a second that it wasn’t him she was messaging, but rather her coworkers, with him among them. “But I stayed in that one.”
A big breath, and he can all but feel it as she makes an effort to look anywhere but at him.
“This afternoon, I was badging out of work, I was halfway to my car, and a message pops up; it’s Santos, and all it says is ‘OMG, Abbot’s leaving’.”
Ah. He’s surprised it took that long for word to get out. Honestly, since he had met with Robby last week, Dana yesterday, just before he’d walked into Human Resources, paperwork in triplicate already signed, he had anticipated the news burning its way through the Pitt’s gossip mill. He’d known it would be a shock; it’s still one for him, even.
He’d known it would be a shock to many; he’d known there would be many who’d miss him.
Looking at Samira now, though, he is confused to see there might be tears, lingering at the edge of her eyes, threatening to spill over.
“And just for that second, I forgot what chat it was that was tagging me, for a moment, I forgot– for a moment, I forgot I don’t work there anymore, I forgot that she just wasn’t messaging in the scheduling chat.”
Because while Samira Mohan does not swear, neither does she cry.
“I forgot, and I messaged back without thinking, asking why that would be news.”
She certainly shouldn’t be crying over him.
“I thought she was just saying you were leaving for the day. I thought she was just updating people, but posted in the wrong chat, but then she messaged me on the side to explain.” And the tears might be threatening, but the trademark Samira glare is there too; she’s staring at him, directly again, insulted and enraged, though he can’t imagine why. “You want to tell me why Trinity fucking Santos had to tell me you quit?”
He would, if she’d ever let him get a word in.
“You couldn’t tell me yourself? Because that’s what you’re doing, isn’t it? I know – because again, she told me, not you – that you’ve told people it’s a six-month sabbatical, like Robby’s, but longer, but it’s not that at all, is it?”
His mouth must be hanging open, certainly words rare efusing to form – she’s right, of course she’s right, the sabbatical paperwork is a compromise he’d reached with Robby, even they both know the truth, he’s not coming back – even as Samira barrels on.
“Because you wouldn’t be selling your house for a six-month sabbatical, would you, Jack? Because you wouldn’t have a sign outside it that says fucking ‘SOLD’ if you were just taking some time off.”
Fucked. He thinks. He’s well and truly fucked.
“I could just be moving–” he tries, but not very hard; he can hear it in his voice how weak the excuse sounds; she knows him too well, and sure enough, she calls him on it (as only Samira would).
“But you’re not, are you?” He’s not.
“You're leaving, and you couldn’t fucking tell me? What the fuck, Jack?”
Again, his mouth moves, opens, but nothing comes out; luckily, she has that covered.
“Well, the good thing is, you’re fucking not. You are going to call your realtor and tell them that you’ve changed your mind, and that he’s going to have to take down the sign. You’re not selling the house you love. Just like you’re going to call Robby or HR or whoever else you need to and tell them that they should tear up whatever paperwork you signed. You’re not quitting the job you love, just like you are not fucking leaving.”
He wishes it were that simple; he wishes that it were a matter of logistics, as easily sorted. Looking at the woman he loves, the one who’d broken him with an ease all too many would envy, he only smiles.
“Samira. You know I can’t do that. You know I have to leave, and you know why.”
“You know I do fucking not.”
“I can’t do this anymore,” he says without thinking, even as he watches her flinch and regrets it; he hadn’t meant to throw her own words back at her, he truly hadn’t, it had simply been the truth he couldn’t deny.
I’m sorry, he wants to say.
“I can’t stay here anymore, Samira, you know that. I can’t keep being here.”
They both know why; he tells her anyway.
“You’re around every corner I turn. At work, where I see you everywhere, the fucking parking garage, the ballpark, the cafe downtown, the fucking farmer’s market.” A deep breath, desperate and ragged. “I went to pick up fucking carrots last week at 7 a.m. after I badged out and I nearly lost it, thinking that, for a second, I saw you–”
He sees her flinch again. Fuck. He hadn’t been imagining the figure of her, walking, just out of sight, just from the corner of his eye.
“It’s not you, it’s not your fault, it’s not anyone’s fault, you know that, but I just– I can’t.”
He hates hurting her, but he can’t do this anymore.
“I have to go.”
His very life is infused with her. Work, this city, this house, the thought of her, the presence of her, the being of her, it haunts them. She was right; he loves this city, he loves his job, he loves the Pitt, hell, he had loved this house. He’d loved the sprawling expanse of it and the two-car garage and the walk-out basement and the patio and the big, massive expanse of the sprawling back yard leading out to the ravine. He’d loved this house since the first moment he and Michelle had first come to see it, loved it when they put in the offer, loved it when they moved in. He had loved living it in with her, had even managed to take comfort in being it after she had died. More than that, he had loved this house as it had come alive when Samira had all but moved in, filling it again as she had done with light and music and love and life.
Without her– He can’t do this anymore. He can’t live here anymore. It will break him in ways more complete than he already is.
“I thought my being at Presby would give us both enough space,” Samira is saying now, and he’s nodding along; he can see why she would have thought so, hell, even he can see the sense of it.
But then, he’s never been chill or calm or centred when it comes to Samira Mohan.
“I hope you’re loving it, sweetheart,” he’s telling her absently, forgetting he’s not allowed to call her that anymore – he really does – and he smiles when she nods, smiling too. He hopes she’s happy there.
“It’s different from the Pitt, from the work we did together, but I love it. I do.” She’s doing that thing again, the tears threatening in her big brown eyes, and his hand is already reaching for her cheek, before – this time – he remembers.
She doesn’t want his touch.
Taking himself in hand, he folds his arms behind his back at parade rest even as she watches, as, this time, a few of the tears she'd been holding back actually, finally, start to fall.
“But also, Presby– can't it- isn't it’s far enough away, Jack, the city’s so big, surely we can–”
He’s already shaking his head; he can’t. He has tried: he really can’t.
“Did you know it’s only an eight-minute drive to Presby from here? The other morning, Robby called me in on short notice, and I was still half asleep getting into the car.” He smiles again, wry. “I had already missed the exit to the Pitt when I realized I was getting ready to turn for yours.”
He loves her.
He really can’t.
“It’s not you, sweetheart,” he tells her again, forgetting again, his voice soft as he reminds her. He’s the one who’s broken – he’s greedy, selfish, he can’t be moderate when it comes to loving Samira Mohan – and it’s his job to make sure it doesn’t affect her.
There’s that glare again, he sees, as she rejects his every argument.
(He loves it so much; he loves her so much.)
“You love me. You told me you did,” she states flatly, staring him down, challenging him to deny it, deny her.
“Yes.”
He does, he did. Three words that he hadn’t been able to keep from slipping out, those three little words that she hadn’t been meant to hear, at least not then, at least not when she didn’t feel the same, or wouldn’t feel the same.
Three little words that had ruined everything.
She’s nodding again, fierce, determined, knowing. There’s a sly look on her face; he loves her so much he thinks his heart is going to implode.
“You love me.”
She settles into a stance that mirrors his without, he thinks, even without realizing it, challenging him, knowing she has the upper hand, knowing she will win.
“You’re always telling me you love me, and yet you’re leaving me.” Eyes narrowing, fierce, she steps forward. “If you’re telling me the truth – you love me – you won’t leave me.”
Not leaving so much as letting her go – and he can play dirty, too.
“Tell me you love me and I’ll stay.” He doesn’t like to, but he can. “Or. How about this, instead. Tell me that one day you might be comfortable with saying it back, tell me that in the meantime, you’re completely comfortable with me loving you. That you won’t hide from my saying it. Tell me either way; I’ll stay.”
It isn’t a bluff; they both know it, they both know he would, she’d but to lift a finger, he’d stay.
There’s a flinch again as the hesitation moves across Samira’s face. He hates it, but he’s won; they both know it. When she sighs, he sighs too, as he wishes he could do something, anything, to wipe her hurt away.
As he keeps his hands where they are, safely tucked behind his back.
She loves him; he knows it, knows she does too. She loves him: she’s just not ready.
“Where are you going?” she asks then, the tears in her voice now that she acknowledges his decision to go, as she wavers, then holds steady before him.
His brave girl.
“Eventually, I don’t know. Baltimore for now, a few days to see my sister and her family,” he says, and Samira nods, she’s met them, liked them as they had loved her, “then, there’s this cottage on the Atlantic I’ve rented before, I’m thinking I’ll get some sun and surf before the weather turns, maybe even winter there.”
She frowns, and he has to control his laugh, knowing how much she hates the cold, hates even the thought of the Pittsburgh winters.
“You’ll freeze.”
Maybe. He shrugs.
“It’s got a big fireplace, wood to chop to keep me busy, plenty of books.”
Then, in the after, six-months down the line, when the end of his official sabbatical comes to an end, who knows. Back to the Pitt, maybe, though a big part of him doubts it – Boston, maybe, Baltimore, D.C. to stay close to family. All he knows is that for now, he can’t be here. He’s got to try at least, try to figure out who he is on his own, try to remember how to move through life without her, without using the crutch of the distraction of work, without the hope of seeing her every time he turns the corner, walks down the street.
It’s impossible, the thought of not looking for her, but not as impossible as being here.
She’s smiling at him now; her hand, freer than his in action, reaching to cup his cheek, free to claim him as she is free to walk into his backyard, his house, his life. Free to claim him as she pleases or let him go.
Who knows, maybe one day, if she’s ready, if she can accept him, all he is, she’ll come find him.
“You might be okay with visitors to your little cabin after you settle in?” He can’t be shocked she has all read his mind, even as she’s rushing to clarify her question before he can even respond. “Ones who love you?”
He’s not a strong man, never has been; he can’t help but nuzzle a little into it, eyes closed to soak in the sensation of her touch, as he luxurates at the feeling of the softness of her hand against his skin as she lets it linger on his cheek.
Yes, he thinks. Yes, he’d be okay with that.