Chapter Text
Instead of a shitty motel mattress, Robby wakes up curled into a familiar couch with his legs tangled in an unfamiliar blanket. Rather than being alone, Jack occupies the armchair near Robby’s head. He’s squinting at his phone in the half-light with his readers on and a frown tugging at his features. The grey twilight filtering through the blinds thrusts the scene into a state of gentle unreality.
Suppressing the urge to sigh, he flicks his eyes shut and drifts in the in-between state of sleep and wakefulness for a bit longer. Waking up has become harder over the last few months. He could sleep for ten hours and feel as if he’d only gotten three.
Of course, it doesn’t help that his brain habitually uses that time to ruminate on everything he’d filed away during the previous day. Thoughts, regrets, grief, it all spills into his head, sapping his energy and paralyzing his limbs. He’d hoped that getting out of Pittsburgh would clear his mind, but Jack had firmly denied him that relief.
Robby’s eyes snap open in realization. He had meant to be on the road by now.
“Fuck.”
He’s punished for the outburst by the sound of Jack setting his phone down and shifting in his seat.
“Still in the world of the living, I’m afraid,” he says quietly. “You were only out for five hours.” Robby raises his head to snark something at him, but the comment dies in his throat at the sight of Jack’s dishevelled state. His clothes are wrinkled. Bags line his eyes. His hair looks the same as it had when Robby fell asleep. He catches Robby’s look and shrugs uncomfortably. “Couldn’t sleep with the sun down.”
Robby snorts and lets his head fall back. Jack rarely gets a full eight hours with the sun up.
“How many cups of coffee?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” he responds dryly. “You want some?”
“Sure, if there’s any left.”
Instead of answering, Jack simply makes a disgruntled noise before pushing off the chair. For a few seconds, Robby just listens to him move about the kitchen—using his forearm crutches, by the sound of it.
“We’re going to your apartment later to pick up clothes,” Jack speaks up. The flat tone of his voice offers no room for negotiation. “Here. I think I put enough milk and sugar in for your tastes.”
Robby accepts the coffee with a grimace. He doesn’t have to heart to tell Jack he’s been taking his coffee black for the past few months.
“Want me to drive?”
“No, it’s all good.” Jack waves him off. “I’m giving my stump a break right now because I was on my feet a lot yesterday.”
“Yeah, getting shot at,” he mutters. “I’m sure that’s what your therapist meant by get a hobby.”
Open disbelief enters Jack’s expression. “At least I’m trying. I’m doing the work.”
“If your therapist is advocating for you to run around getting shot at like you’re twenty years younger with nothing to lose, you should report them,” he says flatly.
“I- okay.” Jack closes his eyes. “You just woke up. Go shower, get something to eat. I am not having this conversation with you right now.”
Robby presses his lips together. Fine, if Jack wants to be like that. He won’t press the matter.
Since Jack apparently hasn’t been to the store in weeks, his breakfast ends up being an amalgam of sad leftovers. Jack sits stiffly on the edge of the chair as Robby shuffles about the kitchen, not watching the tv, but tracking his movements through the room. The back of Robby’s neck prickles with the unrelenting scrutiny.
“Do you have something to say or are you going to watch me like a hawk all day,” he says tiredly.
Jack hesitates before speaking. “Listen, Dana tells me you gave Mohan a pep talk.”
“Mohan thought she was having a heart attack. I informed her that she was not.”
“Right.” Jack’s stare doesn’t waver. “And how did you go about that?”
Robby stares at him and resists the urge to cup his neck with his hands. It’s difficult to be mad at Jack when he’s wearing that expression of deep concern, but he manages a flicker of irritation all the same.
“I simply reminded her that bringing personal baggage into work is unacceptable. Whether that be family issues, spending too much time with patients, or whatever else, the system is not designed to accommodate that.”
“She was having a panic attack, Robby. We don’t yell at people to stop being crybabies and get back to work anymore. That’s shit we were told in residency, in warzones, in MCIs, and it fucking sucked.” Jack searches his expression. “What’s going on? This isn’t you.”
He laughs sharply. “How would you know? We barely work together anymore.” He’s rewarded with a reaction when Jack’s expression pinches. “Maybe I didn’t handle it as best as I could have, but I stand by everything I said.”
“Really? Because from what I hear, you undermine her skills constantly.” Jack leans back and watches him closely.
“What I do,” he enunciates, “Is remind her that the way she approaches Emergency Medicine is not sustainable. She’ll drive herself into the ground before realizing that we cannot spend the amount of time, money, or resources on every patient like she wants to.”
Jack furrows his eyebrows. “So you tell her to adopt the same coping mechanisms that have…” he gestures around. “Brought you here?”
“Oh, come on. You're saying I shouldn't have told her to have boundaries between her personal and professional lives? This is ridiculous.”
“No, I’m saying that the suck it up approach nearly always backfires and that mocking people for their panic attacks is generally an asshole move.”
Robby steps back, hurt and betrayal crawling up his spine. Jack is meant to be on his side. “Jesus- I told you I could have handled it better. What more do you want from me?”
Jack’s mouth opens, likely for an angry retort, before he closes his eyes and visibly collects himself. Robby scoffs and turns away.
“You’re projecting onto her. You realize that, right?” He says, quiet but firm. “That advice will do nothing but push Samira into the same spiral of burnout, depression, and self-hatred that makes you get on that motorcycle every day and ride the freeway without a goddamn helmet. I do not think that is what you want for her.”
Robby stares at him. “Oh, fuck you.” Of all people, Jack thinks he can throw this at him? That’s one for the record books. “Even if I am projecting, I’m still right. She’s been with us for how many years now? Mohan is a senior resident, not some newbie med student. If she doesn’t know how to compartmentalize her shit by now, she should reconsider her career in Emergency Medicine.”
Once up on a time, Robby had been kinder. He’d had empathy. It had only ended up dragging him further into the depths.
Mohan thinks she can care about everything and everyone without consequence. She’s young. The system hasn’t broken her down enough for her to understand that when resources are low and lives are at stake, keeping as many patients alive as possible is all that any of them can afford to spend time on.
He stares back at Jack defiantly and waits for the anger to bloom across his face.
Instead, he gets a suffocating wall of concern.
Fuck Jack Abbot.
“Robby, are you all right? You’re looking-”
“I’m fine,” he snaps, crossing his arms over his stomach.
“Here, sit-”
“Jack, I am fine. I just-” A strange feeling rises in his throat. It’s not bile, but- “I need a moment.”
Robby surges off the couch and beelines for the spare room. The door closes with a slam. His chest feels tight and constricted, refusing to expand around his lungs as he gasps for air. He backs himself into the narrow closet and collapses to the ground. Something about the enclosed space feels safer, more controlled.
Anxiety is not new to him. When he was young, his grandmother used to sit him down and press a cup of tea into his hands. “It’ll pass,” she'd say. “You’re a big boy.” She became less patient as he grew older, but by then, he’d already begun growing out of his little episodes.
Of all the symptoms of panic attacks, losing the ability to breathe properly might be the most irritating.
(Then the other ones set in, which is a whole other level of uncomfortable sensations.)
“Robby, you good?” Jack’s voice filters through the bedroom door. He raps on it sharply. “If you don’t answer, I’m coming in.”
Fuck no, Robby can’t answer. He doesn’t know what kind of sound from hell would escape his mouth if he tried opening it. Does he want Jack seeing him like this? Absolutely not, but what fucking choice does he have? He presses his chin to his chest and brings up his hands to clutch his head.
Goddammit, why can’t he breathe?
The door creaks open and Jack’s shadow falls across the room. Robby shuts his eyes.
“Okay.” Jack’s breath comes out in a slow exhale as he approaches. “Just… okay.” He closes the distance between them and lowers himself to the floor beside him. He breathes in deep and slow. “Follow my breathing, Robby. Can you do that for me?”
He shakes his head no, because his chest clamps down every time he tries to inhale. Jack’s breaths are too slow, too measured. A million thoughts tear through his head in the time it takes Jack to go from inhale to exhale.
“In… out. In… out.”
“Shut the fuck up, Jack.”
“That’s okay. We can start small. You don’t have to do it perfectly.”
He nearly jumps out of his skin when Jack places a hand on his back. It’s not comforting, but it’s distracting enough to focus on. Jack rubs Robby’s back in time with his measured breaths, making little reassurances whenever Robby breathes in a bit deeper or exhales a bit longer.
“It’s okay. You’re doing great, Robby. We’ll figure this out. It’s going to be okay.” Jack’s words slip through his mind as the minutes tick by. Robby keeps his eyes shut—Jack’s focused stares are anxiety inducing on the best of days.
It feels like ages before his body stops feeling like it’s fighting against his mind.
Finally, he sucks in a deep breath and lets it go with a harsh exhale. His chest feels looser, but the shame sweeping through his body almost feels worse. “Fuck, I’m broken.” He aims for humour and falls miserably short as his voice emerges thin and fractured.
Jack shakes his head. “You’re not broken. No more than the rest of us.”
“Only one of us is here snivelling over nothing.” The bitterness in his tone surprises him. He doesn’t feel particularly bitter—just wrung out and exhausted.
“It’s not nothing, Robby,” Jack presses. “What we do—making these life and death decisions every day—isn’t normal. Humans exist to live, to grow, to socialize. Nobody should be tasked with being the keeper of that, yet we are. That is a toll that builds up over time, even for the most seasoned.” Jack’s hand returns to his back, this time pulling him closer. “And when things build up for long enough, they tend to explode.”
Robby chuckles bitterly. He wipes at his nose, making a sound of disgust when a trail of snot follows his finger. Jack hands him a crumpled napkin from his pocket. “That a quote from your therapist?”
“You could say.” The corner of Jack’s mouth lifts in rueful acknowledgement. “For the record, he does not advocate for me risking my life by running around getting shot at with the Tactical EMS team. You were right.”
That earns a startled laugh. Of all the things he expected Jack to say, that wasn’t on the list. “That’s one thing, at least.”
He presses his forehead to his knees.
“Fuck, I was awful to Samira.” He waits for a response, but Jack only observes him in silence. Robby draws in a breath. “I should talk to her. Check in, see how she’s doing outside of work. Adamson always did that for us.”
“I know. We can talk about that later,” Jack says gently. He holds Robby in a secure embrace, steady and warm.
They lapse into silence.
Out loud, he says, “Louis died.”
Jack stills his absent fidgeting and looks at him sidelong. “I saw him in the viewing room yesterday. Paid my respects. Who did the debrief?” His voice turns careful and measured in that way it gets when he’s coaching residents through a new operation without letting them know that they’re one misstep away from disaster.
Robby shoots him a look. “I did. It was Whitaker’s patient, but it hasn’t been a year since he started with us. He didn’t have much to say.” None of the residents had, in fact. Even Langdon was surprised to hear about Louis’s family.
He rubs his neck and waits for Jack to prod him for more information on his emotional state. It’s only when he doesn’t respond that Robby remembers Jack would be taking Louis’s death hard as well.
Jesus, he’s been awful person lately.
“He came in for a toothache, but other than that, we gave him the usual workup. There was no reason to suspect anything more.” Robby recites the words from his inner monologue like they make up a script he’s been duty-bound to memorize. “We did everything we could to save him, but in the end, there was nothing we could do.”
Jack makes a strong effort to maintain a poker face, but Robby can see evidence of pain in his vacant expression and the hunch of his shoulders. Robby places an awkward hand on Jack’s upper back before sliding it around to rest on his shoulder.
A noise escapes Jack’s mouth that was probably meant to be a chuckle. “These frequent flyers, man. You get used to seeing them around.” He clears his throat and begins twisting a loose thread on his pant leg. “Wish I could have been there for the debrief. Could have said a few words as well, take some of the load off you.”
Robby takes in a grounding breath and tries to sound neutral but attentive.
“What would you have said?” He offers.
“Robby, you just had a panic attack.” Jack looks at him flatly. “We’re sitting on the floor in your closet. I’ll be fine, you don’t have to play healer every second of the day.”
Robby winces. He might deserve that, but he still wants to hear. “Jack.”
The look he receives is cagey and reluctant. “Nothing special, really. Just some stories of his visits,” he murmurs.
“I want to know,” says Robby softly, turning his head to catch his eyes. “Please.”
Jack holds his gaze for a few beats without speaking. He lets out a long breath. “Fine.”
Robby smiles to himself slightly before settling himself better against Jack’s side.