Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Two things happen over the next week.

The first is that Trinity moves onto the night shift, swapping with Parker who had been eyeing up a move to the day shift for a while now.

The first few shifts are rough as her body adjusts to the new schedule, and as she gets used to working with the rest of the night crawlers. But it's easier for her, to not have to worry about navigating awkwardly around Baran and Yolanda when she's down for a consult. There's something about the night shift that drains her in a way the day shift never quite managed, that when she gets home she passes out almost immediately without fail.

She's two weeks into the night shift routine when the second thing happens.

Arriving early, Trinity is changing into her scrubs when Crash barges through the door, Emma in tow. 

"...and she just blew up, I know they said she yelled at Robby before he left too, but she was really going for it this time, even Garcia looked like she didn't know what to do." Crash says, stopping when she sees Trinity. "Oh my god, I was just telling Emma, Garcia and Al-Hashimi got into it today!" Eyes alight with the prospect of retelling the story again. "They disagreed over some treatment for this patient, motorbike crash, he was like, mangled. But then after, when we've sent the patient up to surgery, the pair of them start going for each other's throats by the elevators."

And Trinity can feel herself go very, very still as Crash ploughs on. 

"It turns out, they're dating!" Crash tells her, voice pitching higher in disbelief at the revelation. "Al-Hashimi said, or well, yelled I guess, something about not being able to deal with Yolanda's shitty moods at home as well as at work." 

Trinity wants to know why they were arguing, more concerningly for herself as she tries to work through her self inflicted heartbreak, she wants to help fix it. But she also has a 12 hour shift looming ahead of her, a shift she will not be able to focus on if she doesn't keep to her strict stance of as minimal contact as possible.

"Well, I'm sure they'll figure it out. I gotta go get ready for handovers." She interrupts the younger woman before she can continue with her retelling.

She can only try her best to not look in Baran's direction as the two shifts pass by one another, she makes the mistake of glancing once in the attending's direction, drawn by some godawful magnetic force, and she can see the stress working away at her face. Trinity does a full 180 turn to avoid seeing her anymore, the way her heart twists painfully at even a glance isn't something she can withstand for very long.

Maybe if Crash hadn't told her what had happened, she wouldn't have ended up in a bar on her next free day, or night. Well aware that this will not help her maintain a sleep schedule conducive for the night shift at all, but also uncaring, because work is no longer draining her like it was initially. She can't sleep, the aching hole of loss inside of her chest mixed with the bitter self hatred that she just wishes she could have been enough in the first place makes sure of that.

If she drinks enough tonight then maybe something will finally sort itself out in her brain enough for her to be able to get through the days a bit easier. That's the plan, at the very least she wants to make sure she's drunk enough that sleeping isn't an issue when she's done sitting on this dingy bar stool, in a bar far enough out of the way of any places she used to frequent with Baran and Yolanda that there's no danger of bumping into them.

Briefly she considers trying to find someone to take home, that a warm body might be what she needs, but quickly dismisses the idea when it makes her stomach roil a little in protest, that she doesn't want just any warm body next to her, wants two specific ones instead.

So she decides to nix that idea, trades it out for another drink, and then another. At some point switches from beer to something stronger, keeps a steady stream of it down her throat until the burn stops being as noticable, and the bar stool begins to feel unsteady beneath her and she can still remember that she's heartbroken, but the gnawing ache of it all has been dulled enough that it only hurts if she presses at it.

Vaguely as the night progressess, she's aware that the bartender is watching her closely, although she seems to be getting steadily fuzzier around the edges, and when Trinity tries to order another drink she isn't sure which of the bartenders she is gesturing towards. It shouldn't be a surprise when it's a glass of water that's put in front of her, although she does frown at it confusedly for a long time until the bartender taps her fingers pointedly by it. 

"Drink up. You're not getting anything other than water now, maybe soda if I'm feeling generous." Trinity blinks owlishly back at her and then does as she's told.

It doesn't feel like it's doing much in the way of sobering her up, but now she's not actively focused on getting as much alcohol into her system as she can, she does at least manage to muster up just enough coordination to check her phone for the first time since she sat down. There's an unopened message from Baran, sent a couple of days after they broke up. The preview doesn't give her much of a guess as to what it says and she's been too cowardly to open it until now. 

Hey Trin, you can ignore this if you want. But I can't help but feel like maybe we should have talked things through before you left a bit more. I know we can't change your mind about how you feel, but, I don't know, I just miss you

And perhaps she should have read it sober because what the fuck is she supposed to do with that, or maybe she should have just opened it when it first came through, maybe, selfish and cowardly that she is, she could have wormed her way back into their lives. Lord knows right now she would give anything to be sandwiched between them on the sofa again. Maybe Baran does miss her, or did miss her, enough to text at least.

"Hey, we're closing up soon, you got a way to get home?" 

Trinity is jolted out of her head by the bartender once more, fumbles around for a second for the right ways to form words, "I can get an uber." Glances back down to her phone that has locked itself once more whilst she mused drunkenly, tries to unlock it just for it to stay dark, tries again and again until, with a groan. "It's dead."

And the bartender, with a patience and well conceleaded exasperation that can only be gained from many hours dealing with drunken adults, offers, "You can use my phone to call someone to come get you," watching as Trinity sways unsteadily in her seat, "I'm not sure you should be getting in an uber alone right now anyway."

Trinity blinks back at her, muses which of the two numbers she knows by heart to call, well there is a third but she very much doubts calling the landline of her childhood home would go down well with her parents at god knows what hour it is, even if she hadn't cut all contact off with them. So that narrows it down to two, it takes a hell of a lot more fine motor skills than it should do for someone wanting to be a surgeon to tap in the numbers on the screen. Before she can press ring she's struck with a gripping fear that the call might go unanswered, as if the recepient could sense it was her waiting on the other side.

She must hesitate for too long because it's being plucked from her hands, pressed against the bartender's ear who holds it in place with her shoulder as she continues to tidy up around Trinity. Most of the rest of the bar has empited out, spilling onto the street to continue their nights elsewhere or stagger their own way home.

"What's your name, honey?" Trinity is asked, and she replies, first and last name and then adds on that she's a doctor for no reason too, and the bartender is speaking to the person on the other side, and Trinity can only catch snippets. "...yeah that's the one...didn't want to put her in a cab...drank a fair amount...phone's dead..." A lot of mhms and agreeable noises and then she's hung up, turning to face Trinity to say, "Your girl is on her way."

"Oh-" Trinity twists her hands together. "She's not- not my girl," not anymore, she thinks, or she must mumble because the rag that had been used to wipe down the bar gets thrown in front of her, followed by the bartender herself leaning her arms against it to face Trinity head on.

"Well, your 'not' girl said she'll be here within 30 - so you wanna tell me how she became not your girl anymore, because she sounded awful concerned about you on the phone just now." An arched eyebrow in challenge, or invitiation. "I promise you, I'm a good listener, it's part of the job."

The figure behind the bar is still swimming a little, and if Trinity moves her head too quick she multiplies, but she also thinks she really would like to tell someone, hasn't spoken about it to anyone, just walked out on the best two people in her life and has been shuffling around trying to pretend it doesn't hurt just because she knows it's for the best. She starts slowly, a little disjointed in how the words piece themselves together, definitely slurred and at times bordering on incoherent whether through the alcohol or her inability to keep her thoughts in one place.

Keeps going and going, barely looking up from the scratched up wood of the bar beneath her fingers, until she runs out of steam all at once, is just left with the same gnawing hole in her chest that's been growing steadily.

"I'll never understand how people with jobs that need so much intelligence can be so fucking dense sometimes." The bartender sighs and Trinity's head snaps up to look at her because that sounded like an insult but she's honestly not too sure. "Let me get this straight - you decided, without speaking to either of your partners, that they would be better off without you, and instead of telling them that, you isolated yourself until they thought you wanted out of the relationship. But not one of you ever actually sat down and said what you were feeling out loud."

If she's honest she thinks there's a little bit more nuance to it all than that, "If you knew them you'd get it." 

"Maybe. Maybe not. I don't think I need to know them, I'm a pretty good judge of character, and you wanna know my diagnosis Doctor Santos?" Trinity nods, craves the surety with which this woman speaks, "I would tell them exactly why you felt like you didn't belong, what have you got to lose, you've already left them, they can't leave you if it all goes tits up once you talk."

"I liked you better when you were giving me alcohol." Trinity pouts because she doesn't want to do that, because despite what this stranger thinks, there is an easiness in never having to hear her girls - not her girls anymore she reminds herself - outright reject her when she's already left and done it for them.

"You're not the first to say that. C'mon, lets go see if your girl is here."

And Baran is just pulling up to the curb as Trinity lets herself be half guided out the door, her traitorous heart jumps at the sight of Baran hopping out of the driver's side to open the passenger door for her. Trinity mumbles something in the way of thanks, lets Baran close the door and shuts her eyes to try and drag in enough air into her lungs to steady herself. And much too soon for her nerves, Baran is sliding into the driver's seat.

Much to Trinity's inital gratitude, they drive in an awkward silence which lets her grapple with her stomach enough to find a point to stare at and suppress the urge to throw up. But then the silence tips over into downright excrucitating as they slow to a stop at some traffic lights.

"I would've thought Yola would be the one to come get me." Is what leaves her mouth in an effort to try and ease the uncomfortableness of it all.

"Why would you think that? You called me."

"Yeah, figured you'd wake Yola to do it, know you don't like driving in the dark." Trinity mumbles, a little guiltily.

--

Trinity wakes first with a groan, fighting her way through the fog of her hangover and reluctantly blinks open her eyes against the light filtering in from the shitty blinds in her room. Her room rudely keeps spinning for a long few minutes and her thoughts seem to match it as she picks through half formed memories and vague recollections of conversations and feelings. She's almost tempted to write off Baran driving her home as something she dreamt, but she lets her head loll to one side and there's a glass of water and some aspirin waiting for her, and she knows she didn't put them there, has historically always been terrible at remembering to grab water before passing out after drinking.

"Fuck!" Trinity slings an arm over her eyes in embarassment.

She tries her best to scrabble around for any more snippets of conversation she might have had but all she can remember is Baran telling her than she and Yola were on a break, and she thinks vaguely there might have been tears at some point, from her, sometimes she's a weepy drunk. 

All in all, not an ideal way to start the day. 

Nor is the next hour she spends hunched over the toilet, but that's nothing new to her either.

By the time the evening rolls round, she's barely human, has managed to eat two plain slices of bread and chug enough water that she doesn't think she'll actively die - yet. But work waits for no doctor, and she's leaning her head against the cool metal of the lockers, the fluorescent lighting only making her headache worse, when someone grabs her by the scruff of her scrubs and hauls her down a slightly quieter hallway.

"What the fuck, Mohan?" She snaps.

"What the fuck? I should be asking you that. What the fuck do you mean you broke it off with Baran and Yolanda?" Samira snaps. 

And god, she's never hated Yolanda and Emery's friendship more, because what Yolanda tells Emery means Samira knows too and, although she's sworn to secrecy about the three of them just like Whitaker was, Samira took great pleasure in ribbing Trinity for how dopey eyed in love she was.

"How's it any of your business?" Trinity bites.

"It's my business because your girlfriend has been moping around in our spare room for the past few days." Samira explains, dropping her voice as a patient is wheeled past. "She told Emery everything and you're telling me you just decided to walk out on them?"

Worse than Emery being incapable of not telling Samira everything, is that it's led to a sort of begrudging friendship between Trinity and Samira (and a much more enthusiastic one between Baran and Samira).

"I don't know what you want me to say." Trinity says quieter, fingertips pressing into her temple, it feels like every nerve in her body is exposed and rubbed raw.

"I want to know what happened, you love them Trinity, I know you do, so why did you leave? Why is Yolanda crying on my sofa after each shift? And, it's not that I want to kick her out, but..."

"You want to kick her out." Trinity finishes with a hint of a smile. 

"I would really like to be able to kiss my girlfriend without a surgeon sniffling to herself in the background." Samira sighs. "So out with it."

Trinity checks the time, hoping desperately to wiggle out of this conversation, but she has ten minutes until her shift starts, and she knows Samira would have made sure she'd carved out enough time to confront her before handovers, meticulous that she is.

So for the second time in less than 24 hours, Trinity tries to put into words how she's not good enough for them, how it's better this way. 

And for the second time in less than 24 hours, Trinity Santos is told, in no uncertain terms, that she is an idiot.

"Fuck you." Trinity grouses in response, already trying to slip past Samira and head towards handover.

"Wait, Trinity." A hand on her arm, just firm enough to stop her, "just, trust me, and talk to them, both of them. I think you've got it wrong, I really do."

Trinity shrugs the hand off her, jaw clenching, because she can't do this right now, can't think about the what if of it all, the hope that's been fanned to life in the past day, because for the next 12 hours she has to go and be a doctor and save lives and undoubtedly stitch up a few complete morons along the way.

But she does in the middle of the shift, in a moment of bravery or stupidity depending on which part of her brain you ask, types out a message to the chat with Yolanda and Baran that has lay barren since she walked out on them.

Can we talk?

And then spends the next five and a half hours fighting the urge to check it for a response, because even though she knows they should both be asleep and therefore won't have responded, she thinks if she opens her phone and sees no reply it might kill her.

In the end she checks it at 6am, there's two responses both within an hour of her original message, wonders if they've been having trouble sleeping too.

Of course, I'm off today from Baran.

It's my day off too from Yolanda, which isn't exactly an outright acceptance to talk, but she hopes Yolanda is willing to hear her out.

Before she can back out she types out and sends, I'll come by after my shift.

When she passes Samira to leave at a little after 7am, she hears the other doctor say, "Go get your girls, Santos."

Trinity just hopes that Samira has read this situation right.