Chapter Text
“Heard you’re bringing in work for me now? And at the end of my shift? Not cool, man. Not cool.”
Tongue pressed to the bottom of his teeth as he smiled, Robby shrugged helplessly, caught out by the exact person he’d been looking for. Playfully guilty for all to see as Jack stood there looking stern. His thick arms crossed over is chest. Back straight like a soldier’s should be. Himself, playfully annoyed by Robby’s audacity. Princess casually split her attention between their antics and her conversation with Kim. Samira shot a distracted glance their way; more interested in the board than them goofing around.
Gently collapsing into the space next to Jack, Robby’s long arms dangled over the edge of the edge of the countertop as he huffed. An honest weariness hidden beneath the little show he put on for Jack since no one else cared. They looked or glanced. They moved on. Only Jack watched long enough to snort at his antics, more amused than inconvenienced by the request Robby hadn’t made of him yet.
He didn’t have to. The yes was a given simply because it was him asking. It was just a shame that the situation warranted the actual question be asked.
Stealing a glance at him, Robby tucked his chin to his chest, hunched over like he was, and clasped his hands against the back of his neck. Hiding from Jack’s unrelenting stare next to him just long enough for the odd stretch he felt in his back, of all places, to grow a little painful. He pressed one of his hands to his back as he stood up straight. All disarming smile and a small wince of pain.
Jack’s expectant stare was still there. His hands shoved into his pocket while he stood like an annoyed parent. Every bit intent on holding his tongue if it meant that Robby would give in first.
Dragging out the silence a little longer, Robby looked back to the board. Read the time. Pretended not to notice the way Jack leaned in closer in an attempt to catch his gaze.
“How’s your college kid?” He asked, purposefully avoiding the subject Jack had started them on.
Jack rolled his eyes. “Probably won’t be naked sledding in the foreseeable future, but other than that, he’s fine. Surgery for the open fracture went well.”
Of all the ways he pictured a ‘party gone stupid’, as Lena put it, naked sledding was nowhere in that. Caught off guard by the shock, Robby coughed to cover the laugh he wanted to let out as Princess turned to them, eyes wide in disbelief just over Jack’s shoulder. Not that he could blame her. Sledding accidents came in often enough during the winter. The city had no shortage of hills to choose from. But most of the time they were clothed. And from the little cracks in Jack’s carefully constructed neutrality—the smile that flirted at the corner of his lips—the story was probably a solid variation on the usual mix of youth, booze and stupidity.
Watching him from the corner of his eye, Robby hissed out a breath as he shook shook off the urge to dig deeper into that tale. He had to focus. If not for his own sake, than for the tiredness that Jack hid behind too much blinking and a yawn he managed without parting his lips. And John too.
Pushing himself upright, Robby grimaced before facing Jack. The question was there. The secret that had made itself a home in the darkest corners of his soul, hidden beneath the bone deep belief that it didn’t matter. And having to give a voice to it all just left his mouth tasting of ash as a nauseous feeling caught in the back of his throat.
Jack shifted from foot to foot. A large uncomfortable movement compared to his usual subtle, Sisyphean effort to find a comfortable balance on his prosthetic. His concern for Robby’s shift in mood more obvious than normal as his lips thinned with displeasure. He even eyed him up and down for some kind of answer, but he didn’t find it. Not when Robby didn’t know it himself.
Stepping closer, he kept his voice soft as a secret as he said, “Look, if you need me to stay or cover for you, I can. Just say the word. But you’re starting to weird me out with all… this.”
Robby’s bitter flash of teeth fell short of a smile as he looked away. Suddenly and violently all too aware of everyone in the space of the hub—not just Night Shift, but his arriving Days crew as well. He watched some patient attempt to question Larry as the poor guy stood there in his coat, snow still melting in his hair like he hadn’t just walked inside. Their eyes met across the room and Robby shook his head before looking back with a gestured for him to follow; already walking away before anyone could stop him.
Not that anyone tried with Jack following behind him. His presence largely served as a warning somehow. As if the open concern Robby found upon glancing at him was as disconcerting to everyone else as it was to him. Shaking off the though, Robby checked the window of the family room before letting himself inside and plopping down into a chair with a miserable sigh.
He stared at his shoes waiting for Jack to find his way to a chair too. Only, looking up at him seconds passed with no change, he saw him stood near the door like a guard. An unintended warning to anyone who might want to enter. Or an intended one for anyone who might try to leave when the conversation inevitably became too much.
“Alright, man,” Jack said, far more serious with no one but Robby to hear. “What’s going on?”
The broken laugh he exhaled was as flawed as the smile that found a place on his face. Hollow and humorless. Hinting at the quagmire of emotions inside himself that he didn’t have time to work out. Not with the deadline he had given himself to get John out and the usual nuisances of work that was certain to come looking for him. A passing wish Dana was still around crossed his mind. If nothing else, she’d know the exact emotion someone was meant to use during a confession.
Running his hands up his face and through his hair, he tried again. His grin smaller, grim, but honest. Fragile as his will to ruin everything.
“My shift hasn’t even started and it’s already been a fucking day.”
“Yeah,” Jack agreed, drawing out the syllable. “Wasn’t gonna say anything, but you kind of look like shit.”
A few breaths of laughter slipped past as he nodded at his own expense. He had seen the dread in his eyes that morning when he was just expecting to chat with John for a few minutes. A novel concept he only had himself to blame over since if he had just went to the coffee shop, his visit from the guy would be over.
Jack looked over his shoulder through the window in the door before moving closer with a roll of his shoulders. Sitting in the chair at Robby’s side, he settled his arm on the narrow armrest. An unspoken comfort as they both stared at something. The picture on the wall for Jack. The floor for Robby. No mention of the way that Robby relaxed into the brush of arms as the moment settled into something less fraught.
The breath Jack took was audible. “What was it? Sleep late? Wake up too early? Van Horn and you find some new issue to fuck about? Because Lena’s got her money on that one.”
“I’m—I’m not sleeping with Jesse.”
Jack nodded with a soft hum. Easy and unquestioning. No further comment even as he his jaw worked tirelessly with the effort to be so calm.
Rolling his eyes, Robby shrugged helplessly. “OK. No. I know—I know I may have said that before, ages ago, but I mean. Everything after Pittfest was a blip. And one we put an end to that last month.”
“Brother, last month was two weeks ago,” Jack scoffed as he leaned into him. Pressing his shoulder to Robby’s casual as could be, the heat of him a balm to his all too common judgment of Robby’s bed partners, he ignored the dirty look shot his way, saying, “And don’t act like you weren’t in his bed before the hospital had even offered counseling services. Services you avoided while telling everyone else to talk to someone.”
“I talked to Caleb.”
Jack’s bark of laughter was almost mocking. “That’s—OK. Yeah. All I’m trying to say is…I wouldn’t judge if you still were—you know—with him. This time of year.”
“I’m so happy my casual sex with Jesse earned your blessing. Can I get retroactive permissions for Heather? Or does this only apply to future sex partners? The odd guy I pick up?”
“It applies to anyone you decide to stick your dick in days after I catch you considering a walk off the roof. And seeing how you don’t want to face that shady patch in your soul—”
Robby shook his head, tight and quick. “That’s not fair. You know that night was—”
“Yeah. And…”
Jack clenched his jaw. The room falling quiet save for the frustrated breaths he let out in search for a specific phrasing. Though, even that became something softer, almost defeated as Robby picked at his nails. Jack looked to him with a squint and Robby met it head on. Watching as the man lips pressed into a thin line.
“I know what this time of year feels like when you have those kinds of thoughts kicking around your head. Everyone’s with their families, all happy. Everything is lit up and bright and that makes that darkness in you all the more tempting, man.” His face scrunched a little, he swallowed. “Jump in. See what happens because no one will cared and even if they did, it’s—it’s not your problem if you aren’t there. But, if you’ve got a reason—someone or something—to keep you from that, you need to fucking cling to that shit. Certainly got enough excuses to with Hanukkah. New Year’s. Van Horn’s birthday in a few days…”
Jack shrugged, words tapering off into a silence Robby couldn’t help but laugh at, weak though it was.
Patting Jack’s knee, letting his hand rest there, he shook his head again. Slow and easy, chuckling as he said, “No one is having sad holiday sex for Hanukkah. Purim, maybe, but I’m good for now. And as for Jesse, he’s wanted the same thing for his birthday for the past twenty years. Red velvet cupcakes and those shitty little ice cream cups from the cafeteria.”
“Why change what works? My nightcrawlers never complain about the leftover cupcakes we get from your little party.”
Excess, as if Robby didn’t specifically order enough to make sure both shifts had had ample opportunity to them in the years since Jack switched to nights. The minor inconvenience to his wallet somehow more logical than leaving Jack out of the tradition of using anyone’s birthday as a reason to celebrate. Especially the December birthdays, given that he was one one.
Relaxing in his seat, Robby playfully rolled of his eyes. “You’ve spent the past month telling me to talk to someone instead of sleeping around. Maybe I’ll put the cupcake money toward that. Finally fix my shit like you wanted”
“Don’t give me that. First off,.” Jack held up his hand, counting off on his fingers as he said, “You wouldn’t know what to do with yourself without sex. Secondly, I said this month is a freebie. Let him keep putting you through the mattress as much as you want if it means we get cupcakes and those cranberry things you bring for New Year’s. Ellis likes them. And third… the fifteenth is Monday. You’ve already ordered them.”
Unable to argue any of those points, Robby made a show of being mildly annoyed by Jack’s accuracy. “Fine. Then I’ll just skip your birthday this year. That’s still two weeks out from now. Gives me plenty of time to do nothing.”
Jack waved off the threat dismissively. “See, that’s exactly why you’re wrong. I’m gonna be fifty. Can’t have the big day go by without you getting me some giant sheet cake I don’t even need.”
“Hey, your team loves those cakes,” Robby argued, helpless against the way his face lit up at the prospect of another annoying cake.
He’d already knew the exact childish monstrosity he intended to order. Something that would make any toddler envious with exactly fifty candles that Jack would hate, right along with being the center of attention. Not that he got a say in the matter after making Robby endure far bigger and more annoying celebrations of himself at work. It was their little arms race. And Robby felt like he’d found the perfect way to end the year.
Jack shifted in his seat, already uncomfortable at the thought, making Robby aware of his hand on the guy’s knee. Somehow different from the close press of arms Jack maintained for all his moving about. Robby moved his hand while staying close enough to be leaned on.
“And I love you taking me out to dinner as an actual gift. I’m thinking either Meat & Potatoes or Fogo de Chao. Either way I’m getting drunk on your dime.”
“Sure about that? Maybe I’ll be too busy having sex to fight the darkness or whatever bullshit metaphor you used,” Robby teased, leaning in close enough for his nose to brush against Jack’s cheek before jerking back enough to be annoying.
As if he hadn’t noticed, Jack fixed him with a lazy smirk. “I’d say if you got me drunk enough, I’d fuck you myself but I’m planning to be absolutely stuffed by time the night is over.”
A terrible combination of words. Robby’s eyes shut as he grimaced over how easily his mind conjured up thoughts of sex with Jack. Those thick arms wrapped tightly around him. Digging his fingers into the meat of Jack’s legs. Nothing he hadn’t thought of more times than he could count, though the idea of admitting to that felt made the John of it all feel manageable.
He gave Jack’s leg a final pat as he sat up straight in his chair. “I had a meeting with this guy. Rich prick from Chicago who runs a major clinic there.” He stared at ahead at the painting as he scratched at his thumb. “He’s a friend of Gloria’s. Wanted to meet up with me to chat. Invite me to this… dinner he’s having with some other local physicians in order to brainstorm care ideas, I guess.”
“And I’m sure you were perfectly polite when you told him to shove his offer where the sun don’t shine, as always,” Jack snickered, crossing his arms over his chest.
Smiling to himself, he shook his head. “No. No, I was a dick, but— I know the guy and he’s just…”
Robby exhaled noisily. Forty years of describing exactly the kind of person John was built up behind his lips in a car crash of words. Every emotion tied to them acting like a sludge to keep them locked there.
He dragged his hand through his hair, tugging at the ones at the back of his head to loosen something in him. “He fell outside when we were in the park. Fractured his wrist. Pretty sure he has a concussion. And I need you to treat him. I put him on the board already. Name’s John Carter the Third. He’s a doctor too so you can just talk to him.”
“Shit.” Jack’s cheeks puffed out at he huffed out a breath. “With a name like that I’m assuming he’s already called his lawyer to sue you for malpractice somehow. Is that why you want me on this?”
“No—He wouldn’t— I Just…” He stumbled over his defense until the words died. He chanced a glance at his watch. At the door. Dragging his tongue across his teeth, Robby let himself hunch in further on himself; eyes squeezed shut as he held his hands to the back of his head. “I can’t treat him because it would be in violation of AMA guidelines on treating family.”
If he was meant to feel lighter by saying it, he didn’t. Jack’s responding quiet grated like nails on a chalkboard. Endless seconds filled with little tuts and thoughtful huffs. Robby felt sick from bracing for the comment—whatever comment—, but the words didn’t come. Jack just sat there, too quiet for the confession, with Robby too scared to look at him.
“So what?” Jack asked carefully. “You grew up with this guy?”
Robby shook his head, eyes already starting to burn. “No. Didn’t—Didn’t even meet him til I was maybe… sixteen or so?”
“So he’s a close friend from school? You guys went to college together or something?”
More questions in an attempt to make sense of something that simply didn’t. His hands fidgeted in his lap nervously.
It was so easy to understand Jack’s line of thought after spending almost half a century crafting it. His whole life had always been the people he shared and the stories of them. His experiences back in New Orleans. Casual mentions of his grandparents and what it was to grow up with them. The space for family he filled with people like Janey and Jake. The people he’d been working with for decades, now. Jack. That was his family. Those were the people that mattered most to him.
Robby felt oddly proud to think that having blood relatives left in the world felt like such an anathema to Jack that it had to be spelled out in no uncertain term. Even if the words felt like sludge caught in his throat.
“John is my brother,” he admitted, voice cracking toward the end.
Jack’s brows furrowed as he processed the information wrong. The slow understanding of what the situation wasn’t loosening the shock and confusion into something sympathetic. His whole posture softening with compassion.
“Your dad had another kid.”
Robby smiled a little manically as he looked back at the floor. “I mean, yeah? He uh… From what I know of Jack Carter, he has three other kids. A daughter and son with his wife. I think the boy’s name was Bobby? I don’t know. He died before I ever met him. But his daughter, she lives abroad, I think”
“And he had John with—”
“My mom.”
Robby watched the floor carefully. There was a stain no bigger than a dime on the floor—greying, splotchy—he stared at as the room crashed to a halt. Someone must’ve dropped something at some point, but for the life of him, Robby couldn’t figure out what. He tried. Racking his mind for what it could be as Jack went still as anything else in the room. Staring at him with an expression Robby was too much a coward to face.
“OK,” Jack exhaled. “So your mom and this Carter guy had another kid. And that’s John. When did this happen?”
“According to the records? About thirty minutes before I came into the world.”
“Fuck,” Jack whispered, syllable sharp enough to make Robby wince.
Jack bounced his leg for a beat before forcing himself to his feet, treading over the stain as he carefully paced the small confines of the room. Back and forth. Rolling his neck, he stopped on the far side of the room away from the door to take a few steadying breaths until he looked as calm as clear ice over a lake.
“OK. So your mom and this guy…. John is your…. You have a twin.” Something about how definitive Jack made it sound hurt. “You’ve had a twin all your life. And you’ve known about him since you were… sixteen? Which means, somehow, in the… I don’t even know how many years we’ve been friends, you never once thought to mention this.”
“I don’t tell you everything—”
“Oh I got that,” Jack hissed. “But Michael, what the fuck, man? I know it’s my choice to tell you everything, but I tell you everything. We talk. About the job. About sports. Who you’re fucking and when I miss my wife more than I can stand. How is telling me about your twin harder than telling me about your suicidal thoughts?”
He shrugged knowing the answer that it just was wasn’t going to be enough for Jack.
“I don’t know. I—I don’t talk about him because he doesn’t matter? Nothing about the Carters matter to me. He just happens to be friends with Gloria, of all people, and— showed up.”
“So Gloria knows. Anyone else?”
“No,” he said definitively. “…Jesse but—”
“Jesse?” Left eyebrow raising, Jack shook his head. The back of his left hand smacking against the palm of his right a consistent beat to his attempts to swallow down his anger.
“It—I—I told him over a decade ago. John had invited me to his fucking clinic opening and I was drunk and angry,” Robby carried on, voice rising as Jack looked everywhere except at him.
“You got pissy about your brother opening some clinic? Since when have you ever even been interested in that stuff?”
“No. Just—”
Forty years of words and memories came together on his tongue, complete with definitely perfect words to describe the exact sort of life John had been given by luck or kismet. Prep schools that made Robby’s skin itch the moment he heard about them. Days spent doing dressage or wrestling as a matter of after school learning rather than working or helping out around a too small house with aging grandparents. A dozen other critiques that snowballed inside him just to cast aside because it didn’t matter.
It wasn’t pertinent to anything Jack was asking of him. Jack didn’t know John. Jack knew him. Knew him in all the intimate ways that would make those statements too obvious. Lead down too many avenues of his life he never wanted to go down with anyone.
Rubbing at the side of his head, he paused before forcing himself to his feet. The act had Jack’s full attention. Hazel eyes locked on him and nothing else as he said, “There’s just something about him that… He makes things worse. And it’s not something he can help it. It’s just—It’s hard enough watching someone live the life you used to plan for yourself when they don’t have your face as well.”
Jack looked at him, brows furrowed, with a sympathy that was worse for the amount of understanding behind it. Closing the space between them, he patted Robby’s shoulder, squeezing at the muscle as he nodded. Despite the stinging sheen of tears rushing to make his eyes glassy, Robby smiled miserably before looking back at the ground.
With another pat, Jack gripped the ends of his stethoscope and huffed. Eyes focused on the door, on guard for the privacy Robby needed in order to wipe at his eyes and compose himself. “Alright. Let’s… Let’s go see this twin of yours before one of your residents starts asking him for medical advice.”
Smiling as he let Jack take the first steps toward the door, he shrugged. “You know, if it could get me a chance to piss once in awhile I might let him stay.”
Jack laughed as he held open the door for him, the sound easy despite everything else as Robby passed by. Just like the easy way it tapered off into a disgruntled look behind his back as they made their way to thirteen. Fitting perfectly with Robby’s own frown as he reached the door in question.