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From what Frank has heard, this is usually Robby's job. It should be today, too, but Robby is at a conference. And the next in line for this job, the senior attending in charge in Robby's absence, is chatting up his new team. So now the task falls to him – 'inadequate' doesn't even begin to cover how he feels about being the one to help Abbot through one of these moods.
But here he is, fingers clenching around the handles of two mugs of tea, stepping out onto the rooftop. He walks across, towards the railing where Abbot is standing - on the wrong side, because apparently that's something he does.
"Hey, Dr. Abbot," he says quietly and waits for the night shift attending to at least acknowledge that he heard him, just so Frank doesn't have to worry about surprising him into jumping off the ledge.
He gets a head tilt that tells him Abbot knows he's there.
"Made you some tea." And because it's a great opener, he adds, "Just the way you like it."
Abbot looks at him, then at the mug. "And what is the way I like my tea?" he asks like he's genuinely curious.
"Hot water," Frank replies and fiddles with the handles, so he can hold one of the mugs out to Abbot. "With a tea bag in it."
"Which kind?" Abbot asks and takes the mug.
"The kind that's in the break room, man. Don't ask. It smells like-" He brings his mug up to his nose. "Meadow. Grass." It smells like nothing, really. That pack of bags has been sitting in the cupboard for over a year. It probably tastes like nothing, too.
Abbot doesn't even bother smelling it. "Bet it tastes like that, too."
Frank hasn't taken a sip yet but it's more of a conversation starter, anyway. "So… I'm sorry that your shift was shit." He doesn't know what happened, only that apparently it was a car accident involving a whole family. The atmosphere was heavy when he came in, tense and quiet.
"Me, too." Abbot says.
"Robby is better at this. Is there anything I can do? Like, if I ask you not to jump, will that help?"
Abbot huffs, doesn't say anything for a moment, before he turns to Frank. "You're an asshole sometimes. Has anyone ever told you that?"
"All the fucking time," Frank admits, because it's true. He's even figured out the Tagalog word for asshole, just so he can let Princess and Perlah know that he understands them when they talk about him.
At the same time, he thinks defensively, 'You don't know me.' Others can judge him because they know him better, but Abbot? Frank has only done a few night shifts with the other doctor; he really admires the guy, he wants him to like him. He doesn't say any of that out loud. Instead, he asks, "Does that mean you won't…?" He makes a semi-flying, semi-dropping-down gesture with his hand, pointing towards the edge, because he feels like if he says the word again out loud, that might encourage the thought; something about triggers and manifesting and how his job is to try to keep people from dying.
"There was a car accident on the interstate. The father drove," Jack says. "He'll be the only survivor if he makes it."
That sends a shiver down Frank's back. The thing is, he's not uncaring, he's just learned to swallow his feelings and keep a distance because that's what is needed from him. He's gotten very good at not letting things get to him while he's here.
"If?" he asks.
"Broke at least two vertebrae and crushed a couple of posterior ribs. He won't be walking any time soon. Head trauma, too."
Frank doesn't know what to say. A spinal injury sucks, he can attest to that. But the rest? Losing his whole family? Wife, kids, or whoever was in the car with him? That's not something a person comes back from. That's a whole different reason to jump off a roof.
"Nothing to say?" Abbot asks with a little bite. Almost as if he expects Frank to say something shitty.
"What is there to say. He's fucked." Frank takes a sip of his tea and recognizes the taste from those huge thermos cans the nurses fixed during Covid. It throws him back with a sudden, startling clarity, reminding him of the pain of those long shifts, of the way everything was worn down, nerve endings so raw he sometimes didn't know how to breathe and walk at the same time. One emergency after another. Losing patients left and right. Never seeing right, hearing everything muffled. Not enough sleep. Too much standing and walking and bending over and eventually maxing out on painkillers for so long he was afraid his kidneys were going to give out. He'd puked that tea out more than once.
"-obby?"
The ending of whatever Abbot is saying is pulling him back – apparently he's conditioned to take note whenever someone mentions Robby. He looks up from his mug, startled that he drifted off. "Hm? Sorry, I didn't… what?" He notices that his breathing picked up and he forces it down with a shiver. How embarrassing.
Abbot looks at him, quietly and calculating. "Nothing." He ducks back under the railing and comes back to Frank's side. He just starts walking towards the rooftop exit with a quiet, "Come on," leaving Frank to follow. Halfway, Abbot pours out his tea with a wide sweep of his arm. For a moment, the tea is a graceful arc in the air before it splats onto the roof. "Robby tells me I've got you wrong, but he never tells me why," Abbot says between the two of them, and opens the door.
"Maybe he's the one who has me wrong." Frank hopes that's not true. He swears he's not an asshole – it's just easier to pretend that he doesn't care sometimes.
Back in the building, at the elevator, Abbot holds up his empty mug. "But you brought me tea. Told me not to jump."
"Yeah, well, I'd do that for anyone."
Next to him, Abbot laughs out loud and shakes his head in disbelief.
Three months later, Jack meets Robby on the floor for their usual hand-off – the atmosphere is tense and quiet, letting him know something out of the ordinary happened today.
"What happened?" he asks.
"Long shift," Robby answers with a shrug. He doesn't look too bad, not like he sometimes does when everything's a little much. His hair isn't sticking in all directions either, meaning at least he wasn't scrubbing himself for the past couple of hours.
Jack doesn't ask. They're not quite there today; not at that point where Robby needs a shoulder. Then Jack would ask and offer encouragement and comfort.
Robby rubs his hands and gives a sharp nod. "Alright, let's start with Mr. Miller in South 1, who came in with stomach pain but who's being monitored for appendicitis until surgery comes to pick him up." Robby looks at his watch, winces. "Shouldn't take much longer. Maybe half an hour." They go through the cases that Robby deems noteworthy one by one.
"And one last one I want to hand off personally," Robby says and tilts his chin in the direction of the break room, asking Jack to come with him.
Jack follows Robby to the kitchenette, where he picks up a mug and discards the bag in the trash. A stinging, artificial strawberry scent hits Jack's nose.
"What's this?" he asks as they walk back out. Robby is careful with the mug, but he also only filled it just three quarters with water.
"Tea."
Jack doesn't bother telling Robby that he can see and smell that. He wants to know who it's for.
"You'll see," Robby says quietly.
They walk into a trauma room with a door, where Robby takes a deep breath. "Alright. Here's your most stubborn patient for the night." He draws the curtain back and reveals Langdon lying on his side with an IV in his arm. There are cables going out from under his rucked-up scrub top front and back. A colorful, and definitely neither standard nor sterile Pendleton blanket is covering his legs up to his hip. Robby sets down the mug within reach. "Just the way you like it." His hand hovers for a moment. Jack can see that he'd really like to touch his resident.
"Thank you," Langdon murmurs and waves tiredly at Jack without moving anything other than his hand. There's a pulse ox on his finger. "Hey, Dr. Abbot." His eyes are unfocused and he blinks too slowly.
Robby turns to Jack like this is normal. "Your job is to keep him here for another hour at least, alright? In this position. He'll get picked up. He's not to walk. He also has two days off before I call for an update." Robby's look makes it clear that this is his personal responsibility now, no one else's.
Jack crosses his arms. He's got the reason for the tense floor right here, he just doesn't know anything more than that, which pisses him off a little. "What happened?" he asks. Someone must have forgotten to tell him something.
"I don't know either," Langdon answers, face smooshed into what seems to be a pillow made out of Robby's hoodie. "I think we should let me go."
Robby rubs both hands over his head and face. "And I think we should shut up when angry family members threaten us repeatedly, but who am I to argue against your stellar fucking bedside manner." He turns to Jack. "He got shoved into the big, stationary X-ray machine, back first, head second, and landed hard on the floor. We're monitoring him."
"Because of my delicate condition," Langdon mumbles and blinks at Jack.
Robby snorts, a startled, amused sound. "You're not pregnant."
"Not for lack of trying," Langdon mutters with a heavy tongue.
"He gets funnier on morphine," Robby tells Jack and puts a careful hand on Langdon's arm. "Try and get some rest. Be a model patient at home and I'll call you tomorrow evening." Jack watches him give his resident a soft squeeze, his hand hovering like he's about to pet his head, before he steps back to close the curtain.
"Tea," Langdon says suddenly.
Robby nods. "Yeah. It's right there. In front of you. Not the herbal." He grabs a hold of both ends of his stethoscope like the thing is a lifeline. "Just the way you like it."
"With a bag in it." Langdon's smile is sedated and exhausted, and oddly satisfied.