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Robby’s working on charting, keeping an eye out for Jack to stroll through the ambulance bay sliding doors, like he usually does, but Jack enters through the waiting room door. He doesn’t usually like fighting the crowd, but day shift had done a hell of a job clearing out chairs.
“Shit,” Jack mutters as he walks up and looks at the board. “No luck?”
“Afraid not,” Robby says.
“Fucking surgeons.” It’s a rote complaint, and Robby ignores it, thirty seconds from finishing his last chart.
“No beds in ortho, so the torn ACL and the impacted fracture are still waiting down here. And the ACL isn’t shy about wanting a ‘real’ doctor, not ‘the losers who failed medical school.’ ”
“We let people who are failed doctors work down here? Gloria’s not gonna be happy to hear that.”
“Quit bullshitting. You’re just buying time.” Robby saves and logs out, stretching his legs and already dreaming of his bed and his pillow and the sheets he’d washed last weekend. The shift hadn’t been too bad, but Tuesday’s shift had stretched to sixteen hours, and he’s getting too old to get by with five hours of sleep.
“So you win,” Jack says, slinging his backpack under the nearest desk. “What do you want?”
They hadn’t set the terms of the wager, Jack practically on his way out the door the night before when he tossed over his shoulder, “I expect those two ortho patients to be gone by the time I come back,” and Robby said, “You wanna bet?” He hadn’t meant it literally, but no way he was turning down the chance to exact a reward from Jack. Maybe a bag of the dark roast coffee he loved, which Jack had labeled less palatable than charcoal the one time he’d tasted it.
“I will have to think about that.” He rises, expecting Jack to take a step back and give him room to get out from behind the desk. Instead, deliberately or not, Jack stands his ground, and suddenly Robby is sharing his space. He registers the clinical scent of Dial soap on Jack’s skin, the slightest undertone of sweat from the humid night outside. Unlike Robby, always in his hoodie, Jack runs hot.
He’s caught Jack looking at him a few times—looking at him, waiting for Robby to catch up so they can turn their professional compatibility into something else. Robby’s not sure what that would be, but he wants to take another step closer, suddenly wants it so badly that it sends a pang through him.
“Don’t take too long,” Jack murmurs, like a secret only Robby can hear. For a moment, they balance on the edge of a shared breath until Robby finds his voice.
“Double or nothing?”
He’s close enough to see a sweet smile flood Jack’s face with affection, nothing like the usual sardonic twist of his mouth. “I think we can work something out,” he says, before he heads towards the lounge, whistling under his breath.
Whatever the stakes, he’s going to let Jack win.