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“Dr. Langdon!”
And suddenly she’s running over to him with her arms flailing not entirely unlike Kermit the Frog, and she’s smiling so brilliantly, and she’s at his side like she belonged there all along.
What.
It’s only once she reaches her destination that she pauses and Langdon begins to realize what just happened. Her bright smile is still plastered to her face, but she’s hesitating now like it’s only just occurred to her that they’re at work and she hasn’t seen him in ten months. It’s way too late to wonder if this was appropriate.
Everything’s in slow motion as they both process what Mel started. And although it’s not entirely unwelcome, because it’d be ridiculous to not see the charm in this, Langdon can’t help but worry about how earnestly she just greeted the Emergency Department’s biggest source of gossip from the last year. He can practically feel all the goodwill Mel earned in his time away disintegrating before his very eyes and it’s his fault. He can’t help but worry about what all of her new friends are going to say.
Still, he likes the way it feels to have someone excited to see him.
The things he’d clung to and daydreamed about in his time away from PTMC are suddenly back in full force. He wondered, during his time in rehab, if he was only thinking of Mel because she was the brightest part of a very dark day. He heavily considered that the way he felt about a woman he only knew for ten hours could be largely born out of convenience as he sat in group therapy, shaky and depressed but finally in recovery. Something neat and tidy to pin some hope on while he was away, nothing that was going to linger. But clearly, with the way he jumped as soon as he saw her, things aren’t that simple.
He’s not sure what he’s expecting her to do next, now that she’s committed to running over to greet him. She hasn’t met his eyes (he remembers she wasn’t the greatest at eye contact from months ago, how he had to track her face to get her to take a breather) and he’s looking down at the top of her head as she starts to pat his arm with both of her hands. It’s like she’s putting out dozens of tiny fires. It’s like she’s testing if he’s real.
She keeps going until Robby lets out an awkward old man cough, immediately bursting their bubble.
Fuck.
From the center of their gathering, Robby starts to drone on about the Fourth of July and how important it is to anticipate chaos and keep your head on a swivel, but Langdon’s still lost in his head. Someone was actually excited to see him. Mel was still excited to see him, and his skin’s still hot under the short sleeves of his scrub top from where she was patting him.
But her body language has gone from brilliantly excited to devastatingly embarrassed, since Robby decided he couldn’t just mind his business. Their coworkers are watching, either slack-jawed or with expressions of vague disapproval. Why are they all staring at her like that?
Langdon hadn’t considered that Mel would become anything but the darling of the Emergency Room in his time away. But by watching the reactions of his coworkers, it occurs to him that she might’ve been just as lonely as he was during his time off.
When he grabs her shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze, he hopes that he’s conveying everything he wants to say. Thank you, mostly. If he was honest with himself, he’d be trying to convey that he missed her too.
***
Any attempts to keep Mel at an arm’s length and save her from the rumour mill prove fruitless before lunch. She’s relentlessly including him, to Robby’s obvious disapproval.
Every time she calls him over to get his input on something, Frank wants to grab her by her shoulders and shake her, warn her that he’s bad news and will be for the foreseeable future. He wants to dye himself bright blue and help her finally recognize that he’s poisonous.
But it’s impossible to ignore her, he tried at the start of his shift and it made him feel evil to see her shoulders droop as he pretended not to hear her calling for him.
So he stops trying. He lets himself fall into a familiar rhythm with her and it works wonders for helping him feel like a competent doctor again. No offense to Donnie and the med students in triage, who’ve been treating him well, but Frank Langdon doesn’t shine in the waiting room. For the rest of the day he’s at her beck and call, hungry for her to bring him in on cases.
And once he stops pretending that he’s capable of ignoring her, it becomes increasingly difficult to push away just how nice her attention feels. He always knew he wasn’t going to get a parade upon his return, but for every ice-cold interaction with Robby, he gets to bask in her warmth and recalibrate.
When she high-fives him after a save, he can’t help but grin back at her.
When she tells a patient that she’s leaving them in “great hands” with him, he preens at the praise.
Sometime after lunch, Frank loses track of Mel. Which he was incapable of doing this morning (somehow his eyes just had a tendency to settle on her, no matter where she was), so he figures out pretty quickly that something’s up.
“Donnie,” he says, pulling the newly established Nurse Practitioner aside, “have you seen Mel?”
“I don’t spend a lot of time looking for her,” Donnie answers with a shrug, “but if I had to guess, maybe old Mel-practice actually had to head to the courtroom.”
“Sorry, who?”
“Oh shoot, yeah. You would’ve missed this,” Donnie says, “and to be clear, this is mostly nurse talk–”
“More reliable than doctor talk,” Langdon interjects.
“Damn right,” Donnie continues, “anyways, Mel’s getting sued. Nobody has the details, they’re keeping it pretty tightly under wraps.”
“Nobody has the details but you’re already calling her Mel-practice?” Frank knew that the Pitt was a tough place for sensitive people, but damn.
“I won’t take shit from someone who’s definitely laughed at Slo-Mo,” Donnie brushes off the way Langdon rolls his eyes at the call-out, “no need to be defensive, unless the rumours are true that she stalked you all the way to rehab to read you love letters.”
“There’s no way,” Langdon says, maybe a little louder than he needs to be as his face twists in disgust, “where the hell did that come from?”
“You tell me man, you guys seemed pretty familiar this morning,” Donnie says, aiming for a joke that sours when he notices how unimpressed Frank is.
“It’s not like that. We knew each other for one day, ten months ago. You’ve known Mel way longer than I have, and you can take that back to the nurse’s station for the next time it comes up.” Langdon says, and he can tell he’s over-explaining this to hell, but he does feel obligated to defend Mel’s honour here. Following him to rehab is dramatic, even for the gossip-heavy environment of the Pitt.
“Okay, noted, you got chivalrous in the last ten months. No worries. Come on, we’ve got cuts, scrapes and bruises to get back to.” Donnie says, letting Langdon bow out of the conversation before he can embarrass himself further and punctuating his sentence with a fist bump.
They begin walking from the main area of the Pitt back out to the waiting room, but as soon as they get around the corner, the E.R. suddenly fills with the sounds of shutdown melodies and error codes, prompting Robby to call everybody to the desk. They had been warned about this earlier in the day, and although they’d been hopeful that the blackout issue would resolve itself before hitting PTMC, they clearly weren’t so lucky.
***
Once everything blinks back online, the afternoon craziness of being forced to go analog disappears as quickly as it set in. Langdon’s a modern American doctor again, and although the whole team is sweaty and exhausted, he still revels in the quiet confidence that radiates throughout the emergency room now that they know they weathered the storm.
Even Robby had something good to say, which matters to Frank more than he’d care to admit. It was a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment, just a hand on his shoulder and a “good call, Langdon” that only he heard in the chaos, but it was something, and more than he ever would’ve expected. He holds that alongside the feelings of accomplishment that aren’t Robby-related, and all of it combined boosts Frank through some of the straggler cases. Things feel almost q-word (not that he’d ever say it out loud).
He should’ve known better than to get comfortable, and the illusion of calm shatters with Frank’s last case. With his confidence built up, he jumps at the chance to follow the EMTs in as soon as they come through the doors, and it isn’t until they start running through the details of the case that he realizes he’s in way over his head.
It’s an overdose, of course it is, the patient is a father, because why wouldn’t he be, and they don’t save him, for reasons Frank knows are out of his control (not that it helps).
It’s not graceful, the way he excuses himself the instant Dana pats him on the shoulder. He’s stumbling to whatever hiding place seems most accessible, and as he all but slams the door behind him, letting out a shaky breath in the emptiness of the breakroom. He’s unmoored, he’s capsizing, he should’ve never clocked in today, who’s going to tell that guy’s kids what happened? How close was he to being that guy?
He curses himself out, muttering under his breath about needing to “get it together” and pressing his thumbs into his temples so hard he thinks he’ll leave permanent divots as he hears the door snap open and shut. When he pulls his hands away from his face, it’s her. Of course it is.
She sits in the chair beside him and waits for his breathing to slow down before saying anything.
“That was a tough way to end the day,” she says, simple and quiet.
“Oh God, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” He laughs, voice gravelly from having spent so much time on the brink of tears, “did Dana send you?”
“No, I just wanted to check in after I noticed you’d been gone for a while,” Mel admits, “sometimes things are just too close to home for any number of reasons, there’s nothing wrong with you for having an emotional response.”
Frank doesn’t know if he can handle responding to that without actually beginning to cry, so he just nods and the silence falls over them again. It gives him a chance to really take a look at her. If Frank is capsizing, Mel looks to be a wreck already sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
“Are you doing okay? We lost you for a while today,” Frank says, keeping himself steady. He’d hate to scare her off, but it’s clear that they’re both weighed down.
“I’m sure you’ve heard by now, it’s old news. There’s a lawsuit with the hospital, and they needed me to go explain myself this afternoon,” Mel lets her shoulders sink even further, fixing her eyes to a stray crumb left on the table, “it wasn’t great.”
“That sounds about right, do you want to talk about it?”
Frank’s question hangs heavy in the air for a second, and Mel eventually shakes her head in a short, quick motion.
“I was trying to do the right thing, it just didn’t work out,” her pitch is uneven, her voice is shaky, “and they’re so mad at me, even though everyone’s okay and it's all just…” Mel cuts herself off as her voice breaks, and Frank watches as she clasps her hands in her lap, squeezing and adjusting her grip.
“Hey, hey, you don’t have to share anything you don’t want to,” Frank says, “I’m sure you’ve talked about it a lot today.”
“I did,” Mel affirms with a wet laugh, “so much for your least problematic trainee.”
She freezes then, and there’s a lot to read into in the moments that follow. He thought about that moment often, with Mel and Crosby on the floor of the breakroom, but at the time he didn’t have much else to think about. There’s a moment of amazement for Frank as he realizes she also remembers. Often, when he thinks about that shift in September, it haunts him to know how much weight his words held and realize there are some things he’ll never be able to take back. But here for the first time, he gets confirmation that the good moments resonated too.
He’s not sure what to do, and eventually he lands on just trying to catch her gaze so she’ll look at him. When they finally find each other’s eyes, there’s something that unlocks, something easy and comforting that returns to the air between them. He’s sure he looks awful, sweaty and broken down, but she’s not much better with splotchy red cheeks and hair falling out of her braid. They’re a mess.
“Don’t worry,” he grins, for the first time since he got to the breakroom, “you’re still growing on me.”
She grins back at him, and it’s understood. It mattered then, and it matters now.
“You think you’re ready to go back to work?” Mel asks, wiping away the last of her tears with the heel of her hand.
Frank’s eyes flick to the clock on the wall, where he realizes that they’ve been in here longer than he thought.
“After you,” he says, pushing his chair back and offering Mel a hand to her feet, “let’s go see if anyone notices that I was busy melting down in here.”
“I think you could give yourself a little grace,” Mel tells him with furrowed brows, “if that was a meltdown, it was a very reasonable one.”
He acknowledges her statement with a nod, choosing to believe her as they step back out into the Pitt. It feels like bringing his head back above water, and everything snaps into focus as he immediately has to press himself against the wall to avoid a gurney being wheeled past. The shock that comes with the rush of sound and activity puts his head on straight, and starts over to the nurses station where Dana breaks away from a conversation with the new night shift attending in anticipation of his arrival.
“Back in the game?” She calls before he’s reached the counter.
“I’m all yours,” Frank smiles, which earns him a fond eye-roll, “what do you need?”
“Well aren’t you sweet,” Dana says, giving him a pat on the bicep, “just make sure all your cases make it to John and take care of yourself. That should do it.”
“You got it boss,” Frank promises with a nod before scanning the room for Dr. Shen.
***
The evening air is so immediately refreshing that he can almost ignore the parking lot smell that comes with it. His first day is done, and as he leaves it behind he also gets to leave behind all of the worst case scenarios he brought in with him this morning.
He’s not expecting to see anyone in the parking lot when he knows for a fact everyone’s enjoying each other’s company up on the roof, so when he spots Mel on her way to her own car, he stops in his tracks.
He knows why he’s too tired to watch the fireworks with all their coworkers, but that hardly explains why she’s out here too.
“Dr. King!” He calls across the lot, and she finds him immediately among the rows of parked cars. He watches as she tucks some loose hair behind her ears, and he catches up with her quickly.
“No fireworks for you?” He asks, and she tilts her head, confused.
“I didn’t buy any, if that’s what you’re asking,” she tentatively explains, “I didn’t have plans.”
“No, no, I mean on the roof,” Frank clarifies, “are you not going to the roof with everybody?”
Her face immediately drops into one of clear hurt, and it all clicks for Frank. She didn’t know about the roof, and he’s the one breaking the news that she didn’t get the invite. Fuck.
“I guess not,” she says, giving him a smile that doesn’t even try to reach her eyes.
“If it makes you feel better, I wasn’t formally invited either,” Frank says, “I just found out today. We could still head up there, if you want. Do you like fireworks?”
“Yeah, I do,” she says wistfully, “my sister and I really loved them back home when we were little. Especially once we figured out how much earplugs helped Becca with the noise.”
“Then come watch these ones with me,” he offers, “the city does them, which means our tax dollars paid for them, so you have to watch.”
“I don’t know if I have the energy to be around everyone right now,” she weakly protests, and Frank shakes his head.
“Just think of your taxes, Mel,” Frank says, thrilled when he earns a face like she’s refusing to give him the full satisfaction of a laugh, “and we don’t have to go to the roof. I have another idea.”
When Frank first got started in the Pitt, and he needed a second to breathe, he really liked the staircases. It struck a perfect balance of enough pressure to hold himself together (via the threat of passerby finding him freaking out), but it was far enough from the action to disconnect a little. And he happens to know that if you find yourself in the Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center, on one of the landings by the abandoned wing, there’s a huge window with a bench in front of it that happens to have great potential for firework viewing.
As they walk, she starts to open up more about the casual things, like the cases she worked on in her time away that she remembers wanting to share with him. He appreciates the way she leaves gaps in her stories, waiting for him to jump in, make the diagnosis and agree that yeah, that is wild.
Because the bench is on the same wall as the window, Frank eventually settles on sitting normally, resting one arm across the back of the seat and turning his neck to look out the window, but Mel opts instead to just kneel on the bench so she can turn her whole upper body to watch the park below them, where the latecomers to the show look ant-sized as they drag their lawn chairs out to the expanse of grass.
“What do you think?” Frank asks, bringing her attention back to him, “best seats in the house?”
The smile he gives him is appreciative (one that reaches her eyes this time), but as she’s about to give him an answer she’s interrupted by the familiar whistle and pop of fireworks. The sound is less intense here, but it still snaps her head back to the window to watch. She mumbles something vaguely positive that he doesn’t quite catch, and that’s good enough for him as the display starts up.
They appreciate the big ones, and Frank can’t fight back a chuckle as one of the extra loud fireworks screams into the sky. One of the ones that’s hellbent on making the loudest noise, only offering a streak as it flies without any kind of explosion payoff.
“My oldest would be freaking out right now,” Frank laughs, “we took the whole family to watch fireworks a couple of years ago, and Tanner just couldn’t handle it. Too noisy, too much, and these really loud ones were not a hit. He said they were evil.”
“Evil’s an intense word choice, but I never cared for them much either,” Mel agrees, eyes trained on the window, “does he have a favourite?”
“He liked the shapes, I think. They had a couple that looked like smiley faces and stars. He liked those,” Frank recalls fondly, remembering how he tried in vain to explain to his toddler why they were shaped like that, “my youngest loved the loud whistly ones, funnily enough.”
He doesn’t mention that the only reason he’s not able to rush home and watch fireworks with his kids tonight is because Abby whisked them away to her parent’s luxury trailer campground without so much as a check-in.
“That’s awesome. They balance each other out,” Mel hums, eyes going wide at a particularly intense burst outside.
“Do you have a favourite firework, Dr. King?” He asks, keeping his voice intentionally formal as he lets his gaze move from the window to Mel.
“I do. If they have them in here, I’ll point them out,” Mel promises.
“I hope you do.”
He watches the rest of the fireworks through the reflections in her glasses. There’s an added bonus of being able to see which ones make her raise her eyebrows, which ones make her go ‘ooh’, which ones make her grin just a little wider.
Close to the big finale, a firework goes off that makes her point out the window. “Those ones,” she whispers.
A thick trail of sparkles as it rises through the air, spiralling into the sky before it reaches its apex and bursts. It’s a multi-parter: the first boom sends faint orange trails out from a central point, and the second causes dozens of tiny, champagne-coloured clusters of sparkles to crackle and fizz in the sky for a couple of seconds.
“Those are my favourite,” Mel says, slightly breathless as she turns to him.
“Good pick,” he agrees, smiling back at her.
The fireworks wrap up quickly from there, a huge cacophony of pyrotechnics for the grand finale that earn a round of cheers Frank and Mel can hear from their little oasis between the seventh and eighth floor.
He walks her back out to the parking lot, where they wind up among the crowd of their coworkers who are also making their way down from fireworks. If anyone notices Mel and Frank slipping into the group, they don’t say anything, except for Donnie who quirks up an eyebrow in a silent interrogation. Where were you, man?
Frank just shakes his head, and he gets a shrug back from Donnie. Okay. Whatever. I’ll ask you later.
He feels slightly guilty knowing that he’s probably just added fuel to the fires of PTMC’s rumour mill as he walks Mel to her car, but she’s already proven today that she’s not worried about being seen with him, so he decides to stop worrying on her behalf, if only for tonight.
Her car is a beat up sedan with a truly impressive collection of bumper stickers that she gestures to when she notices him reading them. “My sister picks them out from gift shops,” Mel says, “it’s fun, and it’s not like the car value can depreciate any more at this point.”
The self-deprecation pulls a laugh from him, and they only chat for a little while longer before she pulls open her driver side door.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, right?” She asks, hesitantly hopeful.
It hits him that this is the first time they’ve said goodbye. Frank finds that he likes it quite a bit, and takes a second to regret that this didn’t happen in September.
“Yeah, you’ll see me tomorrow,” he promises, “take care, Mel.”
He slaps the top of her car as she shuts her door and starts the engine, walking across the entire lot to get back in his own car and drive home. When he gets in his own car, there are a lot of things to deflate the self-esteem he built up, lost and rebuilt over the course of the day. There are NA pamphlets in his glove compartment that he knows he still has to read. His backseat still carries the indents of carseats that don’t ride everywhere with him now. He has no texts from Abby, and he probably won’t hear from her until she’s back with the kids.
But today he saved some lives, made some good calls, and watched some fireworks. It balances out to an okay first day back.