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There was a time when Frank Langdon thought that if he knew nothing, at least he knew his job. Of all his titles – father, husband, son, doctor – the latter had always been the one that made him most comfortable in his skin. Not that he didn’t enjoy his kids, his marriage, his family – it was just that when at work, there were hardly ever times that he felt truly out of his debt. Inadequate.
While he loved his kids, he had never been as good at the crafts Tanner enjoyed as Abby had been, and he had never been a natural at calming Penny down when she was crying at night. He did it all, of course he did, because he wasn’t a total asshole, but it was not where he excelled. He was the fun dad that wasn’t home a lot, but when he was, he made sure the kids enjoyed himself. He knew it wasn’t good enough. He knew that he was becoming one of those dads that wouldn’t know enough about their kids to attend a parent-teacher meeting and actually know what he was talking about. But first there had been med school, then the long shifts, and somewhere along the way it just became status quo. He comforted himself with the thought that at least he was doing better than his own dad, but that excuse felt more vapid by the day.
He knew he was an even worse husband. He tried to be present and rearrange shifts when necessary – anniversaries, birthdays, parents’ birthdays. He had always been good at pretending – they both were. They had been high school sweethearts, and she had always supported him, and somehow he couldn’t remember if he’d ever stopped to ask what she wanted. They moved in together, they got married, and were nicely on their way to the whole two-and-a-half kids white picket fence shebang before he made it all implode. And then there was the dog. For fuck’s sake, the dog.
Then there were his parents… Who were fine, should anybody ask. On Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas. The lot. But his father had expectations. Should have done football, worked in construction like his father and his father before him. Perhaps it had been his own fault for not managing his dad’s expectations better – he had done a lot of sports, had always been an active guy. Just not the person his old man had envisioned him being. He was pretty sure Abby spoke to his parents more than he did.
And now… now he’d fucked it all up with one stupid decision. Several stupid decisions. Consecutively.
He was still a dad, but one who could only see his kids every other weekend.
He was still a husband, but one who lived in a crappy apartment building while they were slowly working stuff out – if it could even be worked out.
He was still a son, but one whose father refused to speak to him, and whose mother cried every time he phoned her.
Everything he had felt before, finally coming to the surface, because he had lost the one thing that he’d actually been good at. The one thing he felt that he’d had. The thing that he’d held onto so hard that he’d almost destroyed it. He was still a doctor, but he hadn’t been for a long time.
His first day back was hell. Yes, he was still a doctor, and he could not put into words how grateful he was that he got to come back to repeat his residency, but it was just so… painfully awkward. Everyone knew that he was not just a doctor now. He had gained another title. One that he had taken months to accept. One that everyone here that he had known so well yet barely knew at all now knew about. Addict.
During rehab, he had realised that drugs had not been the only thing he had become dependent on. His job had managed to become both the root and a symptom of the problem at the same time. In the months before rehab, he had hardly spoken to any of his college friends, his family, and only during his recovery had he found out how many of those relationships he’d lost. The people at the Pitt had become his family, in a sense, which was perhaps not surprising, given their line of work. And yet… they were not the family he’d thought they were. He got along with the other residents and the nurses just fine, but the only ones who’d shown up to visit had been Dana and Cassie. Robby had been a silent enigma. He’d texted him, to apologise, and then texted him again and again and again. He even sent a letter, with an actual stamp. He knew that he’d hurt him, but he’d never expected… He had thought Robby was his best friend. Perhaps his only friend, in the end. And now he was icing him out, even now they’d come face to face. It hurt more than he’d prepared for.
Then there were the other residents, and the med students – faces he’d seen once at most, names he sometimes barely remembered but faces that were at the same time scorched into his brain, because they were the ones who had been there when–
Mel, the perfectionist who got overwhelmed, who didn’t get his jokes but laughed all the same, who was so unspeakably kind in ways that were so easily overlooked, who seemed to look up to him in a way he was sure he hadn’t deserved.
Whitaker, the ratcatcher who showed up in new scrubs every other hour.
Javadi, who was apparently a TikTok star now (was that even legal?).
Santos, who–
Who he had been so angry with her, at first. When he’d gotten home that first evening, he’d smashed up a plate in front of Abby and–
He had never been violent. But it had scared her. Everything had come out. The pills, Santos, Robby, the shooting. The fear. She’d held him as he cried, that stupid fucking dog headbutting his calf, but even then he had been able to feel her fear. He had changed everything. She had changed everything.
He knew it had been for the better, of course. It hadn’t been sustainable. Once he’d actually gone through rehab, he’d realised just how terrible he’d been feeling. How pent up. How stressed. His back had hurt like a bitch, but that was the least of his troubles. He hadn’t lied to Robby, but he could admit he hadn’t told the entire truth either. He had let the Pitt break him, and Santos had been the only one to see. Perhaps that had been the thing that scared him most.
He’d almost written a letter to her too. Then he’d thought that maybe that was just too weird. He hadn’t quite been able to find the words anyway. To say that he was grateful would have been an overstatement. But he also wasn’t not grateful. Her snooping had ruined his life but probably saved it at the same time, and he didn’t know what to do with that. From where he was sitting, it seemed like she didn’t either.
He almost had Robby again around lunchtime, but then there was the kid with a spinal fracture – only seven years old, reminding him just a little too much of Tanner, and Robby–
Robby had shut him out. Again. Even though Al-Hashimi had pulled him back from triage, even though they were dealing with all the extra patients. He hadn’t even shouted. He thought that maybe if Robby were angry he could deal with that. Anger was tangible. Anger was fixable. This… this cold silence felt like it was impossible to be fixed.
“He’ll come around,” Dana said, a warm hand on his shoulder.
“I don’t think so.”
Her hand stayed, squeezing lightly. “He needs time.”
“He’s had ten months.”
“That doesn’t mean–”
“I know,” Frank said, clenching his teeth. “He doesn’t have to forgive me. Or even hear me out. He doesn’t owe me anything, while I owe him–” He paused. He didn’t even know how much Dana knew, whether Robby had told her about the extent of what he had done for his former protegee.
Dana sighed. “That doesn’t mean it isn’t allowed to hurt.”
Frank’s vision blurred, and he blinked away the threatening tears before she would notice. He let himself breathe, the ceaseless noise of the ER drumming into the background. Dana was there next to him, warm, present. “If he doesn’t want to talk to me now, what is time going to do?”
“Maybe nothing,” Dana said. “Maybe everything.”
“You did well on that lateral canthotomy,” Frank said, his voice as even as he could manage as he headed towards the lockers.
“Been practicing that line?” Santos said, slamming her locker shut with more force that necessary.
“Maybe.”
A snort. “Pathetic.”
A silence fell between them, and he considered leaving. She wasn’t ready to receive his apology, and he didn’t think he was ready to give it either. But between Robby’s refusal to meet his eyes and Dana’s encouraging words, he knew he had to make sure he’d accomplished something today. He could leave Robby to his motorcycle introspection, but Santos was someone he’d have to face every day for the upcoming ten months at the least. Why not right here, right now?
“I’m sorry,” he said, as slowly as he could. She wasn’t meeting his eyes, and he wasn’t blaming her.
“For what? Ruining your own life?”
He chuckled. “That too. But about how I treated you that day. I was–” He trips over the words, like a clumsy toddler taking his first steps. Because what words could he possibly use to explain that, yes, he was an asshole on his best days, and yes, he had been on drugs during his shift despite denying it, and yet it was the fact that looking at her had felt eerily like staring himself in the face that had done him in. “I should never have shouted, and part of me knew you were onto me, and–”
“And now you’re super grateful I’ve totally saved your life, right?” Santos was leaning against the wall, hands on her hips, but Frank didn’t miss the tightness in her jaw.
“You have,” he said, and he could see the slight alarm in her eyes at his honesty. “Whether I’m grateful for it or not. I just–”
“Look,” Santos said, holding up her hands. “I’m not known for my bedside manner, man. You fucked up, you’re back, it’s going to be awkward, and I will be a bitch about it for the foreseeable future. You deserve it.”
Frank smiles. It’s not what he wants to hear, not really, but it’s also not nothing. “I suppose I’ll need someone to keep me on my toes.”
“As long as we still hate each other.”
“Oh yeah. Totally.”
She grimaced, and slung her bag over her shoulder. “Well. See you tomorrow, loser.”
“Tomorrow,” he said, his voice lost on her receding back. Even if he knew nothing, there was always that.