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She preps herself for it days in advance.
On July 4th, when Santos inevitably checks in about the very loose plans they made last weekend, Garcia is going to say no.
Not because she doesn’t want to hook up with Santos, but because she wants Santos to want to hook up with her. She wants more than all the automatic yeses and nodding and shrugging, wants more than Santos agreeing with every damn thing Garcia says, wants Santos to understand that “casual” doesn’t have to mean “neutral” and that letting Garcia make all the decisions isn’t easier, it’s fucking boring.
And of course, she has dozens of run-ins with Santos during those prep days where she doesn’t have to be mean, and she’s completely aware that this is setting Santos up for a much harsher pivot than Garcia intends it to be; but if Garcia doesn’t do what she’s planned, on the very specific day she’s planned it for, she’s fairly certain she never will.
And of course, on July 4th, she doesn’t see Santos for the first several hours, to the point where Garcia almost starts to wonder if Santos knows what’s coming and is avoiding her over it.
But then the first opportunity falls into Garcia’s lap.
“Are you still coming over tonight?” Santos asks, abrupt and vaguely anxious and then adding on a bunch of stuff about Whitaker being away for the weekend, as if either of them has ever cared about what he hears down the hall.
Garcia waits patiently for her to finish speaking, then offers as matter-of-factly as possible, “I might have to rain check.”
She looks directly at Santos as she says it, then stays locked in to study whatever reaction she might get, but then fucking Robinavich interrupts to ask Garcia about a different patient and Santos is gone by the time Garcia finishes her update.
(Gave up just like she always does, like Garcia desperately wants her not to do.)
But Robby fucked with her experiment, so she’ll need to try again.
.
“You know, you can call me just to say hi, sometimes,” she cracks when she enters the room, knowing her joke could apply to the whole group even as she delivers the words right into Santos’s ear.
Garcia lets her sit with that little gem through their entire patient assessment, then manages a brief brush of fingers and some solid eye contact to drive her point home, and sure enough, Garcia’s slightly shorter lesbian shadow is right on her tail as she heads for the elevator.
“What’s up?” she tosses over her shoulder.
“Do you still need a raincheck for watching fireworks tonight?” Santos asks like she’s white-knuckle gripping the question, even more tense than she sounded less than an hour ago. “I thought you were coming over.”
There’s just a hint of disappointment there, but it’s outweighed by barely-contained desperation.
“I made other plans,” Garcia replies easily, even somewhat dismissively, keeping it vague, giving Santos a wide open space to ask follow-up questions or challenge the obvious lie or—
“Okay, cool,” Santos forces out after a few terribly unconvincing nods that give Garcia plenty of time to get on the elevator and press the button for Surgery.
(She’s not going to linger. This isn’t a conversation. This is a test that Santos keeps failing.)
“I’ll try hitting you up tomorrow,” Garcia offers, and only then does she resume eye contact with Santos. “We’re just keeping it casual, right?”
The doors close just as Santos responds, but she doesn’t even need to hear the words, because that tight, dejected, miserable expression on her face said it all.
“So fucking do something about it,” Garcia mutters to no one as she watches the numbers ascend one by one.
.
When Santos asks to talk to her in private, Garcia spends twenty whole consecutive seconds imagining that this is it, that Santos has internalized the lessons from earlier and is ready to actually participate in this thing of theirs.
“Sorry, I just—I don’t really know what to do,” Santos admits, squeezing the back of her neck and looking anywhere but at Garcia.
“About…?” she prompts calmly instead of shaking Santos by the shoulders like she’d prefer.
Santos worries her lips, glances back at the door they just walked through, then crosses her arms defensively. “Langdon,” she mutters. “About him being back.”
Garcia manages to turn her sigh into a standard deep breath. “What’s the problem now?”
Those green eyes rise immediately to her own, with flickers of—frustration? disbelief?—coming and going too quickly for Garcia to process. Santos shoves it all away in favor of something carefully, if not quite convincingly, diplomatic.
“I mean, it’s not a—a problem,” Santos manages. “I’m—I’m glad he got help, or whatever. It’s just… it’s weird trying to… after all that.” She shakes her head and squeezes her eyes closed and then finally bursts. “I don’t trust him. I don’t—I don’t know how to trust him.”
“You just said it yourself,” Garcia points out with the beginnings of wavering patience. “He went to rehab and he’s obviously doing better now. Gloria and Robby trust him enough to bring him back, and I think we’re all ready to move on.”
Santos swallows, hangs her head instead of nodding, and clenches her jaw as she glances off to the side.
“He’s here to stay,” Garcia concludes. “Put on your big girl panties and work it out.”
An unexpectedly tense beat.
(Garcia takes a breath to say she has to get back upstairs—
Or maybe she should ask Santos if there’s more she wants to say—)
“Yeah,” Santos all but spits out. "You're right. Thanks.”
And then she turns around and walks away.
What the fuck.
Santos asked for advice. Garcia gave her advice. And now she’s confused and irritated about two different things, and both of them revolve around Santos, and her test was only designed for one specific variable…
Oh, Garcia does not have time for this right now.
.
She doesn’t see Santos for an hour.
And then two hours.
And then three hours.
Even with all the kids pouring in from the water park collapse, even with Garcia spending more time helping perform miracle after miracle in the trauma bays than on the actual surgical floor, and even with Garcia actively trying to catch a glimpse of her amid the chaos.
She has no idea how an R2 is managing to stay out of sight through all of this, let alone an R2 with a soft spot for children and a hard-on for challenges. Her absence doesn’t make any fucking sense, almost feels like a gaping void; like the only road she can take to get to work caved in and rendered the route impassable, too full of illogic and irrationality for Garcia to walk around or simply ignore.
It’s grating as fuck, and by the time they get everyone up to an OR or an inpatient bed, she’s ready to implode—
“Dr. Garcia,” she hears behind her—Whitaker’s voice, not a question, annoyingly urgent.
“What do you want, Funkytown?” Garcia grumbles without looking at him, keeping her strides confident and even as she continues forward.
“Santos is in the bathroom,” he blurts.
She scoffs loudly and tries not to to let her eyes roll out of her head—
“Garcia,” he begs, plants his feet, and grasps her arm to stop her.
She pauses dead in her tracks and turns to look at him like she could stop his heart with her mind. “What.”
Whitaker lets go of her immediately and holds both hands up, but his expression remains tense with concern. “She’s been sitting on the floor,” he clarifies breathlessly. “Mohan found her, and Al-Hashimi tried to help, but…”
“But what?” Garcia asks begrudgingly when he doesn’t continue.
He shrugs sort of helplessly and sucks in a big gulp of air like he can’t get the words out fast enough. “Normally when she gets upset, she just does everything faster and louder until she burns off whatever it is. But this time she’s—something’s really wrong.”
“And you're telling me because…?” Garcia wants to know, wants to hear him say it.
“You spend the most time with her,” he reasons. “And I know you’re not—y’know—exchanging life stories,” Whitaker acknowledges awkwardly, “but I thought you might… like, maybe she’s told you something, or—?”
“She hasn’t,” Garcia interrupts, crossing her arms and setting her posture. “We’re just sleeping together. Your roommate’s nervous breakdown, your problem.”
Now Whitaker looks properly pissed, which Garcia didn’t even know his little cherub face was capable of.
“Just because you’re not dating doesn’t mean… Do you even care about her?” Whitaker asks bluntly; accusingly. “Like, at all?”
“How I feel about her is none of your—”
“It doesn’t matter how you feel about her,” Whitaker cuts her off like he’s the one with the right to be exasperated, “it matters how she feels about you.”
Garcia’s nostrils flare. “And how the fuck does she feel about me, gilipollas?”
Whitaker huffs and matches her body language. “I don’t know exactly, but it’s not nothing. Maybe even enough to get through to her. But I think you owe it to Santos to at least—fucking try.”
She watches him breathe hard and waits for the inevitable realization that he’s messing with the wrong surgeon… but it doesn’t come. He doesn’t shrink or fidget or so much as bat an eyelash, just stares Garcia down like they’re suddenly equals or something.
“Which bathroom,” Garcia asks after a tense silence, words low and deadly but delivered out into the open air nonetheless.
“Behind Trauma 1,” Whitaker answers without missing a beat.
He side-steps out of her way just before she can shove past him.
.
Garcia makes her way to the women’s restroom at the same pace that she normally navigates the ED. This might as well just be a consult, albeit a maddeningly personal one that she’s still not convinced she needed to be dragged into, but she can also feel her curiosity growing with each step forward.
The bathroom door is closed while the door to the large stall at the opposite end is wide open, and Garcia lets herself in to find Al-Hashimi crouched there, speaking quietly to someone Garcia can’t see yet. She approaches without a word until, finally, there’s Santos: tucked into the far corner, legs folded toward her chest, and arms resting loosely in the space between. Her head rests against the side wall and her ponytail is halfway to losing its elastic and her eyes are dull, empty, unseeing.
She doesn’t react to Garcia’s arrival, and Garcia takes a lot more effort than usual to find her voice.
“Santos?”
No reaction.
“I’ve been trying for a while,” Al-Hashimi murmurs. “First name, last name, soothing techniques, concussion protocol… Dr. Mohan touched her shoulder briefly, but otherwise we’ve avoided physical stimuli. Nothing has worked.”
Garcia takes a moment to study Santos’s sagging posture, and how if her eyes were closed, she’d look like she was sleeping.
“Has she been diagnosed with any mental or neurological conditions, to your knowledge?” Al-Hashimi asks in the silence. “Autism, bipolar disorder, depression…?”
Garcia pinches the bridge of her nose as a voice in the back of her head guesses All of the above. “I don’t know any specifics. She’s never mentioned anything.”
Al-Hashimi hums thoughtfully. “Well, her inactivity and unresponsiveness suggest it's not dissociation,” she considers. “This seems more like an anxious-depressive attack, or maybe a catatonic episode. But as much as I’d like to order a psych eval, with the way today’s been going… I worry that she would just get stuck down here.”
(Your roommate’s nervous breakdown, your problem.)
(I don’t know how to trust him.)
(Your roommate’s nervous breakdown, your problem.)
(You spend the most time with her.)
(Your roommate’s nervous breakdown, your problem.)
(You owe it to Santos to at least fucking try.)
(I’ve been trying for a while… Nothing has worked.)
(You owe it to Santos to at least—)
Garcia takes a deep breath, holds it until her lungs start to burn, then lets it out slowly through her nose.
“I’ll take her home,” she says, so determinedly calm and even that it’s almost emotionless.
“Are you willing to take on that responsibility?” Al-Hashimi asks as she rises to Garcia’s level. “What if she needs professional intervention?”
(Something about that sentiment sits rotten in the pit of Garcia’s stomach.)
“If I can’t get anything out of her in the next twenty-four hours,” Garcia decides, “I’ll bring her back and get her admitted myself.”
Al-Hashimi nods once. “Thank you, Dr. Garcia. I appreciate knowing that everyone here looks out for each other.”
“Get her a chair,” Garcia instructs without acknowledging any of that, “and meet me at the south exit by the lockers.”
.
Santos doesn’t react to being picked up, or steered through the ED, or brought outside once Garcia pulls up in her dark blue Acura. Garcia comes around to help Al-Hashimi get Santos into the passenger seat but lets her fasten the seatbelt, then gives Santos one last lingering look as she shifts out of park but keeps her foot on the brake.
Just staring. Not specifically out the windshield or the side window. Not anywhere at all.
The drive is silent.
.
She pulls over right in front of the building, leaves Santos in her car while she unlocks the front door and their unit and props them both open with whatever objects are heavy and within reach, then doubles back and stretches a little before leaning down and scooping Santos into her arms.
No reaction. No objection. No squirming away from Garcia or attempting to hold on. Just dead weight, a boneless body, letting the world happen around her.
Garcia feels something start to fracture in her chest, the very beginnings of just a little too much pressure on some hardened thing that she can’t recall from any textbook or medical journal, and shakes her head at herself as she carries Santos inside.
Elevator.
Hallway.
Apartment 209.
Past the living room.
First door on the left.
She sets Santos onto her perpetually unmade bed, tugs her sneakers off, then eases the hair elastic free and slides it onto her own wrist for safekeeping.
Arranges the covers over Santos.
Takes a step back.
Watches for some amount of time she doesn’t care to track.
Until Santos blinks, then slowly curls onto her side, then closes her eyes.
Garcia lets out the breath she didn’t know she was holding and ducks back out to find an actual parking spot and lock her car.
Returns to the bedroom, where Santos is just as she left her.
Garcia checks her phone: 7:52pm.
Borrows some clothes from Santos’s comfy drawer, takes a quick shower, and comes back to check on her.
Still asleep.
.
8:28pm
.
Garcia orders dinner from their go-to takeout place, puts Santos’s portion in the fridge for later, then eats her noodles alone right there at the kitchen counter.
Washes the dishes, tidies up some leftover mess, then checks on Santos.
Still asleep.
.
9:19pm
.
Garcia digs a spare pillow and blanket out of the violently disorganized linen closet, then tosses them onto the couch.
Then she takes everything out of the closet and sorts it into sensible categories and throws away a lot of receipts and protein bar wrappers and miscellaneous crud. Puts it all away neatly, and closes the door without having to fight against an avalanche of junk.
Peeks into Santos’s bedroom.
Still asleep.
.
10:04pm
.
Whitaker finally makes it home, doesn’t say anything to Garcia when he sees her set up on the couch, and quietly gathers an apple and a bowl of cereal to take to his room. She hears his footsteps pause at Santos’s door, then the faint squeak of it opening.
Then a sigh, then the door closes, then he shuts himself in his own room.
Garcia doesn’t bother getting up to check on Santos herself, because that sigh could only mean one thing.
.
12:18am
.
A low rumble of thunder wakes her up, and she takes a moment to process where she is and why, and then Garcia pads down the hall and opens that bedroom door again.
Still asleep.
She doesn’t close the door all the way this time.
.
3:49am
.
This couch is nice for spontaneous quickies but not so much for sleeping, and she considers getting into bed with Santos.
(It’s not like Santos would notice.)
But that doesn’t feel right.
Still, she ends up at Santos’s doorway a handful of minutes later, just to check.
.
5:45am
.
Whitaker’s alarm goes off, and then he drops two different bottles during his shower, and Garcia fully gives up on sleeping through his morning routine once he starts clanging around in the kitchen.
“Sorry,” he whispers as he wrestles a change of clothes into his backpack. “Usually you’re getting ready with us, or—”
“Still out cold under Santos,” Garcia offers with a grumpy yawn and half-hearted stretch. “Believe me, my body’s aware.”
He zips up and arranges both straps over his shoulders, but then pauses. “You know her name is Trinity, right?”
Garcia rolls her eyes and changes positions with a sigh. “Of course I know her name.”
“Just curious,” he replies as he grabs his keys and shoves them into his pocket. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say it.”
“What the fuck does it matter,” Garcia mutters.
She doesn’t get an answer; just Whitaker leaving, then an oddly oppressive silence.
.
8:01am
.
Garcia gets maybe another hour total of sleep before she forces herself up from the couch to make some breakfast. She checks on Santos first (still asleep) then starts up the stove and has two plates of scrambled eggs ready shortly after; sets Santos’s plate on the counter to see if the smell might bring her back to earth, then eats her own food standing up just like she did last night.
She hears nothing from the bedroom around the corner.
Cleans up her dishes, covers the other plate of eggs with plastic wrap, then puts it in the fridge with its dinner counterpart.
Opens the bedroom door a little wider.
Santos is still asleep, and Garcia can’t figure out what exactly about this feels so wrong.
Santos not being awake and annoying?
Santos being in bed without Garcia?
Santos sleeping through two meals, a thunderstorm, and her roommate stumbling around the apartment like a baby deer?
Garcia steps into the room, makes her way to the bed, and perches carefully on the side of the mattress where Santos isn’t, then reaches up with one hand to part the curtains above the nightstand. Even with the morning sun bathing her face in light, Santos doesn’t stir, and all Garcia sees are the dark circles underneath Santos’s eyes.
She frowns for a beat, lets the curtain fall back into place, then very carefully cards her fingertips through Santos’s hair.
Lets her touch linger.
Santos doesn’t react.
.
11:25am
.
At what point does rest become unhealthy?
At what point does she need to take action?
At what point should Garcia shake Santos by the shoulders and demand that she wakes up?
At what point should she carry Santos back to the car and deliver her to someone who’s paid to understand emotional trauma?
Garcia digs out her own stethoscope and checks her vitals.
Pulse is steady and normal for someone in REM sleep.
Lungs sound fine, expanding fully and equally, no sign of breathing issues.
And yet Santos won’t fucking wake up.
Why does that make her so angry?
.
1:59pm
.
She’s still on the couch, phone charging so she can alternate between Google deep-dives and occasional breaks for her favorite puzzle game so she doesn’t go completely insane.
One text update each to Whitaker and Al-Hashimi, who immediately tries to call her, but Garcia sends her to voicemail.
No TV, no videos, no music, because she’s listening for Santos.
Listening so hard that she’s giving herself a headache.
She loses the puzzle game, goes to the bathroom for aspirin, and looks everywhere but at her toothbrush.
.
5:37pm
.
A part of her almost thinks she’s hallucinating the sound of footsteps in the hallway.
But then the bathroom door is nudged open.
And it stays open and unlocked, and the light stays off.
Peeing, then a flush, then the faucet.
Footsteps in the hallway again, going in the opposite direction.
They stop at Santos’s bedroom.
Garcia’s stomach is in her throat, and that annoys her, because she’s a goddamn trauma surgeon and this ridiculous Filipina doctor shouldn’t make her so nervous.
(But it’s not about Santos, she reminds herself; it’s about the mental health crisis.
Those are objectively scary.
Her rapid pulse is justified.)
She reaches the bedroom doorway and lets herself in just like she’s been doing. Santos is already back under the covers with her eyes closed, and if she hadn’t just heard Santos walking around, she’d assume Santos had never left the bed.
Garcia maneuvers the desk chair so she can sit cross-legged facing Santos, takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly.
“Santos.”
No reaction.
“There’s no way you fell back asleep in ten seconds.”
No reaction.
“Santos,” she repeats, quiet but firm, “look at me.”
One sliver of green, then the other, then Santos blinks, then her eyelids start to droop again.
“No,” Garcia objects instantly, “stay awake. Look at me.”
With what looks like a great deal of effort, Santos keeps her eyes open, though the lids remain heavy.
“I know you’re tired, but whatever this is about,” she says, gesturing at the bed, “you’re not gonna be able to sleep it away.”
Santos doesn’t seem convinced.
Garcia doesn’t care.
“I have some questions. Thumbs-up for yes, nothing for no. Can you handle that?”
Santos has to literally physically look at her hand that’s resting in front of her before she manages to curl her four fingers in and lift up her thumb.
“Good. Do you remember Dr. Mohan finding you in the bathroom?”
Santos relaxes her hand against the sheets.
“Do you remember Dr. Al-Hashimi talking to you?”
Her hand stays where it is.
“Do you remember anything from last night?”
Her hand stays where it is.
“Was yesterday a bad day?”
A slow thumbs-up.
“What about the day before that?”
Santos folds her thumb around her index finger for a moment, but then raises it back up.
“Do you have a lot of bad days?”’
Her hand starts to shake a little, but it stays in position.
“Do you talk to anyone about your bad days?”
Santos looks away from Garcia as her hand flops down.
“Have you met with the trauma counselor?”
Her expression hardens and she tucks her arm against her chest, nearly hidden by the blankets.
“Why not?” Garcia asks with the same matter-of-fact directness of the rest of the questions and she holds eye contact, and she waits.
Once Santos realizes Garcia won’t move on without a verbal answer, she takes her time worrying her lips, swallowing back the cobwebs, filling her lungs—
“H-urts.”
The single syllable barely makes it out of her throat, sounds scratchy and exhausted and a million other terrible adjectives that irritate that fracture in Garcia’s chest.
“What hurts?”
Santos lets out a shaky exhale, eyelids fluttering a little like she’s actively struggling to stay awake, then swallows hard again. “T-alk-ing.”
“Talking about yourself?”
Santos keeps her hand out of sight and nods instead, and Garcia can’t help but make a face.
“You’re already hurting,” she points out, definitely not as gently as she should. “What the fuck is the point of hurting alone?”
It’s sort of rhetorical, but also not, and either way Garcia watches Santos’s eyes get angry and then glassy and well over almost immediately. She blinks the tears away and rolls over and pulls the comforter up over her shoulders and curls up tight, breathing louder now but stubbornly refusing to sniffle.
“I’m not done,” Garcia warns and rounds to the other side of the bed, leaning back against the tall dresser and crossing her arms over her chest and looking right at Santos again. Most of her face is hidden behind the comforter now, but she sticks her arm out and offers her middle finger to Garcia before setting her hand flat again.
Garcia doesn’t give a fuck about the gesture. “Do you lie to me?”
(She swears she sees Santos flinch within her blanket burrito.)
The hand curls into a tight fist before the thumb comes up.
“Do you lie to me a lot?”
Her hand is trembling again, but otherwise doesn’t move.
“Are you afraid of me?”
Doesn’t move.
(That fucking fracture does, though.)
“Have you thought about ending this?”
Santos’s hand flattens, but her fingertips dig into the sheet, like she needs to hold onto something.
“Are you afraid that I’ll end this?”
The hand starts to curl, but doesn’t quite become a fist, and Garcia hears Santos breathing louder as another wave of tears falls without any intervention.
Garcia clenches her jaw, grips her own elbows hard, and waits for Santos to calm down, but instead she hears the sharp swallows and labored wheezes that Santos is trying to muffle with her pillow. She closes her eyes, steadies herself, then steps forward and kneels at the bedside with her arms folded at the edge of the mattress.
Rests her chin on her wrists.
Finds a softer version of her voice that she hasn’t used in a very long time.
“Do you need me?”
The fist forms now, white-knuckled and horribly unsteady, but no thumb rises.
“Do you want me?”
Her tendons flex as her fingers squirm desperately.
Garcia takes a long breath in and hopes Santos can feel it come back out.
“Do you know what you want?”
It takes a little while, but eventually one red, puffy eye peeks out at her from behind a curtain of tangled hair. Santos doesn’t say anything, or make any indication with her hand, but Garcia thinks she might know this answer already.
“That’s okay,” she says, not gently enough to soothe but hopefully sincere enough for Santos to believe the words. “Sometimes I don’t know what I want, either.”
Santos keeps breathing, takes in Garcia’s admission as the tears keep falling, then uses shaky fingers to shove her hair away from her face and sniffles hard.
“I f-ucked it u-p,” Santos croaks, thick and anguished and heavy with guilt. “I’m s-orry.”
Garcia shakes her head a little. “We both fucked it up, Trinity, and I’m sorry, too.”
She watches Santos’s face pinch and crumple before Santos hides behind the blanket again.
She lets her cry for ninety seconds.
Then she makes a decision.
“We can’t fix this all in one night,” Garcia acknowledges, “but we could start with something simple, if you’re open to it.”
Santos doesn’t come out of her hiding place, but she does stick her arm back out and wait.
“Do you want me to leave?” Garcia asks.
Santos completely flattens her hand against the mattress with her fingers spread.
“Do you want me to leave this room, but stay in your apartment?”
Her hand doesn’t move.
“Do you want me to stay here, but leave you alone?”
Her hand doesn’t move.
Garcia gives them both a beat.
“Do you want me to get into bed with you?”
Santos’s arm slowly disappears under the covers again, but then she moves backward, presumably to make space for her.
Garcia nudges the near corner of the comforter out of her way and lowers herself carefully down to the mattress, pulls the covers up to her waist, and keeps her own hands to herself for now.
“Do you want me to touch you?”
Santos doesn’t react to this question, and Garcia wonders if it’s too complicated for their binary system.
“Do you want me to hold you?”
One more sniffle, then the smallest, faintest “Yeah.”
Garcia suppresses a smile for no real reason as she shifts onto her back and spreads her arms, and this time Santos doesn’t keep her waiting—tucks in close, rests her head against Garcia’s chest, and after a brief hesitation, drapes her arm over Garcia’s waist. Garcia wraps one of hers around Santos’s back and uses her other fingers to brush some of those unruly brown locks out of the way, behind Santos’s ear, then retraces the same path just once before taking her hand back.
Feels Santos sigh, and tighten her hold, and then relax into Garcia’s curves.
She’s not bracing herself for anything.
She’s not crying anymore.
Her cheeks are still damp, but her lungs are steady again.
Garcia presses a light kiss to her hairline without thinking, silently chastises herself but remains outwardly calm, and settles for gently rubbing Santos’s back in simple strokes, up and down, up and down.
“For the sake of trying to get better at this,” she murmurs eventually, “I feel okay with what we’re doing right now. Do you?”
The hand that’s resting just above her own hip stays in its flat position, and Garcia’s motions stall immediately—
And then she realizes that Santos is asleep.
“Fucking cheater,” Garcia whispers under her breath as her back rub resumes, and she starts to trace the pad of her thumb along and around and between those slack knuckles.
.
6:59pm
.
She thinks of the fracture, thinks of gloving up, thinks of having forceps in one hand and polypropylene monofilament sutures in the other.
Tugs the blanket up to better cover them both.
(One stitch.)
Body heat all up and down her side, and knowing that Santos feels the same thing from her.
(Two stitches.)
Santos, who hates vulnerable conversations maybe above all else, still finding the energy to communicate with someone who’s done her no favors lately.
(Three stitches.)
Santos waking up for her, Santos being honest with her, Santos trusting her.
(Four, five, six stitches.)
I fucked it up. I’m sorry.
(Seven and eight.)
We both fucked it up, Trinity.
(Nine.)
And I’m sorry, too.
(Ten.)
Garcia falls asleep thinking about the scalpel in her foot, and the fracture in her chest, and what type of scar Trinity Santos might gift her next.