Work Text:
“Hi, my name is Princess, and I will be the nurse attending to you today. Sorry about the wait, can you tell me your name, please?” Princess looked at the man in front of her. He had dark blonde hair, cut close to the scalp but not shaved. He looked to be mid 30’s, strong build, but not from lifting weights, but from manual labor. His skin was on the darker side, but more from being in the sun constantly. He was sitting in the bed, but she would guess that he was probably around 5’8 to 5’10. He reminded her of someone, but she couldn’t quite place where.
“Hi ma’am, I’m Darrell Whitaker,” She placed a slight accent in his voice, but couldn’t place where.
“And what brings you in to the ER today, Mr. Whitaker?” Princess watched as the man pulled his flannel sleeve back and showed a wrapped and bloody forearm.
“I accidentally cut myself trying to replace a broken window and window frame. I didn’t think it was too bad, but my boss kicked me off the job site and told me to have it checked out.” Princess made a few notes on the tablet before putting it on the rolling stool and taking a few steps forward.
“May I?”
“Yes ma’am,” Princess pushed the sleeve up further and started to slowly unravel the bandage, revealing a long and slowly bleeding jagged cut.
“Well, I’m sorry to tell you, Mr. Whitaker, but your boss was correct to send you in. You are going to need that stitched up, as well as probably some antibiotics. Were there any nails around the window when you were working on it?”
“A few, yeah, but I don’t think any got near me,”
“Well, I can’t say for certain, but I think the doctor will most likely request a tetanus shot as well.” She watched as the man turned a little green and had a grimace on his face. She let out a small smile.
“I’m guessing you are not a fan of shots?”
“No ma’am, none of my brothers and I were, though my littlest brother were the worst. Had to physically hold him down the few times we went to the doctor's office,” He let out a small smile at the memory.
“Oh! How many brothers do you have?”
“I have three and a sister. I’m the oldest, then the twins Rebecca and Robert, then Abel, and then Dennis. He’s the youngest one and the one I had to hold down,” He let out a chuckle. The name made her pause, thinking about their Dennis working in the hospital. She grabbed the tablet again, making it look like she was making a note but was really looking at his intake info, noting that his address did show it here in Philly.
“I noticed you have a slight accent. You from around here?”
“Oh, no ma’am. I was born and raised in Nebraska.”
“Oh! What brings you all the way out here?”
“Family,” Princess waited to see if he would elaborate, but he kept it simple.
“Alright, Mr. Whitaker, well, you sit tight. I will let the doctor know, and we should have you out of here soon.” Princess smiled at him, tucked the tablet under her arm as she removed the gloves, and walked out of the room, gently closing the door. She dropped the smile and her face turned serious, scanning the floor looking for someone. She let out a sigh of relief as she located the people she was looking for.
“Dr. Robby, Dr. Abbot, I have a situation,” She spoke quietly when she got near them. Both straightened up and turned towards her fully.
“What’s going on?” She passed the tablet over to the two.
“Male, mid 30’s came in for a laceration to the forearm. Got it from a job site,”
“Okay, what’s the problem?” Abbot said, looking over Robby’s shoulder.
“Look at the name,” She said. Robby scrolled back to the intake info and saw the last name at the same time Abbot did. Both tensed.
“Coincedence?” Abbot asked. Princess shook her head.
“I don’t think so. He said he was born and raised in Nebraska and that he was here for family. He looks like him. Like, I didn’t think anything of the name, but named Dennis and even mentioned him being the youngest. I don’t know what is going on, but from how little Dennis releases about his family,”
“You don’t think the parting was on good terms,” Robby spoke up. Princess nodded her head. Abbot looked up and made eye contact with Dana. She nodded her head and handed the tablet back to Jesse before walking over.
“What time is Whitaker scheduled to come in today?” Dana raised an eyebrow before raising her wrist.
“He was scheduled 20 minutes ago,” She spoke. Abbot let out a curse before he started to scan the floor. Robby raised his head in alarm and started looking around also. They all spotted him at the same time, but it was too late. The group watched as he entered the room that Princess had just left.
“Hi there, I’m Dr. Whitaker, and I will be taking care of you today, Mr.-” Dennis was interrupted by a voice that he had not heard in almost 6 years.
“Denny?” Dennis's head snapped up, and he looked into the face of his oldest brother. He was stunned seeing how much older he looked, but also how worn he looked.
“Derry?”
“It really is you!” Darrell breathed out and moved to get off the bed, but Dennis took a step back.
“What-what- Why- is everyone?” Dennis couldn’t stop the panic in his voice and the stutter that was escaping. Darrell took another step towards him, which caused Dennis' panic to rise even more, making him feel like he was 19 again as his brother loomed over him. Before it could get any worse, suddenly his vision of his brother was blocked, and an arm around his shoulders was brought in.
“Hey, Dr. Whitaker, I need your help with another patient. Dr. Abbott is going to take over.” Dr. Robby spoke calmly and smoothly steered him out of the room while Dr. Abbott plucked the tablet out of Dennis’s shaking hands.
“Denny?!” Darrell raised his voice and moved towards him, but again was blocked by Jack.
“Hey, I’m Dr. Abbott, and I’m going to take care of that cut on your arm for you,” he smiled and spoke in a pleasant tone. The only thing is that if you knew Jack, then you would hear the undercurrent ice in his voice.
“Please, that’s my brother, I’ve been looking for him,” Darrell spoke up, looking at the man in front of him.
Robby continued to steer Dennis away from the floor, back to the Pedes room, knowing and sensing that a breakdown was looming. He glanced down and saw that Dennis eye’s was glassed, dissociated from what was going on. He gently guided Dennis to sit in a chair that he found, and once seated, started to quietly apply gentle pressure to his wrist in time with a heartbeat and talking in a gentle tone.
“Hey Dennis, you’re safe. You’re here in PTMC. You are currently in the Pedes room. That’s it, gentle breath. It’s you and me in the room. No one else. It’s currently 1:23 pm on a Tuesday.” I just repeated those words calmly as he brought Dennis back. Once Robby saw light and life start to come back to Dennis' eyes, he changed the pressure to soothing, sweeping gestures with his thumb.
“Hey, sweetheart, you back?” Dennis sucked in a deep breath and looked around the room.
“What, where?”
“Hey, hey, slow, you’re safe,” Roby said, still kneeling in front of Dennis. Dennis looked down and felt guilt.
“Dr. Robby, I’m sorry, please.”
“Hey, no. Don’t apologize. You’re okay,” Dennis looked at Robby before folding in half, shoving his palms into his eyes.
“Oh god, why? Why now?” He muttered. Robby placed his hand over Dennis's neck and made soothing movements with his thumb again. He let Dennis sit there for a moment in quiet before breaking it.
“Do you want to talk about it?” He asked gently. Before Dennis had a chance to answer or even straighten up, the door opened again, and someone else entered the room. Dennis sat up so quickly that the blood rush made him a little dizzy. Robby’s hand, which was on his neck, fell to his knee as both men looked to see Abbot in the doorway. He strode over to Dennis and, without missing a beat, kneeled on the floor with Robby.
“You okay, mouse?” It took a moment for the question to register in his brain, but even then, he didn’t answer the question.
“Oh my god, please, you two get off the floor! Here, take the chair,” Dennis moved to stand up, but both men pushed him back down. He tried again, but still they pushed him down.
“Oh my god, you two can’t be on the floor like this, please, I can.” Before Dennis could finish his sentence, Abbott decided to grab Dennis around the waist, spin him around, and then have him sit in his lap.
“There. Now answer the question, mouse, are you okay?” He asked in Dennis's ear. Normally, having Abbott’s voice so close to him would send shivers down his spine, but currently, he couldn’t focus on that. Instead, he let himself go lax in the man's arms, one hand coming up and grabbing the man’s arm like he was trying to hold on for dear life.
“No. No, I am not. I am flipping the fuck out, trying to not to panic at seeing my brother again. I still have 10 hours to go for this shift, and I’m pretty sure if we stay here too long and Santos finds out my brother is here, the Pitt is going to have to pool bail money together.”
“I’ll pay for her bail, don’t worry about that. Right now, the only thing concerning Robby and me is you. So talk to us. What’s happening?” Dennis free hand reached out to Robby, who grabbed it and allowed the smaller man to squeeze. Robby wanted to wince at the pressure but kept his face neutral, knowing that Dennis needed this moment.
“I can’t go into full details, or I will break in a way that you will have to sedate and admit me. But what it breaks down to is that it was right after my second year of school. I was back home for the summer to help on the farm. Well, I had also made the decision to switch from Theology to medicine. I had also become, we’ll say “friendly” with a farm hand who was hired to help that year, since Ab was busy with a new baby. Well,l when I went to tell my family that I was switching in my final days of being home, turns out that Darrell had seen the guy and me and revealed it to the rest of the family. One thing led to another, and my father had a heart attack. He survived, at least last time I knew, but my family didn’t and couldn’t forgive me. Darrell and Robert both beat the shit out of me, blaming me for our father’s heart attack, and disowned me. I tried to call, but everyone went silent on me. I got a letter a month later from the family lawyer. I had been disowned and written out of the will. I hadn’t seen or heard from any of them since,”
“Until today,” Robby spoke. Dennis nodded his head, not trusting his voice anymore. He hung his head, trying to hide his face from the tears that were in his eyes, not knowing if they were from the memories, the panic, or just in general. Both Robby and Jack laid kisses on him, Jack to the back of his neck while Robby kissed his knuckles.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. We got you. Let it out,” Jack spoke. They could both feel the trembling in the small man as he let out small whimpers. They weren’t sure how long they sat there before footsteps were heard coming down the hall. All three looked up to see Mateo in the doorway.
“We need help, I think Trinity is about to fight a patient,” Mateo said, pointing back down the hallway. All three let out various curses as they scrambled to get up. They rushed back to the floor onlyto see Mel and Ellis holding Santos back as she yelled, but not at the person they thought it would be. Instead, they saw Ahmed holding another woman back, with Darrell’s help.
“You stupid bitch! You don’t know anything! You have no right to judge our family!” The woman looked to be maybe around 5’6, maybe 5’7, had dark brown hair, and fair skin. What stood out to the men was that she was pregnant. They would estimate around 4 or 5 months. It was someone that Dennis would recognize, for she was around all the time when he was younger. It was Susan, Darrell’s wife. Trinity yelled something back, but in Tagalog. Dennis didn’t even think about it as he made a beeline to Trinity and wrapped her in a hug. It took her a moment to realize who it was, wrapping their arms around her, swinging her arms, thinking someone else was trying to stop her. But once she realized it was her Huckleberry She wrapped her arms around him tightly and swung them around from view.
“Fucking hell, Huckleberry, you scared the shit out of me,” She whispered in his ear. He didn’t say anything, just dug his head further into her shoulder and tried to keep his trembling at bay.
“Denny?” Dennis flinched at the voice. He wanted it all to stop; he wanted it all to be a horrible nightmare.
“Denny, please,” The other voice chimed in.
“Santos, get him out of here. You take a break too. Mr. Whitaker, please take a seat so we can finish treating you and get you out of here,” Dana spoke up, her voice was hard and gave no room for arguments, but Derry and Suzy were hard-headed and never listened.
“That’s our brother! We have a right to see him!”
“Currently, at this time, you do not. We will get your partner treated, and you two can leave your contact info, and IF Dr. Whitaker wants to get in contact, he will. But right now, you are causing a disturbance to the rest of our patients. So you can stay back here and be quiet while we treat your husband, or you can wait out in the waiting room. Your call, but those are your only two options,” Robby spoke up.
Darrell and Susan watched as a few other doctors, a few other women, surrounded Dennis and walked him away from their sight. They wanted to follow, wanted to scoop their baby brother up and hold him for all the missed time, bundle him up, and bring him back to the farm. To apologize for all the hurtful things they did, both physically and emotionally. Darell felt his heart breaking again, watching his brother leave him again, but he knew there was nothing he could do currently. He grabbed his wife’s arm and squeezed it, bringing her focus to him. When she was looking at him, he shook his head. He knew that right now they couldn’t do anything.
“Okay. I’m sorry. Please, can we treat my arm and then if it’s okay with you, we will leave our info, and when Denny wants to contact us, he can?” Robby softened his look a little but gave a curt nod.
“Yes. Dana, can you escort them back to the room?”
“Right this way,” She held her arm out, directing them back to the room that Darrell was first admitted to. Darrell got himself situated back up on the gurney while Susan took a seat. Abbott followed right behind with a tray to be able to suture the arm up. He had administered the local anesthetic already before going to check on Dennis. He kept his head down as he threaded the needle through the skin, pulling it taut but not enough to tear and be painful.
“Excuse me,” The wife spoke up. Abbott lifted his head a little to look at her, showing that he was listening without speaking.
“I’m sorry to ask, but you seemed close with Denny- I mean Dennis. Can you at least tell us if he is happy?” Abbott took a moment and paused, thinking about all the times that Dennis would gasp awake from nightmares he refused to speak about. Or would flinch when He and Robby would get into arguments, or how in their early days he was constantly asking and looking for reassurance that he hadn’t done anything wrong. But Jack also thought of all the smiles he would give him and Robby, the times that he looked peaceful, curled up between them in bed, or relaxing as he lay against him, and Jack was able to play with his curls. How Dennis looked as he would shuffle from the bedroom, swallowed up in one of Robby’s many hoodies, rubbing at his eyes sometimes like a little kid.
“I think so. I’ll be honest, it took a while for him, but I think he’s getting there.” Both Darrell and his wife let out a sigh of relief. Abbott didn’t know the full story, didn’t think he would, but he also had a feeling that these two were just as stubborn as his mouse, and they weren’t leaving quite yet.