Chapter Text
Don’t kick when you’re down.
When you’re down, don’t struggle, don’t try to move, don’t try to swim, just… let the current take you.
Samira Mohan took surfing lessons on a whim in California before she started med school. Sometimes she thinks the safety demonstration in the beginning is all that stayed with her. How to cover your head when you fell. And most importantly, what to do in a riptide.
Yeah, she can surf, and she knows how to read which waves will give her a better chance than others, but surfing was the kind of thing you did on vacation. Tucking your head in your hands, hearing your blood rush to your head as you tentatively brought yourself back up, that stayed. Through med school. Through the Pitt. Through leaving the Pitt.
Robby kicks when he’s down. This isn’t meant to be an insult, just something she’s noticed. When Robby’s out of it, everyone can tell, and when it gets bad, he yells. Yells at her. Yells at Santos. Langdon and Whitaker never get the brunt of it, Samira chalks that up to them being men, and Mel doesn’t either, which Samira resentfully, privately, chalks up to her being white. Not that Robby would ever say something racist to her face, not something obvious, at least. But she’s faced enough insecure white men in her life to know when there’s something else brimming behind their starter pack misogyny.
You don’t want to work with a guy like that. Samira sure as hell doesn’t. Not when she knows there’s better out there, whether it’s in another specialty, another hospital, another city, or another guy. So when he gave her some shitty half-baked pep talk on the Fourth, she made up her mind that her future wasn’t in the ER with Dr. Michael Robinavitch. Gave him some shitty explanation. Yeah, maybe I just don’t belong here. Here, the Pitt, here, Michael Robinavitch’s Pitt, here, where one bad day from your attending means pretending you don’t cry when a person in power yells at you. Fuck psychiatry, fuck geriatrics. She’s good at what she does. The only difference between her and Langdon’s skills is that Robby’s always there for Langdon when he fucks up, and Robby’s also always there when he knocks it out of the park. Samira knows she can knock it out of the park. She proved that in PittFest, with the pigtail catheter and the EZ-IO. But when she fucks up, it’s just another strike in Robby’s book. Samira tries not to be bitter about it. But God knows if she were sneaking blue pills and working while high, Robby would have a lot more to say to her than he did for Langdon. So yeah. Maybe she just doesn’t belong here, Robby. Whatever you say.
Later, at drinks, her friends will ask her why she didn’t tell Robby off. Why she didn’t give him a piece of her mind, call him a slew of colorful insults and remind him of just how mean she can be. And the real answer is because Samira Mohan doesn’t kick when she’s down. She’s not gonna waste energy fighting some dick that can’t even find the difference between MoHAN and MOhan. She’s gonna do her job, her job that she knows she’s good at, and she’s gonna do it without passive-aggressive commentary from an old white guy. She’s gonna do it without worrying that Robby’ll scold her for going too slow, because fighting Robby is like fighting the current. And Samira Mohan doesn’t kick when she’s down.