Work Text:
Fic holy cringe
Following a bad date, you get hit by a car and are rushed to the ED of the same hospital you’re starting as a cardiology attending at. You see Romano often, and romance ensues. (V self-indulgent, for my tall girls ❤️🩹)
After a massively failed date, you’re walking the slick city streets in the dead of winter. Despite being a bit of a taller woman, you’d decided to wear heels for this first meeting of a friend’s coworker, one she’d sworn up and down was just your type, and they clack dully through the icy mush on the ground.
Your hands are dug deep into your long coat’s pockets, your only true line of defense against the searing cold considering you had donned a thinner, more satin-like dress for the candlelight dinner you were promised. The dry air is drawing snot out of your nose, and it chills your face as it runs down into your lips. It’s almost 11 o’clock, and you begin to wish you’d have at least bargained a ride in exchange for the evening from your knight in shining tinfoil.
The man hadnt even been that hot, you thought to yourself. All the praise and propriety, for what? A guy who tried to stiff the waiter after the bones in his fish were “too thin”? No wonder he’d been so lousy at conversation, he was too absorbed in the delicacies of cursing out a twenty-something year old, rather than minding his purpose in taking you out. Just asking your favorite color wouldve sufficed, really, you’re not hard to please! Truly, what has this world come to, in terms of socialization, sophistication, hell, even empathy!!
You’ve continued your storming path down the empty sidewalk, face now fully tucked into your scarf, eyes on the wet pavement ahead of you, toes frozen, ears bitten, and hair smoothed back by the ever blowing breeze, formed by skyscrapers and their wind tunnels.
That brings you to another gripe, actually, who in their right mind designs a city to have wind tunnels!? Could this not have been prevented, especially considering the weather resulting from the humongous lake?? What a horrific way to ensure your citizens freeze to death. You’d never have planned a city in such in awful manner, nor would you have taken out a woman and been such a sleaze she begins to consider girls as an option again.
Still entirely lost in thought, you begin to cross the street. Due to some mix of anger, perhaps some effect of the cold, and your surroundings of the moment being quite barren, you neglect to look both ways. As it happens, a Toyota comes barreling down the road, swerving around every god damn pothole, and would you believe, gives you a free ride 6 feet into the street! You hit the ground hard, which could have been harder, but the driver so mercifully decided to brake (in all honesty, it had little effect due to the slick roads, and the rules of inertia, but you had to applaud whichever drunk was driving’s insticts for kicking in despite such severe inebriation), and you skid across asphalt for a moment. You think to yourself, before a loss of consciousness, that at least you wont have to walk the next 15 blocks back to your shitty apartment. Or come into work the next day. Lucky you!
. . .
After the driver had managed to sober up a tad and pull their head out of their ass, 911 was called and you were rushed to (you guessed it), County General. Funnily enough, you’d recently interviewed with the Chief of Staff, Dr. Robert Romano, just weeks prior for an attending position in Cardiology. What an unfortunate way to meet him again, as several of the ED staff crowd your gurney.
At least you’ve finally awoken, though, which rules out brain death due to the, what feels like, massive head injury you’ve sustained. Your coat is wide open and your dress has been pulled around, which you can feel due to the cold air hitting your body. You’re still restrained in a collar, and you feel a general throbbing all over. Especially so in your hips, but it’s hard to tell.
A ginger woman introduces herself to you as Dr. Kerry Weaver, and you smile weakly at her when she asks your name. Its a no brainer, and she nods to your answer before interviewing you more thoroughly about your symptoms and medications than you would be getting a history taken by your new, obsessive compulsive, entirely all-inclusive, overly-curious, passionate physician. You admire her and her colleagues as they snap shots of your pelvis, and you simply allow them to monitor your cardiac activity and general wellbeing, restraining yourself from divulging your occupation. After all, today was meant to be free dinner and a hot date, not self diagnose your car crash injuries!
You can only be so lucky, however, as of course a surgical consult is called, for your very much so screwed up pelvis, and who else but Robert Romano would be on at 11:36PM to do this perfectly timed procedure?
Having had your head cleared, the extent of the damage up there being a mild concussion and temporary brain death from too much time around a sickeningly straight man, you’re able to crane up your neck to see both your lacy, barely-there underwear exposed, as well as your soon-to-be Chief of Staff walking in. The latter is a little harder to catch, considering his generally unimpressive stature, but oh well, you suppose. You’re dead whether you see him or not!
“So what do we have, another prostitute hit by some inebriated donkey drag racing his own relection- “, Romano begins, before his eyes land on your bright red face. He clears his throat after, tastefully, cutting himself off.
“Good evening, doctor. Nice underwear,” he quips, and you silently nod and attempt a smile. The morphine has more than kicked in at this point, something you’re hugely grateful for, as you lay back on the gurney. The other doctor assisting Weaver, a John Carter, fixes you with an odd look after hearing Romano’s titling.
“You’re a doctor?”, Carter says, a large hint of surprise in his voice as he continues, “where do you work?”
Romano answers for you, cutting you off as he reviews your chart for a moment with Weaver.
“She’ll be working here, most likely on the days she doesn’t walk the streets looking for men to devour.”
Hardy har har, you think. You’d worn a shorter dress for what you’d thought would be a nice dinner, god forbid it shows a little cleavage!
As you’re about to protest the utter disrespect you’re facing, Romano palpates a specifically tender spot on your hip, causing your face to fall back into a grimace, and your back to arch off the gurney slightly in pain.
“Woah there, cowgirl, I know you’re excited to start work but there’s really no need to leap at me.”
You’re going to kill your new boss.
. . .
After a simple, for Romano, surgery, you’re awoken by your boss-surgeon-verbal harasser…? Maybe not the last part, as when you wake he seems to be looking pretty kindly at you. Sweet.
“So, as I’m sure you can guess, we repaired the crack in your pelvis by way of titanium screw. Don’t worry, you wont set off any metal detectors any time soon, and I’m sure your pretty face would get you out of any situation if you played it hard enough,” is what you first have spewed at you.
No “hi”, “hello, “how are you”, maybe a “your hair looks really good today, for having been hit by a car!”.
Despite your slight agitation, the compliment at the end makes you blink for a second, and the charmer takes the opportunity to wink at you. Has this Keebler elf even SEEN where his head reaches standing next to you, or is he just that cocky? Because you remember quite clearly when shaking his hand in your interview, you had to reach down pretty far..
“Well thank you, Dr. Romano. I do hope this will give you enough of an excuse for me to not come into my first shift tomorrow? I don’t think I could walk if I tried,” you say with a smile, fiddling with your hands on top of the sheets.
This smile is the most lovely thing in the world to your surgeon savior, and he grants you one of his own, still in his power-pose of hands on hips.
“I suppose I’ll allow it my dear, but only if you make up the time you missed at dinner with me, maybe in a similar one of your get-ups. Although, I prefer lingerie to be red,” he says, very quickly. Not fast in the way he’s afraid to say it, but in the earnest way, where you can tell his mind just does process in that speed.
“You’re healthy as a horse anyways,” he continues, “so you’ll heal soon enough that I’m sure sitting across from me at the Chateau Ritz won’t be too strenous on the fracture.”
You’re hardly afforded a second to recover from the verbiage, as you blush profusely and fail to meet his eye, fidgeting more aggressively woth your hands.
“U-uhm, Dr. Romano-“
“Please,” he interrupts, “We’re coworkers, not strangers, call me Robert, or your hero, whichever rolls off the tongue better.”
You swallow gently and meet his eyes in a way that does not do anything to make him less attracted to you, before continuing.
“Well, Robert, is this not, well.. workplace harassment, in some sense? I mean, I know I haven’t begun work yet, but uhm…”
God, what is wrong with you?? You’re never usually this meek, especially when defending yourself!! Get a grip, come on!
Romano gives you another look-over, and sighs before crossing his arms and tilting his head to the side slightly, as though it would better help you understand.
“Look, if you’re really that dedicated to your clientele, (when will this guy stop insinuating you’re a prostitute??), I understand, but it can’t hurt to humor me, hm? Just think about it.”
With that, he uncrosses his arms and leaves you in the recovery room. Rude!!
. . .
It’s been a couple weeks of physical therapy, and also a couple weeks since you were meant to begin acting in your position as an attending. Because Romano, or Robert, can only allow you so much grace, today is your official first day on the job. He’d been checking in periodically with you during your sessions in PT, which felt degrading, but you also got the sense that the man was kind of a puppy. Especially so for you. Despite this, you’re unfortunate enough to work under Dr. Kayson, who seems to be a total ass, but it seems that Romano has again pulled strings for you to have an easier time. This guy really wants to show off for you, doesn’t he!
Your shift goes on without a hitch, until the ninth hour when you are unfortunately taken from your comfortable sitting office to a consult involving an acute MI in the ER. It had been a horribly startling moment for you, causing you to drop what you’d had in your hands… your crutches. You hobble down to the ground floor, and are of course met with the sight of who other than Romano, speed walking around, no doubt covering a surgical consult.
Entering the trauma room you stumble slightly on your uneven gait, and begin to assess the patient to the best of your abilities. The doctors seem to be arguing about the method they use to clear the myocardial clot, causing more than a little tension to build, the paitent seemingly most aware of it. You’re also confused as to why you’ve been paged at all, considering they already have Romano lurking around, observing what goes on with you in the trauma room, but you give the ED doctors your best advice and advocate for the use of medicine instead of, what you conclude to be, an unnecessary surgery.
This seems to miff Robert, and after the paitent has been stabilized he follows you in your arduous journey back to the elevators. Again, you’re quite tall, and he’s quite short, but due to your injury and lack of support his stride seems to match yours perfectly. How sweet! This means that he now only has to crane his neck to speak to you, instead of having to do both that and chase after your long legs.
“It’s interesting that you’re a cardiologist, you know, considering that you’re so scared to cut open your patients and actually see the heart! I mean, would it not have been just as effective to solve it surgically? This guy is going to the cath lab either way, but now he’s just 20 times more drugged up!!”
You scoff at his remarks, and stop before the elevators. You look down at him with an unimpressed, quite sarcastic smile as you place your hands (gently) on your hips.
“Well, Robert, maybe you shouldn’t have been so eager to hire me if you disproved so greatly of my methods. I mean, I did what I thought was best for the paitent! Get over it.”
He rolls his eyes at this just as the doors open to an empty elevator, allowing you both to step in. He gets in on the side closer to the button panel, so you have to kind of reach around him to press the floor number.
“I’m sure it was also comforting for him to have you hobble in and just haphazardly declare a solution, before he has to go under for an undefined period of time!”
He pissily crosses his arms again.
“You also still haven’t answered about my offer of dinner, you know.”
You’re caught a little off-guard by this. It was weeks ago he asked you, he’s seriously expecting a response? What is wrong with this guy?? You shift a little uncomfortably as he crosses his arms again.
“W-well..”, you start, and halfway through your next thought you decide to be brave. “You never uh… you never gave me a time or place, Robert.” You hadn’t meant to add that much emphasis on his name, but it seems to have gotten his attention as his head whips to you. Your eyes are glued on the elevator sign displaying the floors as you lean on the comparment’s wall.
“Tonight, 8:30.”
You spare a glance at him, regretfully as he’s still staring holes into your pretty face.
“I get off at 9-“
“Says who?”
You finally make proper eye contact just as the doors open. Your mouth is slightly ajar at this point. He steps before you can, of course as your pelvis was entirely jacked and your stat page had made you leave your crutches leaning on your desk, only worsening further what little mobilty you had.
“Wear something respectable, please. I don’t want you to be mistaken for my weekend lover.”
. . .
You’re lucky you’d left a skirt in your large, almost tote bag-like purse you’d decided to bring to work today. You quickly change into it, deciding to unfasten just the first two buttons of your dress shirt to match. Slipping on your coat, Romano catches you on the way out of the surgical lounge.
“Ahhh, just the woman I want to see!”, he says eagerly, putting his hand on your back as he begins to lead you out to what you can only presume is his waiting car in the parking lot.
“I thought you’d might’ve ran away before I’d gotten the chance to take you to dinner, you know,” he says, walking through the staff parking garage with you in tow. You’ve already gotten used to your crutches, so it’s really no trouble for you to get to his sports car. He, of course, opens the passenger side door for you, and once he’s settled you coyly smile at him.
“Now why would I waste the opportunity of a nice dinner, especially one that I don’t pay for, hm?”
He shrugs, and responds with a smirk of his own as he fires up the engine.
“Oh, are you insinuating your position doesn’t pay enough? I adjusted your salary heavily just to get you to come on board, you know.”
You giggle as he peels out of the parking spot, and the city lights blur by you. You quite enjoy driving fast with him, as well as his dry humor.
“I’m only saying that it’s nice to be treated, not that I can’t treat myself in the first place. I can’t always pay for myself you know, I don’t want to become totally destitute,” you fire back at him teasingly, adjusting your pencil skirt as you shift slightly in your seat. You notice that he’s actually changed out of his scrubs (what an achievement!) and is now wearing a cable knit sweater and slacks. It makes you feel better about what you’re wearing, considering he didn’t pull out his full tux tonight.
“Oh, so still you rely on me. I suppose I know what you think of me now, just your personal piggy bank, hm?”, he says, speeding off to some reservation he made for the both of you. He reaches to turn on the radio, flicking to a classical station. You snort slightly, cheek in your palm, elbow resting on the center console.
“Yes, Robert, I just think of you as a talking wallet. Obviously your money is the most important thing to me.”
He grins again, eyes mostly on the road. At red lights you can see his eyes flicker to you, but you suppose you’re worse because you’re looking at him back.
. . .
Once you’ve come upon the restaurant, Robert kills the engine and, quite chivalrously, first retrieves your crutches from the backseat, then opens your own door. Upon the offer of his hand, you smile and tip your head with graceful humilty.
“Quite the gentleman, I see. Not like the dates I’ve had recently,” you say with a grin, shuffling the crutches under your armpits. You’ve been confined to flats as of late, but that does little to bridge the gap, so to speak.
Grinning up at you with his hands in his pockets, Robert leads you through the restaurant doors and to your table.
“Oh, been seeing a lot of men, huh? I really had higher expectations of your self-respect, you know.”
You roll your eyes as you seat yourself, wincing slightly. He notices this and gives you a look of concern.
“Do I need to write you something for the pain, doctor? Because I’m more than happy to-“
You cut him off by raising your hand, still settling yourself.
“Believe me, if I wanted pain meds, I would’ve gotten them by now. It’d just be unnecessary,” you reason. Really, you could’ve asked one of your coworkers by now if you felt the pain was debilitating enough. Robert had sewn you up fine, however, you didn’t see the need in over-medication for a weeks post operative wound.
He raises his eyebrows as he studies the menu.
“Fine, honey, whatever you like. I’m not gonna force Vicodin down your throat if you don’t want it.”
This earns a small, half-scoffed, giggle from you.
“Oh, like you’re not the type to do that. I’m sure you’ve had some poor, noncompliant paitent you’ve thought long and hard about forcefully medicating,” you tease him, flipping through the menu, before meeting his eyes with that million-dollar smile of yours, pasted on your face.
“Believe me, I’ve thought about it. Especially when I have to do a consult for the ER quacks and they’re seemingly unable to give a simple dose of Haldol to a paitent screaming his head off.”
You chuckle slightly again, and set down your menu.
“Well, I know what I want. The split pea soup, and to never have to cover the ER. Think I could make a case to Kayson concerning his seniority and my fracture to let me off of it for a while?”
Robert also sets down his copy, and folds his hands on the table.
“Alternatively, I could just have a chat with the baboon and make sure he doesn’t give you any overly strenuous shifts. I am his boss, after all,” he offers, and you smile for the billionth time.
“Oh, so you’re offering to leverage your position in order to cut me some slack? From what I’ve heard in my first day, that’s quite out of character for you, Robert. What makes me different, do you suppose?”
He pretends to look off and think for a moment, but pretty quickly returns eye contact to you.
“Because your interview already proved to me that you’re a dedicated and well-educated cardiologist, and really I suppose I feel bad that a grossly overqualified, pretty thing like you came to slum it at County,” he shrugs.
“‘Slum it’?”, you ask, raising a brow.
“Yes my dear, it’s an underfunded hospital with constant threats of cuts, and it’s staffed by some of the most idiotic and irresponsible individuals I’ve met in my life. The patients are nothing short of messes, and every ward is packed full.”
You snort.
“Not exactly the glitz and glamor you were expecting when you interviewed, is it?”
“I guess not. Pays crazy well though. How’d you get away with that kind of raise, huh? You promised your lackeys some other kind of treatment?”
He looks off to the side, before leaning in to continue.
“Well, as chief of staff, I have final say on budgets and whatnot. So yes, I did do some coercion to give you a boost. What can I say, I like watching sexy women work,” he shrugs.
You roll your eyes. How did you end up on a date with this man??
. . .
After finishing dinner, dessert, and a bottle of wine between the two of you, Robert decides to call it a night. Helping you out of the car and to your apartment, he stops you in the threshold.
“You know, I had a really great time with you tonight,” he starts.
You look down at him, and smile your perfect smile.
“I did too, Robert.”
He looks up to meet your eye. You both stand there for a moment, you holding your crutches and purse, and him with his lips twinged just upwards at the sides.
Slowly, you lean down, and he leans up, and you two kiss, like a ship and an iceberg in the night.