Chapter Text
Each shift of working in healthcare is like reaching blindly into a bag of trail mix. You don’t have a goddamn clue what you’re going to get, but you keep showing up day after day for the same shit.
Sometimes, you happen to grab a handful of pretzels or those yummy brown bread pieces. Delicious. Rewarding. Worth every rusty penny that you dug out of the bottom of your work bag so you could buy them from the vending machine on a whim. They’ll tide you over and keep you satisfied enough to stay sane for twelve hours.
Those are the good days. The ones where your patients are sweet and appreciative, grateful for how hard you work to take care of them. They’re far and few between at times, but they remind you why you ever decided to devote your life to this.
Other times, you reach into that bag of trail mix and end up with all the gross bits. The ones that go in the trash when you’re done because literally no one eats them. And you know they’re cheap and that’s why these companies fill the bag with something nobody likes, but seriously, how hard is it to just put more pretzels in there—
“Exam room three. DILF with a cutiepie complaining of general pain. You can thank me later. I snagged it from Joyce because she was thirty seconds away from giving it to Heather. And I know that census is low today, so that means there’s hardly any patients and you can’t tell me you’re too busy either,” Robin rattles off, setting a chart in front of Steve at the nurses’ station and plopping into the open chair next to him.
Technically, she’s a doctor and has no business being here, but he’s not going to yell at her and neither is anyone else. Dr. Buckley is chill and she’s not the kind of doctor who expects everyone else to be her bitch.
She’s both kind and has a working brain. A real rarity these days.
“Cool. I’ll go see them in a second. Do you know if someone from intake already got their info or should I wait a bit longer?” Steve asks, taking another bite of the trail mix hidden in his work bag that’s stashed in the drawer next to him. He then clicks into the active charts on the computer with his other hand to see if there’s a new one for him to look at in the patient portal.
Call him old fashioned, but Steve likes to know what he’s walking into when he enters a room. Especially when his patients can’t always speak in complete sentences and their guardians are too worked up to be of much help.
Disadvantages to being a nurse in a pediatric emergency room.
“Yeah, pretty sure I just saw Jonathan’s pregnant ass waddle out of there. Last name is Munson, I think? The dad looked fairly young. And hot. Just your type,” Robin tells him, grabbing her cup of coffee that’s hiding behind his computer.
Steve snorts at her blatant disrespect for the rules. At least his snacks are in a drawer. But he’s not the charge nurse today, so he couldn’t care less what she does. Hawkins Children’s Hospital isn’t in their state survey window, so the contraband just has to be vaguely hidden out of sight.
At least until Joyce sees them and cracks down. She’s a fair charge nurse, even if she’s a bit strict at times. But the woman never overloads them with patients and she runs a tight ship. The chaos she wrangles with ease makes it worth whatever silly rules she’s a stickler about.
“Yeah, I see it. Elliana Louise Munson, right?” Steve confirms, clicking into the chart. There are a few past hospitalizations on her record, but nothing major. He skims through quickly, knowing exactly what to look for. Elliana was born at Hawkins General almost six years ago, did a short stint in the NICU as a premie, and then had a case of pretty bad chicken pox when she was two. Nothing especially interesting for her age.
“Sounds right,” Robin mutters, pulling a granola bar out of her lab coat and biting into it. “Argyle is stuck triaging, so he just passed the info along and I did the rest.”
He rolls his eyes. “Joyce is gonna flay you alive if she sees that out in the open.” She snickers at his threat and continues to eat anyway. Whatever, it’s her funeral. “Ten bucks says she goes by ‘Ellie.’ What five year old answers to an adult name like Elliana?” Robin shrugs, shoving the rest of her snack in her mouth and tossing the wrapper in the trash. “Did she look like a girly girl?”
Robin gives him a deadpan stare, but he stares right back. “Steve, stop trying to show the rest of us up and just go see her. Not every child needs the whole five star ‘Nurse Harrington’ experience. Besides, you can read these kids so well, you’ll be able to figure it out in like thirty seconds anyway.”
He smiles at that. She may tease him, but it was still a compliment.
Steve knows he’s a good nurse. A great nurse, in fact. It’s what he excels at in life. And he’s been doing it long enough to be confident in both his patient skills and his nursing ones.
“Yeah, yeah.” He hops off his stool, grabbing his clipboard off the desk and a pen from his pocket as well as a cheap plastic tiara from his work bag.
Steve buys toys from the dollar store as a way to connect to some of his patients and put them more at ease in the unfamiliar setting of the hospital. He keeps tiaras, toy cars, crayons and coloring books, and even some rubber ducks. They hardly cost anything, but they’re guaranteed to win a smile from kids who are having a bad day.
“Go get 'em, tiger.”
Right before he leaves the nurses’ station, he turns back to see Robin already about to open his drawer where his work bag is. “Don’t touch the pretzels in my trail mix or I’ll put laxatives in your coffee when you aren’t looking, I swear it. You can have the nuts or whatever.”
Without missing a beat, she tells him snarkily, “Sorry, I’m not into nuts. I think that’s your speciality, dear.”
He flips her off, then plasters a bright smile on as he enters the emergency room hallway. Exiting the safety and seclusion of the nurses’ station requires that he put on a certain expression.
Exam room three is pretty close to the front, so he doesn’t have to walk far to find where he needs to go. The curtain is pulled shut, so he knocks on the doorframe, waits for someone to tell him he can come in, and then yanks it aside.
The most adorable little girl with long curly dark hair is sitting on the exam bed, big watery eyes, pouty lips and all. Robin was right. He can tell right away that she's a girly girl and his usual routine will work just fine here.
As soon as he’s in the room with the curtain pulled, Steve drops to one knee in front of the sad pup and gives her his most charming smile. He pulls the tiara from his pocket and holds it up as a peace offering towards the child.
“Good day, Princess Ellie. My name is King Steve and I heard you were in need of some urgent assistance today. How may I be of service, young lady?”
She blinks at him in silence for just a moment as she processes his spiel. Ellie then squeals with delighted laughter, clapping her hands and turning back to look at the man standing on the other side of the bed.
Steve assumes it’s her dad since he’s hovering so closely, tightly gripping the rails of the bed, and refusing to sit in the chair right next to him. Probably a helicopter parent since his daughter isn’t visibly injured and he looks like he might cry at any minute.
And oof. DILF is right. Even through the scent neutralizers that get pumped into the hospital air, Steve can smell the heavy stench of a distressed parent, but his scent is still full of something musky and warm. Alpha for sure.
The worried man looks like a virtual clone of the little girl, with the addition of many tattoos, a nose ring, and a well-groomed beard. He has the same big doe eyes and long flowing hair as her though. The family resemblance is strong between them.
“Dad, he called me a princess!” Ellie shrieks, pointing at Steve like he’s the most exciting thing she’s seen all day. He might be.
She reaches her chubby little hands out for the tiara and he happily hands it over, watching as she shoves it on top of her head. It pushes her curly hair down in a million different directions, but she’s thrilled.
His smile is completely genuine as he watches her entire being light up with joy over such a simple thing.
“I see that, Ellie Belly.” Her dad turns to Steve then, looking more than a little uncomfortable about being in the hospital. He assumes the alpha is probably one of those parents who has their own trauma associated with the place, at least by the unyielding tenseness in his posture. “I’m Eddie and this is my daughter, Elliana.”
Steve tries not to pull an amused face at that. Who names their child something so close to their own name? Decidedly weird, even if he’s heard worse.
“A pleasure to meet you. I’m nurse Steve and I’ll be taking care of you both,” he explains, pulling himself off the floor with ease and grabbing the wheeled stool from the desk nearby to sit on. He pushes it up next to the bed, plopping down into the seat. “So what’s going on today, Ellie? Did you get a boo-boo, sweetie?”
Her little face pinches with confusion, like she’s trying to remember what he might be referring to.
Eddie sighs, sounding a bit stressed when he says, “Lovebug, you told me your whole body was hurting all over. In fact, you said that you felt like your Barbie doll- the one you pulled the arms and legs off of.”
Ellie’s face lights up with recognition. “Oh, yeah! I ‘member that now. I didn’t like her ugly hair, so I broke her.” She grins widely at Steve. “I’m all better though! Nurse Steve fixed me.”
Her dad looks horrified, glancing between his daughter and Steve nervously. Probably embarrassed about the fact that he sat in the emergency room waiting area, got through triage, and is now being told that his daughter feels fine.
Poor guy. Kids love to do this shit though. Ellie isn’t the first and she won’t be the last.
Especially because Steve’s ninety-nine percent sure that she was just complaining of growing pains. They’re pretty normal for pups her age and the pain can make parents panic quickly, even though they go away on their own. Eddie looks young, so Ellie is probably his first child. He might not know any better.
“That’s great, kiddo!” Steve tells her, holding up both his hands for a high-five. She leans in, eyeing his palms for a moment and lining her own up in the air carefully before slapping them with all her strength. He recoils back, pretending that her hit was harder than it was and it sends Ellie into a fit of giggles. “Oh my goodness! What strength you have, mighty princess! I bet you can slay any dragon.”
More giggles.
Good, her lungs work just fine, her arms seem like they aren’t hurting anymore, and her coordination is adequate for her age.
Steve glances down at her shoes. They’re a bit worse for wear, but the panels on the sides tell him that they probably light up. Excellent.
“Hey, Ellie. Do your shoes do anything cool when you stomp them?” She glances down at her feet before nodding excitedly in response. “Can I see? You can just kick your legs on the bed and it should work the same.”
The pup listens, kicking her tiny legs as hard as she can until her shoes give off a show of light. Perfect. No leg pain then.
“Wow! That’s awesome!”
Robin might run a few tests, just to make sure, but Steve is confident now that Ellie is perfectly fine.
“Do your shoes do cool stuff too?” Ellie asks curiously, pointing at his Crocs.
He stomps his feet on the ground for a moment before pouting at the pup dramatically. “Sorry, princess. No lights. Just sparkles.”
As much shit as his coworkers give him for his obnoxious Crocs, the kids love them. They can pry his butterfly jibbitz and pink clogs out of his cold dead hands. He’s never found any other shoes as comfortable as these, so the bling is just a bonus.
“Yeah. They’re really pretty though,” she states matter of factly, as if that makes up for their lack of illumination abilities.
“Thank you, Princess Ellie,” he replies, taking down a few notes on his clipboard so he doesn’t forget.
He just needs to look over the vitals that they got from her at triage and then he can report to Robin and give her the go-ahead to come check Ellie out.
“You’re really pretty too- oh, no wait! Dad said that boys don’t like when you call them pretty sometimes and I should ask first? Are you a ‘mega, Nurse Steve? Can I call you pretty?” Ellie chatters away, touching the tiara on top of her head and looking around the rest of the room curiously.
Steve chuckles at her observation. It’s a policy that all hospital employees wear strong scent neutralizing perfumes and hide any outward signs of their secondary genders in order to provide care without distractions. There’s a near invisible patch over his mating gland so that most people can’t tell that he’s an omega if they don’t already know.
But children are observant and they call Steve out for it occasionally.
He’s been told that he doesn’t have much of a scent even without the perfume, but there’s nothing he can do about the bump on the side of his throat aside from the flimsy patch.
No point in lying about something so silly.
“You’re right. I am an omega, Ellie. And I don’t mind being called pretty, but thank you for asking. That was kind of you to check,” he tells the pup, giving her a soft smile.
Steve glances over at Eddie, curious to see how he’s reacting to all of this. He tends to ignore the parents if they’re not talking since they aren’t his primary patients, but he’s been near silent the entire encounter so far.
The alpha has his arms tightly crossed on his chest and he’s biting his lip hard. Clear signs of someone trying to hide their anxiety. Steve can relate, even if it’s not his child being prodded at the hospital. He worries about the pups he takes care of like they were his own.
Again, a pang of empathy hits him hard for the man. Eddie seems like he really cares about Ellie. He’s a better father than the majority that he sees in the emergency room.
“Do you have any bandaids, Nurse Steve? I like the Care Bear ones, but dad says they’re too ‘spensive. So we have the boring ones at home,” Ellie tells him, laying on her stomach now, face in her hands as she watches Steve with wide eyes.
He chuckles, reaching into his scrub pockets and pulling out a couple bandaids. Eyeing them quickly to see what he’s got, he announces, “Sorry, no Care Bears, but I do have My Little Pony, some kitty cats, and rainbows. Any takers?”
She nods excitedly until her tiara almost falls off her head. It’s saved by a few stray curls that it’s nestled in. Without thinking, Steve reaches for the cheap plastic, trying to right it.
His hand brushes something warm and he has to quickly retreat from the touch of Eddie’s hand against his own.
“Sorry!” Steve rushes to apologize. Alphas can be weirdly territorial about their kids sometimes, at least when they’re hurt or in danger. He’s not exactly a threat to anyone as an omega, but he’s definitely not a pack member to Ellie or Eddie.
Mostly because he doesn’t have a pack.
Still, he should’ve thought it through before doing something careless like that.
“It’s fine, I should’ve been paying more attention,” Eddie assures him. He finishes fixing Ellie’s tiara, then lets his hand move to her back, like he needs to reassure himself that she’s okay.
Time for Steve to do his good deed of the day and help the struggling alpha.
“Hey, Ellie?” She looks up at him right away. “If I give you some stickers, can you be a good girl for a few minutes so your dad and I can talk outside real quick? We’ll only be gone for a little while.”
The pup nods happily, holding her fists out and making grabby hands towards him.
Steve chuckles at the enthusiasm, digging into his pockets to find a couple stickers and placing them in her grasp as well as the previously offered bandaids.
“Thanks, Nurse Steve!” Ellie gasps, looking at them with sheer delight.
“You’re very welcome, princess,” Steve replies, nodding his head towards the door and waiting for Eddie to follow him into the hallway.
It’s fairly empty since census has been low today, so he doesn’t bother to go further than the chairs right outside the exam room and sit down.
“Is she gonna be okay?”
Steve’s head whips to the side to look at Eddie, who genuinely does look like he’s gonna cry now.
Shit. Had he not made it clear that she was okay? Did him asking to speak to the dad alone for a few minutes make it seem like something was wrong with his daughter? Fuck.
“Oh no, I think she’s completely fine!” Steve rushes to correct the idea, hands raised in a show of surrender. “It seems like Ellie just had a spell of growing pains and they’ve resolved now, so there shouldn’t be anything to worry about. Of course, I’ll talk to Dr. Buckley and see if there’s anything else to test, but everything I checked looked totally normal.”
Eddie stares at him unblinking for a moment before his head drops between his legs, hands coming up to hold his face.
“God, I just fucking suck at this parenting stuff,” the alpha mutters under his breath. Steve doesn’t bother to chastise him for the swearing since there aren’t any kids around. Truthfully, the guy seems like he could use a good F-bomb (or twenty) right now. “I don’t know what I’m doing with her and it’s like everytime I react to something she does or says, I manage to screw it up.”
His heart clenches at the sheer pain flowing from Eddie. And Steve’s not a parent, but he knows what it’s like to feel like a failure. To feel like nothing he does is right, no matter how hard he tries.
Maybe Eddie’s mate is their daughter’s primary caretaker and he doesn’t normally have to do the hard stuff. Either way, Steve wants to help.
“Being a parent isn’t easy. If it was, everyone would have kids, Eddie,” Steve starts, hesitantly reaching a hand out and patting the alpha on the back gently.
Therapeutic touch is one of those funny things that either works spectacularly or makes people want to stab you in the throat. He’s usually good at knowing when to use it.
Eddie melts into the touch, his body untensing slowly. He doesn’t unbury his face, but he does ask quietly, “Do you have kids, Steve?”
Damn. It’s the one question that always makes people think his advice is worthless even though he takes care of children for a living.
“I don’t… but I’ve seen enough of them to have learned a thing or two. And if I’m ever lucky enough to have some of my own, I know it will be a challenge because raising pups is hard. Harder than most things in life,” he explains, doing his best to comfort the distraught father next to him. “For what it’s worth, I think you’re doing a great job with her. She’s sweet and kind, speaks in mostly complete sentences, and even has manners. Most kids just take my stickers and then complain that they didn’t have the right Paw Patrol dog on them.”
Eddie finally chuckles at that, sitting up slowly and lowering his hands to his lap. The alpha turns to look at him, eyes a bit shinier than before.
Steve just smiles softly back at him, waiting for a response of some sort.
He’s not expecting the virtual stranger to pull him into a grateful hug, but it happens in the blink of a second. One moment, Eddie’s looking all weepy and staring at him. The next, he’s got his arms around Steve and is grabbing onto him like a child would hold their teddy bear in the middle of the night when they hear a thump from their closet.
Eddie’s clearly terrified of something.
But the surprise touch makes Steve’s response time slow. He can’t push the alpha away, not when he can tell how badly he needs a hug apparently. Even if Steve himself is a bit uncomfortable. He doesn’t even remember the last time he was hugged by anyone besides a pup.
Maybe it was when Nancy dumped him last year and tried to console him as he had a nervous breakdown over it? Yeah, that was probably it.
He slowly raises his arms, returning the hug and patting Eddie on the back.
“Hey, you’re okay…” Steve hesitates on what name to use and ends the sentences lamely with, “man.” He internally cringes at his own awkwardness. Why are adults so much more complicated than children? “Ellie clearly loves you and she’s healthy and happy. That’s all that matters, right?”
Eddie nods into his shoulder once before suddenly seeming to realize what he’s doing. He lets go of Steve and rears back like he’s been burned, looking horrified by his own actions.
Immediately, apologies spill from the alpha’s mouth. “I’m so sorry! That was super inappropriate and I should’ve asked first or- or not done that at all because you’re at your job and you’re too nice to push me away. I just- I’m struggling more than I thought I would to take care of her. I thought I was ready and now I feel like an idiot.”
Steve hasn’t a clue what Eddie is talking about, but his interest is piqued. Is Ellie adopted? Or has her dad not always been in the picture? A million questions fly through his head, but he swats them away. This isn’t about him being nosy. It’s about a hurting family.
“You’re not an idiot, you’re a dad. I don’t really know what’s going on in your life, but I know your daughter adores you and she needs you. So, we’re going to clean ourselves up.” Steve reaches for a box of tissues on a table next to him. How convenient. He hands a few to Eddie, watching as the man dabs at his eyes until they look semi-normal. “And we’re going to go back in there and show Ellie that everything is fine. You don’t have to believe it all the time- because the world is fucking exhausting, but you have to make her believe it. She’s five. That means her dad is invincible and she can be a princess when she grows up. You’ve got this.”
Eddie nods at him, looking a bit dumbstruck by his speech. Good. Something must have stuck then. He was hoping that at least a little of that would make sense.
Steve stands up and the alpha follows suit, making for the exam room again. Before he can open it, Eddie places a hesitant hand on his shoulder, making him turn back to see what he needs.
“Thank you, Steve.” He smiles at the dad, happy to be useful to someone. Eddie clears his throat awkwardly, his gaze darting away from Steve’s. “And… for what it’s worth, I think you’ll make a great mom one day if you end up deciding to have kids. You seem to know a hell of a lot about them.”
The kind words are hard to swallow. Knowing what he knows. Having lived through the rejection of someone he thought was going to be his mate one day, someone he thought he’d have pups of his own with.
He hasn’t dated since then and nobody really tries either. It’s why Argyle and Robin expend so much energy determinedly trying to set him up with random people in the ER, even if there aren’t many single parents. They just want him to be happy.
So being a mother to his own kids probably isn’t in the cards for Steve, but he appreciates Eddie’s sentiment nonetheless. It means he’s a good nurse and that counts for a lot in his book.
It may not completely fulfill his desires, but that’s okay. Steve’s used to compromises. He lives on them.
“Thanks,” he responds simply, turning away before he lets this affect him any more.
When Steve carefully opens the curtain, he’s hit with the cutest sight he’s seen all week. Ellie is curled up on the bed fast asleep, tiara halfway off, face plastered in various stickers, and arms covered in colorful bandaids. The picture of carefree happiness.
He fights back his instinctual urge to chirp at the sweetness of it all.
Ellie isn’t his daughter, she’s Eddie’s. But this is something the alpha needs to see. A well-loved pup can heal the heart more than anything else. Whatever Eddie is going through, his daughter is the perfect medicine to his hurt.
Steve glances over to see Eddie’s face melt into an expression of pure adoration and love for his child. It’s heartwarming, especially accompanied by the comforting smell the man is emitting. Decidedly better than the stress that was wafting earlier. In fact, it’s nicer than most scents Steve’s experienced. Full of warmth and a sense of protection, of home and safety.
He finds himself leaning closer to the alpha and that’s what harshly snaps him back to reality.
Eddie is likely mated already to some beautiful omega. One who’s pretty and smart and made a cute pup with him. Their life is probably perfect in every way, full of domestic bliss and affection.
This isn’t Steve’s happy ending, it’s someone else’s. And that’s okay.
“I’m going to let the doctor know you’re ready to see her. I’m sure she’ll get you guys discharged quickly since Ellie is clearly not in any pain anymore,” Steve whispers, mindful of the sleeping girl nearby.
Eddie looks over at him, seeming surprised by what he’s saying.
“Oh. Okay. So, will you be coming back or…?”
He tries not to let that mean anything to him. It shouldn’t.
“Um. Only if you need something from me. There’s a call button on the wall if you have a question. Otherwise, someone from intake will bring you some discharge forms when Dr. Buckley is finished with you,” Steve explains, gesturing to the speaker mounted above the bed.
The omega starts to move towards the door. For some reason, Eddie takes a step closer to him, like he can’t help himself from doing so.
“Thank you. Again. For everything. Ellie really doesn’t like hospitals, but you made her smile and laugh, so hopefully she’ll have new memories of the nice nurse who took care of her. I’m eternally grateful for that,” Eddie rambles, staring him dead in the eyes.
It feels like he can’t leave, not with the way the man is looking at him so intensely. It’s a lot. And he can’t quite figure out why.
“You’re welcome. Just doing my job, but I’m happy I could help,” Steve replies, trying to shrug off the praise. “And I hope all goes well with… everything.” They both know that he’s referring to Eddie’s minor mental breakdown in the hallway earlier.
The alpha nods, finally breaking their eye contact and allowing him the freedom to leave. He may not want to, but he has a job to do. There are more sick and hurting children here than just the adorable one with the insanely attractive father who has poor spatial awareness.
Steve sneaks out before he can change his mind and find a reason to stay.
Once again, he reminds himself that this isn’t his happy ending.
He makes a quick detour to wash his hands and splash cold water on his face in the bathroom before returning to the nurses’ station. Just for good measure. Definitely not because he’s blushing like mad and unable to get his heart rate down.
“Why do you look like you’ve seen a ghost, dingus? Get puke on your Crocs again? I told you that wearing shoes with holes in them is counter productive to working with children. They’re all wet and snotty all the time,” Robin bombards him the moment he returns, clearly finishing off his bag of trail mix as she does some charting on the computer.
Argyle chimes in with a knowing smile, “Nah, man. That’s the look of someone who just found his future husband. Is he handsome? Does he have a kid? Hold on, was it the DILF I sent your way?”
Steve plops himself into an open chair and rests his forehead against the desk. He knows he wiped it down not that long ago, so it can’t be that dirty.
“I hate you both so much. Stop trying to get me mated off to the first available alpha who walks through the ER doors,” he grumbles, staying exactly where he is. “Also, they’re ready to see you in room three, Robin. She’s fine. Probably just growing pains. Resolved without intervention. Completely knocked out when I left.”
Robin makes a short hum of acknowledgement, getting up from the computer and shoving her things in various drawers.
“Oh yeah, Argyle. He’s got it bad. I’ve diagnosed him officially. Steve Harrington has got a serious case of ‘lovesick over a DILF-itis.’ It’s terminal, no known cure at this time.”