Chapter Text
Night shift… Either people love it or they hate it.
There’s plenty to hate about it, really. It wrecks your sleep cycle, jacks up your risk of cancer, cardiovascular disease, digestive issues. It’s like playing roulette with your internal organs. One especially charming fact? Night shift workers can expect to lose about fifteen years off their lives.
Even with the promise of an early death and digestive ruin, someone still has to clock in anyway.
It’ll probably ruin you. It’ll take years off your life. It’s not healthy, it’s not balanced. But someone has to show up for it. Someone always does.
-
Agatha Harkness fucking loves night shift.
She believes that in a hospital, it’s easily the best shift. Fewer people. Quieter halls. Most of the self righteous day staff disappear when the sun disappears, and the ones who stick around tend to be too tired to keep up the act. Not that it's completely free of obnoxious coworkers, but no job ever is. That’s just the curse of shared oxygen.
And the pay? Delightfully absurd. A few extra dollars an hour to embrace less fluorescent lighting, the occasional spiral into an existential cirsis, and losing the ability to behave like a functioning member of society during the day. Honestly? Bargain.
Agatha doesn’t love working nights for the pay or to silently push herself toward an early grave.
She loves it because no one gives a damn if she doesn’t smile. There's no pressure to perform, no expectation of charm. She shows up, does her job, and no one asks her to pretend to be someone that she’s not.
There’s this myth that nights are easier. That things settle down. Patients don’t crash, alarms don’t blare, nobody spirals into a medical emergency after the sun goes down.
That couldn’t be further from the truth.
Emergencies don’t clock out. They just get harder to see in the dark.
And on the worst nights, when things really fall apart, there’s always a full moon.
That part isn’t superstition. It’s consistency. A full moon shows up and everything goes to absolute shit. Machines fail for no reason. People get fucking weird. The laws of physics bend out spite.
It’s chaos. Unapologetic and total.
Agatha doesn’t just handle it. She thrives in it.
Order is fine, in theory. It’s neat. It’s cute. But chaos? It’s messy, brutal, and unpredictable- but it’s real.
-
Agatha is back on nights after over a decade away from them.
She’s also back in Westview.
It’s not a small town- never was. It’s suburbia with too many people, too many intersections, and too many places pretending to be important. The traffic makes no sense, the strip malls all smell vaguely like sweat and fried food, and if there’s a charming side to Westview, it’s buried under a Target, a vape shop, and a mattress store that’s definitely laundering money.
And she loves it.
It’s where she went to college. Where she started over after clawing herself out from under her mother’s roof, her mother’s rules, and her mother’s voice- now, thankfully, all six feet under. Westview was hers before anything else ever was, and she’s not sorry to be back.
Westview was supposed to be permanent. And for a while, it was.
Until Wanda.
They met at a bar. One of those loud, overlit places where everyone’s shouting over each other and the drinks are five dollars too expensive. Wanda had a quick smile and a brilliant mind, and Agatha had been too tired to resist either.
The first year of their relationship, Agatha gave up night shift. She’d been a NICU nurse at St. Rita’s Memorial Hospital straight out of college. She’d built her career on nights and never intended to leave them. But relationships, she reasoned, were about compromise. The second year, they got engaged. Before the end of that year, they were married and relocating to the Windy City so Wanda could step into a shiny new position.
Wanda worked in administration, back when she still remembered what that meant. It obviously didn’t take long for ex-wife to climb. She was good at her job, knew how to play the game. Agatha watched her go from clipboard and sensible heels to executive decisions and boardroom smiles. Somewhere along the way, it changed. Wanda stopped talking about care plans and started talking about cost-efficiency. The person who once fought for nurses was now the reason they were short staffed.
Agatha didn’t follow her then wife to Chicago because she believed in the dream. She followed her because staying no longer felt like an option. Wanda was certain. She made plans, gave names to things, Agatha never had to translate her silences. And maybe that was the appeal. There were no rules to navigate, no words to interpret.
Wanda’s offer came with just enough forward motion to feel like an escape. It was easier to chase a new zip code than to sit still with everything that wasn’t working. So she packed her life into cardboard boxes, told herself she’d find her footing again, and pretended it didn’t feel like she was leaving a part of herself behind on purpose.
But it’s been long enough.
Agatha was home now.
Back at St. Rita’s, working nights as a NICU nurse again, in a hospital that remembers her even if most of the staff doesn’t. The shifts are brutal, the halls are dim, and the chaos is familiar in a way that feels comforting.
Agatha knows exactly what she signed up for. And this time, she’s not leaving.
That is, until her very first night back on nights.
She’d trained for three months on days, but now she was back where she belonged, elbow deep in chaos at 2:30 a.m., drawing labs on a micro preemie who -judging by the flailing limbs and oxygen desats- was deeply committed to playing patty cake with Jesus anytime Agatha so much as touched his arm. Totally normal behavior for a micro. They hate being messed with, and they make sure you know it.
She’d just finished and was now standing at the bedside computer, charting her victory, when she heard the door to the pod open.
The whirr of the portable x-ray machine was familiar, unremarkable. Both of Agatha’s babies had morning x-rays ordered, so she didn’t bother turning around. The tech would need time to set up, and she needed to wrap up her charting. It was routine. Normal. Nothing she hadn’t done a billion times before.
“Heard you guys were having a party… Who invited day shift?”
Agatha froze. Her spine went rigid at the sound of that voice.
This wasn’t happening. That voice. That person. She wasn’t supposed to be here. She was supposed to be at Westview Regional, the same place that woman worked at nearly ten years ago. Out of sight. Out of reach. Out of Agatha’s goddamn life.
She inhaled slowly, bracing herself to face the woman she had spent the better part of a decade not thinking about. Or pretending not to. Success had never really been the point. Agatha was excellent at rewriting her own narrative when it suited her.
Denial was a river in Egypt, and she'd been floating along it with a drink in hand and no intention of docking.
Agatha turned around with her shoulders tall, head held high, and met the face of the last person she wanted to see.
Rio Vidal stood beside the portable x-ray machine in forest green scrubs, her hair clipped back. Those brown eyes scanned Agatha’s face with a slight arch of her brow and the faint press of her tongue into her cheek.
Then Rio’s gaze dropped. It traveled down Agatha’s body, obnoxious and obvious, before dragging back up with the same infuriating ease.
“Didn’t think Wanda let you out after dark.”
Rio was fighting a smirk. Agatha could see it, and it made her want to rip a lead apron in half.
“What are you doing here?” Agatha asked, too clipped to pass for casual.
Rio glanced to the side, then back at her with mock innocence. “My job?”
Agatha rolled her eyes and scoffed just as the respiratory therapist made her way over to the bedspace to help with the x-ray. The baby was intubated, which meant it was a two person job. The RT reached for one of the heavy lead aprons hanging from the front of the portable and slipped it on.
“How long has it been, Agatha?” Rio asked, voice light. “Since you acquired the Darkhold? You hid behind all that dark magic.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
Agatha stepped up to the isolette, flipping open the access ports without waiting for a reply. On the other side, the RT mirrored her movements, her voice bright and oblivious.
“Don’t mind Rio,” the RT said, adjusting her grip on the baby’s ET tube. “She’s always been a little odd, but she’s the NICU’s favorite x-ray tech.”
By then, Rio was dragging the x-ray arm into position over the isolette.
It took everything in Agatha not to snap. She could feel her jaw lock tight, every word she wanted to say caught behind clenched teeth. Instead, she forced a smile toward the RT, one that absolutely did not reach her eyes. It felt brittle. It probably looked worse.
Agatha hummed flatly and turned her attention to the baby instead, carefully moving the wires and leads aside so they wouldn’t show up in the image.
“That is so lovely, Sharon,” Rio said from Sheryl's side of the isolette. She leaned in a little and added in a mock whisper, “You’re my favorite RT. Don’t tell the others.”
Sharon laughed, clearly enjoying the attention. “Oh, Rio. Your secret’s safe with me.”
Agatha made a disgusted sound in the back of her throat and kept positioning the baby.
Rio moved to her side of the isolette, holding the small x-ray detector in both hands. “Ma’lady,” she said with a mock bow.
Agatha stepped back just enough to give her room, but kept her hands inside the isolette. Rio slid out the tray that holds the detector and placed it gently into position. Her hand brushed lightly against Agatha’s stomach in the process.
“Watch it,” Agatha muttered through clenched teeth.
Rio just gave a casual salute and walked back to the portable, grabbing the corded exposure button and stepping a few feet away. “You know, Agatha,” she called over her shoulder, “you really should be wearing lead.”
“Don’t tell me what to do.”
The machine powered up with a loud hum. A moment later, it beeped loudly, signaling the image had been taken.
“How’s it look, Rio?” Sherry asked.
“Positioning’s perfect. All required anatomy is there,” Rio said. “As for anything else, well… they don’t pay me enough to have opinions.”
Sharon laughed too loud, clearly enjoying herself more than the moment deserved.
Once the exam was finished, Rio walked back over to the isolette, reached for the machine’s arm, and retrieved the detector. Agatha shifted as much as she could without letting go of the baby, her body contorting at an odd angle to keep her arms steady in the isolette while making absolutely certain Rio wouldn’t come close enough to graze her again.
Agatha and some name starting with an S- worked together to settle the preemie again. Carefully readjusting until the infant stopped protesting with full body fury enough for him to remember how to breathe.
Her second patient wasn’t intubated, so the RT didn’t stick around. But not before she tossed a warning over her shoulder, “You really should listen to Rio. That lead’s not just decoration.” Sharla crossed the pod to another bedspace without fanfare, her lead apron still in place, chatting easily with whoever was next in line.
Agatha didn’t answer. Just rolled her eyes and kept her expression flat.
It wasn’t that Agatha didn’t know better. The dose was tiny. But for people who stood in it every night, leaned in close, kept their hands inside while the image was taken- it could start to add up. So yeah, lead aprons and distance were habits probably worth keeping, but no one was forcing it. You did what felt right. Some people wore it every time. Some didn’t. Agatha didn’t always bother. It usually depended on the day.
Agatha moved on to her next patient in the bedspace over. Rio followed, rolling the portable behind her and parking it at the isolette.
When the very annoying RT was out of earshot, Agatha turned back to the machine and ripped the lead apron from its hook. She pulled it on, fastened it tight across her torso, and adjusted the thyroid shield around her neck without looking up.
Rio was watching her. The corners of her mouth hinted at a smile she didn’t bother to hide.
Agatha didn’t give her the courtesy of eye contact.
Agatha adjusted the micro into position while Rio set up the machine. When Rio came around to her side to place the detector, Agatha didn’t even look up.
“Nope,” Agatha said simply, nodding toward the opposite side of the isolette, where no one was standing.
Rio sighed and rolled her eyes but didn’t argue. She circled around the machine and did exactly what she was told.
As she worked, Agatha glanced up. She hadn’t seen Rio in ten years and for a second, she just wanted to look.
But the second her eyes found Rio’s face, Rio looked up too. Their eyes met briefly, and Agatha dropped her gaze just as fast.
Rio didn’t miss it. “So,” she said, drawing it out. “How’s the ol’ ball and chain?”
“Not your damn beeswax,” Agatha snapped.
Rio’s eyes went wide with amusement. She said nothing, pressing her tongue into her cheek to keep from laughing as she moved back to the portable.
When it was done, Agatha tore the lead off her body and neck, not bothering with care or quiet, and dropped it back onto the machine.
After her x-rays were done, Agatha dropped into the high rolling chair, the seat bouncing under her with a dull thud. She focused on charting, jaw tight, while Rio made her way around the pod, hitting a few more bedspaces, talking to every nurse or RT she crossed paths with.
Agatha didn’t dare turn around. But her ears were absolutely working overtime.
“Those new scrubs? That color looks great on you!”
There was a soft laugh from the nurse.
Agatha scoffed under her breath. “Fucking flirt,” she mumbled, clicking a little harder on the mouse than she needed to.
A few minutes passed. She kept her head down when she heard the wheels of the portable rolling toward the door. Agatha wasn’t going to look. That was the plan.
“Sweetheart.”
Her head turned before she could stop it. Instinct. Old, dumb muscle memory.
Rio was in the doorway, backing out with the portable in front of her. Her smile was soft.
“I’m glad you’re back.” It wasn’t a performance. There was no dig tucked into it. Only sincerity.
Agatha gave a nod and the flattest version of a smile she could manage. It wasn’t warm, but it wasn’t cruel either.
Rio’s smile widened slightly, the gap in her teeth flashing for half a second before she disappeared through the door.
Agatha turned back to her charting and kept her eyes on the screen, pretending her pulse hadn’t changed at all.
-
Agatha and Rio’s friendship had always defied explanation. It was subterranean. Pressurized. Preserved in a way that made it feel ancient and untouched, even now.
There had never been a confession. Never a moment Agatha could point to and say, ‘There that’s when I knew.’ But it lived in her anyway. In the unspoken rules. In the stillness between jokes. In the way her chest still tightened, all these years later, when something reminded her of Rio and there was no one to say it to.
They weren’t soulmates. They weren’t lovers. They were best friends in a way that ruins a person for anyone else. Best friends in the way that made everything after feel performative.
Agatha didn’t lose Rio because of some spectacular fallout. There was no fight, no betrayal, no line crossed. Just the slow accumulation of choices that didn’t include her. The slow realization that if something wasn’t named, it couldn’t be mourned.
Even now, divorced and hollowed out by it, Agatha couldn’t explain the loss without sounding delusional.
They met seventeen years ago. Through other people. It wasn’t fate. It wasn’t even remarkable. But somehow they’d locked into each other instantly, like two objects caught in each other’s orbit.
Alice had introduced her casually- Rio Vidal, Westview Regional. Didn’t say much else. Didn’t need to. Rio was impossible to miss. She had been leaned back in a cheap plastic chair, black hoodie, one converse resting on the table like it lived there. Unlit cigarette hanging from her mouth, shuffling a deck of cards. Rio glanced up only once.
“Who invited day shift?”
Agatha had shown up to game night out of spite, not interest. Jen had invited her- probably as some warped professional courtesy after their first week on nights together. She hadn’t planned to stay long. Definitely hadn’t planned to notice anyone.
But then a woman named Rio Vidal opened her stupid fucking mouth. And Agatha forgot she’d come there to be unimpressed.
Jen tried to smooth it over, but Agatha wasn’t having it. She sat down, yanked the cards from Rio, and made it her personal mission to win everything for the rest of the night out of pure, targeted pettiness.
They didn’t speak much that night. Agatha left with a headache and no intention of ever seeing Rio again.
Which, in retrospect, might’ve been when everything started.
They didn’t work at the same hospital. Didn’t even live in the same part of town. There was no real reason for them to keep crossing paths after that first game night.
But somehow, they did.
Group things, mostly. Birthdays, breakfasts and nights out organized by mutual friends. They kept ending up in the same places, standing near each other like it was accidental, even when it wasn’t.
They barely spoke at first. Just exchanged looks. Sniped a little. But Rio was the kind of person who could piss someone off without even trying, and Agatha had always been easy to provoke.
Barely speaking turned into constant bickering.
Agatha told herself it was the principle of the thing. That Rio was rude and needed to be humbled. That it wasn’t personal…
…Eventually, the texts started. Then the nicknames. Then the habit of showing up for things neither of them actually wanted to attend just because the other one would be there. They weren’t friends. They were foils. That’s what Agatha told herself. Opposites. A bit. A long running joke.
It happened so gradually, Agatha didn’t even realize she’d started checking her phone for Rio’s name without meaning to. Or that Rio had started asking what days she was off like it was logistical, not emotional.
There was no confession. No shift in tone. Nothing overt. But Rio stopped flinching when Agatha sat too close. And Agatha stopped pretending she didn’t feel better in Rio’s presence. They didn’t talk about it. That was the unspoken rule.
Agatha stopped correcting people when they said Rio was her best friend. And Rio -who didn’t let anyone in, who kept people at arm’s length even when hugging them- never once pulled away from Agatha.
They became each other’s default. Quietly. Permanently. Without realizing it had happened.
People made assumptions, of course. About whether they were more than friends, about the way they moved around each other. Agatha always denied it. So did Rio. And neither of them were lying. But Agatha would be lying if she said there weren’t moments.
Long, quiet, difficult to categorize moments. Nights where their laughter went too soft. Where Rio’s eyes stayed on Agatha’s mouth a second too long. Where Agatha didn’t move away when Rio leaned in too close and didn’t make a joke to break the tension.
They never touched though, not in a way that would’ve changed anything.
But it would’ve taken almost nothing.
And suddenly the joke wasn’t funny anymore. Or maybe it was, but neither of them were laughing.
Then came Wanda along.
A bar. A drink Agatha didn’t like and a stranger who smiled at her.
Wanda didn’t flirt. She asked. She invited. She followed up.
Agatha, too tired to play along and too curious not to, said yes.
Wanda never liked Rio. Said she was arrogant. That the jokes were cruel, the calm was fake, the detachment exhausting. Said Agatha acted differently around her. Smart mouthed. Less filtered.
Agatha pretended not to care. She said Wanda didn’t get it. That Rio was all bark, no bite. That their friendship was weird but harmless.
Rio started answering texts later than usual. Started showing up less. She stopped lingering after things. Started bowing out with ‘next time’ instead of excuses.
Agatha thought maybe it was just scheduling. That Rio was busy. That it wasn’t about her.
But when she asked, offhand, if she was coming to a party Wanda was hosting, Rio just said, “No,” and didn’t explain. No sarcasm. No performance. Just… nothing.
That’s when it started: the quiet.
A distance that felt more like mercy than resentment.
Rio was giving her space. And Agatha- stupidly, blindly- took it.
Agatha told herself it was maturity. Boundaries. A natural shift. People grow up, grow apart. It wasn’t a big deal.
It was a huge deal. She just hadn’t seen it yet.
When Agatha told Rio she was moving to Chicago, Rio didn’t argue.
Rio didn’t say don’t go. Didn’t ask if it was what Agatha really wanted. She just nodded and said she was happy for Agatha. That was it.
Agatha realized she didn’t want support. Not from Rio. Not like that. Not when she was moving across the country with someone Rio couldn’t even pretend to like.
They said goodbye in the kitchen of Agatha’s apartment. Wanda was in the next room, probably pretending not to listen. Rio stood by the sink with her arms crossed.
She stepped forward and hugged Agatha- brief, careful, like she didn’t trust herself with more. Rio smelled like clean laundry. Her arms were solid, but the rest of her felt like scaffolding, like something holding itself up out of sheer will.
When she pulled back, she gave Agatha a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. A small one. The smile people use when they don’t want to be asked how they’re doing. A smile that says, ‘I’m happy for you. Please don’t ask me to prove it.’
And Agatha didn’t.
She let Rio walk out the door without asking the question they’d both been avoiding for years.
Even though something in her chest pulled so hard it felt like gravity had broken.
It would’ve been easier if they’d fought. If someone had yelled or accused or slammed the door. But instead, they both stood still and let the moment pass.
Let each other pass.
Rio never asked her to stay. And Agatha, god help her, needed Rio to ask.
But she was Agatha Harkness, stubborn and loyal to all the wrong things.
She let Rio go.
Now, years later, Agatha’s back.
Back at St. Rita’s. Back on nights. Back in the NICU where everything still works the same and no one remembers her name.
She didn’t come back for closure. She didn’t come back for anyone.
Agatha came back because it was hers first.
And now Rio’s here too.
Not at another hospital. Not somewhere safely distant. Here. Wearing scrubs. Working nights. Acting like nothing happened.
Agatha doesn’t know how long Rio’s been at St. Rita’s, and she’s not about to ask. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like she planned her move back based on who might be on the payroll.
But it’s still jarring.
There’s no rule against running into someone you haven’t spoken to in ten years and realizing nothing about them has changed except their hair and the exact angle of the knife they twist in your gut.
Agatha’s fine.
Agatha’s not mad.
She just wants to know who the fuck decided to keep that particular bit of very fucking important information classified.
-
The second Agatha stepped off the elevator, she called Jen. She didn’t care if she was asleep or not.
“Hello,” Jen answered, voice thick with sleep.
“What the actual fuck,” Agatha hissed into the speaker, walking fast through the crowd of day shift arrivals.
“You need-”
“Yes, I need, bitch,” Agatha snapped. “I need a fucking Xanax because you somehow forgot to mention that she fucking works here now.” She was whispering through gritted teeth, eyes darting around the crowd in case someone might overhear. Not that anyone cared. Everyone was too busy on their way to clock in or dragging themselves home.
“I tried to-”
Before Jen could finish, Agatha yelped. Rio had materialized in front of her like she’d been summoned.
“Holy shit,” Agatha breathed, hand flying to her chest.
Rio stood there with her backpack slung over her shoulders, staring at her, teeth pressed into the inside of her cheek.
“Where the fuck did you come from?” Agatha barked, already hanging up on Jen without letting her finish.
Rio didn’t answer. She just tilted her head toward the wall Agatha had walked past- apparently where she’d been standing the whole time, probably waiting for Agatha to leave.
Agatha stepped around her, heading for the exit pretending she hadn’t just been jump scared in the middle of the hallway. She could hear Rio’s footsteps falling into place behind her.
“What do you want?” Agatha snapped, not bothering to look over her shoulder.
Rio’s voice was calm, almost bored. “Special breakfast?”
That made Agatha falter.
Special breakfast was their thing- hers, Jen’s, Alice’s, Rio’s. Whoever had worked the same night would meet up afterward, get breakfast and maybe a cocktail, try to rinse off the alarm fatigue before heading home to sleep. It had been routine, once. Safe. Familiar.
Hearing Rio say it now felt like being served a memory with a side of emotional whiplash.
“Nope.”
“That’s fine. I’ll try again tomorrow,” Rio said, already falling into step beside her.
Agatha turned her head to look at her, jaw tight. “What are you trying to do?”
Rio didn’t answer right away. She kept walking, expression unreadable, steps easy. When they reached the double doors, she moved ahead and held one open for Agatha..
“Walking you to your car,” Rio said.
That wasn’t what Agatha meant.
She didn’t need someone to hold a door. She didn’t need politeness, or performative courtesy. She meant, what the hell is this? After ten years. After the most awkward, quiet, gut wrenching goodbye Agatha had ever lived through- and she was a recent divorcee, which really should’ve set the bar. After ten years of silence so absolute that it was noticeably intentional. And now Rio was holding a door open for her, talking about breakfast, like none of it had ever happened.
It was surreal. It was absolutely fucking insane. It was exactly the kind of thing Rio would do.
Agatha didn’t respond. The walk to her car stayed quiet. She wasn’t going to entertain this and honestly, she couldn’t have figured out how even if she tried.
What she did notice was Rio shifting her backpack around to the front of her body, unzipping the same front pocket she’d always used for her keys. That small, familiar habit made Agatha exhale before she even realized she’d been holding her breath.
Rio looked up, caught her eye for a second, then looked away and swung the backpack back into place. Like she hadn’t meant to be seen. Like she didn’t want Agatha to recognize that she still did things exactly the same.
Agatha pressed her lips together and bit the inside of her cheek. Something else to focus on. Something else to hurt.
“See you tonight?” Rio asked, peeling off toward the far end of the lot.
Agatha grunted.
Rio’s laugh rang out behind her, loud and smug and completely unnecessary.
And Agatha kept walking, pretending it wasn’t the sound of her past catching up to her.
-
Agatha pulled into her driveway and immediately spotted Jennifer Kale leaning against the hood of her car, arms crossed, clearly waiting. She looked like she’d rolled out of bed minutes ago- sweats, a wrinkled t-shirt.
She didn’t acknowledge Jen. She killed the engine, grabbed her shit, and headed straight to her front door.
“Agatha!” Jen called after her.
Agatha kept walking. Jen’s footsteps followed, quickening behind her. “I tried to tell you-”
Agatha stopped cold. Turned. “When?” She snapped.
Jen raised her brow. “You serious?”
“Yeah. I am.” Agatha stepped closer. “I want to know when. Because I’m pretty sure I’d remember that.”
“I tried at breakfast- more than once. I tried that day during report when I said, ‘Hey, you should probably know who’s working in Imaging now,’ and you literally said, ‘If this is about her, don’t.’”
Agatha’s stomach turned. The words were familiar. She remembered saying them. She just hadn’t let herself actually hear it.
Jen didn’t stop. “I tried when Alice brought her up in front of you and you changed the subject so fast it gave me whiplash. I tried when you said, ‘I don’t care what she’s doing, I don’t want to know.’
Agatha perused her lips and said nothing.
“So no,” Jen said. “I didn’t spell it out for you because you made it very clear you didn’t want to know.”
That was the fucked up part. Agatha hadn’t been lying when she said it. She hadn’t wanted to know. Not if it meant remembering what she left. What she didn’t ask for because Rio hadn’t offered. Because Rio hadn’t said anything. Not when it mattered. Not when Agatha was practically begging for it, in all the quiet ways she thought would be understood.
She would’ve stayed. She knows that now. She absolutely would’ve stayed.
If Rio had asked.
But she didn’t.
So Agatha left. Because someone had to make a decision, and it sure as hell wasn’t going to be her best friend, the one who always knew what to say until the one time Agatha needed her to actually say it.
So no, Agatha didn’t want to know. Not after all that silence. Not after being made to feel like wanting more had been the mistake.
And now? Now she was the one who looked like a fucking fool for not listening. Furious at Jen for doing exactly what Agatha asked. Furious at herself for meaning it.
She exhaled slowly, like the air itself might burn on the way out. Her voice was softer when she spoke. “You should’ve told me anyway.”
“You mean after you told me not to? Multiple times.”
“Correct.”
Because someone should’ve called Agatha’s bluff. Someone should’ve risked it. Because Agatha hadn’t meant it. She never fucking meant it.
“Okay,” Jen said quietly. “I should’ve.”
It didn’t make Agatha feel better.
“Does she know?” Agatha asked, keeping her eyes on the sidewalk.
“Know about what?”
“The divorce.”
Jen didn’t answer right away.
That was enough of an answer.
Agatha’s jaw clenched. “So she does.”
“Alice tried not to bring it up, but you know her and Rio are close.” Jen said with a shrug.
Of course. Alice.
Rio’s best friend. Jen’s wife. The unfortunate bridge between all of them.
“Unfortunately,” Jen said, and her voice was wry, a little sad. “I got you in the divorce. Alice got Rio.”
Agatha looked at her. Jen didn’t flinch.
It hurt more than it should’ve. Because it meant everyone else had seen it for what it was when even to do this day they would both rather deny it than admit what they never had the courage to hold.
The irony was humiliating. Everything about it was fucking humiliating.
Agatha had walked away from a real marriage, signed the papers, changed her name back, packed up the pieces of a life that never fit right and none of it compared to that split.
Isn’t that fucking insane?
Agatha ended an actual marriage and it wasn’t even that marriage that made her feel like a wife walking out on the wrong person.
She’d never even kissed Rio. Not once. You’d think Agatha would’ve gotten that much. Some small consolation for all the circling, all the silence, all the things she never let herself say out loud.
But no. Not even that.
Agatha looked down at her shoes. “Funny, isn’t it?” she said, voice quiet.
Jen didn’t answer. And thank fuck for that mercy.
-
The next night, at exactly 2:30 a.m., Rio showed up for morning x-rays.
She didn’t start with Agatha’s patients.
In fact, when Rio walked in, she didn’t even glance her way. Not once. And Agatha- well, she definitely didn’t notice. She hadn’t spent the entire shift anticipating this moment like a goddamn countdown clock was ticking in her ear. She hadn’t gone back and forth between hoping Rio would show up and praying she wouldn’t. Hadn’t imagined every possible version of this interaction until all that was left was dread.
No, definitely not.
And so what if Rio hadn’t come to her first in a room full of people? It didn’t mean anything. Of course it didn’t. But still- somewhere under her ribs, it landed. Subtle, precise, like a nail set in place by the smallest hand. Like some invisible elf had found the softest part of her and whispered, ‘you still feel this right?’ - before the first tap.
Rio got to her last.
She moved through the pod like it was routine like nothing about this night was different from the hundreds that came before.
When Rio did approach, she pulled the portable beside the isolette with the same smooth, methodical rhythm she used for everyone else. Then her eyes found Agatha. They purposely dragged over her, once, twice, slowly enough to register but not long enough to be called anything.
Agatha didn’t move. She held her ground and pretended she didn’t feel the way that look settled on her skin like it had been waiting all night for permission to look.
“Saved the best for last,” Rio muttered, detector in hand.
Agatha looked at her. She didn’t speak. Just stared, jaw clenched, expression empty if you didn’t know how to look. Rio always had. That was the problem.
It wasn’t the words that got her. It was the softness in them. The carelessness that wasn’t careless at all. Like something inside Rio hadn’t gotten the memo that they weren’t allowed to talk like that anymore. And Agatha’s heart, small and treacherous, softened.
The rest of the exam passed in silence. So did the next.
Thank fuck.
One of her babies was having a meltdown, pissed off in that uniquely preemie way that didn’t understand logic. He was flailing like he had a personal vendetta against respiratory support, glaring at Agatha through the isolette wall with all the fury his tiny face could muster. At one point, he threw a hand toward the ET tube threatening his own life in protest. ‘Do it again and I will die on purpose.’ The message was clear. The drama was exhausting.
And still, she would’ve taken a dozen more like him if it meant not thinking about the way Rio had looked at her. Not feeling it still.
By the time four a.m. rolled around, Agatha called out to the other nurses in her pod that she was taking her lunch and told them to keep an eye on her kiddos. They all responded without missing a beat. She got a chorus of murmured “got it”s and “you’re good,” and that was enough.
Agatha’s lunch was going to be a cigarette.
That was it. That’s all she wanted.
Wanda had made her quit two years into their relationship, and she had. Cold turkey. Swore up and down, even pinky promised like a moron. But she never really stopped. Every couple of weeks, maybe longer if things were good, she’d sneak one. A little rebellion she kept to herself. Wanda never noticed. Sue her.
She left the unit, took the elevator down, cut through a couple of empty hallways, pushed through the double door employee exit, and headed toward her car. The air outside was brisk and damp, smelling of pavement, dew, and whatever fresh mulch they’d dumped in the flowerbeds a few days ago.
Agatha rifled through the middle console until her fingers closed around a half squished carton of Virginia Slims 120s and a scratched up purple Bic lighter. Then she made the walk, past the rows of sleeping cars and motion activated floodlights, to the far end of the lot where an old administration building sat abandoned. She ducked around the side, where the cameras didn’t reach and no one ever bothered to patrol.
She pulled a cigarette from the carton, slipped it between her lips. The lighter took a few flicks before the flame held. She brought it up, cupping her hand around it to block the wind, then lit it.
Agatha’s eyes fell shut as she breathed it in. One arm crossed over her stomach, the other held the cigarette steady between her fingers- pointer and middle.
It burned beautifully. Coated her lungs in tar and defiance.
Smoking was the only thing Agatha never gave up completely.
Agatha had given up a lot, actually. More than she ever said out loud. Night shift. Her best friend. Westview. The only life that felt like her own. Gave up so much she barely recognized what was left.
All for a woman who mistook devotion for obedience. Who kept asking, kept taking, until there was nothing left to offer. And still, she’d asked for more. She would always ask for more.
But this? This breath, this sting in her chest, this small, selfish mercy- was the one thing she never let Wanda actually touch. Never asked permission for. Never pretended she could live without.
Wanda never noticed.
Agatha kept it hidden. Kept it as proof she still belonged to herself and still, it went unnoticed. Somehow, that made it worse.
Agatha held it in for a beat longer then let the smoke spill from her mouth in a slow stream and let her head back against the brick wall behind her.
No rush. No guilt. Just hers.
“Anyone ever tell you smoking kills? You’re a nurse. You should probably know that.”
Agatha nearly launched herself into the next plane of existence. She jolted so hard her cigarette almost flew out of her hand, and for a split second, she genuinely wondered if her soul had evacuated her body.
“Jesus Christ,” Agatha hissed, whipping around. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
And of course, it was her.
Rio fucking Vidal, strolling out of the shadows, summoned by nicotine and bad decisions. Unlit cigarette hanging from her mouth. Hands shoved in the pockets of her scrub pants.
“Would you stop doing that?” Agatha barked, hand still pressed to her chest.
Rio leaned her shoulder against the wall, casually plucked the cigarette from her mouth with two fingers, and looked at Agatha with mock innocence. “Doing what?”
“Stalking me, freak.”
“I’m not stalking you,” Rio said, deadpan. “This is where I smoke.”
“How do you even kno-”
Agatha didn’t finish.
The rest of the sentence stuck somewhere behind her teeth, caught on a memory she hadn’t meant to touch.
Because she did know.
It started with one night. One truly god awful shift. The kind of night that left her buzzing under her skin, chest tight, hands shaking even after washing them three times. She’d texted Rio without thinking. Just said she needed a cigarette or she was going to lose it.
She hadn’t expected a response. Rio didn’t work at her hospital then. It was just a throwaway text.
But by the time Agatha made it outside her own pack of cigarettes gripped tightly in her hand, Rio was already sitting on the curb. Unlit cigarette hanging from her lips, legs stretched out, hood up like she’d been born for the graveyard shift. She didn’t say hello. Just offered the lighter.
After that, it just kept happening.
Not often. Not on any schedule. But every once in a while, when Rio had the night off, Agatha would get a text. Just four words: outside when you can
Rio would show up- parked in the same spot, waiting in the dark, leaning against the building or sitting on the pavement.
They didn’t speak unless they wanted to. Sometimes Agatha would vent. Sometimes she’d sit there in silence, staring at the sky. Sometimes she cried and said it was allergies. Rio never called her on it.
It wasn’t some grand gesture. It wasn’t romance or rescue.
It was just Rio. Solid. Still. Showing up even when everything else was falling apart.
And now here Rio was again.
Rio hummed, eyes narrowing with a small, knowing smile- confirming the moments Agatha had remembered.
“Got a light?” Rio asked.
Agatha turned her head away from her. She took another drag and exhaled. “You have one.”
“I want yours.”
There was no tease in Rio’s voice. It was quiet. Intentional.
And because Agatha was a little bitch in the presence of beautiful women specifically named Rio Vidal, she handed it over without protest.
Rio didn’t take it. She just stared at the lighter in Agatha’s palm. Her eyes dragged from the lighter back up to Agatha’s face with unhurried precision, like she was deciding whether to ruin Agatha or leave it for later.
“What? You forget how to take it all of a sudden?” Agatha snapped. She wasn’t annoyed that Rio kept looking at her like that. It was that Agatha didn’t think she ever wanted it to stop. And that unsettled her. Because she knew the flirting wasn’t real. It was a shield, something Rio hid behind. A performance with no promise behind it.
“Oh, I can show you exactly how well I can take it.”
Agatha didn’t even bother pretending. She let herself feel it- that pull low in her stomach, hot and immediate, striking like a match in the dark.
Rio’s flirting was worse than she remembered. She used to be subtle about it. Sly comments, discreet looks, lines that could pass as jokes if you needed them to. But this? This was different. Blunt. Direct. Like Rio wasn’t interested in pretending anymore. And Agatha hated how much it worked.
Agatha scoffed and took another drag, cigarette back between her lips, and she let her head fall against the brick. The surface was cool through her hair, solid in a way she needed. Agatha rolled her head to the side, so she could look at Rio.
Under the dim cast of a single building light bolted to the wall above them, humming and flickering faintly, Agatha let her gaze drag.
She took in the line of Rio’s shoulders, the angle of her jaw, the way the light touched her face like it remembered them too. And her hair wasn’t dyed black anymore. It was brown now, her natural color, pulled half up into a small little bun at the back of her head. The rest brushed her shoulders, shorter than it used to be. And still, somehow, exactly her.
Rio looked older now. Not startling, just the subtle changes time leaves behind when it thinks no one’s watching. Agatha wanted to memorize all of it. She let her eyes drag, cataloguing every difference, every new detail etched into the face she used to know like her own. Then, just to make Rio squirm, Agatha let her eyes settle on Rio’s mouth. Lingering. Controlled. She watched as Rio’s lips parted, watched the way her tongue swept across them.
That’s when she noticed Rio’s hand slipping from her scrub pocket, fingers inching toward Agatha’s waist. It paused and hovered. But Rio didn’t touch her. Her hand faltered, then fell away, retreating into the safety of her scrub pocket to tuck the impulse out of sight.
Agatha dragged her gaze back to Rio’s eyes and smirked, letting the falter crown her the victor.
Rio raised the hand still holding her unlit cigarette, tapping the filter against her lips before glancing at Agatha. “You know this isn’t the only fag I’ve been dying to wrap my mouth around.” The line was filth, but it came out like she’d been waiting to use it for years.
Rio placed the cigarette between her lips, chin tilted in silent demand.
Agatha rolled her eyes but turned to face her fully, stuck the end of her own nearly spent cigarette between her teeth, and flicked the lighter to life. She lifted it with one hand, shielding the flame with the other. Rio met her halfway, palm against Agatha’s, thumb brushing the side of her hand.
The cigarette caught. Agatha ripped away feeling like she’d been burned.
Agatha leaned back against the wall and tore the crumpled pack from her pocket, fingers trembling just enough to give herself away.
She pulled the dying cigarette from her mouth, dropped it to the pavement, and crushed it beneath her heel. Then she lit the fresh one and drew in fast, clipped puffs. Her jaw stayed tight.
The only thing worse than listening to Rio talk was letting Rio see what it did to her.
Rio didn’t stop watching her. She never had. Cigarette perched between her fingers, she squinted slightly, lips parted. She took a long drag, exhaled away from Agatha, then turned her head back with a smirk curling at the end. Head tilted, tongue pushing into her cheek.
She mirrored Agatha, back to the wall now, eyes bright with amusement.
“What’s the matter baby?” she murmured, pitch sugary sweet and just a touch cruel. “You forget how to play?”
Agatha huffed a laugh and shook her head. “No,” she said, breath catching a little. “You’re just no fun anymore.” She flicked the ash and sparks scattered against the pavement.
Rio didn’t flinch, which annoyed Agatha more than it should have. She just rolled her eyes and smirked.
“Come on,” Rio said. “You love it. You prefer-
“We don’t even know each other.”
And that was true. Sudden and overwhelming. They’d been out of each other’s lives longer than they’d ever been in them. Strangers, technically.
Rio took another drag and said, quieter this time, “Sure we do. You’re my ex…”
Rio paused.
“…Best friend.”
“You’re so much more annoying than I remember,” Agatha muttered, not meaning for it to sound soft, but failing.
Rio nodded toward the cigarette between Agatha’s fingers.
“Too good for American Spirits now?”
Agatha side eyed her. “I prefer my cancer have a little class. Take notes.”
She didn’t say the rest. That she couldn’t smoke American Spirits anymore without tasting regret. That they reminded her of cheap bars, cold parking lots, and a person she had spent ten years trying not to miss.
And Rio’s face twisted, “Where’s your wife?”
Agatha’s head whipped toward her. “Cut the shit. You know we’re divorced.”
“Do I?” Rio snapped. “Because apparently we don’t know each other.”
Agatha’s shoulders stiffened. “Why are you even here?” she snapped back.
“I work here.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Rio shrugged, “Then ask a better question.”
Agatha didn’t. She couldn’t without giving something away. Without admitting she’d already started playing a game she told herself she was done with.
Rio just stood there, like she was still waiting for Agatha to make the next move. Like she hadn’t already made hers the second she showed back up.
It was a pattern. A dance. A loop they’d fallen into a thousand times before.
Old habits die hard. And apparently, neither of them had changed enough to kill this one.
Agatha let the cigarette fall from her fingers and crushed it under her shoe. “Break is over,” she mumbled, already walking away.
“Sweetheart?”
Agatha froze. Eyes shut. A sigh caught in her throat.
She told herself it was exhaustion. That’s why something in her spine flinched toward that stupid, fucking nickname like it still belonged to her.
Rio was off the wall now, standing like she might finally say something. Something important. Her eyes wide, her mouth half open like the sentence got caught in her throat.
Agatha braced herself. “Yeah?”
“I- “ Rio’s voice cracked. She cleared her throat, looked down, then back up again. “Special breakfast?”
Agatha let out a noise that wasn’t a laugh. More a breath shoved through her teeth, bitter and stunned. She brought her hand up over her mouth and waved it. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Agatha said, not even looking at Rio now. “No.”
Rio watched her carefully. She took drag from her cigarette, her eyes flicking down Agatha’s body. She nodded, smoke still held in her lungs.
“Okay,” Rio said, exhaling. “I’ll try again tomorrow.”
Agatha rolled her eyes so hard it hurt and turned back toward the hospital. She didn’t look back.
She couldn’t keep letting this happen.
Agatha had come to terms with a thousand versions of herself. But this burn under her skin, this pulse in her throat, this unbearable awareness of Rio Vidal standing only feet away- this was not one of them.
This wasn’t a version of herself she’d outgrown. It was one she’d locked up and buried with her own hands, swearing she’d never let it speak again.
And now it was breathing. Loud. Alive. And entirely too fucking close for comfort.