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It started, as many things later would, after Pittfest. Which was to say, after a trauma so profound it would leave even the most mentally robust begging for a short stay in the psych ward.
Robby was once again on the roof, because Robby couldn't sleep. For love nor money, he couldn't sleep. It had become a concept to him, merely theoretical in its entirety. Lying there, in the dark, staring up at the ceiling; it was enough to make him want to claw his skin off. He’d started avoiding going home at all, preferring to hide it out in his office, which was great for his paperwork but horrible for his back.
He heard the fire escape door that led to the roof open and then close. Jack.
"You're still here?"
The sun was sinking low into the skyline of Pittsburgh, illuminating the cityscape in an orangey red glow amongst the charcoal black of the night that threatened to creep in, ushering the night. It felt like a taunt of the hours that were about to stretch out before him with no respite or rest.
The other man walked towards him and leant against the railings as Robby shrugged. “Don't feel like going home just yet.”
Jack raised an eyebrow, bumping their shoulders together. "You finally tempted to join the dark side? I always knew you were jealous of the night shift."
He snorted, turning to look at Jack. In the faint red tint of the sunset, you could almost make out the remnants of copper that were still hidden amongst the grey of Jack’s hair. His face seemed softer, younger, in this light. "Yeah, you know what day shift has been missing? Telling people about the importance of a flared base."
Jack smiled ruefully and chuckled. Looking up at Robby, he tilted his head. "What's up?"
"Can't sleep," Robby sighed. "Never was great at it, but since PittFest..."
Jack hummed. "I getcha. Have you tried-"
"No," Robby said, short. Knowing what Jack was going to say. Pills. A quick fix, a chemical solution, nothing more. "And I'm not going to." He thought of Langdon, of his desperation that day when he’d begged Robby not to look in his locker. Robby screwed his eyes at the memory.
Jack held his hands up, placating. "Fair enough, man. Had to ask."
Robby scrubbed a hand over his face. He shook his head. "This job, man." What else was there to say? It felt at times that this job was all there was to his life, where it began and ended in its entirety.
Jack patted Robby’s shoulder, and let his hand rest there. "Don't need to tell me, brother." They stayed there, like that, Robby with his head bent as if in prayer, Jack with his hand clamped to Robby's shoulder, like an anchor, or a pillar.
"I don't need to tell you how important sleep is," Jack says quietly, looking out into the gloaming.
"No," Robby answers. "You don't." It's honest, vulnerable. Two men standing on a roof. It's a place for total honesty. Robby can't fathom lying to Jack up here, it would be rude, almost obscene. Sure I might jump, but I’ll be honest with you while I do it. He hunched his shoulders up to his neck, that instinct to make himself smaller in the face of vulnerability coming in clutch. "I'm almost at the end of my rope here, brother."
"Nonsense," Jack said easily, and squeezed Robby’s shoulder. "You'll be alright. Sometimes it's muscle memory. You tried sleeping here?"
Robby frowned at him. "Sometimes a change in scenery can be helpful," Jack said. "I don't need to tell you about sleep hygiene. Maybe you're not so good at switching off in your apartment anymore. You've built it up too much in your head. If you're bringing your work stress home with you, it's probably not a place you can switch off anymore." He shrugged, his thumb absentmindedly rubbing circles in the curve of Robby's shoulder. "So try sleeping here. Maybe your fucked work life balance could finally come in handy."
He squeezed Robby's shoulder once more, before dropping his hand entirely. Robby felt the cool evening air whip against the place where Jack’s hand had been immediately, like a burn. "Give it a try. Bill me for the hours if it doesn't work." It wasn’t a horrible idea, in all honesty. He’d slept in on-call rooms before, and there were certainly worse places to sleep.
He looked at Jack, and he promised him he’d try.
Four hours later, Robby had given up on any sleep and was skulking around like a moody ghost when Jack caught him by the vending machines.
"No use, huh?"
Robby couldn’t even muster a response, just sighed and clamped his hands beside his head, shrugging.
Jack shook his head, his fingers tapping out a staccato rhythm against the chart he was holding. "You look like the walking dead." And then, without preamble, Jack nodded his head, sharp, just once and looked over his shoulder.
"Ellis," He called. "Want to play Attending for an hour?"
"Oh hell yes," the woman said immediately, snatching the chart off of him without so much as a thank you.
"You." Jack snapped his fingers at Robby. "With me."
Robby followed him, but not without a noise of protest as Jack walked through the maze of corridors, and then all of a sudden Jack’s hands were on him, as Robby was manhandled into an on-call room.
"What the fuck are you—"
With that Jack pushed him onto the bed and pinned him down, leg by his hip and arms either side of Robby's chest. Robby felt like an animal of prey, trapped beneath the other man, his heart was hammering in his chest as Jack just looked at him, eyes sharp and bright.
"Jack what the hell-"
"Will you just shut up," Jack ground out, strangeled, "and go the fuck to sleep?"
There was a beat of silence.
"I can't sleep like this," Robby said, aghast.
Jack made an affronted sound. "What, am I heavy?"
Robby tsked. "No. I just—I haven't slept with— it's been years. Two at least."
"It's no big deal," Jack said, words slightly muffled as he got his head comfortable on the pillow. "We did this sometimes in the army. It's emotional regulation through physical touch. They do it all the time on farms too, calms down the cows right before they slaughter them."
Robby faltered. "That—is not actually very comforting."
"No," Jack agreed, and they stayed there in the silence, the only sound in the dark room being their breathing.
"Just go to sleep, Robby," he said quietly. "You can argue with me after you sleep."
Robby said nothing, but slowly, slowly, Jack felt the rhythm of his breaths lull into something more relaxed, until he was finally, blessedly, asleep.
Two hours later, Jack's alarm went off, and Robby woke with a gasp.
"Told ya," Jack grinned.
Robby stared at him, dumbfounded. "No need to thank me," Jack continued breezily, pushing himself off of Robby’s chest. He checked his watch. "I need to go check on Parker and make sure she hasn't done a thoracotemy on a paper cut." He punched Robby's arm genially. "Catch some more Z's and I'll see you on the flip side."
Robby was about to protest, but then Jack was gone, and Robby turned his head to lie sideways, when he caught a whiff of Jack's cologne, still on the pillow. He doesn't remember much of what he thought after that, only that it smelled like Jack, and it smelled nice, and the spot beside him was still warm from where the other man had lay with him. It wasn't quite the same without him, but the warmth was still there, and then he was, mercifully, asleep once more.
The next time Robby woke, he was 40 minutes late for his shift.
"You could have come and woke me," he groused, blinking against the harsh fluorescent lighting of the nurses station.
"Don't be stupid," Jack said, squinting at the computer. "I'm not going to be an accessory to medical malpractice by denying my chief attending long overdue sleep."
"Jack."
"Robby," Jack echoed, finally looking up at him. "Don't go making a song and dance out of this. It's nothing. 40 minutes over is right on time for us most days. You know this."
Robby turned his head to look at the board, and was relieved to find it civilised enough, or as civilised as the Pittsburgh population deigned to give. "So?" Jack said, expectant.
"Hm?"
Jack rolled his eyes. "You really make a guy work for it. Did you sleep well, Dr. Robinavitch?"
Robby pursed his lips, crossed his hands tight across his chest- faintly reminiscent of Jack's own arms around him, just a few hours before. He was right, Robby realised absentmindedly. It was oddly comforting, cows to the slaughter and all. "I did, Dr. Abbot." And then, quietly, "Thank you."
Jack slapped his shoulder. "Anytime, brother."
It was all going well, of course, until twelve hours later, when Robby was lying in his own bed, sleep evading him yet again. It’s utter madness, he thought, as he grabbed his phone from his nightstand and flicked through his contacts. He had definitely, officially, lost his mind.
Jack picked up on the second ring.
"Robby?"
"Hey," he said, feigning nonchalance, as if this wasn’t a totally abnormal, fucked up thing to do to, totally out of step from the usual well worn beats of their friendship. But then again, maybe Robby had been out of tune with their dance for quite a while, because just a day prior he would have said that sleeping together, literally, was also an abnormal and totally fucked up thing for them to do, and well. Wasn’t that him told.
There was a beat of silence.
"You okay brother?" Jack’s voice had that edge to it, the edge that said I am totally calm and fine, but I am approaching a juncture of considering an involuntary psychiatric hold on you, in a totally calm and fine manner.
"Oh, sure. Yeah, no, I'm fine- I'm sorry to bother you on your night off."
"Don't worry about it," Jack said, a bit more relieved. "My sleep schedule's always a little janky on my days off."
"About that." Robby cleared his throat. "I was just wondering- do you have any other tricks you learnt in the army? Or on a farm for that matter?"
Jack sighed in sympathy. "No luck with sleep tonight?"
"Not a bit," Robby confessed. "It's just like... it's like my mind is a live wire. I can't shut it off. It's like I have this electricity going through me and I can't just relax. And it makes me more stressed to try."
“Yeah, makes sense.”
That stopped Robby short of any pit of self-flagellation he was going to throw himself down. “It does?”
“Of course,” Jack answered. “You’ve been running on empty since Adamson died, brother. And then Pittfest… Coupled with all the usual bullshit from the job and Gloria and just being a human being. Your nervous system doesn’t know how to switch off. You’re stuck in fight, flight, freeze. You just need a reset, that’s all.”
Robby hummed. “That sounds easier said than done.”
Jack was quiet over the phone. It’s actually nice like that, for the few minutes that they breathe in tandem, separate but beside one another. Robby closed his eyes, listened to the other man's breaths coming over the other end of the phone. He could almost be back there, in that on-call room. The phantom of Jack over him, steady and secure, holding him down. He was heavy, but he also wasn't. The weight of him, it had been comforting, and his arms— Well, Robby wasn’t blind. And though they actually only saw each other for maybe twenty minutes on a good day, twenty minutes was plenty of time to get an eyeful of the bulge of Jack’s biceps beneath his scrubs. There, on the bed, they’d held him. It was an odd sensation, because at fifty four years old, Robby honestly couldn’t remember the last time he’d been held like that. But Jack had done it without breaking a sweat, as if it was the easiest and most natural thing in the world. It was almost like they had fit together, in the most literal sense of the world, and Jack’s arms, soft and strong, had been the thing to hold them together.
“Do you know why it was, that we slept like that sometimes in the army?” Jack asked, his voice breaking the reverie that had settled between them.
“No?”
“When your nervous system gets stuck like that, like yours has, and you don’t have the time to solve it through therapy or the ability to dose it away, it’s like a biomechanical hack. With someone else there, your brain is tricked into mimicking; breathing syncs up, heart rates slow down to match. It gives your body something else to focus on and stops it eating its own tail, y’know?” Jack was silent for a minute, before he pushed on. “It’s pretty academic, when you break it down. And one of the more medically advisable ways to combat stress-induced insomnia. All that’s happened here is your autonomic nervous system has gone into fight or flight mode. Even if you were to take an ambien, it wouldn’t actually cure the root cause of your issue, so I think you’re right not to go down that path. Your vagus nerve has just temporarily displaced its ability to feel safe, to let your guard down enough to sleep.”
Robby, inexplicably, feels like he’s going to cry. He feels incredibly fucking broken, on the best of days. His job requires a certain inhumane aspect, the ability to look death in the face day after day after, to deal with insurmountable loss ten times over, seven days a week. To walk around with a graveyard in your mind, of all the people, all the pulses that were lost. And it wasn’t your fault, of course, but it also was, and it always would be, and bar any of that—you would always be the person who pronounced people dead.
On the other hand, you committed acts of godhood daily. You looked into the jaws of death and pulled people out, even when the odds seemed stacked against you. You were Lazarus, you were bold and brilliant and a force for good. Being both those things at once; death and its keeper, it demanded a degree of dehumanisation. Because you weren’t human when you walked in those doors, you were Dr. Robinavitch. Dr. Robby. Robby, to your staff. Robby (derogatory, exasperated) to Gloria. Mike, sometimes to Jack, and only to Jack, and usually only with a few beers in him.
And so it’s only twelve hours out of a given day that he experiences actual human life. Before Pittfest, he in theory would have spent about seven or eight of those sleeping. When he’d lost that ability, it wasn’t lost on him that he had lost, fundamentally, one of the last few things that was tying him to his intrinsic humanity. Second to water, sleep was the most vital necessity for survival. He had been just about keeping his head above the water the past few years, but in recent times he felt increasingly as though he was drowning under the weight of waking hours. Until a day ago, when Jack pulled him into that on-call room, and held him down, and ushered him into the realms of sleep.
It had been wonderful. Robby felt like a new man. It was also terrifying. Truly, legitimately, terrifying, to realise another person had this power over you. To admit to the years of feelings Robby had tried desperately to ignore. In fairness, on a good day, he could convince himself it was nothing. Jack was handsome, you’d have to be blind not to see that, but he was also kind and goodhearted and so compulsively compelled to do the right thing it outstripped Robby’s own streak any day of the week. He was a brilliant doctor, and a better friend.
These were all qualities, Robby had reasoned many times over, that would inspire a crush on anyone. It was disgustingly cliche. Besides, they’d known each other for five years. Five years of picking each other up and letting one another be picked up. And so Robby reasoned that it probably wasn’t a crush so much as it was confused feelings of friendship. It was Jack that had been there for him after Janey, and even after Heather, during which time he hadn’t even muttered I told you so, which he was well within his right to do.
Which all sounded well and good, except that, of course, Robby was lying blind to himself, and the reality was he was a total goner for Jack Abbot, and the only reason he couldn’t admit it to himself was that Jack was decidedly straight, and also widowed, and hadn’t been on a date the entire time Robby knew him so presumably wasn’t in the market for anything of the sort, so Robby just needed to forget it and repress it and bury it in his graveyard. Which he had been doing a pretty good job at, until the day before.
It had never occurred to him that it was even within the realm of possibility, to be that close to Jack, to be able to touch him like that. It was a blessed relief that, thanks to the weeks of exhaustion tugging him down, he hadn’t popped a boner then and there.
The reality is this: Robby could live a hundred thousand lifetimes and he still would not be as good a man as Jack Abbot. And now here was this man, his best friend, his most trusted colleague, and he had solved Robby’s problem— because of course he did. He was Jack, and that was what Jack did best. But his solution was imperfect, and totally selfish on Robby’s part. It didn’t address the root cause, which likely would only ever be solved by intensive therapy and maybe an SSRI, and Robby was too much of a coward to even consider that. So it was a horrible and greedy thing to even consider asking Jack to do it again. It was, additionally, blatantly disrespectful to the other man, who’d done his fair share of therapy to get to be in a much better place. So what made Robby choke up wasn’t the fact that he felt awful for asking, it was that he hadn’t had to. Jack knew that he wouldn’t ask. So he offered, instead.
“Human contact is one of the most powerful natural survival tools we have,” Jack said, quietly, into the darkness between them. “Pressure. Heat. They activate the parasympathetic nervous system, lower the heart rate. Drops cortisol. It’s why weighted blankets work. Why parents do skin-to-skin with newborns. I know you know this.”
“You calling me a baby?” Robby choked out, trying to distract from the overwhelming relief he feels for Jack in that moment, that feels too little like fondness and too tinged with fear to be called love.
Jack huffed a quiet laugh. “I’m calling you a mammal. Which you are, last I checked.”
Robby’s phone grew warm by his ear, and he flexed his left hand, which he realised had been clenched inadvertently.
“Robby.” Jack’s voice cuts clean through the static of the phone line. “You wanna come over?”
Jack’s apartment was dim when Robby arrived, lit only by the under-cabinet light in the kitchen and the glow of the city bleeding in through the windows.
Jack padded out barefoot, in his crutches, wearing old sweatpants and a Penguins hoodie that had seen better decades.
“Hey brother,” he said easily, as if he’d invited Robby over for beers and ESPN. “You make it over okay?”
“I walked,” Robby answered, toeing off his shoes. “Cleared my head.”
Jack opened the fridge and plucked out a beer bottle. He shook it at Robby, who acquiesced with a smile. Robby walked over to the kitchen island, sliding into a stool as Jack opened the two bottles and slid one across the marble to him.
“Do you do this for all your friends?” He asked wryly.
“Oh no, only the very pretty ones,” Jack shot back. And that- well. Robby knew he was a blusher, and he knew Jack had eyes, no matter how dim the light was. The heat that curled through him, at even being tangentially called pretty— Jesus Christ, he put a fifteen year old virgin to shame.
“Brother, relax about it.”
Robby laughed, shook his head, and tried his very best to relax himself if only because Jack was doing him a favour, and so if Jack wanted him to shut up, the least he could do was try.
As they sipped their beers, Robby could almost be conned into thinking this was one of their normal hang outs. Jack resolutely steered the conversation away from work at all, but they conversed easily back and forth about yet another dismal performance from the Pens, a new Ethiopian restaurant that had opened down the road from Robby’s condo, and the new prestige television drama that everyone was raving about but neither Robby nor Jack could make it through the first half of the first season.
So it felt a little less like a shock to the system when they finished the beers and Jack checked the clock on the wall. It was late.
He looked at Robby, and quirked an eyebrow. “You’re not walking to a firing squad.”
“I know,” Robby said, and hated how strangled it sounded.
“We don’t have to do this,” Jack said gently. “You can take the spare bed in the office, or sleep on the couch, or you can leave now and we don’t have to talk about this again.” He must have seen how conflicted Robby looked, because he followed up with, “Or, we can go in there and if you hate it or it doesn’t work you can get up and leave and I’ll never say a word about it, okay?” With that, he picked up his crutches and made for the bedroom, gesturing for Robby to follow suit. “C’mon, big guy. If you’re gonna have a crisis about it, at least be comfortable while you do it.”
Robby laughed, surprised at himself at how Jack was able to get him to calm the fuck down about the whole thing, and followed him in. The bedroom was— nice, actually. He might even go so far as to call it tasteful. He’d seen it just once before, when Jack gave him a cursory tour when he’d first moved in about two years ago, and he hadn’t paid too much attention. But now, he liked the warm beige of the walls, the dark mahogany accents of the wood floorboards and paneling. It was simple, but it was also Jack. The two side lamps cast a warm glow around the room, softening the edges of everything the light touched. The bed itself was plain but inviting, white sheets and a quilt on top— neatly made but clearly lived-in, the sheets slightly rumpled in a way that suggested rest rather than disorder.
“Yeah, don’t tell my CO,” Jack said, looking at Robby’s hand atop the bed corners. “Never much was one for those military corners.”
Robby grinned. The room smelled faintly of laundry detergent and Jack’s cologne, clean and grounding, and Robby felt his shoulders drop a fraction without his permission. It felt safe in a way his own apartment hadn’t in weeks, like a place where nothing was being demanded of him except that he exist, and maybe — if he was lucky — finally sleep.
Jack leaned his crutches beside the bed as he sat down and swung legs up and over into the bed. Robby sat down, gingerly.
Jack looked at him, fond and almost pityingly. “You look like you're expecting me to read you your last rites, brother.”
“I don’t know what to do,” he confessed, almost desperate as the words tumbled out of his mouth. “I mean, this is insane, Jack. I’m such a fuck up it’s beyond comprehension.”
“Don’t say that,” Jack chided. “You’re not a fuck up. You’re a very stressed man, who’s running low on sleep, and has a flair for dramatics.” In the second that Robby rolled his eyes, Jack leaned forward and grabbed his wrist, tipping him— gently— down, into the bed. He pulled the blanket up over the two of them as they settled beside one another. Jack turned on his side, grabbed Robby’s hand, and placed it against his heart. And then, as if he were giving him the weather forecast, he said “You’re Michael Robinavitch, but you go by Robby, and when you have a few beers you let me call you Mike. You take your coffee black with two sugars. You make great latkes, better brisket. Your favourite colour is green. You’re the grandson of Ayde Robinavitch, son of Lev and Julia. You grew up in Pittsburgh…”
And on and on he goes. Robby is only half listening by the time his eyes start to close, heavy and tired, too focused on Jack’s skin beneath his hand, the thin material of his t-shirt not masking the heat emanating from him, the steady and strong beat of his heart. Jack’s hands lie across Robby’s, anchoring his hand in place, absentmindedly massaging the knuckles and tendons between his fingers. He does catch one last one, though, before sleep drags him under. Jack’s voice is so gentle and soft, you’d be forgiven for thinking he was reading him a bedtime story. The last thing Robby hears is “You’re safe, with me. Your name is Robby, and mine is Jack, and you’re my best friend. I’ll never let you fall, and you’ll never let me jump. You’re safe, now, Robby.”
Thankfully, the alarm was so loud and jarring that it jerked Robby awake and away from Jack, which was a blessedly good thing because as luck would have it, he was sporting an almost impressively hard piece of morning wood, which was already abating at the shock to his system from the unknown alarm. His hand, however, was still trapped beneath Jack’s, still resting over his heart, and so he reached over with his left to knock the offending clock off.
Morning light was bleeding in around the edges of the black out blinds, turning the beige walls pale gold. The clock on Jack’s nightstand glared red and accusing. It was 6:05 am. He’d slept for seven hours.
Beside him, Jack was still dead to the world.
Robby went very still, every muscle locking as his brain caught up to his body. The panic tried to spike — sharp and immediate — but it stalled halfway up, like it hit a speed bump. Jack’s heart was still there beneath his palm, steady and unbothered. His chest rose and fell, patient as a metronome.
You’re safe, with me.
Robby swallowed.
Jack shifted beneath him, just slightly, and Robby froze again.
“Robby,” Jack mumbled, voice rough with sleep. “Stop thinking so damn loud.”
Robby huffed a startled laugh before he could stop himself. “You’re awake?”
“Something like that,” he muttered, releasing Robby’s hand from his grip and rubbing sleep from his eyes.
Robby lifted his head an inch, just enough to look down at him. Jack’s eyes were half-lidded, unfocused, his hair sticking up at angles that almost defied the laws of physics. He looked… soft. Younger, somehow.
“You set an alarm for me,” Robby said.
“Sure I did,” Jack answered. “After that bitch fit you threw the first time.”
There was something there, in being thought of by Jack, that Robby couldn’t name nor put his finger on, but it made warmth bloom in his chest. He cleared his throat, trying desperately to usher that warmth away, loathe though he was to let it go, but reluctant all the more to sit with it, in the fear that it would become vital to him and he’d be unable to function without it, but unable to reproduce the sensation ever again.
“I did. Sleep, that is,” he said quietly, the words sounding fragile even to his own ears.
Jack’s expression sharpened just a fraction, the fog clearing. “Yeah?”
Robby nodded. “All night. I didn’t wake up once.”
Jack exhaled, long and slow, like he’d been holding that breath since yesterday. “Good.”
They lay there for another minute, neither of them moving, the moment stretching thin. The reality of it crept back in — where they were, how they were, the fact that this was not, by any reasonable metric, a normal thing for two coworkers to be doing. Even for best friends, which they were, it stretched the limits of acceptability.
Jack nudged his hip with a knee. “You want coffee or you want to lie here and existentially spiral some more?”
Robby took a breath. “Coffee sounds good actually.”
They got up and Robby made the coffee— insisting it was the least he could do, and when he turned around to give Jack his cup, there was a small piece of metal on the white of the marble island.
“What is that?”
“It’s a key,” Jack said simply, reaching over and taking his cup from Robby’s hand. “They were invented about 4,000 years ago, and they go into things called locks. They’re usually used for accessing private property.”
Robby raised an eyebrow. “Thank you for that, Dr. Abbot. But why are you giving me one?”
“So you can come by tonight after your shift,” Jack answered as if it made all the sense in the world. “I have today off and I want to try a new recipe, some goulash thing.”
That — that did something unpleasant and traitorous in Robby’s chest, which he tried to mask by giving Jack an incredulous look, which the other man answered by saying “Leftovers depress me.”
“Jack.”
"Okay," Jack said. “Let me put it this way. You can keep doing this, coming over, and actually getting some rest, or you can go to therapy and actually do the work to regulate your nervous system yourself. Dealer's choice.”
Robby sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Jack, this is — This is so stupid. I feel so bad. I mean, I'm literally invading your bed. I'm messing up your sleep schedule.”
"You're doing no such thing. You're letting me help you." Into the silence, illuminated by the early morning sunrise, Jack said, “Robby, I like helping you. Please, will you let me do that?”
Robby didn’t answer, couldn’t find the words, but he shoved the key in his pocket anyway, before he headed out into the day, feeling well rested for the first time in months. Well rested enough that the niggling confusion at what exactly was going on between the two of them wasn’t enough to destabilise him.
It was that day that Dana noticed something was up.
They were standing side by side in the ambulance bay, Robby taking a breather and Dana having a smoke break.
“So, you gonna tell me who the lucky gal is?” At Robby’s incredulous laugh, she corrected. “Okay, lucky guy?”
Robby shook his head. “Lucky no one. Why? Do I have a mooney-eyed glow to me?”
“No,” She admitted. “But there’s sure as hell something. You’re not downing coffee like holy water anymore and you haven’t snapped at anyone yet today and we’re already—” She checked her watch “— Four hours into our shift.”
Robby ran a hand through his hair. “Jesus, have I been that bad?”
Dana took a drag, giving him a kind smile and knocked her shoulder into his. “We’ve all been through the ringer, you more than most. Everyone is deserving of a little grace.”
“Thanks,” he said, but he still felt cowed, and he looked down at his shoes. “I haven’t been sleeping great. I haven’t been sleeping at all, really.” He forced himself to look up, to meet Dana’s eyes, and give her a small smile. “Finally got a good few hours these past two days. It’s got me back on track.”
“Hey that’s great,” she said, so earnest and happy for him he might cry if he lets himself dwell on it too much. Who was he, to deserve people in his life who cared for him so deeply? If he thought about it for too long, it might suffocate him under the weight of all the debt of gratitude he owed.
“So you’re still single?”
At that, he really did laugh. “God, yes. Terminally.” And though it was technically true, it didn’t feel quite right. He thought of Jack once more, last night, the steady pressure of his hands over Robby’s. The whole day he’d intermittently flexed his right hand, as if testing to see if the ghost of Jack might squeeze back.
“How long has it been since Janey?” Dana asked. “Two years? Three?”
Robby gave her a look. “I’m not going to answer that. And don’t go getting any ideas.”
She gave him a wicked grin. “But I’m doing the single people of Pittsburgh a disservice! I can’t just let you sit here and wilt like a beloved potted plant. You gotta get out there, Cap.”
He waved her off, making his way back into the hospital, but he smiled nonetheless. “Leave me out of your hairbrained plans. Get Whitaker a date or something, God knows he could use it.”
At that, Dana laughed. “Your mouth to God’s ear,” she called after him.
Jack wasn't lying, because when Robby went back to his apartment that night, he really was cooking a goulash.
"Are we..." Robby struggled to find the words as Jack raised an eyebrow. "Is this a— habit now?"
"Sure it is," Jack said, like it’s the most normal thing in the world, not looking up from the stovetop. "But ‘habit’ is such a dirty word. I like ‘coping mechanism’ better."
Robby worried his knuckles. "But then how do we stop?"
Jack looked at him as if he’d grown two heads.
"Is it going to continue like this?" Robby asked. "I mean life moves on. Or are we just going to do this forever?" The unspoken fear of this sat heavy on Robby's lips. What if we can't stop it?
Jack waved a hand. "We'll stop when we stop. When we get our shit under control. It'll be fine." He smirked and handed Robby his plate of goulash. "This isn't Brokeback, brother. Don't worry, you don't have to quit me anytime soon."
The fork that had been halfway through Robby’s mouth stopped as he considered the implications of what Jack said, but no sooner could he choke on air than Jack is moving over to the couch and flicking on the Pens game.
That night, as they got ready for bed, Jack spoke softly to him. “You’re just a little unmoored, Robby. You’ll get a few more hours of sleep and you’ll be back to yourself in no time.”
“Yeah,” Robby breathed.
“I gotta get back on my night shift schedule,” Jack said, almost apologetic.
“Oh Jesus, Jack—”
“No,” The other man cut him off. “I want you here. To sleep, I mean. I’ve been worried about you man, truth be told, so I’d feel a lot better if I at least had you in front of me knowing you were doing okay. It’s no big deal, just means you have to put up with me reading a little, if that’s okay.”
Robby faltered. There’s an alarm going off in his mind, saying WARNING: LINE CROSSING IMMINENT. And what would it mean to cross that line? In theory, there’s nothing necessarily different about this night compared to the other two times they’ve been in the same bed. But the fact that Jack has admitted to wanting this, needing this as much as Robby— it made his heart race.
If he was a good friend, he would bow out now. He would not be selfish, he would not be greedy, instead he would thank Jack for his services, get his ass into therapy, become a better human all around and kick his years long crush to the curb.
But Robby was horribly, awfully selfish. And Jack was right there, looking at him, with his reading glasses on, a journal in his hand. And Robby has spent over three years denying himself anything at all because he couldn’t have Jack and so, he let himself have this.
“Okay,” he breathed, and lay down, turning to his side.
“You want me to read to you?” Jack asked quietly.
“Yes, please,” Robby said, relieved that he’ll have something else to listen to that isn’t the traitorous thrumming of his overexcited heart.
Jack cleared his throat, and began. “The Society of Critical Care Medicine considers both ketamine and etomidate appropriate agents for rapid sequence intubation in critically ill adults, emphasizing that selection should be guided by the individual patient’s physiology and hemodynamic stability.” Without warning, Jack shifted slightly. He was lower down now, Robby’s forehead brushed against his shoulder. “Evidence from multiple systematic reviews and meta-analyses indicates that the two drugs are associated with comparable intubation success rates, as well as similar short- and long-term mortality outcomes…”
When Robby woke, Jack was fast asleep, his head resting atop Robby’s where he’d been squashed between Jack’s head and shoulder. Like something from a bad Indiana Jones knock-off, Robby slowly pulled away, replacing his absence with a pillow so Jack didn’t get too much of a shock. The other man grunted quietly, but otherwise didn't wake. Gently, Robby reached over and switched the light off, before padding quietly out of the room, trying to be as quiet as his large frame would allow.
His shift that day is, blessedly, not too bad.
Before he knows it, 7pm rolls around and there’s Jack, twenty minutes early, looking bright eyed, bushy tailed and ready for handover.
Jack stopped him with a hand to the chest as Robby made to leave. “Hey,” he said. “The key is for… whenever.”
Robby frowned. “If you find my bed… comfortable,” Jack explained. “You can sleep there, if you want.”
Robby softened. “Thanks, brother, really. But I’ve gotta get back to my apartment, or else I’m paying rent for nothing.”
Jack smiled, and if Robby was a vain man, he might think that he saw a flicker of disappointment in Jack’s face. “Point well made and taken. I was happy to be of service, man. Hope the road is easier from here.”
Robby nodded, smiling. It was hard not to feel his own keen sense of loss, but the buck had to stop somewhere. “Me too.”
Robby walked in the footsteps of a well worn routine, though he hadn’t tread that path in the last few days with his and Jack’s new arrangement sending him off kilter. He walked home, stopped by the supermarket on the way home and got the makings of pasta, along with other staples he was surely missing by now.
When he got back to his apartment, it felt oddly cold, which he knew was just from not having been lived in the past three days, but he couldn’t shake the feeling despite turning the thermostat up. And then he did what he usually did when he came home from a shift-- he cooked, he listened to a podcast, he flipped through the television mindlessly and when he went to bed he made a valiant effort to read his book. And when it got to a reasonable hour, he turned off the light and lay down to sleep, with about the same enthusiasm as a man walking to death row.
The funny thing was— he was actually exhausted. He probably could sleep, given the chance. But now, instead of worries about the hospital and memories of patients and an unkind word from Gloria running through his head, he could only focus on how absurdly big his bed felt now, how cold he was without Jack beside him. Even the air felt empty, without Jack’s cologne there. When Robby shut his eyes, all he could see in his mind's eye was Jack, the way the morning light flushed his skin, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled, the way he lazily stroked Robby’s hand as it lay atop his chest, and his fingers—
And so about six hours after saying goodnight to Jack, Robby showed up at the hospital again.
Jack said nothing, but smiled, and cocked his head. Fancy seeing you here.
“How quiet is it?” He asked, suddenly aware of how desperate he sounded, like he was bargaining with himself.
Jack’s smile turned soft, almost fond, taking pity on him as he shifted his weight off the nurses station and steered him in the direction of the corridor. “Quiet enough. C’mon, I have charting to do.”
Which is how they find themselves in an on-call room again, Robby snoring lightly and Jack charting on one of the hospital’s iPads. When it got to 6:30am, and nearly time for handover, Jack asked “Why didn’t you just go to my apartment?”
Robby blanched. “I’m not going to go to your apartment when you’re not there.”
“Oh, but you’ll sleep in a bed with me just fine?”
“That’s— Different,” Robby refuted. Jack’s look was withering.
"Look, you’re overcomplicating this. It’s not a relationship, I’m not your girlfriend, I won’t get put out if you don’t text me back or buy me flowers. It’s not gonna get messy, Robby. So just take it for what it is. Let's just—”
“Just what? Be friends who sleep together, in the absolute most literal sense of the word? Friends who sleep in one another's bed? In a completely platonic and mentally well adjusted way?”
“Yeah,” Jack said brightly. “Doesn't that sound good to you?”
Robby sighed, and shook his head, hands scrubbing at his beard. “A wiser man would say that we’re using casual intimacy to hide from the emotional turmoil we should be working out in therapy,” Robby called out as Jack walked out the door.
The other man barked out a laugh. "Yeah and when you find him, tell him I said hi."
Robby's perception of time started to shift ever so slightly, and instead of his weeks following the usual well-worn beats of shifts, they became punctuated by their shared days off. At first, Robby craved the sleep, the rest that it would bring but that again evolved. Instead, he started to look forward to the quiet conversations before and after their sleep, the sound of Jack’s voice sending him off to sleep, the way his body was always there to anchor him, literally, to the bed. But he came to covet the smaller moments, too, the moments of which he was one of only a handful of people to get to witness. Jack and his sleep mussed hair, the way he always looked around as if he'd been dropped off on his first day on earth upon waking, his penchant for falling asleep with his glasses on. It was disgustingly cute, and Robby couldn’t think too hard about it or he’d work himself into a panic attack.
He was aware that they were slowly approaching a precipice from which they couldn’t return from. There would come a day when Jack would finally get back out there and go on his own dates, leaving Robby alone. Or when Jack would deem Robby suitably cured and return him to the sleepless land from which he’d come, and Robby would go, of course, but his life would never be the same.
Some days he cursed himself for ever letting himself get this close. And then some days, the only thing that got him out into the world was the feeling of Jack’s arms around him, tight and strong, warm and soft. The freckles that danced like constellations across his skin. Some days, when there was a particularly difficult case, or he was steeling himself to go into a family notice, the only thing that anchored him was the memory of Jack in the dark, wrapped around him and whispering “Can I tell you a secret?” And when Robby replied, yes of course, anything, everything, the way Robby could feel Jack’s lips turn into a bashful smirk as he whispered “I prefer this to the roof.”
Of course, all these thoughts came right before he fell to sleep, as he lay there beside Jack, warm and safe, and he began to dread the moment it was taken from him. Jack always seemed to take it as awkwardness, a no-homo kind of reluctance, which was hilarious and something Robby probably would have laughed about any other day of the week.
"You could be a bit more grateful, you know,” Jack said one night, sitting on the side of the on-call room bed and taking off his prosthetic, massaging his leg.
Robby tilted his head at him, a smile playing on his lips despite the panic in his chest at the thought of one day going without this.
"A lot of gals and guys would kill to have me in their bed." He sniffed, lying down and pulling the blankets tight around his shoulders. "I'm wonderful looking." At that, Robby couldn't help but chuckle, and Jack's face softened, melted at the way his quip had relaxed the other man.
“I am very grateful,” Robby replied, softly, as Jack’s arms snaked around his chest, pulling him closer. “You’re a wonderful friend. You’re also a blanket hog, and your snoring could wake the dead.”
Jack fixed him with a look. “But?”
Robby sighed, feigning annoyance. “But I’m very lucky to have you.”
“Nah,” Jack said softly. “I’m the lucky one.”
In those moments between waking and dreaming, Robby was totally consumed by Jack. He wanted to give everything he had to him. Despite being smaller than Robby, and despite the fact that his bed— which Robby did prefer to sleep in, given the chance— is a king size, he had an incredible ability to fill any space he’s in. Robby loved that he could still smell Jack’s cologne faintly on his scrubs the days they sleep in the on-call room together, loved the way Jack’s warmth radiated throughout the whole bed, the way he splayed out and covered Robby in his limbs; he loved it all and it will never, ever be enough for him.
The realisation terrifies him. Because at first, Robby was so dumbstruck that Jack would even deign to be in the same bed as Robby for a one-off, let alone a full on recurring habit— or coping mechanism. Robby, who’d had a crush on Jack since God knows when, initially thought he’d died and gone to heaven to get to have Jack so near like that. And it should have been enough. If he were a normal and well adjusted man, it would be enough. But increasingly as the nights went on Robby’s head was a veritable Greek chorus of “more, more, all of this all of the time please” which was getting increasingly difficult to drown out.
But there is one moment that is awash with unadulterated stillness. It had become Robby’s favorite part of this whole fucked up situation.
He loved the stillness of the room, whichever they were in, the way the whole world ceased to exist outside of these four walls. The way their in tandem breathing is the only thing Robby can hear, their chests rising and falling in synchronicity. The soft light of the on-call room or Jack’s bedroom would cast its glow on their bodies, the exposed skin of Jack’s clavicle where his sleep shirt has gone loose at the collar from years of use, the bulge of his bicep where it’s tucked beneath his head.
It’s in this space that they can take time out from being all the things they are to the world. They aren’t attendings or veterans, they aren’t sons and brothers and grandchildren and friends, they are just Robby and Jack; two people who have found a small moment of freedom from an unrelenting world. And sometimes, in those moments, Jack asks him questions.
“Tell me a secret.”
They’re in Jack’s bed. Because of course they are, and if Robby looked any closer at this whole goddamn bitch of a situation, he’d probably discover himself to be a freak of nature, with a malady so profound it would shake the annals of medicine to its core.
Robby has secrets like a beach has sand, all kinds, of any sort. It comes with the job of being a chief attending, discretion is needed, tight lips are advised.
But this is an observation he’s noted and kept; Jack, for all the mirth in his eyes, the easy way he can smile when he needs to, has a darkness in his soul, and Robby wouldn’t change a thing about it for all the money in the world. He’s the only person Robby’s ever met who could match him beat for beat, who is relentless in his pursuit for what is right and just. He will find Robby on the roof, every time, as Robby will find him, because they understand one another too intrinsically for anything else to be true. Jack’s very existence, the effect he has on Robby, is a wonder, a mystery, one that Robby could study for his lifetime and still not be any closer to understanding.
“I don’t have any secrets.”
Jack would scoff, pulling him marginally closer by the waist. “Well, I know that’s a lie.”
Here is a secret that is really just a truth; Jack has haunted his moments and dreams since the moment they met, and Robby has been with him so often in fragments of dreams he would know him blind, deaf, numb, in this world or any other. Anyone else has become ruined for Robby since meeting Jack, and Robby knows he’s intelligent so sometimes he has to wonder—does he not know? Has he really not noticed? That after only a year and a half of Jack moving here, his relationship with Janey was on the rocks, and six months later, they were broken up? That aside from a very ill advised fling with Heather, there’s been no one, at all? No one, that is, except for Jack.
“Alright, here’s a secret: I’m afraid.”
“Of what?”
Death. The roof. Losing control again and having to watch it crumble to pieces in front of him. Jack, because he could break Robby’s heart and leave him for dead in one fell swoop and Robby would let him. Jack has the power to destroy Robby and he doesn’t even know it. And the real secret is, is that Robby is less afraid of dying than something happening to Jack if he did die, which is scary in itself because he’s been so used to working in favour of himself for so long that he doesn’t know what to do with this heavy, crushing affection that he’s built for Jack.
“Spiders.”
Jack would push himself up on his arms and look at him. “You’re joking.”
“No, really. I think it’s the legs. And the eyes.”
“Tell me another one.”
Robby would huff a laugh and make a show of rolling to his side, punching the pillow to the perfect flatness. “I’m going to sleep now, Dr. Abbot.”
And Jack would flop down beside him, resting his head against the back of Robby’s neck, arm thrown over Robby’s stomach, his presence warm and soft and warding off any impediments to Robby’s sleep. “Spoilsport.”
And so that was how they were, now, this new arrangement that slotted so easily into the contours of their friendship. They still worked well together, they handed off to one another with quips and jokes and went for beers and watched the hockey, but the one thing that did, perhaps, noticeably change was that their visits to the roof stopped almost in their entirety.
Instead, Robby would find Jack in an on-call room, sitting on the bed as if he didn’t know what to do with it without Robby there, or Robby would skulk into the hospital in the middle of the night and Jack would make himself scarce, meeting him in whatever room was free. Sometimes he would still be there when Robby woke, sometimes not. Sometimes, and these were secretly Robby’s favourite, he wouldn’t be there, but before Robby could get up to go on about his day, Jack would return, and apologise, and climb back into bed with him for the minute or two they had left before Robby’s shift started in earnest.
Robby loved these moments because he could actually remember them, and would make a conscious effort to commit them to memory; the way that Jack so gently lowered himself onto the bed, the way he wrapped his arms around Robby, the way he positioned his neck just right so Robby could slot himself into the space between his head and shoulder perfectly. The way Robby could feel his pulse, steady and vital, from his carotid artery, never wavering. In these moments, the way Jack would speak softly to him, just sweet nothings, about a coffee place Parker had found that did a truly exceptional flat white, about an album he’d rediscovered on his drive to work that was a new favourite, about a book he’d seen advertised that Robby might like.
It felt like a dream. The light was syrupy golden through the window, Jack never bothering to adjust the blinds, and Robby would always think, this could maybe almost be enough. Jack, here, near, holding him, the feeling of his voice, soft and low through his chest, the way that Roby could feel his heartbeat in his chest; Jack was absolutely brilliant and alive and wonderful, and Robby loved him so desperately in those moments, that he figured if he could just have this, it would be more than he’d ever dreamed of.
Jack was gorgeous, that much Robby knew to be a fact. But he felt it especially keenly in these moments, that Jack was wasted on the nights. He looked so handsome, in the daylight, strong and golden and shining.
A few weeks later, Dana, who said she'd had enough of keeping Pittsburgh's most eligible bachelor all to herself, set Robby up on a blind date.
Sarah was nice, a bookseller downtown, and they talked shop and about books. It was pleasant, almost nice, and the sex after was perfunctory and almost satisfying, but after two hours of lying in bed, his mind wired and unable to close his eyes any longer than a blink, he made a half hearted excuse about being called in and slipped out of her apartment and into Jack's.
Jack, who had been sleeping soundly, cracked a single eye open as Robby tucked himself into the sheets.
"You smell like Chanel Number Five," he said, voice gravelly from sleep.
"Sorry," Robby replied automatically, and then, aware he might have shown too much vulnerability, prickled and said "What are you, my wife?"
"S'alright," Jack mumbled, sleep already pulling him back under. He hooked a leg across Robby's waist and patted his chest, leaving his hand there. "Damn your wife, I'd be your mistress just to keep you around."
Robby’s heart gave a lurch at that. He wondered, not for the first time, how Jack managed to make this feel so commonplace, as if this was completely normal and the done thing. How he could joke and shrug and insist this was nothing, when this new thing between them had quietly consumed Robby’s every waking moment. As if the act of inviting Robby into his bed— literally, with no pretense or recompense demanded— wasn’t so insanely generous it left Robby breathless if he thought of it for too long. Sleep no longer consistently eluded him, a thing Robby had chased and failed to catch. With Jack, sleep became something given, shared; but it was something else too. Like their conversations on the roof, it became a temple of sorts. A space in time carved out in the day just for them. Except unlike the roof, it was for the most part removed from work. There were no discussions of death, or horrible injury, of injustices or the bullshit bureaucracy of the American medical system. Instead, it was almost— domestic? Was that the word? Robby couldn’t tell, it had been so long since he’d been in a relationship, and as his previous partners always reminded him, he was deeply dysfunctional, so his own idea of what may or may not constitute domestic bliss probably differed greatly from that of the general public.
But it was… nice. Those moments, with Jack, before sleep. Making plans to try a new shawarma place, variable discussions about a running app Robby was trying out or a new gym Jack had found. An article ear marked for a new recipe to try and a reminder for a game upcoming that they wanted to watch.
That was the dangerous part, he thought as his eyes grew heavy—not the closeness, not even the want, but the trust. The way Jack made space for him without asking for anything back. The way Robby had started to imagine this as a constant, as if constants weren’t the first things to disappear.
The next morning, Dana came up to Robby, asked him how the date went. He gave her the same polite answer; great girl, but no spark, what can you do? And he doesn’t miss for a moment the way Jack has stopped his charting to stare at him intently, like a bloodhound caught on a scent. When Robby looked over at him, after Dana walked away muttering about him not knowing a good thing if it hit him in the face, Jack smiled, like the cat who got the cream.
That night, when they’re lying in Jack’s bed, Jack asked, “Why did you sleep with her?”
Robby’s stomach did somersaults. “Sarah?”
Jack nodded. “I don’t— care,” He said, clarifying. “But you came back here, to me.”
“Yeah,” Robby said simply. He sighed, and rubbed a hand over his face. “You said, when we started this, that it wouldn’t become a habit. That we’d just do it until we sorted ourselves out, and we’d be fine. But it became a habit for me. I don’t know how to not come back to you, now. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Jack said. “I like you coming back to me. You can come back to me every time, any time.”
Was this real? Was this happening? Robby didn’t know, couldn’t be sure, and then, Jack is pushing closer to him. “You didn’t answer me. Why did you sleep with her?”
“I don’t— Jack,” he said, desperately, “I had to do something. I was sleeping with you and working with you and you were everything— and you still are everything, even after.” Jack put a hand on Robby’s face, and Robby’s mind immediately went oh here’s that line, the one you always said not to cross. And the thing is—the thing is. Is that actually, Robby is exhausted. Exhausted of wanting without reprieve. And he wanted Jack, with the fervor of a madman, and Jack was looking at him, his eyes dark and searing, and Robby for once, lets himself hope and trust that Jack just might want him too.
“Robby, tell me the truth.”
So, he admitted, “Her lips. They looked like yours.”
And with that, Jack grabbed Robby’s face, pulled him in, and kissed him.
Jack kissed with a kind of urgency that isn’t frantic but isn’t careful either, unpolished and intent all at once, as if he’s still figuring out what he’s reaching for even while his hands are already there, like he wanted all of Robby at once.
There’s nothing tentative about it, though, Jack is so thorough in such a way that you would be forgiven for thinking that he might have thought about this moment before. And before Robby can collect himself, he’s gripping Jack’s hips hard, and moving against him with a reckless, breathless eagerness that makes him feel absurdly young.
It’s been years since Robby felt like this. But Jack—God. Jack.
Jack pulled away first. “Robby, you never told me.” It could almost be heartbreak, in Jack’s voice.
“I didn’t know I could,” he whispered.
“You’re such a fucking idiot.” But the heat is taken out of the words by the fact that Jack is kissing him all the while, his mouth red hot and tongue licking into Robby’s mouth.
It’s like a switch flipped in both of them as they realise they have a ridiculous amount of time to make up for. Jack’s hand curls around a handful of hair at the base of Robby’s neck as Robby clamped his hand down on Jack’s waist, fingertips curling into his hip bone, hard enough to bruise. Jack moaned into Robby’s mouth as he surged forward, plastering himself against Robby, his dick already hard and pressing insistently against Robby’s.
Robby moved his hand from Jack’s hips across his lower back, pulling him in to get more purchase against his dick, as they grind against each other like teenagers. But it’s so good, and Jack is here, really, underneath his hands, all hard muscles and tendons flexing under Robby’s grip.
His dick is like velvet in Robby’s hand, and the moans he makes as Robby strokes become Robby’s very favourite sound in the whole world. His hand is calloused and rough against Robby’s own dick, and it sends a thrill through him because this is just Jack; it has never felt like this with anyone else.
With Sarah, he spent the whole time thinking how much harder Jack’s actual body was, even just in sleep beside him; there were more angles and rough edges, and how odd it was to kiss lips that were smooth where stubble should be. He was so hard he was already leaking precome by the time Jack wraps his fist around him—and doesn’t that just make the other man preen, delighted with himself, at what he reduces Robby to, and Robby can’t begrudge him that, lets him have it all, and more, and more.
Months later, he’s at home, in their bed, in Jack’s apartment, Jack curled around him like a cat, and Robby feels completely at peace with the world.
“Tell me a secret.”
He understands it, now, he does. Why his previous partners called him emotionally unavailable and a specific brand of asshole, and why it could never work. Jack has captured his every fibre, and more so than anything else, Robby wants to let him.
“I love you.”
Silence. Robby’s breath catches.
“I said a secret— Ow!”
“Fuck you.”
“I’m joking, I’m joking— Robby, Mike, I love you too. I love you, too.”
A gentle kiss, accented with smiles from the two. It feels quite like home, Robby thinks. It feels like never wanting to leave.
He doesn’t think he ever will.