Chapter Text
Shane Hollander had worked at Vancouver General Hospital for three years, long enough for people to have formed very definite opinions about him.
And most of them agreed on three things: he was an excellent pediatrician, he drank coffee in quantities that probably should have been regulated and, for some reason no one could quite explain, he seemed incapable of going more than two days without arguing with the orthopedic surgeon Ilya Rozanov.
The origin of the rivalry depended on who you asked.
Some said it had started during a particularly tense case meeting, when the two of them had spent fifteen minutes debating the treatment of a pediatric fracture while half the room pretended to take notes and the other half pretended not to be enjoying it.
Others swore it had happened in the middle of a hallway, when Dr. Hollander supposedly insulted the entire orthopedic department.
Dr. Scott Hunter, from trauma surgery, insisted it all came down to professional ego.
“Pediatricians and orthopedists always fight over territory,” he once explained during a night shift, leaning against the nurses’ station. “One wants to protect the child, and the other just wants to fix the bone. Eventually someone raises their voice.”
That theory would have been more convincing if Hollander and Rozanov hadn’t raised their voices far more often than any medical disagreement actually required.
Over time, the occasional spectacle between the two of them became part of the hospital’s scenery. It wasn’t exactly common, but it didn’t surprise anyone either.
So when it happened for the first time that week, nobody found it particularly strange.
And it was, technically, Shane’s fault.
Shane Hollander was very good at many things. He calmed frightened children with impressive ease and explained complicated procedures to anxious parents with almost supernatural patience.
What he couldn’t do was walk while reading a chart.
He turned the corner of the hallway too quickly, his eyes fixed on the notes of an eight-year-old patient who had arrived in the emergency room after falling out of a tree, and only realized his mistake when it was already too late.
The impact was immediate and completely immovable, as if he had just walked straight into a very tall wall that, for some reason, smelled faintly of antiseptic and expensive cologne.
Shane looked up, ready to apologize.
Ilya Rozanov was staring at him.
Shane was the first to move. He took a step back and reorganized the papers in his hands as if the collision had been nothing more than a minor logistical inconvenience.
“Can’t you look where you’re going?”
Ilya slowly crossed his arms, studying Shane with an expression that didn’t quite reach surprise.
“I can,” Ilya replied with the same calm. “But apparently you can’t.”
Across the hallway, Dr. Kip Grady from cardiology slowed his pace slightly when he recognized the beginning of what promised to be an interesting argument.
Shane sighed loudly and rolled his eyes.
“I was on my way to call orthopedics for a fractured arm,” he said, adjusting the chart against his chest. “But apparently I’ve already found the department’s official representative.”
Ilya raised an eyebrow slowly.
“Then you should pay more attention to where you’re going.”
Shane held his gaze for a full second, his expression completely neutral.
“If I needed a useless comment,” he replied calmly, “I would have asked for one.”
Dr. Kip wasn’t even pretending not to listen anymore.
Ilya tilted his head slightly, evaluating Shane with the same expression he usually used when examining a particularly irritating X-ray.
“Pediatric patient?”
“Obviously.”
“X-ray?”
“Already ordered.”
Ilya extended his hand.
“Let me see the chart.”
Shane handed over the papers without arguing.
For a brief second, their fingers brushed. It was a small gesture, almost accidental.
Neither of them reacted, neither of them looked at the other.
Ilya was already scanning the notes, his attention returning completely to the case.
“Probably a simple fracture,” he concluded after a few seconds.
“I know.”
Ilya looked up from the paper.
“Then why did you call orthopedics?”
Shane crossed his arms.
“Because I’m a responsible pediatrician.”
Ilya handed the chart back.
“Miracle.”
Shane narrowed his eyes.
“Are you going to treat the patient or keep being insufferable?”
Ilya had already started walking down the hallway toward pediatrics.
“I can always do both,” he said over his shoulder.
Shane let out an annoyed huff and headed after him, one step behind.
Behind them, a nurse who had been organizing a clipboard watched the two disappear down the corridor and shook her head.
“They really can’t stand each other,” she commented.
Dr. Kip watched the same hallway for another second before continuing on his way.
“Definitely not.”
🚑
The second time happened two days later.
Shane didn’t usually close his office door in the middle of a shift, but that afternoon he was seriously considering hiding there until the end of it.
The day had started at six in the morning with a feverish baby in the emergency room, continued with two consultations that turned into full parental crises and, at some point between one chart and another, someone apparently decided pediatricians should also handle administrative problems.
Now he was sitting in the chair in his office, his elbows resting on the desk and his eyes closed for a second that had probably lasted about five minutes.
The door opened without a knock.
Shane didn’t even need to look up to know who it was.
“You look tired,” Ilya said, walking in and closing the door behind him.
“I know,” Shane replied, his voice muffled against his folded arms.
Ilya stopped beside the desk for a moment, simply watching Shane there, completely exhausted, his hair messy and his coat crooked on one shoulder.
He reached out and brushed a strand of hair away from Shane’s forehead, and Shane let out a long sigh, followed by a tired little groan.
“Bad shift?” Ilya asked.
“Pediatric shift,” Shane corrected without lifting his head.
Ilya made a small sound of understanding.
“Bednyy moy,” he murmured, lightly scratching his nails against the back of Shane’s neck.
Shane opened one eye to look at him.
“You know I understand you when you do that.”
Ilya didn’t look impressed.
“I know.”
His fingers continued moving absently through Shane’s hair, tracing a slow path. Shane closed his eyes again almost immediately, the tension in his face easing by a few degrees.
“I’ll make dinner tonight,” Ilya said after a moment. “You come home, take a shower, and you don’t have to think about anything.”
Shane opened one eye again, suspicious.
“You’ve said that before.”
“And I’ve done it too.”
“You burned dinner.”
“Once.”
“Twice.”
Ilya sighed as if he had been deeply wronged.
“It was completely intentional.”
Shane let out a small tired laugh, still not opening his eyes.
For a moment, the office was quiet.
That was exactly when the door swung open.
“Shane, are you-”
Dr. Hayden Pike stopped in the middle of the sentence.
The silence that followed lasted exactly long enough for Hayden to register the scene: Shane leaning forward in his chair behind the desk, Ilya standing beside him, much closer than two doctors arguing at work would normally stand.
Shane straightened so quickly he nearly knocked over a stack of charts.
“Hayden,” he said with suspiciously controlled calm.
Hayden blinked.
“I-” he gestured vaguely toward the hallway. “I just came to ask if you wanted to get lunch.”
“No,” Shane answered far too quickly.
Ilya took a step back, his expression returning to its usual professional neutrality.
“Dr. Pike,” he said with a brief nod.
Hayden looked from one to the other, then raised his hands.
“Alright,” he said quickly. “I’ll come back later.”
He closed the door and stood in the hallway for two seconds, trying to process what he had just seen.
When Hayden reached the nurses’ station a few minutes later, the floor’s informal center of medical gossip was already functioning as usual.
Dr. Scott Hunter was leaning against the counter reviewing a chart. Next to him, Dr. Svetlana Vetrova from general surgery was absentmindedly stirring a cup of coffee, and a little farther away Dr. Rose Landry from neurosurgery was flipping through MRI images on her tablet.
Hayden leaned his elbows on the counter.
“I just interrupted the most intense argument in the history of modern medicine,” he announced.
Scott didn’t even look up from the chart.
“Rozanov and Hollander?”
Hayden gasped.
“You already knew?”
Scott calmly turned a page. “They argue three times a week.”
Svetlana made a small sound of agreement, still stirring her coffee.
“Last week it was about a cast.”
Rose looked up from her tablet.
“It wasn’t about the cast,” she corrected. “It was about the type of cast.”
Hayden shook his head.
“No, no. This was different.”
Now Scott finally looked up.
“Different how?”
Hayden thought for a second, trying to organize what he had seen.
“Like…” he gestured vaguely. “Heated rivalry.”
Svetlana raised an eyebrow, and Scott considered the theory for exactly half a second before returning to his chart.
“Pediatrics and orthopedics,” he said. “Classic.”
Rose shrugged and went back to her tablet.
Hayden, however, kept staring down the hallway that led to Shane’s office.
“Still,” he murmured, more to himself than to anyone else, “that was intense.”