Chapter Text
When the notification hits, that little all too notable ping, it takes Dennis a second to realise that it's his.
"Yeah, look at the Vfib." He says, because apparently he's fucking stupid, and traces his finger over the jumps in the rhythm across the paper Robby is holding. He shuffles that little bit closer to him as he does, just 'cus.
Yet he doesn't get the classic quick- yeah- or if he's lucky the -well spotted- or anything at all.
The silent stretches like pulled taffy. Huh. He dashes a look up at Trinity, and realises something is wrong when he gets an eyeful of her mirth tinged grin and that sparkle in her gaze that he's coming to associate with being absolutely fucked.
Oh, oh.
That's his phone, that's his notification, that's… oh fuck thats Grindr.
Like he's been fucking struck by lightning he jumps away from where he's been crowding, not so subtly turns out, up to Robby and scrambles at his pockets.
But his phone decides now is a great time to become a strong willed fish trying to get the slip of a weary fisherman, it flops and flails between his fingers, gets stuck in the pocket of his scrubs and- no, no, nooo. Several more little pings sound, in rapid succession.
"Ah, no wait. Sorry, sorry. Fuck, let me just."
He manages a solid grasp and tugs hard until his phone is free- big catch, that's a keeper- sliding the metal bar into silent with a little damning click- he didn't even realise it wasn't on silent.
After that first day he always checks, he makes sure, because he sure as hell doesn't want Robby to look at him like that again.
And, and, it's meant to be on vibrate anyway because apparently it's really fucking cringe Huckleberry to have a phone that functions as a phone, nowadays. Heaven forbid he answer when people call him. Not that anyone calls him, anymore really. Not after-
"AHA- there, um, sorry." He flushes, hard. He can feel the heat beneath his skin blotching and staining his cheeks as he risks a glance up at Dr. Robby.
"Maybe," Robby says, clearing his throat and looking at him like that again, exasperated and tired and disappointed- the worst type of look, "we save our personal lives for after work, Whitaker."
"Yeah- no, yeah, sorry Dr. Robby. I don't know how it- sorry. Won't happen again." He yammers, but it's too late, Trinity is already sniggering into her sleeve and Robby is looking at him with this strange tense expression, and he wants to die.
Take him back to Nebraska, even that would be better than this.
Than his attending, no it's more than that, than Robby, knowing he's lighting up in the Pittsburgh gay scene.
Robby nods, passes him the ECG, and gives him a tight smile that doesn't quite curl up to his crows feet. "Grab Mohan, but you've got this Whitaker, shout if you need anything. Santos with me. "
Except, of course, he isn't lighting up the gay scene, because he hasn't been on a single date- hook up- yet.
Because every time he talks to someone long enough for their hands on his body to become a feasible tangible possible reality, rather than an idea- a fantasy- he can roll around his head as he rolls his clit between his fingers, he freaks out and blocks. He stares up at Trinity's ceiling, phone clutched in his palm and squeezes his eyes shut as if that'll help against the hammering in his chest.
Then he goes and watches porn that would make his mother weep for his soul if she knew. Weep more than she probably already does. If, by some miracle of misinterpreted scripture, being trans and gay isn't enough to send him to hell then he knows watching this stuff- being interested in it- craving it almost- that certainly is.
No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man- Corinthians 10:13.
But this shit doesn't feel common.
He can imagine his pastor back home being tempted once in a while by stray thoughts when he sees the hems of pretty girls dresses blowing up in the summer breeze, but he can't imagine that he has to resist the urge to want to be tied up so tightly it'll leave marks while someone tucks their thumb and works a whole fist into his cunt. Or do the fisting, probably, his pastor- to his knowledge- doesn't have a pussy.
Either way.
It doesn't feel very -sins of the common man- to Dennis.
He can't imagine the men of his home town that fill up the Sunday pews have these perverse temptations.
Yet he still watches it. He watches all manner of debased things that make his cunt drip so much that he soaks his boxers and then when he's cum once, twice, sometimes three times, he'll lay there in a bed that still doesn't quite feel like his own, and feel sick.
He'll wipe his internet history and panic it won't be enough, and Santos will know how much of a freak he is when they (the internet people he guesses? The WiFi people? Who is her WiFi even with?) send her a report- do you know someone is using your WiFi to watch some pretty messed up shit? Here's the links!
So then in desperation to be fucking normal for once he'll look at the dating apps, and the men his age who might accept and love him and he'll swipe left on every single one of them with a growing sense of unease before he inevitably switches back to Grindr- even though it started this whole spiral in the first place.
And he'll go back to chatting to men whose ages are nearly double his own and have sparse enough bio's to scare him- and he'll think- what the fuck is wrong with me. He'll talk to them anyway, of course. Because both options scare him, but the fear of being fucked is easier to grapple with than the fear of being unlovable.
But he's never, yet, met a single person in real life.
"Yo, Hucks," Trinity grabs at his shoulders as she pushes him outside, what must be an hour and two major traumas later. There's blood on his shoes, smearing just at the tips of his trainers. You can't really tell through the pitch black material, but he knows its there. He knows. He's going to have to scrub it out. Maybe here, instead of Trinity's sink, that seems- unfair. "I cannot, I stress cannot, believe that Dr. Robby knows you're on Grindr."
She mock whispers, though it's just them out here so far as they wait for an incoming. It still makes him look around wildly.
"We're at work Trinity," He hisses, then, "and he probably doesn't even know what Grindr is, anyway."
He hopes he doesn't. He really, really, hopes his boss- his straight boss- doesn't know it was Grindr. His straight, incredibly attractive, boss.
Dennis gulps in the fresh air while he can, both because he feels like he might pass out with shame, and also because anything beats the stale blood and sweat and disinfectant filled aroma that lingers in the air of the ER. It cloys in his hair and sticks to the back of his throat. There's no place he'd rather be, but sometimes its a bit much.
"No he definitely knows. His eyebrows did that thing." Santos waves her hands.
Dennis frowns, tugging on his scrubs. "What thing?"
"When he looks at you all incredulous and shit- you know the thing- don't fuck with me Huckleberry. He knows." She grins daggers at him.
"Ughhhhh." He shoves the palm of his hands into his eyes as he groans. Presses until he can see little white shapes dance and crystallise and bloom red. Until they ache.
"One way to come out I guess." She shoves her shoulder into his, but it doesn't help. "You ready for your 'date' tonight? Assuming that was him?"
She even makes the air quotes. He sees her do it through the lingering light that flashes through his vision and wishes he didn't.
"No, he cancelled after I told him."
Dennis had replied while he got a brief five minutes reprieve to piss. He'd whipped his phone out of his pocket, sat down and excitedly opened the messages from 'Simon- 36'.
Just a quick- oh by the way I'm trans, hope that's okay :) And of course, no- turns out that's not okay. Turns out he wants his twinks with nice little twink dicks and to fuck them in the ass. That's fine, whatever. It's not like he doesn't also have an ass, but it's fine. People like what they like. He probably wouldn't have gone anyway, so.
It's not like he cried in the toilets about it- when would he have the time? It literally didn't matter.
Besides as soon as he'd stepped back into the fray he'd felt the strong sturdy grip of Robby's hand on his shoulder- fingertips curling at the nape of his neck- he'd quickly decided, yeah. None of that mattered at all, actually, for real. He definitely wasn't gonna meet up anyway.
Still, he's half expecting Trinity to tell him, once again, that he should put it in his bio. But he wants someone to want him for him, and accept him, not someone who wants him because of it. Like some fetish or something. He wants like- other fetishes, sure, he thinks, just not the 'boy with a pussy' kind.
That feels… too far for him.
"Again?" Is all she says though, softer than he thinks he probably deserves. It makes unease swirl in his gut. "Well, we can order in and watch Greys, my treat."
"Trin."
He looks at her a little too long. If there's one thing worse than her teasing it's her sincerity.
"Okay, a consolation then, for the plight of your ongoing virginity, come on huckleberry."
"Trin!"
"Also, I think you should let me cut your hair because this little Amish boy thing you've got going is not- it's not great. I feel like he woulda taken one look at you and been out of there anyway. Now it's a little longer you've gotta let me cut it." She goes to tug at him and he bats her hand away. A buzzing fly he does not have the patience for today, his hair is fine. "Oh, so only certain people can pet you, then? Only a good little puppy for our atten-"
"Trinity, stop it." Dennis snaps. His cunt clenches and his breath catches in his chest without his permission.
Whose a good little puppy, Whitaker. Robby's voice is so clear in his mind, clear enough that he almost looks around to see if the man himself is behind them, but ah- Trinity isn't reacting so probably not, she'd just staring at him with a curious tilt of her head. Good boy, be a good boy for me, that's it. Good boys take it just like that, Whitaker.
"You can cut it. My hair- whatever." Dennis stumbles over his words, scared that Trinity can see the perversity in his head- like it's being projected right into hers in vivid technicolor.
His cunt aches. Like it actually makes him a bit sick, how much he needs it. He took his shot yesterday, so he's keyed up in general, but he shouldn't be wanting to fucking drop to his knees in the ambulance bay and shove his fingers into his cunt while he whines and presses his face against the sun-soaked concrete. What the fuck. Just at the thought of his boss calling him a puppy.
Maybe he can like- run to the bathroom and-
And what Dennis? He thinks frantically, a wild rawness to his thoughts that he can't seem to grapple with. Jerk off in a bathroom stall at work where anyone could walk in?
"ETA 2 minutes-" Oh, that's Robby. That's a very very very real Dr. Robinavitch, not the patronisingly sweet cloying version in his head. The difference is a cold bucket of reality that hits like ice over his head and trickles down his spine. It creeps like a sickness into his stomach. "-we can talk about Whitaker's style choices later."
"I'm thinking a mullet." Trinity presses with a shit eating grin whilst Dennis tries not to pass out. "What do you think Dr. Robby?"
Robby smiles, huffs out a little- kinda forced sounding- laugh and turns to watch the ambulance pull in.
Dennis promptly forgets about the Robby in his head and the ache between his legs, at least for a little while, because the blood on his gloves and the screams in his ears become the only thing he can even begin to focus on.
~
Michael has a problem, and the shape of the problem is that MS4 student with big wide mousy eyes and a nervous looking but surprising strong constitution.
He takes a can from his fridge, opens up the brown paper take away bag, grabs a fork, and flops onto his sofa.
Eyeing the bowl of fruit on the table with overwhelming suspicion, he flicks on the TV. It's all probably just past ripe. Like if he moves them from the unaltered position he shoved them in when he bought them, then the bottom of the peaches will be sticky and this side of too soft. Maybe he should chuck them, but ah- well- Jack is coming to visit tomorrow. The bananas at least look kinda passable.
The fork stabs into the noodles as he flicks over to storage wars and resolutely ignores the desire to put on The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City- because watching an episode or two by accident is fine but this would be a choice wouldn't it. He's not at rock fucking bottom yet, thanks.
He gets five minutes into watching them auction off a lot before he caves and thinks about him.
Did you know Whitaker is gay? He absolutely cannot, but wants to, text Jack.
Why would Jack know though? Dennis has been on what- one? One night shift. One day with Jack covering. His first shift. Three times isn't enough to know something like that. Right?
Michael's had nearly three weeks with him, and not an inkling.
When he thinks about Dennis Whitaker, he thinks- nice kid, good potential, surprisingly jacked, easily movable.
He doesn't think- twink, frequents Grindr, quick hookups.
(Okay, maybe he thinks twink sometimes, though he tries not to.)
Seismic shift in perspective, huh?
He can practically smell the fumes from the paint stripper as he works off his layers of assumptions about the kid- religious, probably dating some equally mousy girl who flits around his arm in pretty floral dresses and giggles softly, blonde, hair to her tits, never a V cut top in sight, married by his thirties, kids a year later, steady little career.
Now look, he's not unaware of his… desire to slap his hands on the boy. Grant a man his vices, no?
His forks stabs at a piece of chicken and accidentally skewers some broccoli on it's way. He frowns and tugs it off using the edge of the plastic container until it topples back onto the noodles.
But there's a difference between the way a- lets say straight- Dennis looks up at him and lets him do that shit, and a gay one. Hell even bisexual.
Whitaker with a mousey little girlfriend is fine. That's fine. Whitaker with a random sleazy Grindr hook up? A man? A man like him? No. Absolutely fucking not. Although he doubts the kid has his age range high enough for men like him- men old enough to be his father.
Oh Mikey- you've got to eat your greens, come on now, just one more.
He stabs at he broccoli, hesitates, shoves it into his mouth, his fingers twitching to reach for the metal around his neck.
So Dennis is gay- bisexual- whatever. But Michael just had to walk out into the bay a few minutes early didn't he? And he just had to overhear that Dennis is not only wanting to fuck men, but that he'd never in fact been fucked before, that Dennis Whitaker is a virgin.
Knowledge he now possesses against his will, by the fucking way, he coulda gone his whole life without knowing any of this and been better for it.
The takeout gets shoved onto the table, a pathetic selection of vegetables pooling in sesame oil on the plastic, right next to the fruit as he settles down and switches the channel 'accidentally'.
Like the gross man he is, he takes a swig of beer and settles a pillow behind him- for his back- before he slides his hand into his sweats and palms at his cock.
Half hard already- just thinking of the kid. His big wide eyes, the way he moves so easily, takes direction so nicely, feels so- so small under his hands, the way he easily lifted Trinity as a joke the other week- fucking sleep build or what- the-
-the way he would look, face pressed into Michael's sheets, huffing in his scent- he wouldn't change the covers before pressing Dennis into them, of course. Where would be the fun in that. Back arched in a perfect little bow. Maybe he has little freckles, moles, scattering his lower back. Maybe not- maybe perfect uninterrupted porcelain.
Maybe Michael would have to put a pillow under his hips for when his legs start shaking, and they would, because he'd make sure to make it as pleasurable as possible for the kid as he stretches him out for his cock. His fingers are bigger than Dennis', even just slipping one of his lubed up fingers into the kid would probably feel much more than anything he's had in him before.
Unless- Michael frowns- maybe he has toys. He hopes not. Is that bad? Does that make him a bad person? Probably, yeah. But- look- this is his fantasy isn't it? Fuck it- he can think what he fucking wants. It's never going anywhere but his head.
So Dennis has only had his own fingers in him.
Of course, then, he'd gasp like a pretty little thing as he's stretched from one to two of Michael's. Maybe he'd even whine and bite at his covers. Taste his subtle sweat in the sheets. Would he like it? Michael thinks he would. He would.
The hand on his cock speeds up as he slicks himself with his own spit and precome. His head falls back against the cushions.
Dennis could probably cum multiple times a night, so what would be the harm in giving him an early one? Pressing against his prostate and flicking his fingers slick and slow against it until Dennis tightens around him like a vice. That feel good baby? Maybe he'd grab Dennis' hair- his stupid mullet Santos wants to give him- because he would look good with one- and pull his face up so Michael can see the expression he makes as he cums for the very first time with another person. With him.
Fuck- fuck.
Michael tries to tighten his grip around himself but it's too late, he's coming in ropes in his sweats like a fucking teenager, faster than he has in years. Before he could even get to fucking the kid.
Sharp staccato breaths are ripped from his lungs as he presses his clean hand to his eyes and jams his knuckles in them until they ache.
Fucking hell Dennis.
~
"Did you know the Whitaker kid is gay?"
Jack pauses as he rests his bag on the table- right next to the sweet rot of the fruit. He hasn't noticed it. The rotting. When he looks up he's got a single eyebrow arched almost perfect in it's form and judgement, and Michael thinks- yeah, fucked it.
"I haven't even set up the Wii yet."
Michael screws his face up, shoves his hands in the pocket of his zip up, and sighs as he asks, "and why did you bring a Wii?"
"I like the bowling."
Michael scoffs and pulls a face, tilting his head and scrunching up his shoulders.
Jack takes the offending console out of his bag and starts faffing with the cords, handing two controllers to Michael who- reluctantly- takes them.
"Firstly, take it down a notch. Secondly, I'm about to beat your fucking ass at this, I've had practice. Picked it up for next to nothing a few weeks ago at the exchange."
Wonder why? Michael doesn't say. He's about to ask what Jack was even doing at the exchange in the first place, but before he can Jack beats him to it.
"Thirdly," Jack wiggles his eyebrows as he finishes with, "I thought we weren't meant to gossip about peoples sexualities anymore?"
"Shut the fuck up." Michael snorts, as Jack shoots him a rueful grin, moving to hijack his TV. "Gonna report me to HR? I just didn't clock it."
"Oh I definitely clocked it." He snorts as he plugs in the HDMI and turns to raise his eye at Michael. "You gonna grab drinks or? Theres a pack in my bag that needs to go in the fridge."
I'm not your fucking butler- Michael mumbles, but does as he's told, depositing the controllers on the side, popping the beer in the fridge and getting out the ones he put in to chill yesterday.
"Just didn't seem like the type." He tries for casual. Misses by a mile.
Jack gives him a little grace. He's got that careful look in his eyes that he always seems to have around him since that time on the roof. That I feel like if I take my eyes off you you'll jump- are you gonna jump?
"Brother, when I covered your day shift he got flustered by a guy flirting with him and I thought I was gonna have to swap him out." Jack snorts. "Plus he just like-" He waves his hand over his shoulder. "He seems like the type."
"Seems like the type- I dunno I think the kids today are harder to pin down." He says, resolutely ignoring the rest.
Who flirted with him? What did he look like? What was Dennis' reaction? Did he get his number- that would be unprofessional- did Jack tell him that that would be unprofessional? Does he think Dennis wants to fuck him? Would it make a difference if he did?
"Yeah, but a twinks a twink." Jack rolls his eyes, plugging in the power to the socket. "There, Jesus, finally. You've fucked enough of them to know."
Michael huffs indignantly. He doesn't- that makes it sounds like he has a- a thing- a type- like he's out there fucking twinks in their twenties. He hasn't fucked a twink in at least what, eight, nine years?
"It's not like that. Fuck man, sorry, I guess, for just wanting to-" He trails off.
"Uh-huh. Gossip? Is that the word we're looking for there Mike? He's MS4. He's not even a doctor yet." The statement is damning. So is the warning look he gets.
"It's not like that Jack." He repeats, a little stronger, and downs half the can in one go. He can see Heathers name on Jack's lips and wills him not to say it. It's not a pattern. He's not- he's not a- a fucking HR problem case. He's not. This is in his head, in his fantasies, it's not gonna become a thing. It's not his fault that Whitaker looks like that- and looks at him like that.
Jack eyes him like he can tell exactly exactly how it is. And on some level he'd be right wouldn't he? It is like that. Fuck. "Good. How'd you find out then? If not your impeccable gaydar."
Michael can't help the huff of laughter that's drawn from him, softening as he looks over at Jack and hands him a remote all the same.
"His Grindr went off during his shift."
"Oh boy." Jack grins with all his teeth as he laughs. "Rookie mistake from the rookie. Who heard? Who realised?"
See, you love the gossip.
He shakes his head as Jack starts to create him a fucking Mii. Christ alive. What has his life come to- no literally what is he fucking doing?
"Just me and Santos- assume she knows given they live together."
"Huh, didn't know that either." Jack hums a little, already half distracted, and rather obnoxiously turns the volume of the TV up until the bright tinny and relentless music starts to drill through his skull.
When he finally passes the controller over, Michael’s avatar is standing there waiting. It waves at him mockingly- it's stupid round head and blocky shoulders. Everything about it is sanitised and neat- none of the tiredness in his eyes and crows feet and slump of his shoulders.
The plastic is still warm from Jack’s palms.
Jack throws himself into the game with embarrassing sincerity, his whole body leaning with each swing, shoulder bumping Michael’s every time he steps back, grinning like an idiot when the pins scatter. He's not bad at it either - the digital ball hurtling down the glossy fake wood rendered alley.
Jack laughs as he scores a strike. "Would you look at that."
Michael finds himself smiling back before he catches it, mouth stretching without permission. It’s been a while since he's heard laughter in his apartment.
It should irritate him, at least a little, because he knows what Jack's doing. With his Wii and his ease.
Instead, Michael feels himself softening around the edges, the beer taking the sharpness off everything, the day stretching out ahead of them- bowling, shit talk, maybe ordering pizza, Jack asleep face-down on the sofa by midday with the TV still on. On that night shift schedule still.
The can sweats against his fingers, water tracking down into his sleeve. He wipes it on his jeans and it leaves a dark patch on the denim.
It would almost be nice if his brain would shut the fuck up for ten minutes.
Yet.
When he lines up the next throw he finds himself picturing Dennis’s hands instead, long fingers and nerve bitten nails, the way they hover little when he’s passing over a chart or an ECG. Wonders whether the kid ever had one of these growing up, whether he crammed in front of the TV with his brothers on a living room carpet in Nebraska, shoving each other out of the way for a turn, all elbows and shouting.
It’s too easy to imagine him younger and smaller, hair flopping into his eyes- probably looking up at one of his older brothers for direction. Needing someone to orbit. He seems like the type.
The thought trickles warm and unpleasant in his chest. Thick honey through his ribs.
"I think you're getting it, brother." Jack tells him as the ball careens into the gutter. The dull digital thunk feels faintly personal, honestly.
"You're an real ass you know." he huffs as Jack claps him on the back.
Without whisperers prayers from the tongues of the devotes, without wax burning down to the wick and knees ground raw on stone, eyes turn upward in wait, a god is nothing. Maintained by belief- sure- but when that belief rots, what's left alone in the darkness?
A god needs it's followers.
Micheal needs his followers.
He needs the quiet reverence of the med students and interns and residents, of his attendings even. He wants- no, he needs it- he needs to feel needed. He needs the looks they give him when things go sideways- when he makes a split decision that they would have never thought to try and it works- like he he’s got some private line to the heavens. No, when they look at him like he is God. He needs the way they go quiet when he starts talking, the way they scribble down what he says and laugh too loud and too eager. The way they jog a little beside his long stride so he doesn't have to slow down.
The whole ED bends a little- just a fraction- towards him. It settles him more than drugs or prayer or Jack’s careful voice ever has. After all, when the flat-line rings out, when the blood pools tacky under his shoes, when the smoke won't clear- it's all he has left. Just the memory of all those faces tipped up at him, waiting and believing.
But to garner that reverence he has to maintain the image. That's the deal, right? That's what's at stake here.
Dennis has seen the broken image. The shattered image. He's seen that Michael's no God at all, just a man, a man who couldn't keep it together, and men like him aren't to be worshipped.
Yet Dennis still, despite everything, looks at him like- like he believes.
He's not sure which is worse, being wanted, or being handled.
Micheal grabs two more beers as Jack swears at a split spare, real fuckin' dramatic about it- flopping back onto the couch and throwing an arm over his eyes. His t-shirt rides up to show a strip of stomach, pale and unselfconscious. He looks comfortable here in a way Michael never quite manages.
When he's good- Jack is good.
But when he's good like this Jack always has a way of looking straight through him, like he can see the scaffolding holding everything up.
Jack's trying to handle him. That's what this is. He's trying to stave off that impending sick leave he's already pencilled Michael in for.
As if he would ever take it.
Dennis looks up at him, but Jack looks through.
One of those makes his spine straighten, and the other makes him want another fucking drink.
So he opens one. Then another. The tabs piling up on the table beside them.
The day plays out as he though it would- Jack staying until he's yawning into the dimming afternoon light, established routine maintained despite the addition of the fuckin' Wii. The sun beginning to smear at the edges of the horizon. Then he's packing up his games and his ease and his laughter, and when he walks out that door he'll leave Michael to an empty apartment and a TV he can't bare to turn off, even as he sleeps.
"You might wanna chuck those by the way." Jack gestures to the fruit bowl as he swings his backpack over his shoulder. Ah. Well. "I think they're going off. You'll get fruit flies."
~
It takes two whole shifts for Dennis to realise somethings wrong.
Or maybe not so wrong but like… absent.
Robby is like- not ignoring him or anything, but he's not pulling Dennis around the ED with a strong hand to his shoulder or neck.
When he notices it he can't stop noticing it. Especially when Robby goes to grab him and appears to physically stops himself. His hand twitching back in a strangled aborted movement. Dennis looks down at it with thinly veiled confusion.
It infects his shift slowly but surely, his mind waaay too occupied by replaying every single interaction he's had with his boss to make him pull back like this.
If he made a mistake or did something really fucking stupid to make Robby lose faith in him then like, fine, but he just can't think of anything.
"Whitaker. Where are you going?" Robby's voice snaps as Dennis makes a play for the bathrooms. He really- really- needs to piss.
The phantom touch of Robby's hand echoes in the space around them. Or, well. It echoes for Dennis. Which is a little rude- really- because those hands are the frequent subject of his fantasies, tucked up in his bed after a long shift and his shoulders tingling from the memory of Robby's touch. What is he meant to do with this? He can't get off to a nearly touch. Not that- whatever- anyways-
Last week he woulda' just scruffed him. Shit. Why'd he have to think that. He clenches hard, and the movement makes him wanna piss even more.
"Uh- going to p-" Robby raises an eyebrow. "I mean- check on my patient in twelve?"
"Good. Let me know if there's anything strange in the labs. They should be back now."
Robby slaps his back, then looks up at him with a pained scrunch of his face, whips his hand back like he's been burned.
"Sorry." He cringes, like touching him is fucking infectious- like he can catch-
Oh. OH.
It hits like sour milk on his tongue, the smell of it rotting in his nose as his stomach turns over on itself, spit pooling under his tongue, bladder clenching so hard it makes his knees feel watery. As he tastes metal at the back of his throat he has the wild, humiliating urge to scrub his hands on his pants, to make himself smaller, cleaner, less obviously gay.
That's what this is, right?
He hasn't touched Dennis since he heard his Grindr go off and… presumably since he realised Dennis was gay.
"I- uh-" He stammers, moving away from Robby.
He won't cry. He didn't cry when his dad- when he- Dennis didn't cry. And he won't cry now.
I am strong. I am competent. I don't need anyone but myself.
He thought that Robby was different. He really did. He's seen him with gay patients. He's seen him with trans patients. But maybe that's different, that's like medical professionalism right, but maybe this is too far. Probably doesn't wanna give him the wrong idea probably. The sad little infatuated queer.
The snarl rises in his throat, like a feral animal backed into a corner, the air on the back of his neck rising.
"I'll go after." Dennis can't help the snap to his voice.
"After?"
Humiliation courses through his veins. Dennis grinds his teeth. "After I go piss Robby. Is that allowed? Is that okay with you?"
Robby's eyebrows shoot skyward. He curls his hands into the pockets of his jacket- doesn't want to touch him. He rocks on his feet. Opens then closes his mouth, scrunches up his face as he smiles, pained.
It deepens the lines around his eyes until Dennis feels a cold sweat trickle down his back. Oh fuck. Yeah, no, he's gonna puke.
"Doctor- I mean- Dr. Robby. Robinavitch." Dennis tries to correct.
Robby's face pulls- if anything- even fucking tighter. "Yeah, of course ah- go- yeah, go Whitaker."
Dennis grimaces. "Sorry- thanks- sorry."
He takes two steps, two whole steps towards getting the hell out of this conversation but then- then he stops and swivels.
His trainers squeak against the vinyl. It's so loud that Dennis cringes. "It's just-"
Robby sighs, turning back. "What Whitaker?"
"Is it because I'm- you know."
"Is what because you're what?" Robby shrugs, shaking his head in tiny back and forths like he's vibrating, like Dennis is wasting his time with his space but- but he deserves to be here. He does.
He takes a step closer and then hesitates. Leans in a little and whispers, "because I'm- you heard my phone and- because I'm-" he mouths the word gay.
The speed at which Robby's face shuts down would be comical, if Dennis was in any fucking mood to laugh.
“Whitaker,” he says, carefully slow. It's the way he talks to combative patients. Robby straightens a fraction, shoulders going square. “I don’t know what you’re implying, but we’re at work.”
Yeah. So don't discriminate and-
Dennis cringes. And what? What is he asking for? For Robby to touch him again? Fuck.
Fuck.
"Nothing. Implying nothing Dr. Robby. Imma, just like, go." He points stupidly down the corridor. "Gonna go- piss-" he needs to stop saying piss to his fucking boss. "- and check on central twelve. Bye."
He swivels before he can clock the look on Robby's face. He doesn't need to see it to know what it'll be. What you’re implying right now. Yeah, he can't fucking accuse his boss of being homophobic because he stopped the- probably inappropriate in the first place- casual contact he gives through the workday.
Stupid.
He's so fucking stupid.
It's a close thing, the way he nearly sprints to the bathroom. No running in the ER. But if he waits here he'll die, like actually die, he'll fucking flat-line as his organs shut down one by one under the fluorescent lights while Robby watches and probably does nothing.
He turns too fast and nearly clips a crash cart, mutters sorry and flings himself into the bathroom, picks a stall and heaves himself inside.
His bladder aches sharp and insistent. His body always picks the worst possible moments to be a body.
Is there a dog in the ER?
No, that's just the keening sound of the air escaping the gaps in his teeth as he tries not to moan, his bladder finally given permission to release.
Thank fucking god the bathroom is empty.
He dips his head into his hands as he rests his elbows on his knees and takes a minute.
His pulse is everywhere. In his gums. In his fingertips. Down between his legs where Robby still still fucking effects him. His cunt throbbing despite the humiliation. Maybe because of it. But he wishes it would fucking stop. He doesn't want it, not now. Not when Robby clearly finds him the wrong kind of disgusting.
The lights hum overhead a mosquito whine that never stops.
Jesus Christ. Get it together.
He stares at the scuffed door a few inches from his nose, somebody’s carved initials into the paint with a key. The air smells sour. Cheap soap and disinfectant.
He thinks, stupidly, of being fifteen and hiding in the church bathroom after youth group, waiting for his voice to stop shaking before he goes back out because he'd fucked up and said he didn't want to be someones wife- and Pastor John had frowned down at him and quoted proverbs 12.4: an excellent wife is the crown of her husband. But he couldn't be anyone's wife. He couldn't fathom it- sat there in his Sunday dress and his hair platted down his back. Some of the boys had laughed, and James- who always made his life hell- had leaned in, pulled on his hair, and whispered wives, submit to your husbands with a waggle of his eyebrows. Dennis had run- he'd had to run, because he'd felt so sick he thought he was going to pass out.
As he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror, all those years ago, he'd felt wrong and disgusting.
He looks at himself now, and tries not to feel the same.
But it's the same light and the same incessant buzzing.
Nothing changes, he thinks bitterly.
He washes his hands too long. Scrubs the heels of his palms, between his fingers, up his wrists, pink creeping up under the skin.
His reflection looks small. His scrubs hanging off his narrow shoulder and neck. His eyes are already shiny, like he’s about to cry, which makes him furious enough to bare his teeth at himself.
It really shouldn't fucking matter, he shouldn’t want his boss putting hands on him in the first place, what the fuck is wrong with him, what kind of pathetic- but it felt like- like being wanted maybe, or chosen.
“Get a grip,” he mutters, but it comes out thin.
Fine.
Fine.
If Robby doesn’t want to touch him, whatever, fine.
There are a hundred guys within five miles who would, right?
Yeah, there are. He knows there are because he keeps ghosting them all. And what does it matter if they know he's trans before- Trinity is right. He just needs to be open, get out there and give this shit a go.
He scrambles out his phone and quickly changes his bio to say he's trans. Fuck it. There. Easy. There's gotta be someone out there that wont make him feel like this. He can't keep waiting on a fantasy. Robby was never gonna fuck him. He was never gonna call Dennis good. But someone out there might.
He dries his hands on his scrubs, leaves damp streaks on the fabric, unlocks the door and walks back out with his face arranged into something passable.
Because he's fine.
Right?
~
Yeah, if he thought it was bad before, he was fucking mistaken, because Robby practically avoids him like the plague for the rest of the shift.
"What did you do to piss him off Huckleberry?" Trinity laughs as they both watch Robby do a fuckin' 180 ballerina spin to avoid them. Exist, apparently- he doesn't say. "That was a full Looney Tunes manoeuvre. Did you kill someone again?"
"Har har." He taps on the pad, not even looking up at her. He shrugs like he hardly even notices Robby. Like it doesn't matter. Like he hasn’t been tracking his movements all afternoon. "He's probably just busy."
She squints at him. "You’re being weird today."
"I’m always weird."
"Yeah but usually in a fun, neurotic little hamster way." She narrows her eyes. "Somethings up- spill."
He huffs something that might be a laugh and reaches for the pen. She keeps it just out of reach, eyes flicking down to his hands. They're not red anymore, but he almost feels like they are. Like she can see it. She notices everything, and it's always, always, annoying.
"I updated my- app- bio." He settles on. Not even a lie.
Trinity blinks. "Okayyy. To…"
"To say I'm- you know." He shrugs a little. "You told me to, so, you know. I've gone and done that now."
"I didn't tell you to Dennis." Trinity frowns. "You-"
"Well I've done it so." He interrupts her. "Triage the dickheads, right? If they’re gonna bail, they can bail before I waste my time."
Trinity hesitates, even though there's no time for it. No time for this whole conversation really. "You sure you're okay?"
"Fine." He snaps, maybe a little too loudly.
~
It comes in three's right? That's what they say.
First he fucks up the intubation, which he knows how to do- he knows, and where Robby would gently correct him or guide him he just- he took over with a raised eyebrow. Talked him through it, but didn't look at him again once, while Dennis stood there like a scolded fucking child.
Then he misses the fucking lipase, and Robby is there again- Epigastric pain and vomiting. We like to rule out pancreatitis before we send them home, okay Whitaker? Of course. Basic shit. He should know this.
By Gods infinite mercy Robby isn't there when he breaks the sterile field and Mel has to gently rest her hand on his arm and remind him to re-glove. But the hit feels just as bad as if he was, because he's fucking contaminated now. Inside and out, right?
When they wheel the patient out for the OR he stands there, crimson tinging the blue of his fingers, and tries not to shake.
"Are you… okay?"
He takes a breath, and Mel draws closer. Theres a ringing in his ears that isn't going away.
"M' fine."
Mel shuffles in front of him. "You don't look too fine. Did something happen?"
Theres a faint click as the door closes, gently muffling the constant sound of the ER, but Dennis can't let it be a comfort because the glass around him reveals too much. Like a fish in a bowl, his breakdown is visible from all sides.
"Apart from the fact I can't do basic stuff apparently?" He grimaces as Mel pulls off her gloves but he can't. If he moves his hands they'll shake. "That's like. The fundamentals, not breaking the field- and I didn't- I was gonna just-"
"Hey. We all get tired, you know when I was-"
Dennis shakes his head and cuts her off. "I'm not tired, I just-" Just want my boss not to hate me. Want to get through this rotation. Want to transfer to the night shift. What, Dennis?"
"Why don't you take a break? Just a little one- what do you have on at the minute?"
"Uh- central twelve, waiting for repeat labs, and-" No he discharged the kid. He should have at least three cases but- "that's it, sorry."
Shame permeates through him, beading on his skin like sweat.
Mel just smiles at him though, lips pressed together. "I'll let you know if they come back. Go grab a snack?"
He sees Robby through the glass, frowning over at them before Mohan hands him a pad and he's off again. That frown though, that's enough.
"Okay yeah." He doesn't move.
Mel hesitates. She shuffles a little closer, looks over her shoulder, then whispers. "You need help with your gloves?"
"No." It's harsh, his voice, he feels instantly bad for it. "Sorry. I've got it."
He peels his gloves off with a soft snap. The Latex sticks to his wrists where he’s been sweating. Gross.
When he drags himself through the door of the staff room he goes straight for the draw McKay hides her stash in and grabs a chocolate protein brownie bar like a criminal. She buys more than she can eat though, she's expecting you to take it. She expects everyone to dip in when they need to. Still, he feels like a dickhead as he does. Begging for scraps. Taking Trinity's room without rent. What the fuck is his life?
It’s dry as fuck. Gets immediately glued to the roof of his mouth.
Fundamentals, his brain provides, helpful as ever. Don’t break the sterile field, don’t cry in the bathroom like a child, and whatever you do don’t accuse your boss of being homophobic because you’re horny and insane.
But because he apparently cant catch a break, ever, he doesn't hear Robby come in until it's too late- until he's muttering a low, you okay, kid? that makes Dennis jump so hard that he spills his water- for his tacky mouth- down the front of his scrubs a little. Kid?
"Shit-"
"-sorry"
"-lemme just-"
"-no wait, here." Robby grabs a towel and presses it Dennis' chest.
His hand stretches over his entire chest, and Dennis' traitorous breath hitches. Robby must feel it. He's gotta- he can't not when Dennis' whole body jolts with it.
"I didn't mean to make you jump, sorry." Robby grimaces into his smile, dabbing at his chest while Dennis stands there like the generic man emoji and lets him. "I just wanted to check in and see if you're doing okay."
Dennis lets out a incredulous laugh before he can help it, then claws the sound back into his throat when he the sound hits his own ears. Robby's eyebrows climb his forehead for what feels like the hundredth time today.
"Fine. Yep. All good." He tries to smile.
"Great," Robby drawls with a sickening sweetness. "So your patient in twelve-"
"-going, yeah." He tries to snake his way past Robby but he gets a hand to his shoulder and he's dragged back before he can even make it a single step.
"Whitaker, stop. I was being- doesn't matter. Whats wrong? You just hiding in here just for fun then?"
"Nothing."
"The intubation and the lipase and-"
"No, yeah, yeah I'm sorry about that, obviously." He stammers. This is it. He's gonna get kicked out the programme. Robby's hand is still on his shoulder. In panic he blusters, "if you want me to switch to the night shift I can."
Robby's hand tightens. "What?"
"I get if you don't want to teach me now you… know I'm gay. If that makes you uncomfortable."
Robby doesn’t pull his hand away, for a moment that's' all Dennis can focus on.
It stays there, solid and warm through the thin cotton of his scrubs, thumb hooked a little too close to the curve of his neck. Like before.
But when he focuses on Robby's face, he sees his eyes widening a fraction, mouth parting, the lines around his nose pulling tight as if Dennis has said something genuinely baffling. He looks so confused that for a second Dennis is confused, but then it morphs into a pained flicker. Like he’s hurt him. Which makes no sense because Dennis is the one standing here braced for impact and instead Robby just looks… stricken.
"Okay. Okay." Dennis feels the breath Robby exhales in his hair. "I don't know where this is coming from, but I don't give a shit if you're gay Whitaker. That changes nothing." He looks so intensely at Dennis that he feels like he's looking into his very soul.
He slowly nods his head until Dennis is nodding along too. It doesn't make sense, but his hand is still on Dennis' shoulder, and he looks- he looks like he's telling the truth.
"It changes nothing, okay?" He repeats.
He nods again. The hand on his shoulder gives a small squeeze. So then whats the problem-
"Okay good-" Robby inhales deeply through his nose. "-and, if you thought I was… discriminating against you for your sexuality, that's something you should always raise with HR okay? Never offer to change shifts or fuck up your sleep schedule and rotation to appease anyone, especially not me. Not for something like this."
Dennis feels his stupid eyes starting to water and wills himself not to cry. It's just been- it's been a fucking day. It doesn't explain why Robby's being so weird with him either, but the hand is still on his shoulder so. So maybe it's okay. Maybe it's not. He's so fucking confused.
"Sorry." He mumbles.
"You don't have to apologise Whitaker. I just need you to know that that shit isn't okay. You need to advocate for yourself."
He bites his lip and blinks away his tears. "Okay."
"Do you need to talk about this more? With me, or, with someone else?"
Dennis shakes his head. Absolutely not. He never even want's to think about this again, never mind talk about it.
Robby pats his shoulder. "Okay. Take five, get another drink. Come find me when the labs are back, yeah? We good?"
Dennis nods. "Yeah, were good."
Are they though?
~
It's possible, maybe, potentially, that Michael has… over-corrected with Dennis.
How else can he explain the fact Dennis thought he was homophobic just because he'd tried to maintain a more- appropriate relationship in light of the fact he cannot stop jackin' it to the kid. Every night, sometimes in the morning. He can't fucking stop.
So when he places his hand on Dennis' neck and scruffs him, now all he can think about is pushing that surprisingly strong neck into the bed whilst rutting against the kid until he begs oh so sweetly for his cock. And that's just… that's not conducive to a productive workplace environment now is it?
Okay, maybe apologising for touching him in the corridor was a mistake, and … avoiding him in the ER. Fuck, he's meant to teach him not make him run to Jack's night shift because he's so uncomfortable. Because he thinks that his attending can't stand to touch him because he's gay.
And he should have handled that conversation better but he couldn't ask the kid what about his behaviour made him think that, because he knows exactly what he did, or didn't do, and he wasn't about to put either of them through that conversation.
Besides, he just needs a middle ground right? If he can't touch Dennis because he's a grade A perv, and he can't not touch Dennis because that's apparently homophobic, then he just needs a nice, safe, middle ground.
It would be more convincing if he wasn't trying to plan solutions whilst lazily palming his cock over his sweats as he waits for Grindr to download.
Yeah, he's not a good man, whatever. His palm nearly covered the kids whole chest, so sue him.
Keeping his profile pic blank, his bio tumbleweed empty, and sets his age a good decade lower than it is. When he opens it up, he pretends he's not looking for the familiar face of his student.
But who is he kidding?
In the absence of Whitaker's sad little tired eyes in any of the little pictures, he sets his sights on scrolling through the topless faceless pictures that could be Dennis. A few potentials, all in the right age range.
He dips his hand into his sweats and pulls out his cock. Looking at the dusty pink nipples, those slim waists, he can almost pretend they're Whitaker. Can almost pretend that he's not the PTMC Chief Attending, and Dennis isn't a MS4, and that he's just a lonely man looking for a hook up, and Dennis is a little twink looking for someone more experienced to show him the ropes.
Yeah. He can- he could show Dennis everything, if he let him.
Message him right here on the app, chat him up a bit, flirt, make him feel comfortable, go out for drinks somewhere maybe. Watch him get blushy and giggly over his beer, run his big hand up Dennis' small thigh. Ask him if he wants to go back to his. Make him gasp into his mouth as he palms the kid over his trousers until he can't say anything but yes, please sir.
His thumb hovers over the message button as he comes against his t-shirt.
In the end he deletes the app. Post-nut clarity hitting with the knowledge that he can't escape the fact that he really is the PTMC Chief Attending, and Dennis is a MS4.
And besides, the profile wasn't Dennis' anyway.
~
It's all fine and good- really it is- he's achieved this blissful status quo where- on top of everything else he deals with- he now counts how many times he touches the kid during a shift. Arbitrarily allows himself a maximum of four times, a minimum of two, and calls that a fucking good day's work.
And it has the desired effect.
Dennis has stopped looking at him like he's scared Michael will kick him out of the programme for being queer- like this is the twenties or something- and has returned to being the competent little trainee doctor Michael knows him to be. No more botched intubations.
At least it has been working, but now the kids are fighting, and Dennis has shrugged off his touch for the first time since he started his rotation. Not that that should be his biggest concern, but it is strange.
"You'd think this was a Vets the way it's getting catty in here." Dana stage whispers to him as they both watch Whitaker and Santos stare each other down over the monitor.
"Good one." He snorts as Dennis rolls his eyes and stomps off to collect a new patient.
"You gonna do somethin' bout that boss man?"
"Not my monkeys not my circus."
Dana snorts out a laugh and juts up her chin. "This ain't your circus, ey? Whose is it then?"
Michael shakes his head, not bothering to hide the smile that warps his lips. "Can you shuffle the guy from two into something a little more private? The family are on their way."
"Sure can, but Robby, unless you do something about that I think people are gonna start making bets or gossiping." She side eyes Princess and Perlah, and he laughs a single loud syllable of a thing.
"Fine, fine." He mumbles.
Except he doesn't hardly even get time to breathe before the ER swallows him whole again.
EMS roll in a biter- a drunk biter. Two major traumas. Someone’s kid pukes neon blue slushie down the front of his own shoes.
Gloves on. Gloves off. Alcohol foam. Hello, hows it going in here? My name is Dr. Robinavitch but you can call me Robby. Gloves on again.
Every time he stops for half a second to try and talk to Whitaker someone grabs him. Constant small disasters piling up and up and up.
By the time the board finally clears enough for him to lean back against the desk, his scrub top is sticking to his spine and his hands smell like latex and coffee and sanitiser.
He scrubs a palm down his face.
And that’s when he spots Santos hovering by the Pyxis. Perfect. He hauls himself over.
"So, a little trouble at home? You and Whitaker seem… more tense than normal." He says as he saddles up besides her.
Santos frowns up at him. "We're fine, it's fine."
She taps at her pad and he steps a little into her way so she's forced to look up at him. "Santos. We can't let our personal lives affect the work here, or the environment for others."
Fuck it, maybe he's going too far but he's curious, sue him.
"What? No Dr. Robby we're not. It's fine, honestly. I won't let it affect anything."
Tight lipped as always. The look in her eyes- yeah he's not getting anything out of her. He should've known not to try her first, Dennis would have been the surer bet.
~
"You need to stop glaring at me, Robby just fucking interrogated me about it."
He hears Santos whisper-shout and pauses in his mad dash to the bathroom. His piss can wait. Maybe its not just Jack that loves the gossip.
"You told Robby about my date?" Dennis hisses, betrayal clear in his voice. "What the fuck Trin."
Michael feels a cold shiver trickle down his spine. He pulls the pad up in front of him in case anyone questions him and leans a little closer.
"Well, I wouldn't say that mans interested in dating."
"For fuck sa- what is your problem. What if that's what I want? You told me to get out there, I got on the app, you said I needed to change my bio, I changed it, you said I should give someone a chance, I'm giving them a chance."
"I didn't mean some freak weirdo old man whose bio is mostly his kink list. What the fuck Dennis it's like you're asking to be chopped up and have your organs sold on the black market."
"He's not- he seems nice and- like- you shouldn't have been looking anyways this is nothing to do with you- and-"
"And- and-" Trinity mocks savagely, and then sighs at the long pregnant pause. "Fuck, Dennis, I just don't want you to get hurt."
It's oddly soft from Santos. That's what gets him. It makes his chest tighten and heave a little.
"I know what I'm doing." Dennis says, with all the bravado of a kid who doesn't know at all what he's doing at all. Of a lost and scared kid, baring their teeth when they're backed into a corner. Oh Dennis. "I'll be fine. It's fine."
"Can I at least come to the bar- or like I can be across the street at Maisie's or something?"
Dennis sighs. "No. But… I'll keep my location on and I'll text you updates- alright?"
"Not really."
"I don't need you to look out for me like some child. Like you don't trust me. I promise I'll text you, okay?"
"Fine."
~
Theres something a little unnerving about sitting in the back of a gay bar alone. Tucked away from the hustle of it all and slumped into his coat, surveying every new person that comes in to see if they're familiar. Because that's where he is- in the bar opposite Maisie's, chewing on his bottom lip and slowly sipping his whisky as he contemplates every single fuckin' decision that's led him to be the kind of man that apparently stalks his med students.
Its alright.
He could be here just, for himself, obviously. He could be taking Jack's advice and getting himself out there again, and if it just so happens that he can check in on Dennis, and make sure he's okay then, why not?
Why the fuck not?
As he swirls his whisky around his glass the ice clinks against the sides.
That would require him actually talking to someone though, wouldn't it?
It's been a good couple of years since he's been in a gay bar, and there's always always some creep nursing his own drink and just watching everyone. To be fair it's a staple of every bar- gay or not- and tonight? Tonight he's that fucking guy. Raise a glass to his pervert brothers in arms, he guesses.
Not enough to jerk it to the kid every single night, hey Robinavitch?
He pulls up his text thread with Jack and hovers his fingers over the keypad.
No. Absolutely not. Theres no way he can casually text Jack. Even if he phrases it like he wants company, if Jack sees Dennis here he'll know. If he tells Jack he's here to look over Dennis, to make sure he's safe, Jack will put the fucking looming mandatory sick leave form through himself. Fast track it even.
And- and he can't leave now, because if he walks out while Dennis walks in then Dennis will know.
Fuck.
He's made his bed now he's gotta fucking lie in it hasn't he?
With every ten minutes that passes without any sign of Dennis, he realises its ten minutes he could have used to leave and stop this fucking insanity. But that's the catch right? The unknown time in which-
Oh.
For some reason, strangely, he hadn't thought Dennis would come. He'd thought maybe the kid would cancel, or Trinity would have gotten the wrong bar, or- or it was a fucking breakdown induced insanity that his brain had concocted. But no.
No, that's Dennis Whitaker being shepherded in with a hand to the small of his back by a man that doesn't look much younger than Michael himself.
The door bangs shut behind them and a draft rolls across the floor, dragging in the smell of cold air and cigarettes and wet pavement. His head hammers, he can hear it, the blood rushing to his ears and the dull thud of his heartbeat in his throat.
Dennis laughs, soft and polite, and lets himself be guided to the bar.
The man's hand doesn't leave him.
Theres a certain possessiveness to the touch that instantly makes Michael's skin crawl, given that he knows they've just fuckin' met. What right does he have, to touch Dennis like that? It's not aggressive or overt, but it's presumptuous, a proprietary pressure that makes him want to smack it the fuck away.
He wants to see Dennis smack it away.
Why isn't he smacking it away?
Dennis shifts forward half a step, and the guy just follows and keeps contact, thumb brushing once like he’s soothing a- a dog.
Michael feels the nausea rise in his throat all hot and metallic, something instinctive and animal that says wrong wrong wrong and not even because it's not his hand. Though it should be. It should be his.
He feels fucking insane, tightens his grip on the whisky and tells himself to look away.
He doesn’t.
Instead he watches the guy lean over the bar and order for both of them without asking Dennis, two fingers up and a cocky grin at the bartender, a point back at Dennis- Dennis opening his mouth like he might object, might say actually I’ll just have a beer, might assert literally any preference at all- go on kid do it- but then he just nods- because of course he nods- because he’s pathologically polite and terrified of being difficult and Michael knows that about him in the same- oddly intimate but useless- way he knows how he slips several sugars into his coffee and still grimaces at the taste, and how he forgets to eat but steals protein bars, and how he-
The drink that lands in front of Dennis is tall and already beginning to sweat. Looks like a long island, which- there's easier fucking cocktails to start off on, especially on a date like this.
The guy slides it forward with a smile, and Michael can almost hear him saying here sweetheart, try this, you’ll like this better.
Dennis smiles sweetly, and some ugly and territorial heat uncoil low in Michael’s gut before he can stop it.
It's not necessarily want or even lust. It's something meaner. Some prehistoric, bone-deep impulse that has absolutely no place in a fifty three year old attending physician sitting alone in the back of a bar watching his student doctor.
Without really thinking about it he catalogues the distance to Dennis and the exits and how fast he could cross the room if he had to, as if Dennis isn't a grown man on a date, but someone who might need saving.
His hands clench so hard they hurt as he watches them slide into two chairs around a small table. He can see the fucking guys leg pressed up against Dennis', as Dennis starts to nurse his drink.
As the ice in his glass slowly melts and dilutes the dregs of alcohol still left, the rest of the bar seems to settle in for the night. The laughter loosening and bodies pressing together as the air thickens with aftershave and sweat.
The guys still on his first bottle, but Dennis isn't. He's on his third drink now, the same long islands, all ordered by the guy. His face already has a little flush that dusts high across the cheekbones.
Every time the guy leans in to talk, Dennis leans in too like the guys talking too quietly.
It gives him chance to knock their lets together and they stay like that.
What a fucking sleaze.
It's at the fourth drink that Michael realises with a dull horror that he recognises the trajectory of this night with the same clinical certainty he recognises sepsis or a tension pneumo. The slow inevitable slide of it. The way Dennis is going to get smaller and softer and easier to steer with every cocktail, and the way the guys hands are going to get bolder and more insistent.
And even worse is the realisation that there's absolutely no way- no possible way- he's going to let Dennis go home with this guy, no matter what consequences that will have for him.
Yet he's sat here like he's paralysed or somethin'. Bones ceasing up and turning to led, pinning him in place.
Eventually, the guy makes the decision for him and whispers something into Dennis ear, then hooks a thumb over his shoulder toward the little lit EXIT sign and the strip of darkness beyond.
Dennis hesitates.
Say no, kid, Text Trinity. Go on. Go home. Please Dennis.
The guys leans in with that same easy grin and says something else, and Dennis nods.
Of course he fucking nods. Dennis- Dennis, fuck- no.
Dennis is practically already halfway out of his chair before he seems to realise he’s stood up, swaying a little when the blood rushes to his head and his hand has to catch the edge of the table to steady himself.
By the time Michael pulls himself out of his seat to follow, Dennis is already backed up against the brick with the guys fucking tongue down his throat, but he doesn't look like he's kissing back.
Michael takes a step forward just as Dennis places two palms flat to the guys chest and pushes gently until the guy backs off.
"What?" he guy huffs out.
"I uh- this was nice, but I think I better head back- I'm on shift tomorrow, at the uh- hospital. Remember? I work in the-"
He's not on shift tomorrow, is the thing.
"Come on." The guy leans in and Dennis pushes firm again. "Come on Dennis, don't you want to come back to mine, hmm? Don't be like that. Were having such a good night."
Yeah, absolutely fucking not.
His feet move before he can stop them, not even giving Dennis a chance to respond. Not willing to risk the fact that a line like that might work on Dennis. He'd hope not but- but just in case. He doesn't let himself react to Dennis' wide startled eyes as he tries to shrink back into the brick because he needs to get him safe and away from this creep.
Like, now.
"He said no mate, how about you back up." Michael snaps, crowding into his space.
Big wet doe eyes snap up to look at him in shock, but he can't return the gaze yet. If he does he knows he's done for and he can't let Dennis distract him, not now.
"We're fine thanks, mate."
Michael's bigger than him. He could absolutely take him, maybe, in a fight. He doesn't quite think it'll come to that though. Theres a few too many people lingering out here with cigarettes in hand for him to make too much of a scene. Or at least he hopes he's reading this guy right.
"Doesn't look like it. Back. Up."
"He's fine, aren't you fine Dennis?" The guy's palm presses into Dennis' shoulder and he only just resists the urge to punch him. Just because it would be more trouble then Dennis needs right now.
"Uh- Robby- what." Dennis stammers. "What are you- "
"Answer the question kid." Michael keeps his eyes trained on the guy.
"I want to head back home please- I'm on shift tomorrow-" He repeats the lie. "Thanks for the uh- drinks, Jason, but I don't- I-" His voice wobbles a little, and Michael's heart breaks for the kid.
He still doesn't look at him though.
"See, he wants to go."
"Fuck off mate- he wants it. These trans boys are always gagging for it."
"Okay, enough." He shouts as he shoulders his body between Dennis and the guy, and feels Dennis' hands cling to his coat at the elbow. "You either back the fuck up and leave, or I'm getting security and telling them how I watched you ply this kid with drinks while you sat there and had half a beer."
"Robby, can we go?" Dennis is more insistent now, tugging on his arm.
"Wait you know him? What is this shit?" He finally backs up. "You know what, fuck this, man- whatever, have the fucking slut. Waste of my fucking time." He shoulders Michael hard as he leaves but none of that matters because he's gone. Finally.
He turns to Dennis, takes in the tremble in his lip and the water filling at the corners of his eyes, the way he slumps against the wall but his grip stays tight in the fabric of Michael's coat, and says, "oh, kid."
"What are you- why are you- thank you Robby- I really didn't want to go back with him, I didn't."
"I know- "
"I wouldn't have, I promise."
"I know Dennis." He says softly, hovers a hand near his elbow and waits for Dennis to lean into it if he wants- he does, but he hesitates a little.
"You haven't called me that before." Dennis mumbles.
Michael's throat constricts. "What?"
Dennis blinks up at him. "My name."
Huh. Michael guesses he hasn't.
"How about we get you home, hey?"
He's expecting a small nod, a quiet thank you or something. He's not expecting Dennis to stiffen and his breath to go all shaky. "No- Trinity. She was right and I can't go back to her like this. Please Robby. Please you can't take me back to hers. She was right and I was so stupid and wrong and- and-"
Drunken logic really is a bitch.
"Hey, hey it's okay. Breathe for me. That's it, good boy. Trinity just wants to know you're safe Dennis."
"No." Dennis' breath hitches as he groans, but his panic slowly subsides as Michael rubs slow circles into his arms. "I don't wanna see her."
"You can tell her he wasn't for you. You don't have to say anything you don't want to."
"No." Dennis whines. "I can't you don't understand, she knows things Robby. She will be able to tell. I can't."
Fuck.
"How about we go back to mine then, I have a spare room you can take and I'll drive you home tomorrow? I know you don't have a shift Dennis." He hears himself say, like he's floating spectrally above his own body. Isn't this one for the books- he hears Jack's voice say in his head.
Dennis nods instantly, a little too quickly really and leans into Michael's touch heavily. "Please. M' sorry I lied." He mumbles.
"Don't be- don't be sorry Dennis, you have nothing to be sorry for, okay? You did a good job, saying how you felt back there, yeah?"
Dennis looks up at him with wide drunken eyes. "Okay."
"We need to text Trinity that you're safe. Think you can do that for me Dennis?"
Dennis scrambles at his pockets. "Uh-huh yeah. I can do that."
"Atta boy, there we go, pull her name up for me?"
Dennis fumbles his phone out of his pocket and nearly drops it twice, with all the same clumsiness of him frantically trying to get them out of his scrubs to silence his Grindr notifications. Where this all began. Fucking look at them now.
His shoulder keeps knocking into Michael’s chest every time he sways and Michael just steadies him automatically, hand at his waist, like if he lets go the kid will just drift off up into space."You okay with me holding you like this Dennis?"
"What? Yeah, 'course."
The screen swims under Dennis’s fingers. He squints at it.
“Why’s it moving,” he mutters.
“It’s not moving, you're just a bit drunk Dennis, you're okay,” Michael says, softer than he means to, guiding his thumb to Trinity’s name. “There. Just tell her you’re safe and you're not coming back tonight. She can track your location if you want, and you'll text her when you're there.”
Dennis types slow. Painfully slow. Tongue caught between his teeth. Thank goodness for auto-correct.
Michael watches the top of his head while he does it, the little cowlick at the crown. It feels like he's a whole world away from the competent little doctor Michael knows, this Dennis, small and drunk and trusting enough to lean his whole weight into Michael. Like Michael isn’t the kind of man who followed him to a bar and watched from the shadows like a fucking creep.
The text whooshes off.
Dennis holds the phone up and grins. “Sent.”
“Good,” Michael says. “Good job.”
Dennis tucks the phone back into his pocket and then just… stays there, forehead tipped briefly against Michael’s shoulder, waiting for the next step. Until he mumbles ", m' cold."
“Yeah, no shit,” Michael huffs, shrugging out of his coat and wrapping it around him. The sleeves swallow Dennis’s hands. He looks younger like this. Drowned in it.
It worsens the ache in Michael’s ribcage.
Dennis chatters a little as they walk to the car, words tangling over each other. Something about being embarrassing. Something about how he doesn’t usually drink like that, promise, he’s not stupid, he just wanted to prove he was normal.
Michael ignores that one, unlocks the car and Dennis folds himself into the passenger seat without argument,head thunking gently against the window as soon as the door shuts. He’s asleep almost immediately, mouth parted, breath fogging the glass.
Michael stands there for a second with the door still open, one hand on the roof of the car just looking at him.
He wants to keep him safe and close and untouched by everything ugly in the world, which would almost be noble if it wasn’t tangled up with all the other shit rotting underneath it.
God complex, savior complex, midlife crisis- fuckin' pick one. Pick all of them.
“Get a grip,” he mutters to himself as he walks around to the drivers side, slamming the door shut a little harder than necessary and regretting it instantly as it jolts Dennis awake.
"Hey, Robby?" Dennis mumbles, his face half illuminated by the soft glow of the streetlight.
"Yeah, kid?"
Rain drips against the car, light little sounds against the metal and glass. Quiet enough that they don't quite mask the hushed way Dennis mumbles, "thank you."