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And it's easy done
Our little remedy
And the reason comes on the common tongue of your loving me
— Hozier, Moment’s Silence
Robby lays on top of him like a warm, hairy blanket as he drives his dick into Jack's ass.
"Jesus fuck," Jack moans.
"'M gonna miss this," Robby whispers into the crook of Jack's neck, his hot breath by Jack's ear making the hair at the back of his neck stand up.
Jack just pushes his hips back into Robby in answer.
"You don't have to," he says, because fuck it if he wasn’t going to give it the old college try. "You can— ah!" Language left him in the moment that Robby's dick glanced over his prostate, but returned once he pulled out—"Stay."—And gone again, as Robby thrust back in, harder and softer at the same time; brute force only dulled by the ecstasy that was climbing up from Jack’s dick to his gut as Robby went to town.
"Don't tempt me," Robby breathes.
That was the funny thing. Jack could tempt Robby, if he really wanted. He could do the right things, knew how to say the right stuff; he could invent a problem with the Bonneville and ask Robby for a second look, or he could just promise Robby one last blow job for the road, and he could probably get Robby to delay his trip by a day or two. If he really did a good job, he might be able to reroute Robby's trip to begin and end in Jack’s bed. Maybe take a detour by his shower.
He could feel Robby’s tether start to fray, desperation colouring the frantic pace of his thrusts. At Jack’s hips, Robby’s fingers curled around his os coxae, hard enough he knew he’d have bruises for a good few days after the fact. "Well, make it good then," Jack bites out over the sound of their skin slapping together. "C'mon and leave me something to remember you by."
At that, Robby becomes relentless. He bends over Jack, splaying all his weight on top of him and holding nothing back, driving his dick in further, harder, kissing his back, his neck, his shoulders. That was Robby, a gentleman through and through who wouldn’t even entertain the idea of coming until his partner has first. Most of the time, Jack finds it funny; a weird little polite quirk that’s so at odds with his lothario-like tendencies, but sometimes, times like this, when Robby is completely and single-mindedly devoted to making sure Jack comes, he finds himself overwhelmed with a fondness so profound he worries it will drown him.
Jack’s so lost in the pleasure of it all that it doesn't even register; the feeling of teeth at his left scapula, the way Robby sucks and kisses and bites, sweeping his tongue across the broad swathe of skin. All Jack can think is more, more, more, until Robby clamps down, hard, and he's seeing stars.
He’s an anomaly, Michael Robinavitch; objectively, he is a manwhore terrorising the female population of Pittsburgh, (and a single, widowed, vet amputee, but admittedly Jack brought this on himself— God help the women, who probably had well-meaning but completely delusional fantasies of being the gal to fix Robby; Jack never even entertained the idea, nor did he promise it, or ask it of Robby; he went into this whole fucked mess with his eyes wide open, and now they were wider still, because he didn’t want to miss a fucking minute of it. The point is: Jack knew what he was getting into, the minute he first laid eyes on Robby, that loose-limbed confidence, that grin balanced on a knife’s edge somewhere between charm and catastrophe), but equally, Robby is a brilliant doctor, and a better friend.
There was no one else, ever, Jack would want in his corner more. Robby, who treats women with such casual cruelty (telling Noelle he sleeps with the TV on? Seriously, what was he, 21?) also has the highest patient satisfaction scores of the PTMC; has near daily cards delivered to him from thankful parents, sons, daughters, the whole gamut, thanking him for his presence during their loved one’s medical emergency or final moments. Robby, who is so willing and able to look death in the eye, to hold the very awful parts of the lived experience in his hands with you, is also the man who refused to answer Frank Langdon’s very desperate, and then very apologetic, texts, letters, emails and calls. Robby, who should and does know better.
Robby, who is riddled with PTSD so profound Jack sometimes really does wonder if he didn’t accidentally wander into Fallujah in ‘04 for a while and forget to tell Jack. Robby, who is so terrified of the work it will take him to get better, to accept that he is just a man who has not always been perfect, that he is hardening, and sharpening, becoming meaner and crueler to those who have the bravery, the mettle, to try to change their narratives, to help themselves.
Robby had plenty of people in his corner begging him to change, to get better, to be better. Jack had been there, once, too, and the niceness of people, the well-meaning condescension of them— it makes you sick to your teeth. But Robby had him fixed for six, he knew his number, literally and figuratively; he knew Jack found therapy to be a lifeline, knew that Jack was worried about him only in theory because he loved him too much in practice, knew that Jack would drop anything and everything to help him, because Jack had let Robby do the same. Knew that, when Jack finds him on the roof, he won’t insult Robby and beg him not to jump.
So, Jack took a different tack. Robby was an immovable force, so Jack just… stood beside him. It wasn’t very hard to do, and Robby worshipped him for it. Jack met him with beers and burritos and fancy IPAs and fancier woodfired pizza, and then Jack took him to bed and took him apart, always slow and always steady, and always, always, leaving Robby begging for more.
But. But. Jack had been the one, hadn't he? It was Jack who found the book on zen and motorcycle maintenance in Robby’s bag when he was digging for condoms and lube, who asked about it later, who told Robby about his buddy who owned a motorcycle dealership, if he was interested. It was Jack who had been the one to help him fix the damn bike, Jack who had encouraged it at the beginning, thinking it was a good way to get his mind off of Adamson and Jake and Leah and the whole lot of it. Jack, who had just been so relieved to see Robby engaged in the world again, interested in something aside from ESPN and orgasms.
And now they were in this fucked up situation, where Jack had done that, had built this death trap that Robby was about to set off on. And wasn't that the kicker? Even when he'd realised it, when Robby's figaries about taking off into the great unknown started becoming real lines on a map, Jack hadn't—couldn't—stop it because it all meant time with Robby, and that was the whole, Robby-sized problem of it: that Jack would let him have anything, really, if he asked nicely enough.
Robby had always practised medicine the way he did everything else—Jack knew that from the very first day he ever laid eyes on Robby, performing a pericardiocentesis in a crashing trauma, sliding a needle toward a strangled heart without waiting for permission, trusting his hands to find the narrow, invisible space that kept disaster at bay. Reckless, maybe, some would say definitely. Indulgent in delusions of his own grandeur, certainly. But precise, controlled, and beautiful in the execution.
Jack hadn’t even been technically working at PTMC when he’d seen it; Adamson was giving him a cursory tour of the lay of the land before they were to head up to his office for the official interview. But Jack had been transfixed by the man before him, the way he never so much as blinked; and if you hadn’t been Jack, you might not have known it was a move as risky as playing Russian roulette blind drunk.
There are doctors who practice by algorithm, and there are doctors who practice by instinct. Robby had always been the latter. If he wasn’t such a bleeding heart, Jack always thought he would have been an asset to the American war machine.
Adamson had kept talking as they wheeled the patient out and up, presumably into an OR or ICU, but Jack hadn’t heard a word of it. He’d been watching Robby strip off his gloves, shoulders loose, expression almost bored, as if he hadn’t just wagered everything on a centimeter of space and won.
Forty minutes later, Adamson was giving him a verbal offer of a job, and Jack accepted without hesitation.
Jack saw it later in the bar the first night of his first shift, too— the way Robby held eye contact a beat too long, like he was already calculating angles and outcomes, already deciding whether the jump into Jack’s bed was survivable, and if it wasn’t, how much pleasure the fall would get him, anyways.
So Jack’s never been under any illusions, with Michael Robinavitch. It was field work, it was high stakes, narrow margins, and no guarantee of survival.
"What's this?" Jack asks, twisting and looking in the mirror at the bright, red mark that was suspiciously Robby's-mouth-sized emblazoned on his shoulder.
"Something to remember me by," Robby says dryly, coming up beside him and pressing a kiss to Jack's cheek as he steps into his boxers.
"Oh yeah?" Jack asks. "Me and Nicole going to match?"
Robby shoves him half-heartedly, Jack’s shoulder knocking gently back into the mirror affixed on the wall. "Her name is Noelle. And don't be a dick."
"Pot, kettle." Robby looks at him so fondly then, Jack thinks he could just melt into it, if he could, and then thinks he might say something stupid if they stay like this for too much longer, so changes tack and says, faux-glib, "You're leaving a lot of broken hearts in your wake.”
"Oh yes," Robby says, leaning against the wall, running his hands through Jack's sex-mussed hair, idly playing with a curl at the base of his skull. "But you are my favourite," he says, kissing the corner of Jack's mouth.
Jack stops him with a hand to the other man’s chest just after he pulls back but before he can kiss him again. "And your best," Jack amends.
"And my best," Robby agrees, eyes crinkling with his smile as he leans in to kiss him once more. When he pulls back, Jack already misses him— and Jesus, if that isn’t a ringing endorsement for how these three months are going to go.
“Be safe,” Robby instructs, placing a chaste kiss on top of Jack’s forehead. “Don’t go being a martyr.”
“Only if you are,” Jack shoots back, poking Robby’s still bare chest. “Wear your fucking helmet, Robinavitch.”
Robby smiles at him, placing one last kiss on his cheek before he moves off to get dressed in earnest. “Of course I will,” he says, and Jack wonders when it was, that he got so good at lying, that it really did sound like a promise— when he got so good at it, that even Robby himself believed it.
But that’s a thought for later, for Robby’s absence. For now, he’s still in front of Jack, bathed in the warm glow of early morning light, looking impossibly young and bright and vital for someone pushing their mid-50’s, that Jack just leans back against the cool glass of the mirror and drinks him in, trying to commit the image to memory, for fear it will never be this way again.
It was fucking stupid, is what it was. Fourth of July meant nothing to no one, it was just an excuse for the great American population to momentarily absolve themselves of their sins, get piss drunk, make a mess and expect other people to clean it up. As per the usual.
Jack usually picked up the TEMS shift on the day because it left him so exhausted that with the right dose of ZzzQuil, he was just about able to sleep through the fireworks, and it left him out of other people’s hair so he couldn’t be accused of being a downer.
He hadn’t expected to hang around too much after they brought the patient in, but the knife laceration to the chest was severe and it looked like things were picking up in the Pitt. Jack and Luis took one look at the mounting chaos before them and Luis gave him a fist bump and wished him the best, with the promise that they’d radio if they needed him out in the field again.
He’d left Robby and his soon to be replacement to their pissing match as he grabbed a curtain to shuck off his vest and tactical gear and get into a pair of scrubs. He’s just getting his shirt over his head when he hears the sound of the curtain whip behind him and an “Oh my god.”
Mohan stands before him, jaw agape, as she stares at him.
“Oh my god,” she repeats. “Jack, what happened? Keep your shirt off and sit down and let me take a look.”
Jack’s head is still thrumming with the adrenaline from being out in the field that it takes him a minute to come back down to Earth to actually understand what she is saying. “I’m fine, Mohan, stand down.”
“You are not,” she insists, stepping forward and snapping the curtain closed behind her. “You have a substantial contusion, maybe a 4–5 inch subcutaneous hematoma—”
Jack is already so frazzled by the chaos of the day that for a second, he contemplates sitting her down and giving her a full neuro, before he twists around to see what she’s getting so upset about and— aha. A Robby sized problem. As were many things in his life, but this one made physically manifest.
It takes everything in his will power to not start blushing like a virgin then and there, and instead shake it off and say, with as much conviction as he can muster, “It’s fine.”
But Mohan’s already halfway through a physical exam, snapping on gloves and turning his shoulder towards her. “Was this a rubber bullet? Blunt force? Did you report it? Why is it that red?”
Hell, it makes him smile. He knows he’s confusing the crap out of her, sending mixed messages and all that as he dances out of her grip, gently batting her hands away.
But Mohan is a hell of a doctor, who has one hell of a teacher, and she won’t take no for an answer because she continues on, all guns blazing. “This absolutely needs documenting.”
Jack refuses to look her in the eye as he says, deadpan, “It’s not an injury.”
“Then what is it?”
There is a moment, when Jack could take the moral and professional high road and give her a non-answer and be done with it, maintaining healthy boundaries, etcetera etcetera. Except for the fact that he’s been spending far too much time with Michael Robinavitch, who, as it turns out, is an awful influence.
Also, if Ellis’ intel is anything to go by, which it always is, Mohan’s crush on him hasn’t quite gone away even all these months after PittFest, and Jack doesn’t want to subject the poor woman to spending any more time pining after his wasted heart.
So, he turns to her full on, and meets her with that gaze, the Jack Abbot special, almost egging you on; promising to tell you the answer and promising that you’ll hate it.
But, Mohan is a hell of a woman, obviously not intimidated by him in the slightest, and two can play at that game, so she squares her shoulders and meets his gaze head on. “I’m filing an incident report.”
And Jack finally nods his head over at Robby standing in Central—not a clue what's going on, God bless him—and with all the smugness he can muster, says, “There’s your incident report.”
It was a cold day in hell when Jack fell in line with any of the clowns in the OR, and not that he would ever let them hear it, but he had to agree with them on this one.
“Hey you.”
Robby’s head snaps up from where he’s flicking idly through a tablet, leaning up against the nurses’ station.
Jack beckons him closer.
He doesn’t miss the eyes on them, doesn’t miss the raised eyebrows at the way Robby just follows, coming at Jack’s command, without even so much as a bitchy word to say about it.
"Brother, what's this I hear about you going all scalpel jockey on a nec fasc with Garcia? Stealing beers from a cooler? Walsh is texting me from maternity leave which is pissing me off to no end anyways, and now you’ve got me agreeing with her?”
Robby shakes his head aggressively. "It's nothing, everyone's just making a big deal out of nothing." Robby’s eyes narrow at him. “And I know you’re not agreeing with her.”
“Of course not,” Jack agrees gamely, “But the art of subtlety is lost on you. If you go guns-a-blazing every time, it makes it less fun in the long run and they’ll kiddie-proof everything. Don’t go throwing my toys out the basket just because you don’t have to stick around to deal with the tidying up.”
At that, Robby does crack a small smile and chuckle, but Jack sees the way his shoulders drop, the weight they’ve been carrying. He sees Dana’s look, from across the room, behind Robby’s back— the small shake of her head, the way she raps a knuckle against the desktop briskly. Tapped out.
“So,” Jack says, pretending at being congenial. “You still dead set on leaving tonight?”
Robby stands to attention immediately. “Of course. Why? I’ve got nothing stopping me.”
And that, well. No comment. Jack can be the bigger man in that regard. “Thought you might want your going away present, is all,” he responds, fixing Robby with the same gaze he makes him meet when he’s about to sink into him.
Robby doesn’t say anything, but he does lick his lips, which Jack would laugh at if he wasn’t already starting to miss the man in front of him.
He shakes his head, standing up from his stool where he’d been charting. "You're a real squeaky wheel right now, Robinavitch.” He roots around in his cargo pockets, before he finds what he’s looking for and tosses his house keys to Robby. "You know the alarm code. There's leftover pad thai in the fridge or I have stuff for pasta, whatever you want, it's yours."
Jack mirrors Robby's incredulous look. "Robby, go. Shower, eat, relax. Let me handle it from here, your shift is over in thirty minutes anyways. I'll see you in—" he checks his watch, "Five hours."
"I'll lose the light," Robby gripes, but half-hearted enough that Jack knows he doesn't want himself to be believed, he just wants the pantomime of the fight, because it makes the final act so much sweeter.
Jack rolls his eyes, giving him what he wants, always what he wants. "Eat a carrot, you'll be fine."
When Jack finally gets home from the shift from hell— because seriously, what the fuck was that?— Robby is splayed out on his couch.
The motorcycle is parked out front, packed up with saddlebags and ready to go, stationary for the last time in what will be quite a while.
Robby has the audacity to almost look annoyed at him.
Jack stands, frozen in the hallway, keys still in his hand.
“You could have just asked me nicely for one last fuck,” Robby says, a hint of acidity to his words.
Jack can’t help the incredulous laugh he lets out. “You’re such a prick,” he mutters, smiling though, as he drops his keys in the bowl and shrugs out of his jacket. “I wasn’t asking, brother, I was performing an act of civic duty. You were a short fuse today.”
Robby scoffs. “Langdon is just—”
“Didn’t say Langdon,” Jack interjects, not even wanting to touch that with a ten-foot pole. There’s a beat of silence. “You were a dick to bring up smoking to Dana, when you know she’s trying to quit.”
At that, Robby groans. “Yeah, okay,” he admits, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Today was tough,” he says quietly.
Jack hums. “Bad luck to start a trip in a bad mood.”
That elicits a small smile from Robby. “That's not a thing.”
“No,” Jack acquiesces, walking over to the couch and sitting down beside Robby. He frames the other man’s hips with his hands, angling them towards him just so. Robby lies back down, shifting just so that Jack can see the beginning of the hard outline of his dick through the age-worn sweatpants he's wearing. “But it should be.”
They stay like that for a beat, Jack boxing Robby in, Robby lying supine on the couch like a muse, like a statue made of marble.
“What was that going away gift you got me?” Robby asks, pupils widening with every second he looks at Jack.
Jack smiles wolfishly as his hands go to the waistband of Robby’s sweatpants, never breaking eye contact.
“Something to remember me by.”