Chapter Text
Robby was dragged out of sleep — the kind of deep sleep where you forgot what year it was — by the incessant buzzing of his condo’s intercom.
bzzt bzzt bzzt
It still took him a moment to place the sound, and a quick glance at the alarm clock as he flicked on the bedside light told him he’d barely been asleep for an hour. He’d expected images of all the PittFest victims to keep him awake but he’d dropped off fairly quickly, exhaustion winning out.
Except now, someone was at his door. And determined to get in.
Vowing to throw something out the window if it turned out to be drunk kids, Robby hauled himself out of his bedroom and shuffled over to the intercom.
“What?” he asked, belligerent.
There was silence, and Robby was about to curse the youth of Pittsburgh when—
“Robby? Let me up, brother.”
Jack?
Robby didn’t say anything in reply, just hit the buzzer to open the door downstairs. Jack knew where Robby lived — of course he did, they hung out at each other’s places often enough. Normally it was to watch a game, they had plans to watch the Steelers opener on Sunday before Jack was on shift in the evening, but that still didn’t answer the question of why he was here now.
Robby supposed he was about to find out, and he unbolted the front door in anticipation of Jack’s arrival. At least the elevator was fixed now; the last few times Jack had been over it had still been broken, and although Jack Abbot was never one to complain, Robby knew he hated taking too many stairs at a time on his leg.
Eventually the elevator pinged, and a moment later Dr Jack Abbot stumbled out. He looked…normal? Unharmed, as far as Robby’s trained eye could see on the quick once over he gave him as he made his way between the elevator and Robby’s door. Unsteady on his feet, maybe, just slightly, but Robby didn’t know if that was tiredness or alcohol. Or both. He had left him drinking in the park, after all.
“Jack? What are you doing here?”
“Drank too much to drive. Figured I could crash here, my place is too far to walk.”
And that was true. Jack lived down in Allentown, but—
“You walked here?” Robby asked, incredulous, brain waking up a bit more. That wasn’t normal. It wasn’t that far, but at this time of night? On Jack’s leg?
Jack didn't answer him for a long moment and Robby was just about to ask again when he finally spoke.
“Needed to clear my head. That's all."
Jack said it very matter of fact, and after the day they'd had Robby could understand that, he could understand that a lot. But that meant when Jack had found him up on the roof earlier, when Jack had been trying to talk Robby down, that Jack himself had been hiding a lot more than he let on.
Still waters ran deep, Robby supposed. And he knew Jack had a lot more going on under the surface than the cocky confidence and steady competence he gave off in the emergency room. The man was battle tested, but those battles had left their scars all the same. Robby saw glimpses of it occasionally, but though he was sure he was Jack’s closest friend, even Robby was kept in the dark most of the time.
He couldn’t blame Jack. He did the exact same thing, after all. He was aware enough of himself to know that, even without the therapy Jack was trying to convince him to do. But still, something didn’t seem right.
And the thing was, Robby had known Jack for a long time. He knew him back when Jack did his residency at PTMC, back when he was an army scholarship kid, feeling so smug about the government paying for his medical school costs in return for a few years of service. Robby was there at Jack's wedding, and by his side at his wife's funeral. Robby was there when Jack came home in pieces, and was there to help him build himself back together.
Robby had known Jack in a thousand different permutations, and he'd never seen him look like this.
He looked lost. He looked like he wasn't seeing Robby's living room, wasn't even seeing the man before him.
Robby took Jack by the arm, thought about leading him over to the couch. It was covered in the laundry he hadn't bothered to put away the night before, the laundry he hadn't even glanced at when he'd arrived home earlier.
He led Jack into his bedroom instead and sat him down on the bed. The bedside lamp was on, bathing the room in a soft, warm glow. Black out curtains held the streetlights outside at bay and dimmed any noise from the road below.
Jack had been in here before, followed Robby in when he was getting changed and didn't want to give up the thread of their conversation; or when Robby was puttering around at home doing his chores and Jack was talking his ear off about one thing or another. Even one less than memorable night when Jack had gotten far too drunk on his wedding anniversary, and Robby hadn't wanted to send him home alone in that state. He'd given Jack his bed that night, taken the sofa, and spent most of the night awake straining to hear the soft sounds of Jack's snoring from the other room, terrified that it might stop.
The last twenty years of Robby's life had been punctuated by the sounds of Jack Abbot. And now Jack was listless, silent, eyes unfocused. He said he'd had too much to drink but Robby couldn't smell it on him, hadn’t seen anything when he’d been in the park earlier to suggest that he was going to drink more than a beer or two. Hadn’t Jack said he wanted to sleep for a couple of hours before heading back in, even though he wasn’t meant to be on shift until the following night? It didn’t make sense that he would've had too much to drink, but something was definitely wrong.
Robby was tired though. Tired of everything, and he didn’t know how to solve Jack right now, apart from sleep. Apart from putting this whole godforsaken day behind them and facing everything fresh tomorrow.
So Robby knelt down in front of him, rolling up his trouser leg to reach the release for his prosthesis. Jack let him, eyes moving down to focus on Robby kneeling before him, the only acknowledgement that he was even aware of what Robby was doing.
Once the leg was off, Robby shifted his weight, ready to stand up, but Jack stopped him, a hand on his shoulder. Robby’s knees weren’t what they used to be, but he could cope with staying down a moment longer if it meant Jack saying what was really on his mind.
But Jack stayed silent, even as it looked like he was about to speak. Mouth opening, and then closing again with a rueful shake of his head. Something cleared in his expression a little bit though, and Robby went to stand again. This time Jack let him, but when he went to move away, Jack’s hand caught him by the wrist this time.
“Thank you.” Jack said softly. And— of course, of course. Always. There wasn’t much that Robby wouldn’t do for Jack Abbot, but giving him a moment of peace in the middle of the night? A safe place to come to when he needed it, no matter the reason? Robby could do that as easy as breathing. As easy as a hand on Jack’s shoulder up on the PTMC roof. We’re in this together, brother. If you jump, I jump.
Robby assumed that was it, and went to move away again, to clear the laundry off the sofa so he could sleep there tonight. His back wouldn’t be kind to him in the morning, and it was already aching like hell after that shift, but he’d be fine. Jack hadn’t relinquished his hold on Robby’s wrist though.
“I—“ Jack started to speak again, before tugging on Robby’s wrist until he had no choice but to sit down on the edge of the bed next to Jack, pressed together from shoulder to knee.
When Robby was seated, Jack’s grip loosened but he didn’t let go, as if he needed the contact with Robby there to ground himself, or give himself the courage to speak.
“My first tour,” Jack began, before stopping to clear his throat. “My first tour, there was a young private, clipped by some shrapnel after a transport ran over an IED. It was… rough. In the lead vehicle everyone was killed, and most in the second transport were in pretty bad shape too.” He scraped his hand across his jaw, and in the silence of the night Robby was close enough to hear the way the callouses on his palm scraped across his stubble.
“This kid though, he seemed fine. I removed the shrapnel, patched him up. He was fine. A little banged up, a little shell-shocked, but talking, alive.”
Jack paused and Robby just let them sit in the silence for a moment, not pushing, not pressuring. Jack would tell him when he was ready.
“So I left him. Handed off to another medic for the night shift and got some shut-eye. Even on that first tour I was so god-damned tired all the time.
“I never saw that kid alive again.”
Jack let go of Robby’s wrist then, covered his eyes with both his hands, as if he was seeing that night all over again and couldn’t bear to look at it. Maybe he was. Robby had seen that haunted look in Jack’s eyes often enough to know that it never really went away, not really. Knew enough of it himself to attest to that.
Once again, Robby let him have his silence. It was the least he could do, and the same courtesy Jack offered him time and time again, on the roof and off it. They were on the roof now, metaphorically at least, the kind of conversation they only ever had up there, where they confessed to the darknesses festering inside of them.
Finally Jack spoke again, voice muffled through the shelter of his hands, his downcast head, elbows resting on his knees, slightly lopsided from only having one foot on the floor.
“He aspirated. The duty sergeant that night didn’t know any better to check, and he choked to death on his own blood during the night, filled up his lungs like some kiddie’s paddling pool.” Jack took a deep breath and finally moved his hands away. Twisted his head to look at Robby, an indecipherable look on his face.
“He died. That kid died, all because I didn’t watch him, I didn’t watch out for him. And after you left earlier that’s all I could see. That kid dead, and you dead too. Jumped off the roof, or stepped in front of traffic, or I don’t even fucking know Robby, but I couldn’t let that be you.” His voice broke, but he didn’t look away this time.
“I needed to have eyes on you, that’s all I could think about. I needed to check you were okay with my own hands, my own eyes.”
He stopped there but he didn’t look away, and Robby sat back on the bed slightly, taking Jack in. He reached out an arm, the same wrist that had been clutched by Jack earlier, and twisted his wrist up to face him. Jack understood his meaning without him having to say anything, and his fingers latched onto Robby’s pulse point, tracking the heartbeat there.
Robby could see the moment that Jack registered the pulse under his fingers, a minute relaxation of his shoulders, the tense line of his back.
“I’m not dead, I’m not choking, I’m right here.” But it felt too close to how he’d been feeling earlier for it to feel like the truth. He had felt like he couldn’t breathe, had gone up onto the roof to only find some fresh air, to only feel like he could catch his breath, like there’s wasn’t an anvil pressing down on his lungs.
Now sitting there with Jack, it was the quietest he had felt all day, but still it felt like he was up there. Buffeted by the wind, and the horror of the day, and every other fucking day, all of them weighing down on him all at once.
He didn’t realise that his breath had quickened, until he felt Jack’s grip tighten on his wrist and pull him closer. Jack shifted his weight on the edge of the bed, twisting and bringing his right knee up next to Robby’s hip.
“Hey, hey, Robinavitch, focus on me brother. I’m right here.”
And it was Jack’s turn to comfort him now, to let him know that everything wasn’t completely fucked, not if they were both still alive, both still kicking even if just out of reflex.
Robby focused on the feel of Jack’s fingers gripping his wrist tight. On the slope of Jack’s shoulder as it twisted towards him. He’d know those shoulders anywhere, could recognise Jack by the shape of his silhouette in the dark and know that help was coming, that he wasn’t alone. Those shoulders that somehow always seemed capable of carrying the weight of Robby’s fuck-ups, his failures. Even when Jack broke, here he was picking up the pieces of Robby anyway.
And that was enough to bring him back into himself. The awareness of how fucking selfish he was being. Jack had needed him this evening, had needed to know that Robby was okay, and here he was making Jack look after him once again.
Gently, making sure Jack knew he wasn’t trying to pull away, he pulled his wrist free from Jack’s grip. He let him go easily, and wasn’t that how Jack always was? Never trying to demand something from Robby that he couldn’t give.
Robby lifted both of his arms and pulled Jack into a rough hug, letting it sit for a moment before speaking.
“Thank you. Just— Thank you.”
And it was thank you for rescuing me, and thank you for caring and thank you for being here and thank you thank you thank you for not giving up on me, even though you should. Robby didn’t know how to put all of that into words, so he held on tight to Jack, arms around those shoulders, and hoped the warm solidity of his body could telegraph his message. That the root of him could seep into Jack through osmosis and Jack would know how much he meant to Robby without him ever having to find the words at all.
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