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The day shift was always difficult for Dr Jack Abbot. He was used to the hospital at night so being there in daylight is always disorientating and felt wrong. He was here working the day because he and Robby had an early flight the next morning to the Caribbean for a much needed vacation. So it was for a very good reason.
But that didn’t stop the entire shift being a challenge for Jack’s concentration. Not medically. Medically, he was fine.
In terms of his ability to function around his husband who was looking unfairly attractive in his scrubs? Not so much.
Because Robby was on a winning streak today. One of those terrifyingly competent days where he walked through the department like he owned gravity itself. Glasses perched low on his nose. Sleeves shoved to his forearms. Coffee in one hand. Trauma reports in the other.
Jack was barely surviving it.
“You listening to me, Abbot?”
Jack blinked hard and looked away from where Robby was currently leaning over the nurses’ station, explaining something to a med student with sharp little hand gestures and that clipped attending voice that always did unfortunate things to Jack’s nervous system.
“Hm?”
Dana stared at him. “You’ve signed the same chart three times.”
Jack looked down. Sure enough:
Jack Abbot.
Jack Abbot.
Jack Abbot.
“…in my defence,” Jack said carefully, “my husband is being aggressively hot today.”
Dana didn’t even look surprised. “You say that every day.”
“It’s because I don’t get to see him wandering around all day looking like a stressed bisexual university professor who accidentally became head of an emergency department. ”
Dana fixed Jack with a glare that would have made most interns wet themselves. “Jesus Christ. Abbot, if you have an erection in my department I’m going to get you castrated myself.”
Jack shifted subtly so he was standing more behind the desk. “No! Me? Never!”
Across the station, Robby pushed his glasses up his nose while on the phone trying to arrange a patient transfer.
“Oh my God,” Jack whispered to nobody.
But he avoided Dana like the plague after that, in fear she’d follow through on her threat.
—
It only got worse from there.
Robby running a trauma with blood on his gloves and calm authority in his voice. Robby standing with his hands on his hips while arguing with radiology over scans. Robby laughing suddenly at something Santos said, head tipped back just enough to show his throat.
Jack genuinely considered lying down on the ambulance bay floor for a few minutes. And the worst part?
Tomorrow they were leaving for vacation. A full week. Just him and Robby in the sun.
Jack had spent the entire day intermittently thinking things like:
My husband in swim shorts.
My husband shirtless by the pool.
My husband sleepy and sunscreened and stealing drinks out of my hand.
He felt like a Victorian man seeing ankle for the first time. Could he still practice medicine effectively if all his blood was in his cock? Lets hope so.
—
Jack spent the afternoon of the shift feeling particularly like a teenager with a catastrophic crush. Which was embarrassing considering he was a fully qualified attending physician nearing his fiftieth birthday.
But Robby was making it impossible to behave normally. Absolutely impossible.
Because at some point., Robby had touched Jack’s hip while moving past him during a trauma and Jack had briefly forgotten the alphabet. And he really wished he was exaggerating.
Whitaker had asked him for a medication dose and Jack had stared into the middle distance like a man trying to master telepathy.
“Dr Abbot?”
“Hm?”
“The dose?”
Jack blinked. “Right. Yes. Medication. Love medication.”
Whitaker squinted at him. “Are you okay?”
“No.” Jack watched Robby across the department as he snapped on gloves with sharp efficient movements. “Your boss is ruining my life.”
Robby, entirely unaware he was causing high levels of neurological damage to his fellow attending, was currently lecturing a med student about discharge paperwork.
Not cruelly. Robby never really did cruel. But he did do intensely disappointed. Which somehow made it worse.
“You cannot,” Robby said, pinching the bridge of his nose beneath those stupidly attractive glasses, “discharge a chest pain patient with ‘probably fine’ written in the notes.”
The med student looked ready to dissolve into atoms. Jack, meanwhile, was trying really hard to obey the ‘no boners in the ED rule’. Because there was something about Competent Dr Robby that really did it for him. The calm voice. The sharp intelligence. The little flashes of irritation. The way everyone in the department unconsciously straightened when he walked past.
Jack leaned against the counter beside Princess and sighed dreamily. “I need to work more day shifts, he’s so sexy at work.”
Princess didn’t even look up from her paperwork. “I’m begging you to keep some thoughts inside your head.”
“I am. These are the filtered ones.”
Across the room, Robby gestured toward a computer screen while explaining ECG changes.
Jack, like most physicians able to make it to being an attending, can honestly say he would rather lose his other leg than have to be a med student again. But right now his brain was betraying him and coming up with some very interesting fantasies.
Exhausted med student Jack Abbot, standing in borrowed scrubs with terrible coffee in his bloodstream and a hopeless crush on Dr Michael Robinavitch, lead trauma attending and hottest man ever.
Fantasy-Robby stood over him with crossed arms. “Abbot.”
Jack shivered. “Yes, doctor.”
“That chart is unacceptable.”
“I can redo it.”
“You’re going to redo it and then you’re going to explain to me why you thought this management plan was remotely appropriate.” Dr Robinavitch pulled his glasses off slowly. “Or I’ll have to punish you.”
Jack didn’t know how to process this. It had been years since he’d had sex on hospital grounds, but this was really testing him.
A few feet away, real life Robby glanced over. “…why are you looking at me like that?”
Jack smiled. “No reason, sweetheart.”
Robby narrowed his eyes, looking unconvinced.
Langdon took pity on him and snitched like the little suck up Jack believed him to be. “He’s being weird again.”
“I’m always weird,” Jack argued.
Robby looked between them slowly, clearly deciding whether he actually wanted the answer. He did not. “Whatever’s happening,” he said cautiously, “keep it away from the trauma bays.”
Then he turned and walked away. Jack watched him go. Watched the broad shoulders under his scrubs. The confident stride. The glimpse of a tattoo under his sleeve when he reached for a chart.
Jack leaned both hands on the desk. “…I need to bite him.”
Whitaker dropped his tablet in shock. “Jesus Christ.”
“Respectfully,” Jack said, still staring at his husband, “there is nothing respectful happening in my brain right now.”
—
By four in the afternoon, Jack was beginning to suspect he might be having some kind of medical event. Not cardiac or neurological.
Something worse.
Because surely no human being was supposed to spend this much time thinking about their husband, whom he has a very healthy sex life with. He’s not repressed or touch starved or whatever. But it was becoming genuinely distracting.
He’d lost an entire conversation with Collins when Robby had taken off his hoodie on the other side of the department. Because beneath it, his scrub top had ridden up slightly, fabric catching softer around his middle where his stomach pressed warm and comfortable against the dark material. A little pudge pulling the scrubs tighter when he stretched, the fabric catching at his waist before settling again.
An entire conversation. Gone. Vanished into the horny void.
Jack stood at the nurses’ station pretending to review labs while internally conducting a serious self-assessment.
Okay.
Maybe this was hormonal. Or stress. Or early-onset insanity.
Because this could not possibly be normal. He was a doctor. A professional. A grown man. Not some 18th century widow clutching a handkerchief because her husband’s forearms existed.
Jack frowned thoughtfully to himself. Maybe he actually needed to see someone. There were conditions, probably. Brain tumours maybe. Something endocrine. He should look it up later.
Across the department, Robby bent over a gurney to help reposition a patient.
Jack’s train of thought derailed so violently it practically left scorch marks. Scrubs stretched across his hips. Shoulders shifting under fabric. One hand braced against the mattress while he explained something calmly to the patient .
Jack stared.
Then immediately thought:
Fuck yeah I need to see the doctor.
“Oh my God,” he whispered to himself.
Mohan looked up from beside him. “Another episode?”
“You don’t understand.” Jack pointed weakly across the ER. “Look at him.”
She looked. Then turned back to Jack. “I mean. He’s objectively attractive.”
“Objectively attractive?” Jack echoed, scandalised. “That man is a public health hazard.”
A few feet away, Robby straightened up and pushed his glasses back into place with the back of his wrist.
Jack nearly ascended. “You know what the worst part is?” he muttered.
“The constant HR violations?”
“He has no idea he’s doing it.”
Which was true. Robby existed in a permanent state of completely accidental attractiveness. He didn’t preen. Didn’t flirt intentionally. Didn’t even seem aware that every exhausted nurse, doctor, paramedic, and med student in a fifteen mile radius occasionally stared at him like he’d been handcrafted in a lab specifically to ruin concentration.
Robby just… existed.
Meanwhile Jack was over here fighting for his life because his husband had nice hands. Again.
Robby glanced over suddenly, catching him staring. Jack didn’t even look away.
Robby narrowed his eyes immediately. “…why do you look like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like you’re plotting something.”
Jack smiled lazily. “Just appreciating workplace morale.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means your ass looks incredible in those scrubs, honey.”
Robby went bright red instantly. “Jack!”
“What?” Jack spread his hands innocently. “I’m supporting my coworkers.”
“You are harassing your coworkers.”
“You married me voluntarily.”
Robby stared at him for one long suffering second. Then muttered, “Unbelievable,” under his breath and walked away again.
Jack watched him flee with the helpless expression of a man being hunted for sport.
“…yeah,” he sighed softly. “Definitely need a doctor.
—
So naturally Jack was confused when they got home and Robby was quiet and withdrawn. Jack noticed it first in the bedroom while they packed. Robby kept picking up shirts, staring at them, then putting them back down again. Long pauses. Little frowns.
That tiny tightness around his mouth Jack had learned meant something’s wrong and I’m pretending it isn’t.
“You okay, honey?”
“Fine.”
Immediate lie. Jack watched him fold and refold the same pair of shorts three times.
Then Robby sighed sharply and sat down on the edge of the bed. “…I don’t think I wanna go anymore.”
Jack froze halfway through packing extra liners for his leg. “What?”
Robby rubbed a hand over his face. “It’s stupid.”
“Michael.”
“It’s really stupid.”
“I decide that.”
“It’s embarrassing.”
Jack shifted closer until their knees touched. “Baby.”
Robby’s shoulders slumped immediately. For a second he just stared at the carpet. Then quietly: “I hate how I look lately.”
Jack’s brain fully stalled.
Robby choked out one laugh, brittle and embarrassed. “Look at you and then look at me, Yankl. Jesus Christ.”
Jack stared at him like he’d started speaking fluent dolphin. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re built like a fucking superhero.” Robby gestured vaguely at him. “You work out, you’re all muscular shoulders and stupid arms and-”
“Stupid arms?”
“Don’t interrupt my self-loathing.”
Jack sat beside him slowly.
Robby kept going, words spilling now that they’d started. “I’m exhausted all the time. I look tired constantly. I’ve got grey hair coming in, I’ve gained weight, I spend half my life stress-eating protein bars in my office, for fuck’s sake.”
Jack’s expression had gone from confusion to genuine heartbreak. “Baby…”
“And I know it shouldn’t matter, but we’re gonna be around pools and beaches and everyone’s gonna look amazing and-” He swallowed hard. “I just feel gross lately.”
Jack looked at him for a moment before recovering quickly. “Michael Robinavitch.”
Robby groaned immediately. “No, don’t government-name me.”
“You are quite literally the hottest man I have ever seen in my life.”
“That is objectively untrue.”
“I almost walked into a crash cart today because you looked at me over your glasses.”
Robby blinked. “What?”
“You did some chest compressions and I had to go stand in the supply closet for a minute.”
A startled laugh escaped him despite himself.
Jack kept going, relentlessly now. “You know what I see when I look at you? My husband. My brilliant, terrifying husband who runs an emergency department on four hours sleep and caffeine and a piss poor budget.”
“Jack-”
“I see the guy who holds my hand in his sleep.” Jack reached up, brushing fingers through the grey at Robby’s temples. “I see the man who carried me to bed after a thirty-hour shift because my leg hurt too bad to walk.”
Robby’s eyes went shiny immediately.
“And for the record,” Jack added, quieter now, “the grey hair is very much working for me.”
Robby laughed wetly. “You’re insane.”
“I’m obsessed with you. Different issue entirely.”
That finally broke him. Robby covered his face with one hand, shoulders shaking once with a quiet laugh that turned into a sob halfway through.
Jack immediately moved closer. “Hey. None of that.”
“I know it’s stupid-”
“It’s not stupid.” Jack pulled his hand away gently. “You spend all day taking care of everyone else. Sometimes your brain gets mean to you. It happens, baby.”
Robby looked wrecked by the softness of it. Jack leaned forward and kissed him carefully. Slow. Warm. The kind of kiss that said I know every version of you and I choose all of them.
“You’re so beautiful it actually irritates me,” Jack murmured against his mouth.
Robby made a helpless little noise.
Jack kissed him again before adding, “I’m considering purposely shrinking your scrubs in the wash so I get to see more of your ass at work.”
“That’s quite the threat.”
“It is.” Another kiss. “You have incredible thighs.”
Robby laughed hard enough to hunch forward. After a few more kisses, Robby leaned back to look at his husband. Really look at him.
All the affection. All the certainty. All the ridiculous impossible love shining openly across Jack’s face like sunlight through glass. And something inside him unclenched.
—
Robby was still embarrassed about it hours later. Not actively crying anymore. But still a little folded in on himself. Jack could always tell.
It lingered in the way Robby avoided mirrors while getting ready for bed. In the way he tugged absently at the hem of his t-shirt. In how he kept trying to redirect conversation every time Jack kissed him too softly.
Like he didn’t quite believe it yet. Which was insane to Jack. Actually insane. Because his husband looked like that.
Currently, Robby was standing barefoot in their bathroom brushing his teeth in old grey sweatpants and a faded college hoodie, hair messy from the shower, glasses slipping down his nose.
Jack watched him from the doorway with the deep emotional exhaustion of a man cursed to love too hard.
Robby caught him staring in the mirror. “…again?”
“I physically cannot stop.”
“You are so weird.”
“You say that like it’s not one of your favourite things about me.”
Robby huffed quietly into his toothbrush. Jack wandered closer until he could wrap his arms around him from behind. Robby leaned back automatically. Instinctive. Familiar.
Jack rested his chin on his shoulder. “You know,” he murmured, “you really ruined my productivity today.”
“Mm?” Toothbrush still in mouth.
“I spent most of the shift trying not to climb you like a tree.”
Robby choked on toothpaste immediately. “What?”
Jack grinned. “Oh good, we’re communicating now? Great. Because I have notes.”
“Oh no.”
“Oh yes.”
Robby rinsed his mouth while glaring suspiciously at him.
Jack leaned closer, voice dropping warm against Robby’s ear. “You spent half the shift using your scary attending voice and I was so fucking turned on. At one point I genuinely wanted you to bend me over the nurses’ station.”
Robby made a horrified choking noise. “Jack-”
“I’m serious. Then later you walked into your office and I had a full thought about locking the door and getting on my knees for you.”
Robby made a strangled sound and covered his face instantly. “Jesus Christ, Yankl.”
“What? I suffered all day.”
“You are impossible.”
“You took your hoodie off and I could see your waist.” Jack kissed the corner of his jaw slowly. “That’s not my fault, baby,” he said softly, voice dropping warm and sincere, “do you know how hard it was to keep functioning after that?”
Robby looked confused and stared at Jack in the mirror like his brain couldn't keep up.
Jack kissed behind his ear. “I spent the next twenty minutes thinking about grabbing your hips.”
The blush that spread across Robby’s face was immediate and intense. “Jack-”
“I’m serious.” Another kiss. Robby wasn’t able to string a sentence together, he was only able to gasp and stammer in response. Jack continued mercilessly. “Then you rolled your sleeves up during trauma one and I briefly forgot how medication works.”
“That seems unsafe.”
“It was unsafe. Dana almost took my licence away.”
“She should.”
“You have any idea what you do to me?”
Robby made a strangled noise somewhere between horror and laughter. “Apparently cause workplace incidents.”
Jack turned him gently then, hands settling at his waist. “You know what I saw all day?” he asked quietly.
Robby shook his head once.
“My husband.” Simple as that. No hesitation. No uncertainty.
Jack brushed his thumbs slowly against the warm softness beneath Robby’s hoodie. “My husband who looks devastating in scrubs.” Kiss. “My husband who gets all bossy and sharp-tongued when he’s stressed.” Kiss. “My husband whose beard and stupid pretty face have been ruining my concentration for years.”
Robby’s eyes went glassy again immediately.
“Hey,” Jack said softly, catching it this time before he spiraled. “None of that.”
“I just…” Robby laughed weakly. “I don’t understand how you look at me like that.”
Jack looked genuinely startled. “Michael. I look at you and think mine.” Jack pressed one final kiss against his forehead. “And from tomorrow,” he murmured, “I plan on spending an entire week staring disrespectfully at you in swim shorts.”
Robby laughed helplessly into his shoulder. “You’re unbelievable.”
“Correct.” Jack squeezed him tighter. “Now come to bed so I can continue objectifying my husband in peace.”
“Yankl-”
Jack cupped his face gently, thumb brushing warm against the flush in Robby’s cheek. “Your brain can lie to you all it wants, honey,” Jack murmured softly. “But I won’t.”