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"The lock sometimes jams a bit, but honestly, no one really ever locks up," the petite woman in front of him says, her dark brown braids bouncing against her back as she hip-checks the door open before him.
She's tiny, barely coming up to Robby's sternum, but her eyes are bright and she'd tried to carry his duffle bag in for him when she'd offered to show him to his cabin. Robby had refused, but her almost infectious cheer didn't seem to waiver.
"You have your own real bathroom, fortunately, and that's just through the back, here—" Her tour is brief, given the size of the small cabin around them. "And you have the kitchenette, and a couple closets— check for black widows, they're bad around here— the desk, and the bunks!" She spins in place as she points out each item.
"Ah," Robby says, when she pauses, clearly waiting for him to say something. "It's—"
"Cute, right?" The girl's grin is infectious, her cheeks round and flushed, and Robby gives her a tentative smile in return.
"Cute. Yeah."
Her grin gets even wider, somehow, and she tilts her head to the bare bunks.
"We have bedding for you two, but it's still drying out right now. When the doc gets in, he can show you where it is." She wets her lips, and Robby watches as she gives him another fast once over. It doesn't seem unfriendly, but Robby has to work not to squirm.
"Do you have any questions?"
Robby blinks. If he'd had a chance to think since she'd introduced herself (I'm Emma, but everyone calls me Em) he might have something to ask her.
"No, I— I'm alright, Emma. Thank you." He hitches his duffle a little higher on his shoulder, and she gives him a quick nod, before she waves and disappears back out the door.
It's only when the door shuts behind her that Robby has a chance to really take in the space. He'd been told it's the nicest cabin on the grounds, reserved for the senior staffers (even if his hackles had wanted to go up at the description), but even 'rustic' was a bit of an oversell.
The floor is bare, leaving wide, rough-hewn boards that have obvious wear patterns across them exposed. Almost all of the structure is the same: rough, exposed, and weathered, even if it was kept immaculately clean. The weather-worn brown wood only goes up to about waist height, where wide windows stretch between the posts and give the impression of a fire lookout, with a waist high wall and the roof above, finally wrapped in a deep porch.
Calling the row of cabinets and fridge in the back of the cabin on the only solid wall a kitchenette seems like an overstatement. But, there's a two burner range and a solid looking oak table and chairs before it, and when Robby tugs open the fridge, it's already nominally stocked, including with a six back tucked on the top shelf. The bathroom was behind it, half outside (if enclosed) and accessible from the back porch, and the ratty looking closet that was fortunately free of spiders finished out the space.
Robby sighs as he finishes taking in the space, and sits down heavily at the table. This wasn't the summer he'd planned by any measure, but for now, it would do.
Robby hadn't thought Jack was serious when he'd recommended it.
It was a little hard to hear inside the bar, and Robby sends a balefully look over his shoulder at the jukebox, where someone had just put on 'Achy Breaky Heart' for the second time tonight. Jack's voice is what makes him turn back to him.
"It's not the worst gig," Jack continues, like Robby hadn't been functionally ignoring him for the last thirty seconds. "And you don't really have anything else happening."
"Not the worst?" Robby snorts as he speaks, picking up his beer and taking a long pull. Only this far north, almost in Erie, would a self-respecting American bar serve Molson. Jack had plopped it in front of him with a sly smirk, after declaring the last round his treat. "Really making a good sell, here."
"Okay, it's fun," Jack says, unphased by Robby's dismissal. "It's a little more than a month, you get nice and sunburned, you get to go— reconnect with nature, and swim in a lake, and the kids are always a blast." Jack doesn't fidget as he tries to catch Robby's gaze. "You get to go be the cool older brother for these guys, and maybe even make a good impression on some of 'em."
Jack is earnest. It seemed to be his only other setting, when sarcastic wasn't available. It means that the words, no matter how corny to Robby's more than a little jaded ears, ring true. Annoyingly.
"This is a shitty midlife crisis," Robby says mildly, twitchy in opposition to Jack's stillness, but the other man can smell blood in the water.
"Hey, cheaper than a Miata." Jack slaps his shoulder, and drains his beer with a single, long pull. "I'll text Kiara. She'll email you the paperwork."
Kiara turned out to be the camp's hyper-competent and rock solid coordinator, and apparently the granddaughter of the original owner of the campground. She'd sent him all the forms, once she'd confirmed he actually was a doctor, and with startling efficiency, Robby found his June and July solidly booked.
He shouldn't have been surprised. Jack was always like— that. Clear sense of vision, direct and to the point, but enough charisma that you found yourself nodding along and pulled in his wake, even when you weren't entirely sure why. It had been amusing when Robby had first met him in med school. Now— he wasn't really sure.
They'd both been young, but even then, Jack had seemed a little older than the rest of Robby and their peers. Maybe it was the bulldog expression he wore when he needed to get something done, or the knowledge that once he'd finished his degree, he'd be sucked up by the United States Army to pay it all off, all part of the Military Health Professions Loan Repayment Program. Either way, Robby had liked him, and when they'd graduated, hoped for the best but hadn't expected to see him again.
It had been a surprise, almost 8 years later, to bump into him in New Orleans. Robby had loved it, for all the bitterness of his time there. He loved the city and the noise and the people, but it wasn't anything he'd associate with Jack.
It hadn't been a long chat, with Robby heading home after his shift at University Hospital, only just reopened after the remodel; and Jack on his way towards Bourbon Street to meet up with his future brother in law for his bachelor's party. Still, it'd been good to see him.
The next time Robby had seen Jack, it had been in Nashville.
It was pure luck of the draw that Robby had stopped there on his drive north. He had his car stuffed full of boxes and plants, the few things he hadn't quite had the stomach to leave behind in Louisiana, and as he'd driven over the Lake Pontchartrain causeway, he'd felt like he was running from something. The detour to stop someplace that might even be fun was an impulsive one, but he'd ditched his car in a hotel parking lot, prayed no one took too much interest in the shit he'd brought with him, and headed up Music Row.
After the last decade that he'd spent in New Orleans, drunk people weren't exactly unfamiliar to him. He'd seen the worst of the worst, and he's mostly bemused as he wanders around drunken tourists in garish cowboy hats and more than a few people trying to hand out demos and busking for the undulating crowds.
Robby's debating if he should stop and join them, maybe find a drink for himself, when his eyes catch on a man on crutches who almost topples into the street before some of his drunken friends grab him and pull him upright. Robby snorts, but it's not until the man turns and the light catches his face that Robby realizes who it is.
He has to take long strides and almost elbows a blonde woman who looks to be more turquoise jewelry than woman who steps in front of him, but he finally closes the gap. He ducks down to be heard over the noise, and bumps into the man's straw cowboy hat.
"You're a doctor. Seems awfully stupid to be both drunk and on crutches."
Jack startles, as Robby had hoped, but when he spins and catches sight of him, his grin is infectious.
"Mikey, holy shit—" He's laughing, and he reaches out to grab Robby with one surprisingly fast hand. "Hey, guys— I went to med school with this guy, small fucking world—"
It's not until Robby has followed them to two other bars and is more than a little unsteady on his own feet that he gets the story. It's another bachelor party, this time for one of his Army buddies, and Jack doesn't normally need the crutches.
"I'm rock solid, honestly. Should be cleared for return to duty any day now, but when I get drunk, my balance is the first to go." He reaches down, and with a quick jerk, pulls his pant leg up. The glossy metal and plastic of a prosthetic is unmistakable, and Jack sends him a smile that seems a lot more sober than a moment before.
"They kept telling me operations outside the wire were dangerous, like I hadn't spent the last five years trying to patch holes in kids who'd been doing just that." Jack snorts, shaking his head as he tugs his pant legs back into place. "But I signed up for it, didn't I?"
Robby isn't sure what his own expression is, but as he takes in Jack's face, it's obvious that he's not the only one trying to outrun his ghosts.
Robby follows them to a few other bars, drinks some of the shots that get sent their way when patrons realize it's a herd of soldiers crowding their way into the spaces, and in a drunken haze, promises to exchange numbers with Jack. It's not until the morning, when he's staggering out of a cab back to the hotel he hadn't slept in, that he realizes he'd never given Jack his number, and neither had Jack.
"You're the third Michael Robinavitch, M.D. that I've called," Jack bitches over the phone, two years later. "First one died last year, and the other one was a very irate podiatrist in Dayton, Ohio."
"Failing to see how that's my fault."
"It's the twenty first century, tell that hospital of yours to put some photos up of their doctors. Would have saved me the trouble." Jack's voice is a little tinny, and Robby's amused enough that it takes them a little while to get to the point.
It's an invitation. Jack had been amused when he offers, the smug tone warm enough that Robby was willing to ignore the tease in the other doctor's voice.
"I figure we meet when I'm on two different Bachelor party trips, the universe is giving me a message. This time, I'm inviting you deliberately."
So Robby comes. Vancouver, of all places, because Jack and his fiancee had met there.
He learns about Jennifer— brown eyes, big smile, and so full of piss and vinegar that Jack wasn't sure how he'd gotten on her good side. She'd tripped over Jack's leg, too far out from under his table at a restaurant, and she'd thought it had been deliberate— up until he'd shown her his prosthetic and offered a sheepish explanation that he wasn't always the most aware of it.
She'd been mortified, and after she'd stopped apologizing, Jack had told her that he'd forgive her, but only if she went out to dinner with him.
Robby's invited to the wedding, too, but he isn't able to make it. He gets an email with photos, and a long recap from Jack, as well as a teasing reminder for him to send a gift.
He gets an email when Jennifer gets sick, too. Cervical cancer, unexpected, only found when they'd been trying to conceive and couldn't quite make it happen. Robby hears from him less, after that, until he gets a letter out of nowhere.
Jack hadn't invited him to the funeral. Jennifer hadn't wanted one. So Robby just gets a piece of paper shoved in an envelope, with a new address written on it, and a few brief words about looking for a civilian job. Jack had lived in DC, near Walter Reed. This one is in upstate New York, near Buffalo. Not quite close enough for a day trip. Robby writes the address down, and waits for another email.
Robby doesn't wait in the cabin for Jack to show up. It's a little stuffy in there, even with a couple of the windows propped open and the cold war era ceiling fan spinning above his head with the approximate volume of a jet engine. So he sprays himself down with bug spray, tugs on his sunglasses, and heads out to explore.
The camp is mostly empty, at the moment. There are a few volunteers running around, but he's left to himself as he steps out of the cabin, down the creaky steps to the trail, and into the woods.
This, he can admit, is the rustic image the camp seems to be going for. Tall trees stretching up into a dense canopy above him, with broad dirt paths that have been heavily trekked enough that the ground is hard and almost burnished from the foot traffic. His cabin is tucked up high, deep into the grounds and on the side of a ridge, giving him a broad view of the cabins and yurts that make up the sleeping area for the campers, sweeping down towards the sparkling surface of the lake below.
He finds the mess hall during his exploration, the nicest and most finished building of the grounds, and the single paved road heading out to the main highway for service vehicles, but it's hidden from view. He also finds what he thinks is a larger rec hall, with benches and a squat stage, dominated by a huge, taxidermy moose head on the vaulted wall above the stage. The little medical building is behind it, with a fairly well equipped couple of beds, and actual AC. Robby's certain that must be Jack's doing.
He doesn't head back to the cabin until the evening is starting to get the warm pink glow of dusk, mosquitoes coming out of the woodwork and unsettling bark of a heron enough to send him back towards the relative comfort of the cabin. He shouldn't be surprised to see the door standing open and the overhead lights on, but his heart stutters for a moment before he spots the familiar silhouette of the other man through the array of windows.
"There you are— was about to send out a search party." Jack's got his back to Robby, but he twists and sends him a wide grin once he finishes stuffing what looks like his hundredth pair of cargo shorts into the drawer of a dresser.
"This place isn't that big," Robby grouses quietly, even as he runs his gaze over the other man. He still couldn't quite believe he was here, and he eyes the other man as he steps further into the cabin. He's not sure what possessed him to actually fill out the application, but he'd done it, despite everything else that happened.
"No, but who knows. You might have fallen in the lake." Jack pauses, and sends him a glance. "You can swim, can't you?"
Robby laughs, a little stilted, and doesn't dignify the question with a response as he takes in the changes to the space. Jack notices, and sends him a slightly self-congratulatory look.
"I got the beds made up, everything was still airing out on the clothes lines by the play fields, but they're dry. Ish." He gestures to the beds. "Mosquito netting — you're welcome, by the way— so we can open up windows and get some airflow overnight without getting eaten alive." Jack turns again, and steps over to the wall, where a little half dome light is stuck to the wall. As Robby looks around, there's a few of them. Jack taps it, and the light comes on.
"For when you inevitably have to wake up in the middle of the night to piss. Way easier when you can see where you're going. I put one in the bathroom, too. There's no light in there."
Robby doesn't laugh, even if part of him wants to. "Thank you," he says dryly. "This was the nice cabin, you said?"
Jack grins. "We have electricity and running water. Welcome to the Ritz Carlton of Camp Monongahela."
It's quiet, until they get closer to bed. Jack brought take out with him, fortunately, and even if the Chinese food is cold and straight from the fridge, it's filling, and Robby puts away more than he'd thought he would. He hasn't been that hungry, after everything with Grace fell apart, but whether it was the wandering around camp or the travel to get here, he's ravenous.
Jack doesn't comment on it, which Robby's grateful for. He'd tugged off his prosthetic at some point, and he hops up to grab his elbow crutches and manages to clear the table of empty containers with surprising agility, despite the bulk hanging from his arms.
"You prefer top or bottom?" Jack asks, tucking the trash into a sturdy looking container that was just outside the back door. Emma had said something about trash and bear cans. He assumes that must be it.
Robby's distracted enough by Jack's hands that it takes him a moment to process, and he blinks in surprise before looking up at the other man's face. He doesn't quite know what to say, until Jack gestures to the bunk beds.
"Oh—" Robby breathes out, not sure why his face feels warm. Obviously. He'd been a little taken aback when he'd seen them at first, feeling every inch of his age, but he'd already signed up for this and backing out because of the beds seemed a little primadonna. "Uh, top."
He aims for unaffected when he says it, but when Jack shuts the back door and turns to face him, his eyebrow is creeping up towards his hairline.
"You never exactly struck me as a guy that liked being on top."
Robby blinks, and this time he's certain of the leading inflection of Jack's voice. He can't tell if it's some joke, or a knee jerk reaction, baked in after years of military life and the accompanying hazing.
"I figured you'd want to be on bottom. With your leg." He's resolute in ignoring anything besides the literal text of the conversation, even when Jack snorts.
"When was the last time you crawled into a bunk?" Jack asks, amusement replacing the almost inscrutable tease of before.
"Recently," Robby says, a little guarded. He'd practiced before Jack had arrived, scuttling up the end of the bed and onto the top bunk with a little less grace than he'd hoped. That was recent.
Jack holds his gaze, and after a long moment, snorts out a laugh.
"I'll take the top bunk. No sense in having you roll out of bed and hit the ground like a sack of potatoes."
"Couldn't you patch me up if I did?" Robby asks, and it's a relief when Jack's expression melts into a more familiar grin.
"Hell no, man. I'm off the clock."
Robby had been hired on for the same role as Jack, technically. Senior Camp Director, which Jack told him just meant they made 50 cents more an hour than the camp counselors, and because they both were emergency medicine physicians, the camp didn't bother hiring a nurse for the summer.
"Realistically, I think we should get to split whatever they'd pay the nurse and add it to our paychecks," Jack says as they shuffle through the rec center, which Jack had piously informed Robby was called the main hall. The junior counselors, incongruously named college students who worked over the summer, had already been through and outfitted the place in streamers and posters, but Jack wanted to give it a once over.
"Doesn't really save them money if they do that," Robby pointed out, and picks up a mostly deflated balloon from where it had gotten stuck under a metal folding chair. He kicks it into the center of the space, and Jack shrugs.
"But think of the money we'd be making."
That draws an honest laugh out of Robby, and Jack sends him a wide grin in response. The money they're being paid doing this job is a fraction of what they both make in their actual positions, and they both know it. When Jack had first told him about the camp, Robby had asked, and Jack had just laughed at the idea.
"What you get out of this whole thing isn't the paycheck, Mikey, believe it or not." It had been in that fuzzy period, where Jack had been nearby, when Robby had been with Grace, and he hadn't known when to talk about the woman that he really thought might be the one when Jack was still so fresh off the loss of Jennifer.
The civilian job Jack had ended up taking was a senior attending for the emergency room at a relatively small hospital, off the beaten path but serving half a dozen smaller towns in the area. Robby had asked if broken ankles and infected cuts were all that interesting during a 36 hour shift, and Jack had just snorted.
"I've seen enough real trauma for a lifetime, man. I'll take the broken ankles."
The campers arrive a few days later, in a storm of overprotective parents and overexcited preteens.
The first two weeks were the younger campers, 10 to 14, and Jack had been particularly excited about their arrival. He's been at Camp Monongahela for the last three summers, and as they stood watching the younger counselors shuttling kids around and shooing parents back to their cars, the bubble of calm around them feels— safe. Familiar, even if everything else about this wasn't.
"You need a nickname," Jack tells him, his skin a little pale with the smear of unblended sunscreen across the bridge of his nose and the red in his mostly gray hair visible under the patchy sunshine above.
It takes Robby a moment to respond, blinking behind dark sunglasses and returning his gaze to watch Frank and Mel, two of the repeat counselors, pick up several duffle bags and backpacks before leading the line of overexcitable kids to their respective cabins, deeper into the campgrounds.
"I have a nickname," Robby protests, and glances back at Jack when he snorts.
"Robby is not a nickname."
"It's not my name, it's a version of my name— how is that not a nickname?"
"No— it's the spirit of the thing, man. A camp nickname."
"Well—" Robby sighs, tilting his head. "Why didn't you just say so?"
His exasperation isn't enough to cut through Jack's serious expression, and he tilts his head at Robby.
"It can't be Doc. I claimed that one." Jack's arms are folded in front of himself, a clipboard dangling from his grip by his side. It makes him look broader, more imposing, and Robby isn't cowed in the slightest.
"You 'claimed it'?" Robby asks incredulously. "What are you, five?"
"I was here first!"
Robby huffs, more amused than anything. Jack continues on, undeterred.
"Say I give it up, huh? What would I go by?" Jack's eyebrows creep up, and Robby lets out a louder laugh at that, head tipping back as he grins.
"I don't think any of the nicknames I'd give you are suitable for use in front of children."
When Jack shoves him, he doesn't stumble. Jack's laugh makes him forget the chaos of the day around them, and instead narrows his focus to the sudden warmth burning from just a few feet beside him.
Robby had thought Grace was going to be it for him. Forever, or something like it.
She'd come through the doors of PTMC's emergency department with a broken finger, a steely look in her eyes, and cursing like a sailor. Robby had been a goner by the time he'd helped reset the break.
She was only in town for a couple months, helping her brother clean out their recently deceased mom's house, but she'd ended up a fixture in Robby's apartment soon enough. Once she'd finished cleaning out the house and putting it on the market, she'd returned to Vermont, and Robby had followed her there, in love and more than a little stupid.
The hospital he'd worked at was tiny, and he'd emailed Jack to bitch about it enough times that the man finally demanded he just call him instead, and the calls had eventually turned to infrequent trips to visit each other and bellyache about small town practice.
Jack was better, a few years out from Jennifer's death, if not entirely good, either. When Robby asked him, a little haltingly, if he'd help him pick out a ring on his next trip, he'd been relieved that Jack had just been excited for him.
It means Jack was the first person he called when his proposal (in their living room, curled up together, most of a bottle of wine disposed of between the two of them) had gone down in flames, and Robby had realized what felt like 'forever' to him had been 'fun for right now' for Grace.
He'd had thoughts of eloping, a courthouse wedding and a spur of the moment honeymoon. He loved traveling, and every time he'd mentioned his time living in other parts of the country, Grace had let out a soft sigh and mentioned how badly she wanted to see more of the world.
Robby had thought he'd understood her. He'd thought wrong.
Jack's couch was comfortable, but he knew it wasn't a long term solution, and he thinks mild sleep deprivation combined with Jack's particular brand of earnest, bulldog determination had gotten him into this position. God knows he wouldn't normally have signed up to be a summer camp director.
It takes until the fourth night of camp for him to admit that maybe Jack knows him better than he wants to admit. He's got Amber, an excited girl who had a proclivity for finding and catching snakes (all nonvenomous, at least at the moment) on his left, and Oliver, a quiet boy who's more than a little homesick on his right. Robby has to act quickly to grab the snake Amber had tried to drop into Oliver's lap to 'cheer him up', and when he looks up, Jack is watching him from the other side of the mess hall.
The grin he sends to Robby is enough to make his chest heat up. The wink he sends right after is enough to make Robby laugh.
The days settle into a rhythm that feels normal, if never quite predictable.
Jack has spreadsheets of plans, of which cabins go where for what activities, when certain highly anticipated dinners were served (always strategically to boost morale), all correlated with the weather to make sure all water activities wouldn't be disrupted by a summer thunderstorm.
"This is neurotic," Robby had murmured when Jack had first spread them out in the camp director's office.
"It's well planned," Jack protests. "A career in the military and this job has more in common than you'd think," he adds, voice raspy and prosaic.
"Hooah," Robby mutters, and Jack's laugh lights him up like the Fourth of July.
It's a mixture of things, with the younger group. Archery for some of them, plenty of time on the lake, canoeing over shining waters, and hours spent running through mess of trails in the woods surrounding the lake.
Jack and Robby end up pulled into the water, more than once. Once, when a young kid with dark eyes and a row of braces ended up going over the side of his canoe, only for Jack to jump into the chest deep water, prosthetic and all, and hoist him onto the dock.
The boy, Kevin, had been fine, if a bit rattled, and had clung to Jack until Robby had brought him up to the medical cabin to give him a once over. He'd relaxed once he got dry, and was back to being a chatterbox by the time the both of them made it to the mess for dinner.
The second time had been by the end of the second week, when the kids had gotten tired of chicken fights in the shallow pool by the campground entrance, and challenged the counselors to a battle in the lake.
Robby had tried to abstain, until Jack had wheedled him down, and he'd ended up with the other man sitting on his shoulders and grappling with some of the other staffers. The jeers calling them old hadn't stung— at least not until Frank and Emma, a surprisingly vicious pairing, had yanked Jack off Robby's shoulders and sent them both spluttering into the shallows.
It's peaceful, despite everything. Maybe because of everything.
"It won't last," Jack tells him in the quiet between the two camps. It's not quite a week, just enough time to clean the cabins, restock the food in the kitchens, and pull out some of the activities that were a little too challenging for the younger groups.
"No?" Robby asks, his voice distracted as he shoos the fat, shiny body of a black widow off the pool noodle he was pulling out. He'd gotten used to them fairly quickly, and once he wiggled the foam noodle, she'd skittered off away from him in a blur.
"No," Jack says. "These guys are fun, and I know most of them, but—" He shrugs, and it leaves Robby floundering, just a little.
"But what? They get in knife fights in their free time?"
Jack huffs out a breath, and tosses his own bounty of dusty looking water toys onto the ground. "No, Mikey. But they're all— hormonal. Teens."
Robby huffs in return. "What, we need to break these kids up from getting hot and heavy?"
"Well— sometimes." Jack raises his eyebrows. "And drinking, too."
Robby turns to face him, hands coming to rest on his hips. They're both filthy, sweat making every dusty cloud of dirt stick to them on any exposed skin.
"Why the hell are these kids having more fun than us?" He says, and Jack glances up at Robby's tone. He's been squinting as he works, and the creases of his crows feet are bare of the dirt that dusts the rest of his face. When he grins, the lines disappear again.
"Are you not having fun, Mikey? I'm hurt."
Robby rolls his eyes, and bends to pick up the pile of pool noodles with as much dignity as he can manage. If he can tell anything from Jack's amused snort behind him, it's not very much.
"Do you ever miss getting laid?"
Jack's voice makes Robby jolt from where he's stretched out on the couch.
They'd ended up back at Jack's place, after he'd gotten Robby to agree to the camp that summer. They hadn't been drunk at the bar, but when they got back, Jack had pulled out a bottle of whiskey, and they'd spent the better part of the last hour disposing of it.
"What— what the fuck are you talking about, man?" Robby's feet are just shy of the coffee table, his legs stretched out and his hands folded behind his head. He has to twist a little to meet Jack's gaze, where the other man is stretched out in almost the exact same position. His prosthetic got kicked off when they started to drink in earnest, and his pant leg hangs hollowly from just below his knee. Robby knows he'll be sent to retrieve his elbow crutches from upstairs when this is all said and done, and he fights the urge to frown about it.
"Getting laid. What's confusing about that?" Jack's voice is just a touch annoyed, responding to Robby's tone as much as anything.
"Do you mean like— tonight?" He hadn't thought Jack wanted to pick up. He'd have gotten out of his hair if he did.
"No, I mean— in general. After Grace."
Jack doesn't flinch when he says her name, so Robby works not to flinch, either.
"It's only been a couple weeks, Jack. Not like I'm dying over here."
"Six weeks," Jack corrects automatically, and Robby's frown gets a little deeper.
"Fuck— If you want me to leave, I'll leave, but you've got to say something." He's annoyed that Jack hadn't just told him to get a hotel or something, but the other man waves him off.
"God, put the pitchfork down." The drinking hasn't made either one of them particularly patient. "I mean— after Grace. After having that. Do you miss that?"
Robby frowns, his cheek still pressed into his own shoulder as he twists to look at Jack. It's uncomfortable, and he finally reorients himself, twisting his body until he was sprawled and facing the other man more comfortably.
"I haven't— I don't think it's been long enough for me to really have an opinion on it," he says, a dodge, but his eyes flicker down to the cushion between them, anyways. It had been nice with her. Easy. Fun. Maybe not explosive, but familiar.
"I do," Jack sighs, wistful in the way only significant amounts of alcohol could make him. "Miss getting laid, period."
It takes Robby, more than a little drunk himself, to catch up to his meaning. When he does, he gapes.
"You haven't gotten laid since Jen— since then?" He's staring, and he knows it.
Jack waves his hand dismissively.
"I have," he says grumpily, then corrects himself. "I've— I've tried, I guess. Couple times." He turns his head to meet Robby's gaze, and he wets his lips as he works to find the right words. "Couldn't make myself go through with it. Just— wasn't her, y'know?"
Robby doesn't know. For all that his grief with the situation feels like a raw wound, sensitive and tender, he finds it sporadically. It's unnoticeable for long stretches, until he prods it, and the burn starts up all over again like it's the first day all over again.
Jack doesn't notice Robby's internal churning, or he just doesn't care.
"I— just want that familiarity again." He doesn't look away from Robby, and suddenly, it feels— pointed. Heavy in a way that has nothing to do with the subject matter, or the half pint of liquor sitting like a brick in his stomach. Instead, it's the way Jack's regard feels like a physical thing in the space between them. "Want someone who feels safe, like her."
Robby blinks at him.
"That doesn't sound— bad. Sounds reasonable, I think." Robby doesn't really hear himself speak. He must manage it, though, because Jack nods at him like he's said something sage.
"I think so, too."
Robby doesn't remember the room getting this hot. Nor does he remember shifting until his shoulder is almost brushing Jack's. He's known Jack a long time. He wonders exactly how familiar he is to the other man.
Robby isn't sure who moved first. That night, colored with the blurry haze of too much alcohol and not enough clarity, is missing the details he knows are essential.
He does know the kiss is messy. It's hard hands grabbing at the other, teeth knocking, and the moment of realization before Robby pulls away and pushes himself to his feet.
"Let me get your crutches," Robby pants out, his shirt rucked up and caught up on the curve of his stomach. He's not sure when that happened. Not sure when he'd made the decision to kiss Jack, either.
The other man just stares at him, and Robby almost falls over himself as he heads up for the stairs.
Jack's right. The older kids are harder.
They're more fun, although the first time he admits this to Jack, the other man sends him a slightly betrayed look.
"They're all fun," Jack says quietly, even as they watch as one of the kids sprints off the end of the dock to flip into the water. It gets a chorus of catcalls from the kids in the shallows and on the beach, and when his head pops out of the water, his grin is wide enough that the both of them can see it from where they're leaned against a tree, out of the way of sprinting, sopping wet kids.
"Didn't say they weren't," Robby agrees, but when Jack elbows him in the side, he doesn't bother dodging it.
Still, they bring their own set of problems. One of the older girls, Trinity, a whip smart kid who made Robby want to laugh as much as he wanted to pull his hair out, seemed to have issue with the counselors from day one. It takes Jack explaining, hashing out the details of the complicated friendship between Trinity and Mel, back when Mel had been a camper, and the apparent interest Frank showed Mel as soon as she'd become a counselor.
It was messy. Worse, it was teenage. It made Robby feel even older than he already was.
They don't catch kids trying to fool around every night, but by the fourth night, they have to set up night shifts to patrol the campgrounds, and break up any potential amorous events. On the fifth night, they start carrying tick removers, too, after Robby had to pluck one off the ass of a very embarrassed teenager who'd been sneaking out to see one of his fellow campers for a late night rendezvous.
It's exhausting, and Robby finds himself struggling to keep up with the pace of things. It gets so bad he almost falls asleep during breakfast that morning, just barely catching himself before he takes a header into his bowl of oatmeal.
"This is getting ridiculous," Robby gripes to Jack later that day. The other man had woken Robby up when he'd had climbed back into the top bunk once he'd finished his own night patrol.
"Told you," Jack says, and it's only a little smug.
Robby's not sure if it's the exhaustion that finally does it, the heat of the summer, or just plain shitty luck.
The activities had been split up among counselors, a blend of what they excelled at and what they'd tolerated the best. Robby's personal favorite was a backcountry first aid class, one that he'd taken from Jack as soon as he found out about its existence.
His least favorite is softball.
He has no animus against it, or baseball, by and large. He'd gone to see the Pirates when he still lived in Pittsburgh, even if it was hard to call that baseball. He watched some of the World Series when it was on in October, and he didn't have a terrible arm himself.
Still, the difference between casually enjoying a sport and having any interest in coaching it are two entirely different things.
It was Trinity, in the end. Or her pitch, even if it had fouled off the bat of one of the other team, and in a move that seemed to defy physics, came backwards over the kid's bat and ended up hitting Robby hard in the temple.
Robby doesn't remember much, after that.
He remembers the immediate panicked noises, and Trinity calling out for Donny to go get Jack. Doc. He'd giggled at the nickname, but that had only made the faces above him seem more concerned.
"He's the fucking director, what if you killed him?"
"He's not the director, he's the— sub-director. I think. And I'm not gonna kill him!"
"Language," Robby slurs out, a little dazed, and the voices get quiet for a minute before kicking up again.
He remembers Jack coming into view, eyes dark and intent, and careful hands guiding Robby up to his feet and to a beat up Subaru that had been driven across the grass to get closer to Robby. It was going to leave tire marks on the field.
"Look, Mikey, I really don't give a shit about the grass."
Robby hadn't realized he'd said it out loud.
It feels like he blinks, and then he's back in their cabin. It's disorienting— one second he's looking up at the sky, then the next he's on the bottom bunk, leaning back in the bedding that smells like sweat and his own shampoo, and he blinks up at the wood above him, and twists to look for the other man.
It hurts, and he whines, which is apparently the magic word, because Jack is suddenly back beside him. It's only the realization that he can see Jack moving in his periphery that makes him realize he'd had tunnel vision before now.
"Don't move and it won't hurt so much, eh?" Jack's voice is quiet, and he crouches down beside the bed to get a better look at him. "I need to get a better look at you, now that it's quiet. Can you stay with me, Mikey?"
Robby doesn't nod, but it's mostly because Jack is already shifting closer to him with what Robby knows is a pen light. He already wants to slam his eyes shut, and Jack's ready for him already.
"Easy, boss. I've wrangled bigger and badder than you, and you're currently not at fighting weight." His thumb finds the edge of Robby's eyelid to tug it open, and he winces in sympathy. "Here we go."
The neurological check is fast and efficient, and Robby knows the steps just as well as Jack does. It means he also knows the results.
"You took one hell of a whack, didn't you?" Jack murmurs, even as he shifts to sit next to Robby's hip on the bed beside him. "Trinity has gone to nationals with her fast pitch team, you're lucky."
"I am?" Robby murmurs belatedly, fighting the urge to close his eyes and drift off. He's comfortable, and the nervous tone to Jack's voice has been replaced with calm, bemused warmth. He feels like he's taking a bath.
"You're not concussed, I don't think." Jack leans forward, and it's only when the mattress dips on the far side that Robby's eyes slide open again and he realizes the other man is half braced over Robby's supine form.
"Don't think?" Robby focuses on Jack's face, on the tan that darkens his cheekbones and makes his freckles stand out over the bridge of his nose, on the flecks of hazel in the blue of his eyes, and when he realizes he's been staring, Robby laughs softly. "I thought you were a doctor."
Jack doesn't laugh. "I told you, I'm off the clock." He doesn't look away from Robby's face. "I'm going to keep checking you for a little while. You'll have a hell of a shiner, and I'd feel better if I had a CT of your head, but. I think you're alright." He wets his lips, and Robby realizes the look on his face is nerves. He'd scared him. "Like I said, lucky."
Robby watches him, and has to work to keep from looking away. Jack had always been intense, from the first time Robby met him in med school, to every wayward meeting in between then and now. He's taken it for granted, that it was just Jack. Intrinsic.
As the other man takes in Robby's face, Robby wonders if it's not that Jack is so intense by nature, but if instead, he's intense about Robby.
"I think," Robby mutters, and his voice comes out froggy. "I think I am lucky."
Jack nods, and when he presses a kiss to Robby's forehead, it feels like confirmation.
Jack is as good as his word, and for the next few hours, Robby gets prodded awake, checked for symptoms, and plied with water and aspirin. Jack almost helps him walk to the bathroom, when Robby finally puts his foot down.
News of his survival, and Trinity's supposed attempt on his life, spread like wildfire through the campgrounds, and when he walks into the mess hall for breakfast the following morning, headache pressing at his temples and only a little unsteady on his feet, the campers break into actual applause.
It makes his head throb. It's still worth it.
The sound of the door scraping open and then slamming shut wakes Robby up from his sleep on the last night, heart pounding and head throbbing.
"Shit—" Jack curses, a little too loud, and Robby struggles to sit up in his bunk as the other man stumbles across the cabin and finally slaps on one of the little nightlights he'd dotted throughout the space.
"Jack—" Robby groans, voice rough with sleep. "The hell is your problem?"
The night patrols had continued, even after The Softball Incident. Robby had gotten a few days clemency, but had been thrown right back in it by the end. The last shift had been Jack's, and Robby glances towards the thin light of dawn coloring the sky above the lake, just barely visible through the windows, before looking back towards Jack.
"The older kids are hard," Jack says, a little wistful, and settles down in the chair at the dining table closest to their bunk. "I told you."
"I'm sure," Robby says, just a little grouchy. "How is this related to you waking me up at—" Robby checks the faintly glowing dial of his watch, "Four in the morning?"
"They said it was water," Jack continues, like Robby hadn't said anything, and it takes a moment for Robby to realize the stumbling wasn't just exhaustion. Jack was—
"They said what was water, Jack?"
"What was in the water bottle." When Jack focuses on Robby, despite everything, his gaze is the exact same as usual. Intense, and focused. Until he hiccups, and the effect is shattered.
"Did you drink what was in the water bottle, Jack?"
"Everclear," he says, a little raggedly.
Robby's eyes slip shut, and his head throbs unhelpfully.
"Why did you drink it?"
"I thought I was proving a point," Jack mutters, and it sounds so desolate that Robby can't help but laugh. It just makes Jack frown. "By the time I realized just how much was in the bottle with the actual water, I'd finished the majority of it. Don't laugh."
He goes to stand up, and Robby's laughter stutters to a halt. He's already the walking wounded, and the last thing he needs is for Jack to take a tumble, and someone to find him like this.
"Fucking hell, Jack," Robby mutters, and when the other man eyes the bunk above Robby, he makes an aborted noise of panic.
"We've got to be up in three hours, man. Get over here." Robby has to shimmy to make room, but the other man doesn't protest, or even act confused.
The bed rattles when Jack drops down into it, shoes still on and prosthetic digging uncomfortably into Robby's shin. They both wiggle a little, and finally they slot into a more comfortable pile in the tiny, twin sized bed.
"Mike," Jack says softly, his face half pressed into the pillow. Robby twists to look at him, and when he does, he finds Jack looking at him from half opened eyes that seem a lot more coherent than they did a moment ago.
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad you're here," Jack murmurs, and Robby feels warmed down to the core.
Robby's still not entirely sure he doesn't have a concussion, at least a mild one. Jack is uncomfortable, if not outright drunk, and there's a buzzing in the dark of the cabin of at least one mosquito that's been trying to find a gap in the netting for the last few hours. It's not a good time.
This time, when Robby kisses Jack, he knows he's the one who initiated it.
This time, he's sober, and can feel the way Jack stills, how his breathing hitches, and the exact moment he processes exactly what's happening.
The bed squeaks as Jack pushes up onto his elbow, and his free hand reaches to cup Robby's jaw. He does taste like everclear, astringent and burning, mixed with something sweet— whatever mixer the kids had added to the bottle.
"You taste disgusting," Robby murmurs against his lips, but the complaint is dulled by his immediate press closer, his hand finding Jack's shirt and pulling him flush.
Jack doesn't bother replying, and when his hands find Robby's skin, the taste of him is the last of Robby's worries.
They don't get much sleep before the sun actually rises enough to wake them.
Jack's cock is thick, curves a little to the right, and fits well in Robby's hand. He kisses like he's got something to prove. He'll be miserable with a hangover the entire time the kids' parents are picking them up.
Robby doesn't know what new insights Jack gained from their night together. But from the pleased little smile that goes incongruously with the squinting look of discomfort on the other man's face, he thinks they're positive.
They don't get a chance to see each other until later, after the campers have left, and the cabins have been cleared, and the counselors have their last night dinner together in the empty feeling mess hall. It's a little surreal to hike out to their cars in the parking lot, on paved roads instead of dirt trails, and when Robby drops his bag into the trunk of his car, he's relieved to find Jack waiting for him across the parking lot, sitting on the bumper of his truck.
The vehicle settles a little when Robby joins him, and they sit shoulder to shoulder for a long moment, surveying the cracked blacktop in front of them.
"What do you think you'll do now?" Jack asks, voice quiet and a little reserved. It's a simple question, but the answer feels loaded.
"I don't know," Robby says softly. "I still have my townhouse in Pittsburgh. Hadn't bothered to sell it, when I moved." He swallows down the nerves that threaten to choke the words in his throat. "I could probably get my position back with PTMC."
He's not sure about how he'll feel, stepping back into the same place he'd first met Grace. But at the same time, he can't stomach the thought of returning to Vermont.
"Probably," Jack says, and he shifts enough to make the truck groan under his movement. It's a long moment before he speaks again.
"Y'know— I. I moved, when I first met Jennifer." Jack's voice is a little pensive, but he doesn't stutter when he says her name. Robby's eyes drop down to the ring on his finger, and Jack notices, but doesn't stop talking. "And it was the right choice at the time, but it didn't exactly end well."
Robby wants to protest, but before he can open his mouth, Jack keeps going.
"And I had— a friend, who fell hard for this girl, and picked up and moved with her, because he thought it was what he should do." Jack's eyes land on Robby, and it feels like a physical weight. Robby doesn't try to respond.
"So— I don't know that it's smart, y'know. To quit your job and pick up and chase after someone, just because you think there's a chance of something." Jack doesn't blink. "I think it might be pretty stupid, actually."
Robby can't pull in a full breath. He has to focus, try to unclench his chest, and finally, he sucks in a deep lungful of air as he drops his gaze to the ground in front of them.
"Maybe," Robby murmurs. "Maybe a little romantic, too."
Jack doesn't smile, but when Robby risks a glance over at him, his lips are pursed like he's trying hard to keep from saying something stupid. Robby understands the feeling well.
"Yeah?" Jack finally meets his gaze again, and when he does, he smiles. His smile lines and freckles weren't visible in the dark of the cabin this morning. Robby can't help but stare, now. "Well. Maybe third time's the charm."
When Robby kisses him, he keeps his eyes open, and tries to counts the freckles on the curve of Jack's cheekbone. He loses count soon enough and gives up, his eyes slipping shut with a soft sigh. It's alright. He's got plenty of time to do it over and over again.