Chapter Text
Growing up in landlocked Nebraska, Whitaker had never seen the ocean. Instead, he saw lakes and rivers of every variety. He grew up in, on and around them. He learned to skip flat stones on the still water, competing with his brothers for the most hops. He learned how to fish in the calm pools, how to outwit something, acting on survival instincts alone, enough to bring it to the bank and get a knife between its eyes.
He learnt how to swim by fighting off his brother's attempts at drowning him. Clawing at hands and arms stronger than his own, thrashing and fighting to get to the surface. Keeping your head above the water comes easier once the only thing you're struggling against is your own lack of buoyancy.
But his favourite memories came from the lake at the front of his family's property. Off of the gravel driveway, past dry, grass sparse flat grounds, near the treeline that fenced his family's property from the road.
It was barely a lake. It was more so a pond, maybe. But it was deep enough to catch him without him hitting the bottom when he jumped in from tree branches. The water was always cold and dark, the canopy of leaves above it prevented the sun from warming anything beyond the surface. In the dead of summer, he would come out with his teeth chattering.
His brothers didn't like this lake. This lake was too small, too deep, too far away from the house, too quiet. Whitaker saw it as an oasis. A breath of fresh air. A momentary escape from his brother's torments and his father's anger.
On summer mornings, he would grab his towel and some swim shorts and leave the house before his father was awake. His mother would leave a paper bag with a sandwich and a water bottle sitting on the kitchen counter for him. Her wordless support of his escape. He would make the trek through the paddocks, climb the wood and wire fences. Then he would find his undisturbed patch of peace.
Leaves abandoned their trees to lay on the surface with him, getting bleached by the sun while he turned red. He would float on the water, eyes closed, head tilted back, basking in the morning sun like a lizard warming its cold blood. Mosquito larvae jet around under the protection of the fallen leaves, dragon flies and lightning bugs used the floating leaf litter as nurseries for their pupae.
And for a moment, he was at peace. He felt as if he was half sunken into the earth, connected to it by roots and veins. He could feel each breeze, hear the leaves shivering in response and the water rippling as it skims over the surface. He could hear his blood pumping, pulsing through arteries like the steady jetting of the small silver fish in the water.
The world felt bigger than the farm. It felt more purposely crafted by someone more knowing than him. He felt like a small brush stroke in an infinite masterpiece, floating, connecting.
Santos bangs on the bathroom door. Whitaker blinks. The lake is no longer, instead he can feel his limbs touching the sides of the tub, the water level having dropped from the unreliable plug.
“C’mon Dennis! I get enough UTIs from work, I do not need them at home!” She calls out through the door, hitting it again to punctuate her sentence.
He sighs and sits up. He pulls the plug and lets the now cold water gurgle down the drain. He sits for a moment, cold and wet. The seal around the walls of the tub is growing black mold. He keeps telling himself he should bleach it. He never does.
He pulls himself up, steps onto the floor mat waiting for him and wraps a towel around his waist. All the towels smell faintly of mildew. The laundromat in the basement of the building leaves everything smelling musty. Still, it's better than washing them in the sink of the hospital room he had been staying in. The air was so still and damp that nothing dried properly.
He gives his hair a half-hearted rub with a towel, then shuffles out of the bathroom. Santos all but pushes him out of the way, locking the door behind her. He shuffles back to his room and begins to dress. He doesn’t need to get ready for work for another hour, but he doesn’t want to change twice so he puts on his scrubs. By the time he’s dressed, Santos emerges, still in her sweaty leggings and sports bra from her morning gym sessions.
“You trying to drown yourself in there?” She huffs at him from the doorway of his bedroom.
“Unsuccessfully,” he replies. He hadn’t slept well, and he wears it under his red-rimmed eyes in purple shadows.
“I keep telling you to let me hold your head under.” she says.
He hums, half considering it.
“And clean that mold! I don't need another thing living here rent-free.” she calls out as she heads to the kitchen.
“I pay rent.” he grumbles to himself. He tucks his scrub top into his pants and knots the drawstring. Any plans of cleaning fizzled up with her demand. He follows her into the kitchen and watches her start making breakfast - eggs, vegetarian sausage, onions, bell pepper and enough seasonings to mask the strange taste of the faux meat.
She stirs it all together, only half paying attention. She's more focused on her phone. Though, she could cook with her eyes closed and a hand behind her back, and it would still turn out better than anything he could make.
“If you want some, just say, you don't have to hang around like a dog expecting me to read your mind.” Santos says. She made enough for him too. She’s been doing that lately. Even if she gets in twice as many jabs than she does at work, she’s still a good roommate in her own weird way.
“Thanks.” he says as she hands him a plate
“Do not put ketchup on it again.” she says, still holding the plate.
“…okay?” He agrees and she lets go of the plate. “But maybe I wouldn't have put sauce on it if your vegan meat wasn't so dry.” he says as he sits down on the couch. Santos scoffs and sits beside him.
“Okay Gordon Ramsay. Maybe I will feed it to a dog. At least the dog would be grateful.” she retorts.
He rolls his eyes and starts filling his mouth with forkful after forkful, Santos grins to herself, privately smug that he likes her cooking.
With some breakfast on board, he reviews flash cards on his phone. He had planned to work on his case study paper last night, but instead he procrastinated so long the sun rose without him so much as glancing at the document. The tab sat open, untouched, in the background. He pulled yet another useless all-nighter, and he will have to pull another soon to finish that paper.
Santos finally emerges from her room. She ties her hair into a ponytail and grabs her bag. “Come on, huckleberry. We have lives to save and paperwork to fuck up.”
Whitaker sighs. He turns off his phone and follows her out of the door. “Well, at least it's the paperwork and not the patients.”
Santos huffs. “I don't know. I know the morgue hates it when you're on shift.”
He groans as he walks beside her. “And I know the patient satisfaction scores get 20% lower when you’re on shift.”
She laughs. “At least my patients are alive,”
“Dead patients can't give negative patient satisfaction scores.” he continues to riff.
She hums, nodding. “So you're saying if I piss them off, I should mix up their meds? Great advice. I will pass that on to Robby.”
Whitaker’s eyes widen. “No, Trinity, c’mon.”
She snorts. “Nope. I will tell him as soon as I get there that you’re advocating for me to commit malpractice.”
He sighs and gets into the elevator with her. He leans his head against the wall. He knows she’s joking to a degree, but sometimes she lets people in on the bit without explaining it's a joke. He's gotten a few telling offs from nurses because things got lost in translation.
After a ride in Santos’ beat up old Subaru, and a sing-a-long that did not help his brewing headache, they arrive at Pittsburgh Hospital. Santos starts swearing at other drivers as she tries to find a park. The only time she seems to speak Tagalog around him is when she's on the phone to relatives or wishing death on someone for not giving way.
The entire walk from the distant car park to the entrance to the ER, she's grumbling to herself.
As soon as they get through the back entrance, he can tell he's in for a hellish shift. Tensions are high. Every other patient has a security guard preventing them from attacking staff, themselves, or from escaping.
“Full moon,” Mateo comments, his eyes still glued to a TV screen displaying updates of an off shore hurricane.
“That’s just a superstition. Like someone saying quiet-“ Whitaker begins.
A chorus of ‘shh’, groans and ‘don’t say the q-word’ start up within earshot of him. He just heads to his locker to dump his bag into it. He needs to clean his locker. There’s rubbish from weeks ago in there, a lunch container from eight days ago in there too. He just sheds his jacket and shoves it in, then closes the locker door.
He runs his fingers through his hair. His mental checklist of to-dos is getting longer and longer. Groceries, going to the gym with Santos (he can’t put it off a fourth day in a row), laundry, meal prep, vacuum, it’s his turn to clean the kitchen too, don’t forget the mold around the bathtub, and now his locker.
He sighs to himself and heads to the break room to join the rest of the team for handover. There are no chairs left, there never are, so he leans against the wall beside Santos.
Abbott rattles off the different patients, assigning them to different doctors and nurses. He doesn’t pay attention until he hears his name, and even then he’s only half listening. He knows it’s bad. He knows he should focus. But he doesn't. He can’t.
Handover ends with Abbott putting his hands on his legs, then stretching out his back. Everyone takes it as their cue to head home or get to work. Unfortunately, Whitaker is in part of the latter.
As he’s looking for a computer to check his patient notes on, he feels a hand grip his shoulder. “You alright?”
He looks up. Robby is beside him, standing a head above him, ducking his head a little to meet his gaze. He looks rested. He smells clean, his cologne is at its freshest and strongest in the mornings. He loves that smell. It’s probably expensive.
Whitaker blinks, willing himself to focus. “Ah… Yes. Yeah, I’m just tired.”
Robby frowns. “Exhaustion is the quickest way to burn yourself out,” he points out, giving his shoulder a squeeze. “Grab a drink from the vending machine. Take a moment.” he tells him.
Ever since Pittfest, Robby has been checking in more on his residents - on everyone really, but in particular the people he considers vulnerable. Judging by how often Robby checks on him, Whitaker can guess his attending doesn’t see his mental health as particularly stable.
“I’m fine. Just need to shake it off.” Whitaker insists, trying to step away from the older man’s grip to get to a computer, to focus on the notes, on the patients, to not feel that warm, comforting weight on his shoulder.
Robby grips him tighter, pulling him back to his side. He shifts, standing in front of him, a hand on the younger man’s biceps. “How many hours did you sleep last night?”
Whitaker grimaces and looks away. He’s not weak. He doesn’t need his boss asking if he’s eating and sleeping like he’s an unstable teen.
Robby frowns when the younger man doesn’t answer. He shifts his hand back to one shoulder and guides him into an empty exam room.
Having to be pulled aside and spoken to by his boss: this is a new low.
Robby closes the door gently and folds his arms. Whitaker stands where Robby had placed him, eyes glued to the floor, jaw clenched in annoyance; both at himself for not hiding it well enough and at Robby humiliating him like this. It’s a small department, everyone is going to have noticed.
“If you’re not well rested, you’re going to make mistakes,” Robby says. “And when you work in emergency medicine, there is no room for the scale and frequency of errors that sleep deprivation causes.” he begins his lecture.
Whitaker keeps his eyes on the floor. “I had a paper I needed to work on.”
Robby shakes his head. “Whitaker. You’re a medical student. You need to have better time management. If you can’t manage your work and school load, how will you cope when you’re a doctor?”
He feels like a child being scolded by his parents. Maybe that’s how Robby sees him. It has to be. Why else would he scold and lecture and check on him like this?
“Whitaker, look at me.” he says, shifting a finger under the younger man’s chin and pushing it up so their eyes meet. He can feel the heat rising in his cheeks out of shame. “You need to go home and sleep.”
Whitaker’s eyes widen. His heart drops into his stomach. “No- No, I’m fine!” he insists.
“You’re dead on your feet.” Robby points out, shifting to holding his jaw so the little tics in the younger man’s expression can’t escape him.
“I don’t need to be sent home. I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m just a little tired. We’re all a little tired!”
Robby shakes his head. “This isn’t a punishment.” he says, his voice softening into something calmer. Something soothing.
Whitaker grimaces and tries to look away, but the hand on his jaw pulls his gaze back. “Go home. Sleep. Clear your head. Check in with your folks. Whatever you need to do.” Robby tells him.
Whitaker shakes his head again. “I don’t need-”
“This isn’t a discussion. This is your attending, telling you’re not fit to be working today.” the older man says more firmly this time.
Whitaker’s eyes shift up and meet the dark brown one’s looking down at him. His shoulders lower in defeat. The guilt twists and knots in his stomach. He lets out a breath. He nods.
“There’s a good man.” Robby says, finally letting go of him. He tilts his head to the door. “I’ll tell them you’re having COVID symptoms. Go rest up.”
Whitaker slips past him, out of the exam room, back onto the floor. A few of the nurses are watching. Santos is watching. The heat travels to his ears, down his neck. He’s sure he’s bright red now. He goes to his locker and grabs his bag and jacket. He slams the door before the trash inside can tumble out.
He feels his phone buzz in his pocket. He ignores it and b-lines for the door. He’s wide awake now. The shame sits heavy and hollow in his chest, the guilt claws at his throat, making it swell closed.
He gets a taxi and sits in the back, holding his head in his hands. How humiliating. How pathetic that he needed to be sent home like a child with a fever.
Maybe it was a test of his resilience. He sits up a little, a pang of anxiety causes his heart to start pounding in his ears. Maybe he was supposed to fight to stay. Maybe he was supposed to prove how badly he wants to be there.
Wasn’t that obvious? Does he not give enough to his patients, to that ER, to him?
He swallows and sinks into the back seat. Robby thinks he’s weak. He must. Ever since Pittfest, he’s been treating him like a porcelain doll, meant to be kept on a shelf away from the hard cases.
Santos gets the hard cases, but she’s an intern. She’s served her time and proven herself - even if she’s as new to the Pitt as the rest of them. But Mohan? Mel? Javadi? They’re second and third years! Yes, he’s been struggling since Pittfest, but they all have, so why is he being sent home when everyone else is getting to prove themselves?
He sighs and rubs the back of his neck. He proved himself plenty during Pittfest and every day since.
Maybe it’s the fact that he’s got it cushy now. Santos’ apartment, it’s not exactly a five-star hotel, but it’s way better than that hospital wing. The air was so still and thick, he could feel the dust collecting in his lungs each time he took a breath. He still can’t get the smell out of the clothes he washed in the sink and tried to dry in that damp, unventilated room.
Maybe the comfort has made him forget how hard he’s worked to get here.
Maybe Robby has noticed him staring.
He pulls uncomfortably at his jacket at the thought.
Maybe he’s noticed how he tries to piece him together by the glimpses of personality he shows at work. From whatever outerwear he’s wearing that day, to his shoes, to what he’s having for lunch, Whitaker will spend spare moments trying to figure him out from the crumbs of him he gets to see.
He knows he’s practical. He knows he does some kind of walking or running in nature by the way his shoes will occasionally track dried mud after weekends. He knows he meal preps, usually on his days off. He sees it sitting in the fridge in the break room, in a container with a label made of a blank patient property sticker. He knows how he smells. How his hands feel.
He imagines more.
He wonders if he knows.
Maybe that’s why he got sent home; Robby’s planning some kind of meeting with HR to discipline him.
Once at Santos’ apartment, he lets himself in. He drags himself to the couch and lays face down, backpack still on, weighing him down into the seat further. He groans. His back hurts too much for this. He slips the bag off and lets it fall onto the floor, laptop be damned - he doesn’t have the energy to care right now. He lets out a heavy breath that empties the air from his lungs.
He feels like he wants to cry. His eyes have that sting to them that only tears bring. He refuses to give substance to the idea that he’s pathetic.
His phone buzzes yet again. He ignores it in favour of letting his boneless, heavy body sink into the couch. His blinks slow.
He should do some cleaning now that he has some time. He should text back whoever keeps messaging him. He should finish that paper.
His cheek is pressed against the couch, keeping one eye closed. The other follows. In the darkness, he can feel the water again. The calm, weightless cradle of the lake. He can hear the white noise made up of cricket and cicadas and frogs. He can feel the sunlight blanket him.
He’s too exhausted to put up a fight.