Superstition
Marlene is practically throwing a fit because her scrub cap has gone missing. She wears the same three ones every single surgery and suddenly, all three have disappeared from the laundry.
Dorcas is watching her, confused. She didn’t think Marlene was uptight about this sort of thing. Sure, almost everybody wears scrub caps that they love, but she didn’t think it was that serious. She didn't think Marlene was going to flip out if she couldn't find them.
At first she thinks it's almost childish.
And she sort of gets it, when their patient flakes out mid-surgery.
In the locker room, everyone is talking about it.
“Four surgeries today,” Barty notes, “four deaths. Day’s barely started.”
Evan takes a bite out of his apple, “The morgue guy said that surgical fatalities come in threes and sevens. Thinks there are going to be three more before midnight.”
Mulciber snorts, “Well, if a creepy morgue guy said so, he must be right.”
Evan rolls his eyes at him, “He’s the morgue guy, Mulciber, he knows things about death.”
“So does Mulciber,” Barty points out, “you kill more patients than anyone, don’t ya?”
Mary pushes through the door, “C’mon.”
“Where?” Dorcas asks, grabbing her coat.
“E.R.,” Macdonald answers, turning to leave while the interns follow, “let’s go.”
While they are walking, Lily Evans stops them to talk to Mary, “Here.”
Mary looks at her hand, the cup she’s offering, “What is this?”
“It’s hot chocolate.” She smiles, nodding to the cup. “Drink it. It’s a thing. Brings good luck.”
Mary looks skeptical, taking a sip, “That’s not a thing.”
“It was in New York.”
“Well, this is Seattle, sweetheart.” Mary teases, face straight. Lily can see through it, a talent most people do not have. There are only a few people in Mary’s life who understand her humor, that oftentimes her deadpanned face is a way of joking around, using sarcasm instead of just laughing all of the time.
Lily shrugs, “You’re drinking it. So, whatever.”
Mary continues heading to the E.R.
〚*〛
Marlene is on the phone with dry cleaning, asking them to hold when Albus walks to her, “Sorry to hear about your valve replacement this morning,” he says, looking at the board.
Marlene huffs, “The laundry displaced my scrub caps.”
On the other end of the phone, someone asks, Why don’t you clean it yourself then?
She’s atomic, the way she blows up, “Because I am a surgeon! I need my scrub caps.”
The nurse goes to erase another name from the board, Albus watching her. “What are you doing?”
“Another elective surgery has been canceled.” She says, taking the dry-erase marker.
The Chief rolls his eyes, “This whole three and seven thing is absurd.” He says, looking at Marlene, “You better not be pushing surgeries because you don’t have your personal scrub caps, Mckinnon.”
Mckinnon snaps her head over, “I didn’t push any surgeries.”
She definitely thought about it.
But didn’t.
Marlene walks away, tired from having to carry on two separate conversations. Albus turns to the nurse before going to retreat back in his office, “I don’t want anyone changing the board without talking to me first, got it?”
She nods, timidly.
〚*〛
Regulus is sitting on a patient table, swinging his legs.
There is absolutely no one in the pit right now. Sirius comes up to him, offering him a cup too.
Regulus picks his eyes up, staring at his brother. He’s too cheerful for this. He must not have spoken to James yet.
Sirius nudges the cup forwards until Regulus takes it from him, “Is this hot chocolate?”
“Yes, it’s good juju.”
“From New York?” He mocks him.
Sirius squints, “Who told you?”
“Evans gave one to Macdonald this morning.” Regulus stifles a yawn, “What the fuck is going on with you right now? You look all cheerful and hideous.”
Sirius smiles, “Can’t I be in a good mood?”
“No.”
“Why are you all pissed then?” He pokes his little brother, waiting for an answer.
Regulus is not going to tell him. He couldn’t even if he wanted to. He’s still haunted by the fact that he even told James, coming to terms with it. . . it’s just not going to happen. Not for a very long time.
Regulus shrugs, “I’m always like this.”
“No, today you’re grouchy and depressing. Usually you’re just grouchy.” Sirius tilts his head, scanning him up and down as if that will somehow diagnose his internal conflict.
It does not, unfortunately.
Regulus takes one sip of his juju and throws it in the trashcan by the nurses station, watching his brother get paged upstairs.
Mulciber is complaining, “This sucks,” he mumbles, Macdonald overhearing him, “there’s no blood, no guts, there’s not a single patient here right now. It’s dead quiet.”
Macdonald glares over at him, “Did you really just say that?”
“Mulciber!” Evan groans.
“Fucking idiot.” Barty mumbles to Regulus, trying to get him out of his weird mood. Usually, he’d at least give a half-smile, maybe an eyebrow raise, something.
He’s been stone-faced all morning, like nothing is there at all.
“What?” He looks over, confused.
Dorcas sighs, “You said the Q-word, that’s like saying Macbeth in the theater.”
“Oh, please,” he says, waving his arm, “you really think that because someone says it is quiet, that it’ll mean-”
“Someone help us!” Two people walk through the doors, one of them coughing up blood into a tissue.
Macdonald points, “Crouch, take that.”
Evan is paged, he looks at his resident for a moment, “Duquette, I’ve got to go.”
While he exits, Vance looks over and says, “Two incoming.”
Mary goes to get a trauma gown on, paging Sirius Black while the rest of her remaining interns get prepared themselves. She looks Mulciber up and down, siren wailing in the distance, and says, “Want to say it again?”
He shakes his head, following her into the bay.
There’s two ambulances, Macdonald and Meadowes take the first while Regulus goes to the second one, Sirius joining behind him.
“Jesse Fannon, thirty-two, unrestrained driver in a rear end collision.” The paramedic says, unloading the man from the ambulance, “There was spider webbing at the front where his head hit. B.P. is one-twenty, pulse is seventy-five.”
Mary looks at Dorcas, “What do you want to do, Dr. Meadowes?”
“Primary and secondary survey,” she answers, “and, uh, a head C.T. and X-ray.”
“Great,” Macdonald nods, “page Potter when you get there.”
“Wait!” Jesse stops them, “I’m counting the siren beeps, I need to get to thirty-three.”
The paramedic locks eyes with the doctors, “He also has a touch of O.C.D..”
In the second ambulance, Regulus and Sirius are unloading their patient, “Nikki Ratlin, thirty, erratic B.P.. In the field, complaining of chest and leg pain.”
Sirius scans the patient, “What happened?”
She shrieks, “I got struck by lightning!”
Regulus looks up at the sky. It’s not even raining. When they are in the trauma bay, finishing her initial exam, she starts yapping to Sirius about how, “My horoscope couldn’t have been clearer today. It told me to stay home.”
The younger Dr. Black stares, “Ms. Ratlin, you have no sign of wounds from lightning.”
“No,” she shakes her head, “it was a sign.”
Sirius empathizes with her, “Normally people struck by lightning have a wound where the bolt entered and exited their body.”
She leans her head back against the pillow, “Alright, I wasn’t struck struck. The tree was struck and fell on me.”
Regulus clicks his pen close, “A tree fell on you?”
She waves a hand around, “Well, it was more of a big, like, branch. Same difference.”
Sirius huffs, “Just tell us the truth, Ms. Ratlin, no judgment here.”
“You wanna know the truth?” She prompts him, “My boyfriend loves that tree. He’s totally going to freak out.”
Sirius is about to say something else when Remus pops over, “You paged?”
Regulus doesn’t miss the way his brother tucks his hair behind his ears when he’s looking up at Dr. Lupin. “Yeah, uh, Ms. Ratlin needs that gash sewed up, I am having Regulus do some tests so if you have time-”
“I’ve got time for you.” He nods, looking straight at Black, “Let me get a kit.”
〚*〛
Evan is checking Deni’s breath sounds, “Sinus tachycardia, low-grade fever, pulse ox seventy-five.” He mumbles, saying it aloud while he writes it in the chart, “I’m also hearing rales in your lungs, Deni. How bad is the pain?”
She’s rasping every time she breathes in, “Five or six when I breathe.”
Evan hides the fear on his face, turning for a moment to compose himself, setting the chart on the counter behind him.
Deni speaks again, despite the discomfort directly due to it, “I heard that four people died in surgery this morning, they’re expecting three more.”
“Who told you that?” Evan turns, angry that someone is planting seeds of doubt in her mind. She needs this surgery, anything else and she won’t survive. It’s her only shot to hold over until a transplant.
“Nobody, just don’t wanna go to the O.R. if it means I’ll die.” She shudders.
Evan looks at her, carefully, “This could be a pulmonary embolism, Deni, a simple complication from the LVAD surgery. We need to talk to Mckinnon.”
〚*〛
Dorcas and her patient and Regulus and his are all crammed in an elevator together.
Dorcas looks at Regulus, “Mckinnnon’s being weird.”
Regulus hums, not caring.
“Something about her scrub caps and she doesn’t have her favorite ones,” she leans against the wall, “like it’s bad juju.”
“I like juju.” Regulus’ patient interrupts.
That’s when Dorcas’ patient repeats the word over and over again, trying to satisfy himself. They roll out of the elevator after another floor.
Sirius resets her leg in the new room, listening to her high pitched screaming. Regulus covers his ear for a moment, the raging headache not getting any better at this rate.
Sirius looks at her leg, speaking, “Before Dr. Black takes you to C.T., you have a lot of bruising up and down your leg, are you sure a tree branch did all of this?”
“What?” She gets defensive, “You think my boyfriend did?”
“Well,” he says, “the bruising doesn’t look like a tree branch hit you.”
“Fine,” She relents, “you guys are going to think I’m really weird, but I was sort of up in the tree when the lightning hit.”
“So,” Regulus interjects, “you climbed a tree and it was struck by lightning?”
“I really wanted to surprise him, you know, I had to see if his psycho dog was in the yard because of the barking and stuff. I know, it sounds really weird. And he wasn’t even there.”
“The dog?” Sirius asks.
“The boyfriend.” She answers.
Regulus and Sirius look at one another, thinking the same exact thing: there is absolutely no way she is telling the whole story. At this rate, they are going to spend more trying to figure out what happened than actually treating her.
〚*〛
Dorcas finds Dr. Potter, who is eating a snack as he walks.
“Dr. Potter,” she steps up, “I’ve got a thirty-four year old male with a blunt head trauma and severe O.C.D..”
“You get a consult?”
“Yeah.”
“Let me know when you get his C.T..” James tells her, stalking away.
“Thank you.” She says, setting the chart down. Dorcas is surprised James didn’t want to see more of it, he must have been busy.
Mckinnon walks up behind her, knocking into her hip when they stand beside one another, “Hey.”
“Hi.” Dorcas says, turning. “Sorry about your valve replacement.”
Marlene seems to be reminded of her bad mood now, “Thanks, the laundry lost my caps.”
Dorcas laughs, “The guy didn’t die because you weren't wearing one of your caps.”
“I know that,” Marlene signs something, hands back on her hips, “I just prefer. . . to operate wearing my own.”
“You know,” Dorcas mentions, “I have one of your caps in my locker, so if you want to kick Evan off Deni’s case, you could have it back.”
Marlene tilts her head up at her girlfriend, “Why do you have one of my caps in your locker?”
“That’s not the point.” Dorcas mentions. “The point is that I’ll keep it hostage till you kick blondie out.”
“I don’t do ultimatums.” Marlene tells her. "And I definitely don't do girlfriend favoritism." Her voice is hushed, not wanting anybody to overhear right now.
Dorcas feigns feeling sorry, “Think of it like a trade.” She walks to the elevator.
〚*〛
Sirius nudges his little brother, “Twenty bucks the girl is a stalker.”
“If she’s a stalker,” Regulus waves his hand, “let’s call the police and move on.”
“She’s got to be more of a gentle stalker, rather than kill you with a knife stalker.” Sirius says.
Remus walks into the room, “Who’s a killing stalker?”
“My patient,” Sirius answers, at the same time Regulus groans to say, “Nobody.”
He doesn’t miss the way his older brother stands up a little straighter when the plastic surgeon walks in.
“I hope she lives to gently stalk another day,” Sirius feigns, “go prep her, Reg.”
Regulus steps outside, eyeing the two of them from the window when they get alone.
Sirius folds his arms, watching as Remus sits down to look at his own scans, “Do you believe in that seven fatality thing, Remus?”
“I believe that this girl needs her spleen removed. And I believe you are a good surgeon who is capable of doing that.” He nods.
Sirius had forgotten what it felt like to be believed in, momentarily. He never forgets anything. Remus makes his head spin.
He’s like a puzzle. One that Sirius wants to solve. Badly.
〚*〛
Evan is standing beside Deni in her surgery, talking to her so she doesn’t start freaking out.
Dr. Mckinnon is staring at the screen, “Deni, there is a big clot. I don’t think I’m able to get it with a catheter, I’m sorry.”
“What?”
“We are going to have to open your chest again.” She decides.
Evan has to take a deep breath so his face doesn’t heat up.
〚*〛
Dr. Lovegood is evaluating Dorcas’ patient while Dorcas gets the scanner set up, trying to move her patient from the bed to the table while he holds a conversation with someone else.
〚*〛
Regulus is turning the corner, staring at the labs in his hands when he runs directly into James motherfucking Potter.
James, in reaction, begins apologizing. That is, until he sees who it is.
He gets about half of the word out before he trails off and stares at the boy, eyes more cold than Regulus could ever imagine.
For a moment, he just looks at him. His pupils burn through Regulus, who is so much of a masochist that he won’t turn away.
“James-” he finally breaks, the word a revival in his mouth.
James blinks and walks away like it’s nothing. Like he doesn’t even care. Regulus doesn’t know how to do that. He used to. It came easy to him, being the one who runs. He isn't used to having to be like this. The one who runs after someone.
He can make the bad decision but reap the consequence? Oh no, he isn’t interested in that.
〚*〛
“I am not having surgery today!” Their patient screams, holding onto the bed rail like they might start dragging her away any second now.
Sirius sighs, setting the chart on the table, “You have a ruptured spleen.”
“Which I’m sure is very important,” she levels, “but I am not having surgery today. You can operate after midnight but not one minute before.”
Regulus stands behind his brother and lets him deal with this one. His mind is a little too focused on the neurosurgeon who keeps ignoring him.
Sirius sighs, “Ms. Ratlin, if I thought it would be safe, I’d be happy to do that after midnight, however, your spleen is bleeding. And guess what? Spleen trumps horoscope.”
“But it was more than just my horoscope!” She snaps. They wait for her to continue, “I had a flat tire on my car this morning. Then, a wreck on the freeway. Two signs. I went to Kevin’s house anyway. This is my karma, I was struck by lightning.”
Regulus scoffs, no longer able to stay quiet when she won't admit that she is lying, “Ms. Ratlin, for the last time, you were not struck by lightning.”
“I’ll die, okay?” She confesses, “If you operate on me today, I will die. I know I will. Please, just, will you call my boyfriend? Tell him I’m having surgery at midnight.”
Sirius gives the chart to his brother, stepping out the room as she begins to cry.
“Call the boyfriend.” He orders him.
“Can’t I just call psych?” He offers.
Sirius laughs, vaguely, “Get her down to I.C.U., too. She is going to kill herself trying not to die.”
〚*〛
Dorcas is looking at Deni Duquette. She came in to find Evan, who is almost always hanging around here, but he’s not right now.
It’s not until Deni pulls her into a conversation that she understands the intrigue her best friend feels towards this woman.
She is kind. She is thoughtful. She can hold a conversation extremely well.
She is perfect for Evan.
But she is also dying.
“You know,” Dorcas states, bluntly, “Evan paints a pretty picture because he likes you. So this is going to be hard on him.”
“You mean,” Deni smiles, “when I die?” Dorcas wasn’t going to put it that way. Deni waits, “I’m asking you, Doctor, woman-to-woman.”
“With a clot in your pulmonary artery,” Dorcas raises her eyebrows, “well, it will cut the oxygen to your lungs and you will die of hypoxia. If that doesn’t kill you, the strain on your heart will.”
Deni has come to the idea that she is going to die sooner than she expected. When you are little, you have all these dreams. The perfect wedding. Going to college. Becoming an astronaut or a princess or a chef. You never think about getting sick.
And about all the things that getting sick could ruin.
Dorcas doesn’t stop, “It’s not a routine surgery, Ms. Duquette, because of the anticoagulants already in your system.”
All the doctor talk seems to really be getting to her.
“I’m just saying that Evan likes you. And he won’t leave you. He won’t pull away, if that’s what you are expecting.”
〚*〛
At lunch, they’re talking about all their patients, arguing over who has the best one. It feels normal. Like nobody is fighting or anything. Like none of them have terrible personal issues going on. Like none of them are struggling at all.
“This death cluster thing is ridiculous.” Evan takes a bite, “I mean, just because four people died today doesn’t necessarily mean there’s going to mean three more.”
Nobody answers him.
Evan stares back, “You guys think it’s real?”
Barty stares at him. Nobody can see but under the table, he knocks his knee into Evan’s, pretending not to notice that Evan doesn’t move his leg away. “Are you worried about Deni?”
“Of course,” he says, almost too quickly, “she is my patient.”
“Okay then.” Dorcas says, “You’re acting weird.”
Evan uses this time to ask, “Did Mckinnon say anything to you about Deni’s surgery?”
“No,” Dorcas makes a face, “it’s your case.”
“Right,” he nods, “I know. But like, as your girlfriend, did she?”
“Shut up, Rosier.” Dorcas groans.
〚*〛
Dr. Potter says, “It’s the only way I can get to the affected part of the brain.”
“By removing my skullcap?” The man asks.
James nods.
〚*〛
Evan finds Deni before she’s going to surgery. She’s clearly scared, the first thing she says to Evan is, “My will is inside my nightstand, just make sure it gets in the right hands, okay?”
Evan’s face drops, “Why are you talking about your will?”
“We have to be realistic, Dr. Rosier.”
“Dr. Rosier?” Evan mumbles, “Since when am I Dr. Rosier?”
The nurse begins to push her down towards the operating room, Evan panicking, “No, wait. Um, can you just give me a minute, please?”
Although they are not satisfied with that, they allow it.
“Deni, listen to me.” Evan grabs her hand, “You cannot go into surgery thinking that you are going to die.”
She stares up at the ceiling, not speaking again.
Evan watches them take her into surgery, leaning against a wall, he prays. He prays that Deni will not die.
His faith has been something complicated for a long time. He feels guilty, only praying in desperate times. But if he has learned anything, it’s that sometimes miracles happen and he needs Deni to live.
Evan sees Dr. Mckinnon, still on the phone with the laundry, complaining she doesn’t have a scrub cap. He eavesdrops to hear, “Yes, I know I had another not put into the laundry, my girlfriend stole it and won’t give it back. Now, where are the rest.”
Evan can’t stop himself from interrupting her, “Dorcas has one?”
“She’s holding it hostage,” Marlene says through her anger, returning her attention back to the phone.
Evan all but runs to find Dorcas, pulling her into the makeshift library they have.
He’s all words, “Do you have one of Mckinnon’s scrub caps?”
“So?”
“Give it to her.” Evan instructs.
“No.” Dorcas says, “She can have it when she puts me on the Duquette case.”
Evan yells now, “Give it to her, Dorcas.”
“What’s going on with you?”
“He needs it to operate.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
Dorcas tries to leave when Evan blocks the door, “That isn’t your decision to make.”
“Are you kidding me right now?” Dorcas folds her arms.
Evan is not playing, “Are you going to give it to me or am I going to have to physically take it from you?”
Dorcas scoffs, “Are you threatening me?”
“Deni isn’t going to die because of some petty game between you and Mckinnon. Give it to me now or I swear, Dorcas, I will never speak to you again.”
She gives up the scrub cap, finding Marlene at the walkway in front of the large windows. Evan is lurking back a bit, making sure Dorcas doesn’t try to pull any tricks to keep the cap.
Dorcas is staring at her, “You don’t need it.” She stares at the red, “I keep it in my locker because every morning, I look at it, and I’m reminded of what I am here for and what I want to be. A surgeon who is decisive and who executes and doesn’t need a piece of clothing to give her an edge in surgery. You don’t need it, Marlene.”
She stares out the window, standing up, “I know.”
Dorcas walks away, offering Evan a dirty look. That’s when Marlene ties the scrub cap to her head and gestures for Evan to walk with her, the two of them heading to the operating room.
〚*〛
Regulus is checking Ms. Ratlin’s blood pressure, “Nikki, is it possible you are misreading the signs? Two surgeons are telling you that you need surgery.”
Nikki looks at Dr. Black, “Did you call my boyfriend?”
“He said he hasn’t been your boyfriend in a while.” Regulus answers.
“Did you tell him I got struck by lightning?”
He might give up.
〚*〛
Dorcas is watching Evan as he is tying a plastic scrub cap to his hair, Marlene already inside.
Evan catches sight of her and is angry again, “What did you say to Deni? Why does she think she is going to die?”
“She could die, Evan.” Dorcas reminds him. “You realize that, right?”
Dorcas isn’t trying to be mean, she doesn’t want to be. But Deni, she’ll die eventually, even with the very best surgeons trying to keep her alive. She’ll die and she doesn't want to watch Evan go through something like that.
Evan scoffs, “Just so we are clear, Dorcas, don’t talk to me again.”
“You’re not going to be my friend because of some half-corpse?” Dorcas waves her hand.
They shouldn’t be doing this in the scrub room, surely.
“No!” Evan snaps, “I don’t want to be your friend because on your best day, that corpse is twice the woman you will ever be.”
Marlene is staring at the two of them, “Get out. You both need to leave, right now.”
“Dr. Mckinnon-”
She puts her foot down, “I don’t know what the hell you two are thinking but I don’t want it anywhere near my O.R., do you understand?”
Dorcas leaves like she doesn’t care.
Evan isn’t so easily swayed.
It’s not until Marlene threatens to pull him from the case altogether that he steps away, retreating to the locker room.
〚*〛
Barty is heading to the locker room, reading to go home after his patient passes on the table.
Evan is on his knees, hands folded over the bench they sit on, head down.
He’s mumbling something, over and over.
“Evan?” Barty asks, going to sit in front of him, on the other side of the bench.
He snatches his head up, looking at him.
“What’s wrong?”
Evan unfolds his hands, “Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Evan?”
“I’m fine. Dorcas and I are fighting, that’s all.”
Barty isn’t an idiot, despite popular belief. He can tell Evan isn’t telling him the truth right now. “So, what are you doing?”
He doesn’t answer.
Not until Barty leans closer, his elbow on the bench as he holds his head up with the palm of his hand, “Is it Deni?”
“She’s in surgery right now.”
Barty nods, “Want to go get drunk with me, then?”
Evan shakes his head, “I can’t move.”
“I mean, I can carry you if you want me to. You’re tall but mostly just lanky–”
“Barty,” Evan laughs, then realizes he is and immediately goes back to being straight-faced. “I can’t just leave.”
Barty shrugs, standing up and stepping over the bench to sink down beside Evan, carelessly throwing an arm around his shoulder.
Evan lets his head fall onto his friend’s shoulder, his eyes gently closing to try and hide how visible his tears are.
He has his knees tucked in, arms around them, Barty moving his hand through Evan’s blonde hair.
He wishes he didn’t get a buzz, although it is growing back fast—and healthier, without so much of the lingering green hair dye from college—because he misses his old hair. Barty has always loved when people play with his hair, a habit he grew into when he was little. His relationship with his father was never good, especially when Barty announced he was in fact, not straight, but rather something more. He hasn’t ever been able to pinpoint an exact definition for how he felt. Most people just call him a whore, the way he will sleep with anyone. But his mother was never one to judge. She always made sure to take care of Barty. In fact, after he came out to his parents—if that’s what you wanted to call it—his mother made up some excuse and went to meet her son who had been thrown out of their house the night before. She gave him money, lots of it, and a key to a vacation house for when he had nowhere else to go. She hugged him and told Barty that she didn’t care who he wanted to love, as long as he was still her son. Throughout college, she sent him care packages, money, cards, and birthday presents. She was still a good mother. That was the one thing Barty could count on. She used to call him, leaving voicemails if Barty was in class or at a party or something. They didn’t talk much, only on the rare occasion when his mom wasn’t in the presence of his dad, and Barty actually picked up the phone. And then one day, the letters stopped. The calls stopped. And the payments stopped, not that Barty was focused on that much. He knew, deep down, that something was wrong. That he had lost his mother, in one way or another. But he could never bring himself to find out what had happened. He’s too afraid to go looking for an answer that he doesn’t want to see. So, when he thinks about his mother, he doesn’t try to guess if something horrible had happened, he thinks about the times when he was still innocent and little, and his mother would run her fingers through his hair, humming to him before bed.
This moment with Evan, it’s the same sort of calm. He knows Evan isn’t available. For one, he’s learned his lesson to stop falling for friends. It never works out. Two, he has this weird situationship going on with his patient and Barty really, really doesn’t want to get involved with that. And three, Evan, for all Barty knows, is straight. And even if he wasn’t, Evan probably wouldn’t let himself feel anything for anyone other than a woman.
So he pushes the feelings out of his messed-up brain, trying to ignore them the best he can.
〚*〛
Regulus is running into the gallery, “Sirius, Nikki Ratlin is bleeding out, they are transferring her to an O.R. right now.”
Sirius and Regulus run down there now, stepping into the scrub room to realize that it was too late.
She coded before they could save her.
“Shit,” Sirius mumbles.
〚*〛
“We’re losing him,” Mulciber says to McKinnon, who isn’t stressed even now.
“I am working as fast as I can.”
The monitor beeps erratically.
〚*〛
Regulus sits in the locker room, looking at Evan and Barty.
They’re clearly plagued with the idea that Deni is dying, all sentimental and shit on the floor.
Now might be a good time to tell Evan. “She lived.”
Evan cocks his head up, unbelieving. “Are you serious?”
“Go see him.”
Evan stands up, climbing over Barty without another thought.
Regulus steps by him, opening up his locker, asking, “What was that about?”
“What?” Barty sits up, shoving his shirt off.
“You into Evan now?”
Barty laughs, stretching his back, “What, are you jealous?”
“No,” Regulus says, coldly. “I just thought you would have learned your lesson by now.”
“You don’t know me very well then.” Barry smirks, looking at him when Regulus’ eyes fall on somebody behind him.
Barry could guess who it is before even turning around.
Regulus wouldn’t chase for just anybody, after all.
James hesitates stepping onto the elevator, just before the close. Somehow Regulus weasels in behind him, pulling the stop button.
James scoffs, stepping back to put more space between them.
“James-”
He turns his head, not wanting to look at him. “It’s Dr. Potter.”
Regulus is desperate, anxiously stepping forwards, “James, it wasn’t like that.”
“How do you not care?” James asks, explosive, “I mean, you pretend like it doesn’t matter. That you want to fix things. I came to invite—and then you were just what? Laughing with the man you slept with and ruined our relationship?”
“If I recall, you were the one that called it.” Regulus says, trying to show his point.
“Because it was clearly too much for you.”
Regulus rolls his eyes, “You are not too much for me, James, tell me you know that.”
James hesitates, maybe for the first time in his life. Regulus has never seen him so taken off guard. It’s the heat of the moment and clearly James is affected by it.
He doesn’t stop, gaining momentum from this sudden silence.
“I am so fucked up sometimes and I know I don’t deserve you, not at all. But I want you, James, I need you. I do.” Regulus practically whines, “I hate my life when you aren’t in it. I have made mistake after mistake and I can admit it, and I am so so sorry that I hurt you in the process. So please just let me make it up to you, James, I just want things to go back to how they used to be.”
James steps closer and Regulus thinks he has done it. Then James reaches behind him and pushes the stop button back in, “You should have thought about that before you slept with Barty.”
Regulus yanks the button, again, “I’ll do anything you want, just give me another chance.”
He’s staring at him with those eyes. The ones that James can’t refuse.
“Come to dinner with me and Sirius to meet my parents.”
Regulus was more planning on something like sex but he guesses meeting his parents is doable.
Not as fun, surely, but doable.
He nods, “Of course.”
James looks him up and down, “Stop flirting with Barty.”
“I wasn’t-”
He leans in closer, their lips almost touching, “You heard me, Regulus.”
He is almost too stunned to speak. James is never like this. In all honesty, Regulus has a little bit of self-reflection going on. Does James feel like this, so worried every conversation because Regulus is just about as pessimistic as they come?
James pulls the lever, descending down to the ground floor. Just before they walk out, James stares, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Regulus watches him walk away, too stunned to speak.
〚*〛
There are tears running down his face when Deni finally wakes up.
She smiles, realizing she’s alive, “I guess I’m not one of the seven then, huh?”
Evan wipes his face, approaching her bed before saying, “It’s past midnight, we only had six.”
Deni moves her hand to touch Evan’s, gently caressing the skin, “Evan, why are you crying?”
“I’m not crying.”
“You are, too.” She says, sweetly.
“Damn it. I’m sorry.” He shakes his head, looking on the edge of insanity. “Damn it.”
“What?”
He covers his face with his hands, “I cannot fall for a patient, it’s against the rules.”
Deni blushes, her eyes still half-lidded from surgery, “Good luck with that, I’m a catch.”
He laughs, quietly, pulling the curtains shut and going straight to her bedside, kissing Deni like his life depended on it.