Author's Note: This is a one shot based on a cut scene from season 12's "Split Decisions." In that scene Dubenko and Sam have a conversation where he reveals just how short his marriage was.
He sat at the kitchen table staring at it. The gold band resting atop a stack of thin linen sheets of notarized paper. Her wedding ring, the set of divorce papers looking more ominous in the early morning light than they had the night before. The surgeon had yet to touch them. Didn't want to acknowledge the fact that it was over. He had never failed at anything before this, and well frankly…the failure hurt almost as much as the end of their relationship. Almost.
She couldn't take it any more. After eighteen months of marriage, she wanted to call it quits. Told him she needed more from him than the large pay checks, the beautiful home. She needed him. His physical presence. Needed a husband. He told her that he couldn't do that. Couldn't make those commitments she needed. No, he was at the mercy of his pager. There would always be calls in the middle of the night, during dinner parties, interruptions in their lovemaking. And he would always go.
She put the papers on the table and sat her ring on top of them. Asked him why it was that every other person in the city was more important to him than her. Why did he care more about saving the lives of strangers than saving their marriage? When he refused to answer, she left. She left. And he didn't try to follow. Didn't try to stop her. He let her go.
Hours later, he was still sitting at the table, looking at those papers, that ring. He didn't want to admit that it wasn't the patients that came first, but his ego. He was a surgeon. At the hospital he had power and control. Influence and authority. He made things happen. He saved lives, prolonged them or otherwise improved the quality of life for people. And that, those skills he possessed, earned him respect and admiration. Fed the ego. And he wouldn't give that up, not even for his wife.