The first thing Jemma Simmons noticed as she walked into her usual coffee shop was the absence of a certain barista, and she couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. It's not like they were close or anything, but there was something to be said about being happily greeted by the same girl every day as a way to start a long day of work.
It had been around a year since she had started stopping by the same coffee shop regularly at 7:30 every single morning before heading to the hospital where she worked. From the very first time she decided to try out the place, she'd always seen her—whose nametag read "Skye"—there, made small talk as she waited for her drink to be ready, secretly hoping the shop would be crowded so it would take longer and they'd have more time to talk. Sometimes Skye would even write something nice on her cup instead of "Jemma"—like "have a good day" and a smiley face. And her smile… You know when someone has such a great smile that it manages to brighten up your day? That was Skye.
As Jemma waited in the small line to buy her coffee, missing that bit of anxiety she usually felt to see Skye, she considered what could have caused her to miss work, but quickly dismissed the thought. She was definitely overreacting; Skye was probably just late or took a sick day.
She did the same on the next day at the sight of Skye not being there again.
When the third morning went by without exchanging smiles and small talk with the friendly barista, Jemma started to wonder if something was really wrong. There was still the possibility of her overreacting, but missing work for 3 days in a row? There had to be a reason. But how was that any of Jemma's business anyway? She couldn't just summon the manager and ask where the hell the nicest barista they had was.
Ironically, this is pretty much what she did two days later. Figuring that there must have been a reason for the five-day absence, on Friday she ordered her drink and then discreetly called another barista aside.
"Is there something you want me to do?" The confused guy asked, he didn't seem to be in a great mood.
She hesitated for a moment, but decided it was worth it to keep going anyway. "Erm, is… Is Skye still working here?" Jemma unconsciously tried to make Skye's name sound like she had no personal reasons for asking that, which probably didn't work; she'd never been the best at lying.
His expression slightly changed, as if someone who simply wanted to know about his co-worker didn't deserve rude treatment. Or maybe the look he gave her was his way of making it less shocking for her to hear what he was about to say.
"She was in an accident last weekend."
Her reaction was unexpected. Her jaw dropped and she stared at him in pure disbelief as the air was forced out of her lungs.
"No, wait, she's fine," he said, trying to fix the effect that his poorly-thought out sentence had on her. "She was in an accident and is still in the hospital but she's okay now."
Jemma took a deep breath and ran a hand through her hair, trying to mask the blush creeping up her cheeks. Way to be subtle.
"Alright, thank you," she said to the guy, who seemed to find it curious that she was so worried. Great.
Thankfully for her, another barista called her name, holding her drink, and handed it to Jemma. As she checked the cup, though, the words in black ink weren't her name. A surprised Jemma realized the barista had given her the name of a hospital and what must have been a room number. The blonde woman, who had certainly heard the conversation happening next to her, smiled sympathetically at Jemma as the doctor smiled back and mouthed "thank you".
During the day, Jemma debated with herself whether she should go visit Skye or not. She supposed the blonde barista was a friend of Skye and wouldn't have given her the directions if she wasn't sure her co-worker wouldn't mind a visit. On the other hand, wouldn't it be a little bit weird for Jemma to just show up there?
In the end, Jemma eventually admitted to herself that, despite how little contact they'd had in the past year, she really wanted to see Skye. And not just as in visit her in the hospital. She wanted to get to know the girl better outside of the coffee shop, and maybe paying her a visit could be a nice start. Truth is, Jemma wanted to have a consistent reason other than "she sells me coffee" to justify to herself how much she actually missed Skye, because she was feeling ridiculous.
However, it took a little push from her best friend to convince her that she should do what she wants.
"Alright, what is going on with you today?" Fitz blurted out after five minutes of talking endlessly to Jemma while she was too busy with her own thoughts to pay any attention.
"What?" She replied in an unbelievably high-pitched voice.
"If only you were as good at hiding your feelings as you are at what you do for a living!" Fitz mocked her, his eyes waiting for her to spill out the truth already, and so she did, because she knew there was no way she'd get out of this by lying.
They were walking out of the hospital at the end of their shifts. As soon as she finished her quick, one-sentence long explanation, trying to sound nonchalant like she couldn't care less about the topic, he stopped mid-step.
"You mean Skye, the girl from the coffee shop that you still go to every day even though there's a better one not ten feet from here?"
Jemma sighed out loud dramatically. "Never mind", she said, maybe a little bit more irritated than she should have been.
"No, wait!" He held her arm as she started walking away from him. "I mean, I think you should just go, Jemma." He added softly. "And put an end to this attempt to disguise how much you want to; it's no use, really."
"That was extremely helpful, how can I thank you enough for such great advices?" She replied sarcastically.
He looked up and exhaled loudly, taking a deep breath before trying again: "Do you want me to go with you? I can drive you there."
"No, it's okay, Fitz," she said, more patiently this time. "Go home, you're tired. I'll take the subway." He'd just been in a 4-hour surgery, she couldn't accept a ride to the opposite part of the city.
His lips quirked upwards into a smug grin. "Yeah, right," he laughed, clearly finding too much entertainment in the situation. "Thank you for sparing me from being the third wheel. Two's company, three's a crowd, right?"
Jemma gave him her most theatrical eye roll ever.
Skye woke up to find an unexpected visitor standing in the corner of her room. She was facing the wall, tapping her phone's screen frantically, and it didn't take Skye longer than a second to recognize her. Unfortunately, it also didn't take her heart rate monitor longer than a second to start beeping hysterically, making Jemma Simmons turn around so quickly she almost dropped her phone. Skye buried her face in her hands and winced as she accidentally slapped the cut covered with butterfly stitches on her forehead. Skye cursed all of humanity and asked herself if she could possibly be any clumsier.
Slowly lowering her hands again, Skye could barely contain the sheepish smile, brought to her lips not only by her own unbelievable heart rate increase but also by the sight of Jemma embarrassingly shoving her phone into her bag and brushing a lock of hair behind her ear. Looking at her had the same effect on Skye as watching funny cat videos and babies laughing. She was pretty sure the way she was looking at Jemma was pathetic but she couldn't really bring herself to care. After a year, the truth is Skye was tired of trying to suppress the bubbly feeling that hit her whenever she was around Jemma.
"Jemma?" Skye didn't think she'd ever called the doctor by her first name before, but there's a first time for everything, right?
"Hello, Skye," she replied, which made Skye's smile widen because Jemma said it as if she'd never called Skye by her first name either, and then she wrinkled her nose. God, she's beyond cute.
As Skye pulled at the sheets covering her, Jemma walked closer, sneaking a glance at Skye's legs. She was wearing blue shorts, combined with the purple—and probably two sizes bigger than it should be—sweater. She was ridiculously beautiful, in case that wasn't made clear yet. After giving her an awkward once over, Jemma focused on the aftermath of Skye's accident: there wasn't anything too serious visible besides a thick bandage that covered her left leg between her ankle and knee and a few light bruises on her face, in addition to the small cut with butterfly stitches.
However, Skye seemed to be having a hard time sitting down as she cringed in pain, and Jemma presumed she also had an internal fracture in her abdomen—likely broken ribs.
"So, what brings you here?" Skye asked as Jemma settled in the armchair beside her bed.
Great, Skye has no idea how the hell Jemma knew her whereabouts. "Oh, your friend in the coffee shop, didn't she say anything to you? When I went there this morning, one of your co-workers told me about your accident, then another one gave me the- I mean, she didn't just hand it to me out of nowhere, I sort of asked about you and-"
"Jemma," Skye interrupted softly. Her rambling was as cute as everything else. "I meant why, not how, but-"
"Oh yes, of course," Jemma started over, but then realized she didn't have a proper answer. "What- I mean, I don't know, I just- I thought you'd like a visit… Why? Is this a bad time? I'm sorry, I know it's rather late to be visiting, but my shift ended-"
"Jemma," she did it again. Skye liked how the name sounded in her voice. "It's not a bad time at all."
The fact that Skye was still smiling was giving Jemma the awkward feeling that the girl could read every single one of her thoughts.
"W-why are you looking at me like that?" Jemma asked in a low voice and immediately regretted it. This was the kind of stuff you shouldn't mention out loud, she realized too late.
What, like you're made of rainbows? "Nothing. I'm just glad you're here."
And she really was. Jemma had mentioned a few months back that she lived in the neighborhood where the coffee shop was, and that the hospital where she works and the one where Skye is are pretty much in opposite parts of the city, meaning Jemma had been to the trouble of going all the way there just to see her. Skye couldn't put into words how happy that fact made her so she made it clear by smiling nonstop, which was doubtlessly creeping Jemma out.
"Had to see for myself what you got yourself into," Jemma said, a little more comfortable this time, and then pointed at her rib cage. "How many?"
Skye looked confused for a brief moment before answering, "Two." She then tapped her own left temple and added, "Plus a slight concussion." Jemma raised her eyebrows. "I'm fine now. Couldn't say the same earlier this week, though." She gave Jemma a shy grin.
"How did the accident happen?" Jemma asked, pursing her lips.
"I know everyone that's been in a car accident must say this, but it really wasn't my fault." Skye's smile slowly faded away as Jemma waited for her to explain further. "This drunk-ass imbecile blew a red light at 10mph over the speed limit and ended up destroying the side of my best friend's car, which the insurance is covering for but I'm not planning on driving it again anytime soon. My consolation prize for being stuck in bed for a week is knowing that the bastard was arrested."
"Wow. Were you still lucid when the ambulance and the police arrived?" Jemma realized that she was making Skye go through the accident again in her mind and mentally kicked herself. "I'm sorry I ask so many questions, forget it…"
"It's okay," Skye curved the sides of her lips into yet another smile as she caught a glimpse of Jemma absentmindedly fidgeting with her fingertips. "I blacked out immediately when my head hit the window. Next thing I knew, I woke up in this hospital eight hours later."
Jemma didn't know what to say so she went with her first thought. "Well, I'm glad you're better now."
Skye didn't say anything, but gave her a look that spoke volumes. Incapable of holding her gaze, Jemma dropped her head down, checking her watch just to look at anything besides Skye's eyes. That gave her the wrong impression, though.
"Uh, do you have anywhere to be?" Skye's question made Jemma look back up again and her lovely smile had disappeared even though she was trying to sound indifferent. "It's okay if you do, I-"
"Not really," it was Jemma's time to cut her in the middle of her sentence. "It's Saturday night, and I'm not working tomorrow."
Skye resisted the urge to let out a relieved breath; instead, she gave Jemma a genuine smile. "Tell me about your day, then."
Jemma furrowed her brow. "…beg your pardon?"
"C'mon, I want to hear about your day! Did you save any lives today?"
Suddenly, Jemma remembered something that had happened months ago at the coffee shop. She'd arrived there in the morning looking a bit sad, and Skye noticed, asking her if something was wrong. At first she'd said she was just tired, which wasn't exactly a lie, but then had given up and told Skye the whole truth, that one of her patients had passed away after struggling with a terminal disease for almost a year. Skye's response had been unforgettable: "I'm so sorry… It's so sad that some people are faced with the news that the end of their lives might come sooner than it's fair, and not everyone has the strength you have to watch that happen as you try your hardest to delay the worst. I'm sure he couldn't have had a better doctor taking care of him during his last months." Jemma was thankful for Skye for not saying anything when she had quickly walked away as tears welled in. What Skye never knew was that the patient had actually been a 6-year-old girl she had been treating alongside an oncologist.
Jemma started telling Skye about her day as requested. She mentioned calming down a little boy that had refused to have his appendix removed, and said that the surgery had been successful after all; she smiled as she told Skye about the premature baby that was getting much better every day; she also talked about twins that were fighting the entire time because one blamed the other for the tumble that had given her a broken ankle. Jemma cut herself off after speaking for what felt like a long while, although Skye didn't look bored at all.
"That's so cool. I like to think of doctors as a kind of superheroes, you know? They save lives, and so do you, or at least you make them better." You make mine a little bit better, Skye wanted to add, but instead she said: "I mean, I wish my accident hadn't happened, but it could at least have been closer to the hospital where you work."
Jemma's cheeks flushed as she let out a chuckle. "I wouldn't be the one treating you unless you were a lot younger."
Skye stared at her bemusedly, but then went through everything that Jemma had just told her and realized something. A little boy, a premature baby, twin girls… Her jaw dropped in disbelief. "How come you never told me you worked in pediatrics?!"
She laughed at Skye's amused reaction. "It just never came up, I suppose," Jemma explained.
"God, I can't believe I didn't know this," Skye complained, thinking about how great Jemma seemed to be with kids. And with everyone else, really. She looked down, fiddling with the edges of her sheet. "We don't know much about each other, apparently," she noted matter-of-factly. Jemma nodded, not knowing what exactly Skye meant by that. So Skye added, "I say we should change that."
Jemma beamed at her like she couldn't possibly be any happier in that moment, and Skye tapped a spot on the mattress next to her leg as she shifted a little bit to the side and invited Jemma to come closer. Jemma didn't hesitate before moving from the armchair to the edge of Skye's bed.
Skye bit her lip and started asking several questions, not in a job interview kind of way, but more in a "I want to know everything about your life and what are your hobbies and what's your favorite food and stuff like that because there's a huge chance that I'm falling in love with you" kind of way. However, the focus of the conversation quickly became herself, because it turned out Jemma was just as curious about her life.
Jemma found herself staring with amusement clear in her eyes as Skye shifted from one random subject to another, and letting her jaw drop when Skye talked about her past as a hacker. She made it clear that this particular hobby wasn't as left in the past as it could be, but Jemma wasn't nearly as shocked by the whole illegal hacking thing as she was entertained. The more Skye talked about her life, the more Jemma wanted to know.
Suddenly, they both realized they'd be talking incessantly for more than an hour when they heard the doorknob turning slowly.
A man whose height was pretty close to the door's walked in and looked at Jemma first before focusing on Skye. "I was going to apologize for being late since we'd agreed I'd be here half an hour ago, but now I see you didn't miss me at all."
Truly, Skye didn't even remember she'd agreed to anything with him. She grinned sarcastically at the man as he dropped his blazer on the armchair while loosening his tie. Jemma had the feeling she should at least try to give him a nice smile, but despite hearing about Skye's life for the past hour she had no idea who the man was or why the two of them were so damn comfortable around each other.
"Did you even consider pretending you're cool and trying to make a good first impression?" Skye gestured with her head slightly in Jemma's direction.
"This is Grant, but you can call him Warm," she told Jemma with a chuckle as the man rolled his eyes at her. "My roommate and babysitter in a suit and tie."
"What she means is I'm the guy that owns the place and lets her live there, and the one that has to visit her here every day," he joked, stopping next to Skye's bed.
"Same difference," Skye waved dismissively. "Warm, this is Jemma Simmons."
He raised his eyebrows promptly after hearing the name, and curved the corners of his lips into an interested smirk.
"So you're the Jemma."
Skye buried her head in her hands, evidently more angry than embarrassed. Lifting her head back up, she glared at Grant like she couldn't believe he'd just said something so stupid. He glared back, giving Jemma the impression that they were having a telepathic argument. Meanwhile, Jemma was too busy trying not to smile over the fact that not only Grant had clearly heard about her, but also Skye apparently referred to her by her first name—which was kind of sweet.
"I forgot to mention that sometimes he does a great job at embarrassing me."
Even though the two seemed to have a sort of brother/sister relationship, Jemma couldn't help but wonder if she may have misunderstood everything from the very first day she saw Skye up until this moment. The fact that the guy looked like a cross between an Abercrombie & Fitch model and a secret agent also didn't help much.
She didn't actually think the question through before blurting it out. "Are you two, uh…" She tried to ask in a low voice, but Grant heard it anyway and started laughing hysterically like he'd just heard the funniest joke ever. Jemma allowed the small weight on her chest to lift.
"Nah, we're just the friends with benefits type," Skye replied in all seriousness, making Jemma freeze in her spot.
"Shut up," he said to her and then turned to Jemma. "She's mocking you."
"Yes I am," Skye admitted, but she wasn't done just yet. "But he secretly wishes I was straight," she whispered to Jemma, and the doctor started laughing nervously. These two were undeniably messing with her.
"I don't, and this is the end of this nonsense," Grant declared, rolling his eyes at Skye again.
"I'm just joking, Jemma," Skye clarified, seeing the confused look in her friend's face. "He has a girlfriend, and she hates me."
"She doesn't, although I wouldn't blame her if she did." He said, his tone putting an end to that subject. "So, you ready?"
"Ready for what? You're taking me to dinner at some fancy restaurant?"
Grant closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "CAT scan, Skye."
Jemma tried not to look disappointed. Skye had told her that she was close to being released from the hospital, so it was normal that she had to have a scan and some other tests before leaving. But it also meant that her time with Skye was ending for the day.
Skye looked up and sighed in a mix of disbelief and frustration. "Seriously?"
"Yes, seriously," he mocked her voice, placing his hands in his hips. "Get your sorry ass out of the bed. Want me to get the wheelchair or-"
"No need, I'll walk," Skye answered, despite usually asking Ward to carry her in the wheelchair because walking hurt like hell. She didn't want Jemma to see her in a wheelchair and was completely aware of how ridiculous that was, considering Jemma was a doctor. "Get out of here and wait in the hallway, I'm coming."
As soon as he walked out and closed the door, Skye looked back at Jemma, who had been just quietly watching the exchange. "So, er…" The doctor started. "I believe it's my cue to leave."
"Yeah, I guess," Skye replied, a sorry look on her face. "Thank you for coming, though… This was fun." Jemma smiled widely because she was starting to realize that Skye wore her heart on her sleeve. She wasn't generally afraid or ashamed of showing her emotions, unlike Jemma, who was pretty much the opposite. "Spending time with you is… pretty awesome." You are pretty (and) awesome, she thought.
Her sad big brown eyes made Jemma's heart tighten in her chest. Jemma was surprised by how much she wanted to hug Skye and stay like that forever. "I agree," she said simply. "I mean, spending time with you, not myself-"
This time, Jemma cut herself off, exhaling loudly and shaking her head. Skye noticed that her lovely British accent got even heavier when she was rambling. "I get it, Jemma," Skye said gently. "So, uh… Are you busy tomorrow?"
Lucky for her, the following day was a Sunday. "Not at all, why?"
Skye couldn't find the words for what she wanted to say, so she just looked around the room and at the door as she tried to come up with something. Surprisingly, Jemma understood what she was "asking" before she said a word. "Oh. I think I can-"
"I mean," Skye interrupted; she thought she had to make it clear to Jemma instead of letting the girl answer her thoughts. It was the least she could do. "If you don't have anything else planned and don't mind giving me the pleasure of your company again, I won't complain."
Jemma had a hard time containing the gigantic grin that was fighting to spread over her face. "If you insist."
They both just looked at each other for a brief moment before Jemma said, "One last thing… We don't have each other's phone numbers."
"No sweat." Skye picked up her phone from the bedside table that was covered with meds and used paper cups bundled next to a laptop. She started tapping the screen in such a fast way that, to Jemma, it looked like she was just patting the screen randomly. However, less than a minute later Jemma noticed that Skye clearly wasn't doing anything random when she heard her own phone beep inside her bag. As she picked it up, surprised, the screen had gone black except for a phone number in white letters.
"Bloody hell," Jemma let out an entertained laugh.
Skye bit her lip to contain a smirk as she said, "Good night, Jemma."
Jemma stood up to grab her bag on the armchair. "You too, Skye," she smiled at her one last time before making her way to the door.
But then again, Skye wasn't done. "Hey, take a screenshot on your phone so you don't lose the number and then touch the screen again." Jemma squinted at her, but did as requested. This time, she wasn't taken aback, but amazed. The short message that made Jemma blush to her core read:
"I miss you already. See you tomorrow :)"