Abby looked at her cell phone screen. Her brother's distance hurt her deeply - she'd text him, leave messages in his machine hoping he would get back at her, but it was always Maggie who updated her. He was doing better with his new meds, apparently, but it was still a struggle to get him to go to his mandatory therapy sessions.
She put her phone back in her pocket and found Susan leaving the handicapped stalls with a disheveled Chuck in tow. She watched silently as Susan tried to get rid of him, obviously embarrassed by her presence around them. Chuck smiled sheepishly "See you later?" but she sounded unsure "Yeah. You know what – maybe. I don't know…". Chuck sounded disappointed but he wasn't going to insist with Abby standing right there.
The nurse kept looking at her feet "Six MVA's. Four adults, two kids. ETA 5".
Susan nodded and adjusted her stethoscope as they walked outside together.
Abby had to say something "I thought you were divorced".
The blonde avoided eye contact "We are". She tried to make small talk before they reached the ambulance bay "Any news from Carter?".
The nurse buried her hands deeper into her pockets and smiled sourly "It's been over a month. I don't expect him to call anymore. If I hadn't bumped into him in the lounge, I wouldn't have even known he was going".
Susan did a double take when she saw Abby in blue scrubs, pushing Trauma 2's doors open. She greeted her, her eyes promptly observing the patient in front of her "Hi. You asked for a surgical consult?". Susan mouth was slightly agape and Abby shrugged her shoulders "I'm back in med school, I started my surgical rotation today".
The blonde smiled appreciatively and nodded "He's all yours". She watched on as Abby talked to Gallant, assessing the patient to take him to the OR. She followed her down the hall and Abby smiled coyly "I never meant to quit med school forever and it seemed like the right time to go back". Susan nodded and asked curiously "Where'd you get the money?".
Abby punched the elevator buttons, a playful smile on her face "Begged, borrowed, threatened my ex-husband".
The blonde laughed out "Good for you!".
"And as soon as I paid up, they put me back on rotation".
Susan looked amused "And Corday sent you down for a consult?".
The other woman shrugged "Well, she was jammed. She figured I could handle a bowel obstruction".
"So, no more nursing?".
Abby shook her head "I'm still going to take a few shifts for a while, I need the money".
The blonde shook her head at her gingerly "You never said anything..." and Abby nodded "I didn't want to jinx it...".
Susan smiled proudly at her "Wow, you must feel great".
"I do".
"And tired", Susan grinned noticing the dark circles around her eyes.
Abby nodded "I was up till 3 studying the branches of the facial nerve. We have a parotid resection later".
They rolled the gurney in and Susan quipped before the elevators doors closed "Ten zebras bit my cockatoo! It's a mnemonic: t-z-b-m-c. Mnemonics got me through med school. I'll see you around!".
The doors closed and Abby tried to keep the giddiness out of her face. She'd been harboring the desire of finishing med school for a while. Since she went back to AA, she started to really look at her life and the decisions she had made. She didn't follow through with anything - when something got in the way, she'd shut down or give up. It happened with her family, her marriage, med school. It happened with Carter.
Abby didn't want to give up anymore - she would finish med school and get her MD.
And she was going to fight for her own happiness.
When Abby started her ER rotation, everyone had an opinion about her decision of going back to med school. The nurses kept giving her a hard time, like she was betraying them or something and when she asked Chuny to change a banana bag, the nurse had side eyed her almost scornfully "In a minute, doc".
The doctors expected her to know everything and it didn't help that she was paired up with Encyclopedia Girl... Neela, her name was Neela.
Neela knew every obscure symptom for every obscure disease, read every damn study in every medical journal known to man.
She was getting on her nerves already.
Abby saw Susan approaching them as the patient asked Neela if he was having a heart attack "I don't think so, but your heart is beating fast". Neela showed Susan the tests "No T waves, narrow QRS". Susan asked gently if this had ever happened before but the man said it hadn't. The younger woman added quickly "EKG tech's on his way".
Susan nodded "Supraventricular tachycardia?".
"Yes, vagal maneuvers didn't work. Adenosine?".
"Six miligrams".
Abby listened to the exchange and watched Susan as she double checked the lab orders. The blonde smiled at the British med student "Nice assessment". Neela almost squeaked with the praise and Abby rolled her eyes and followed Susan down the hall.
She reached her and huffed "You never compliment me like that".
"Like what?", the blonde smirked as she listened to her.
"Nice assessment", Abby mimicked in an excessively sultry impersonation of Susan's voice.
The blonde chuckled "I do!".
She shook her head and didn't look amused "No, you don't".
"I don't?", Susan thought about her words. Maybe she hadn't phrased it in the exact same way, but she remembered complimenting Abby a few days ago when she inserted a chest tube.
Susan smiled when she realized that Abby was just jealous. She lowered her voice before entering Exam Room 1 "I give you my time, which is the highest form of a compliment".
Abby watched as the door closed behind her and cursed herself mentally for behaving like an idiot.
Neela watched Abby. She always looked so focused and like she actually knew what she was doing. Neela cringed every time she had to stick a needle or make small talk with a patient. She could answer most of the medical stuff in a heartbeat - she had photographic memory and had relied on it to get through med school. But she knew it wasn't enough.
Everyone seemed so skillful and passionate. It was all so fast paced just like the American TV shows she watched as a kid. And there she was, Nerdy Neela from Southall living her own American dream and feeling so bloody insecure.
She returned her gaze to Abby, still so enthralled by their EM manual and she cleared her voice "Abby?... Do you ever feel like you can't do this?".
The other woman looked at her briefly before smirking "Every single day. But then I just suck it up and do my job the best I can".
Neela played with her pen "Dr. Lewis asked me to talk to the wife of the MVA we got earlier… the one that didn't make it…And I couldn't do it. I asked Michael to do it…".
Abby leaned back on her chair "She has to sign off your chart, you know that, right?". Abby knew that if Susan specifically asked Neela to do it, she would check up on it later.
"I think the attendings don't like me", Neela sighed and Abby just chuckled "What? They're always praising you, always asking you the most improbable differentials that you always manage to get right!". Abby hoped she wasn't fishing for compliments because she just wasn't in the mood.
"I think they keep asking me questions trying to unravel me… like they sense that most of the time I'm actually clueless". She kept sketching on the borders of her notepad until she heard Abby's voice again.
"Look, the ER isn't for everyone… It's intense, you have to make several judgement calls during your shift and no one values what we do down here… If it makes you feel better, I feel exactly the same way. I'm a damn good nurse but I'm not sure I'll be any good as a doctor…", Abby confessed and smiled encouragingly.
Behind them, Susan cleared her voice and they both turned around. "Excuse me. Care to join me, Neela? I'm discharging your patient in Curtain 2 but he says you haven't explained him his out-patient care routine".
Neela almost winced and quickly scurried out of the lounge. Susan watched her as she left and she called out before leaving "Abby?".
When the brunette looked up, she quipped "You're not a good doctor yet, but you'll be. Wanna try out a crike?".
Abby reached the door in seconds "I've never done one…" and they bumped awkwardly against each other as they both went out of the door. Susan's hand found Abby's forearm for balance and her lips curled into a smile, unable to mask the dizziness she felt around her "I'll talk you through it".
Abby rarely had company now, so she couldn't hide her smile when she saw Susan through the spy-hole.
The blonde grinned as she opened the door for her "I bear food".
She watched as Susan went directly to her kitchen "Chinese and sodas. I don't know about you, but I'm starving".
If this was just someone else, Abby would've hated the barging in. But she watched contently as she rambled on, looking for plates for their food. Abby smiled "Susan, you don't have to do this".
She stopped in her tracks and gave her a little smirk "What, eat? I'm hungry. And I know you haven't eaten either".
Abby knew she knew exactly what she meant but she let it go. "Weren't you supposed to go out with Chuck?". She had heard him asking her out earlier. He always seemed to be around County nowadays.
Susan rolled her eyes "He's getting a little too clingy. We haven't done anything in ages and I checked your schedule and saw that you weren't on until tomorrow evening, so I decided to stop by…", she said as she took the first bite.
"What's the plan for tonight?", Abby asked in jest, sipping at her soda.
"We can watch a movie. Diss men. Whatever you want", the blonde shrugged.
Abby cocked an eyebrow as she ate her food "You heard about the letter".
Susan wasn't going to pretend she hadn't. Everyone in the ER talked about the letter Luka brought her from Carter "For the record, I think he's being an asshole".
"Maybe I'm just not cut out for relationships", Abby declared gently.
It was a little out of character for her to be actively dissecting the subject, but she needed to talk about it, put her thoughts out there. "I did what I always do… I shut him out when my brother needed me and I wasn't there for him when his grandmother died… I know I'm a piece of work. Can't really blame him for dumping me...".
Susan looked thoughtful before giving her two cents. "My personal life is a mess mostly because of my relationship with my sister. Chloe was my idol when I was a kid... She was the best sister you can imagine... taking me to all the cool places, letting me hang out with her friends... Then she got involved with the wrong people and I couldn't give up on her. It has impaired me from furthering my own personal relationships and I've spent way too much time in therapy to get to the conclusion that it's mutual. As much as I convince myself that she needs me, I need her too".
Abby nodded "That. Nothing hurts more than my brother not talking to me… I can't understand, we've always been so close...".
The blonde whispered "Give him time. We always forgive them, right?". She thought about how many times she promised herself that she'd cut Chloe from her life. It's just wasn't that easy. Moving back to Chicago had been a huge step for her, trying to break that cycle.
After they ate, they sat on to the couch to watch a movie but Abby's mind wandered away. She asked a question that had been on her mind lately "How did you know that I'd come?". Susan looked at her blankly and Abby tried again "That day in the lounge. When you asked me to meet you and Carter. How did you know that I'd come?".
The blonde smiled softly "I didn't know. Carter almost killed me, he was so scared that you'd take offense or something. I just... I guess I was hoping you would".
The brunette pressed "Why?".
"I can't really say. Me and Carter... it was fun but he was so obviously into you… I guess I wanted to see what he saw in you...". She didn't raise her eyes from her hands and Abby prodded gently "Are we ever going to acknowledge this?".
Susan looked up and saw Abby gesturing back and forth with her hand between them. She spoke softly "I value your friendship more than anything...".
Abby's voice lowered another octave "But you're attracted to me...".
Susan felt her cheeks warming and she let a smile escape "Yes. But it's different now. I'd never come between you two".
Abby entangled her fingers in her hand and whispered "He's not here anymore...".
Susan took Abby's hand and pressed a kiss to the back of her hand "No. I think he still is". She knew she had feelings for the other woman, it was too damn obvious. But she also knew Abby was lonely and loneliness was a terrible advisor.
Abby thought about her words. She couldn't deny that she was hurt about Carter leaving her, she was - she had harbored feelings for him for quite some time now. It was complex because she couldn't just switch off a button and forget about him. But she found herself thinking about Susan more and more lately - whether she was with Chuck or not, whether she'd see her at work.
In the darkest periods of her life, Abby had slept with a lot of people. A few were women - because when drunk, miserable and lonely, gender wasn't that important to her. She was okay with the occasional ambivalence of her sexuality - she never really had to address it because she kept dating men. Abby had searched intimacy but those hook-ups brought her nothing other than the immediate satisfaction of her lust. Susan was the first woman Abby had wanted while very sober. And she knew that it wasn't just the sex that she remembered too vividly.
It was everything else.
Susan got her and it was terrifying as hell.
They looked moonily into each other's eyes and it would've been too easy, because she knew that if she kissed her, Susan wouldn't push her away - she could see it in her eyes.
For once in her life, Abby wanted to do things right. She was tired of hurting people and getting hurt. She was tired of being bitter and lonely. Contrary to what she had said to Carter a few months ago, she wanted to change.
She moved closer to Susan and wrapped herself around her, her forehead resting in the crook of her neck. Susan wasn't expecting that move but her arms curled instinctively around her, holding her close. She was sure Abby could hear her racing heartbeat, her cheek was pressed against her chest. But Abby didn't move and didn't say anything else.
Her fingers raked through Abby's hair who purred softly against her. The humming on her skin went down Susan's body and she could feel her body warm in all the places they touched, it was maddening.
Susan thought about Chuck. He was a good guy, he made her laugh and the sex was good. She had avoided the subject like the plague whenever she sensed he was going to ask her to give them a shot. She now knew why - it paled in comparison to this.
Holding Abby in her couch, stroking her hair, the two of them dimly lit by the TV screen, that was intimate. Quickies in bathroom stalls were not - that was about sublimating the longing she carried in her system. And she knew it wasn't for him.
She sensed when Abby's breathing started slowing down and her body relaxed into her form – she'd fallen asleep.
She should get up and go home, she was so tired.
But with Abby so close to her, Susan couldn't bring herself to move an inch.
