TITLE: A Mouthful of Air
AUTHOR: JD
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks to everyone who reviewed any part of this story. And thanks again to Em for the Croatian swears.
CHAPTER SUMMARY: Carter confronts Luka, and – for better or for worse – everything returns to normal.
Chapter 8: Not What's Missing
Luka loosened his necktie and pulled the noose off over his heavy head, grabbing his bag out of his locker. His shift hadn't been obscenely difficult, and yet he felt drained, ready to collapse. His tired mind wandered back to the ambulance bay, to that gut-wrenching talk he'd had with Abby earlier in the day. He fretted anxiously about whether he'd made himself clear to her – Abby's total absence of reaction stymied him. He considered trying to bring it up with her again – her insecurities, her lack of self-esteem, and her hasty ability to project them onto even the best-intentioned innocents – but he knew he wouldn't. He felt he had crossed some line with her today, and he didn't want to press his luck. At this point, he knew she was not quite angry with him. True, she hadn't spoken to him the rest of the day. But he was able to recognize when she was avoiding him – if she hadn't wanted to see his face for the rest of her shift, she easily would've secreted herself away whenever he approached. It was an oft-used skill she had.
No, she wasn't avoiding him. Her silence was merely a sign that something was weighing her down, troubling her mind. Luka pondered the possibility that he'd touched a nerve, that he'd somehow gotten through the battlements and barricades that shielded Abby from others – and, to a lesser extent, from herself.
He pressed his palm against his locker door, the satisfying click signaling that it was finally time for him to go home and give himself over to his exhaustion.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The setting sun allowed a handful of its expiring rays to illuminate the otherwise shady ambulance bay, and Luka noted as he was departing that Carter was shooting hoops by himself. Luka briefly stared at the animated young doctor, Carter's unbounded energy making him feel even more weary. Luka lowered his head and slowly trudged along the far wall, trying to walk by unnoticed. He was surprised at how often he managed to skirt past others unobserved – even though his size might ordinarily elicit glances, the ghostlike manner in which he carried himself usually rendered him invisible to people going about their daily lives.
He could see out of the corner of his downcast eye that he was almost directly behind Carter. A noxious part of him wanted to grab Carter by the lapels and flatten him up against the bricks, wanted to yell at him for being a spoiled idiot: Of course Abby's good enough for you! You're not good enough for her!
But his better judgment won out, and a voice in his mind repeated in a soothing chorus: It doesn't concern you, it doesn't concern you, it doesn't concern you. . . . His steps moved along to the cadence of his thoughts, taking him further away from the ER.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Is he that dense? Carter thought as he grabbed an errant rebound. The man is six-foot-four and he thinks he can slink by and no one will see him? He wiped a trickle of perspiration from his neck, the setting sun turning his brown hair a glowing auburn as he vented his aggression at the hoop.
An unremorseful combativeness was awakening within him as the lumbering Croat passed behind him. Carter's mind flashed back to other injuries done him by long-gone doctors. At least when Doug Ross slept with Harper, he had the balls to come clean about it, to apologize to me. And it's not even like he knew about the two of us. But Luka knows about me and Abby – he just can't stand it!
Carter was utterly flabbergasted at the way Luka was innocently pretending to go about his business. His hostility ballooned out of control, until he just couldn't stand it anymore. He reared back with his right arm and chucked the basketball at the opposite wall. It hit with a resounding rubber THWACK barely two feet in front of Luka's approaching head.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"Svet karati, bestija!" Luka exploded, startled by the sudden bombardment. He threw his bag to the ground, picked up the still-rolling basketball and marched over to Carter.
With his eyes on fire and his chin firm, Carter stood tall, his fierce expression daring his rival to start something.
But Luka simply tossed the ball back to Carter and abruptly said, "Watch it, Carter."
Carter caught the ball without flinching, his gaze continuing to bore into Luka's skull.
The mantra kept repeating in Luka's head – it doesn't concern you, it doesn't concern you – but his execrable pride was beating it down, slowly and convincingly.
"I don't have a problem with you, Carter," he tried his best to explain calmly. "What's going on between you and Abby is none of my business."
For a split second, Carter actually felt sympathy for Abby. He was mystified by how Luka could be so cold – how he could let Abby get drunk, sleep with her, and then pretend that it didn't matter.
"Oh really?" Carter spat out. "Because I think it is your business."
Luka, perplexed, asked, "What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean," Carter replied.
Luka stood there voiceless, not having the slightest idea what Carter was talking about. He waited for the incensed doctor to continue.
Carter wasn't sure that he bought Luka's oblivious act, but the man did look confused. "I saw you," he said, hurling the ball back toward Luka, who caught it and cradled it in the crook of his arm. "I saw you leave Abby's house the other morning . . . after you'd both been out at the bar."
Luka shut his eyes in understanding, barely shaking his head. "We were just talking," he explained, moving closer to Carter until the men were eye-to-eye just inches apart.
"Right," Carter derided, refusing to stand down. "Because you had to talk at her apartment. You couldn't talk somewhere else, somewhere public – say, at the bar."
Carter's ill-placed sarcasm stung Luka, and though he knew the truth shouldn't come out like this, he relished what he was about to say: "No, Carter, we couldn't talk at the bar."
"Why not?"
"Because Brian was there."
Instantaneously, every jealous and resentful thought Carter had been feeling dissipated and in their stead flooded a heartbreaking preoccupation with Abby.
"What?" Carter found he could barely stand. "She didn't tell me that. What happened? Did he come after her?" Carter couldn't help but cast his own panic about his stabbing – and his dread of Paul Sobriki – upon Abby, feeling her fear, her paralysis.
Luka softened slightly as Carter's crestfallen face communicated his deep concern.
"Look," Luka started, "I'm not sure exactly what happened myself. All of a sudden he was just there, standing near Abby. When he saw me he took off, but Abby was still pretty shaken up."
Luka considered telling Carter why Brian had run away from him, telling Carter about that night at the Windbreaker bar, but he decided against it. Abby could tell him if she wanted. Besides, that was an act he took upon himself just for Abby – not for Joyce, not for any other woman Brian ever might've done that to.
That was reparations for Abby.
"So I went to her apartment, just to make sure she was OK," Luka went on. "We wound up talking a good part of the night, and at some point I must've fallen asleep on her couch. Then in the morning she woke me up, and I went home."
He paused, trying to read the disorder apparent in Carter's face. Luka's exhaustion, once annoying, now felt debilitating – it seemed to him that every conversation he'd had in the past few days had been fraught with turmoil. He was suddenly aware that he was completely weary of talking, and he hoped not to have to talk to anyone else for a long, long time.
He decided to get all that was left to say out of his system, so as not to have to mention it ever again: "I've always been above-board with you, Carter, but if you're mad, be mad at me. Don't put it on her. She deserves some compassion."
With that, he tossed the basketball back to Carter, strode over to pick up his bag, and silently left the ambulance bay without once turning around.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Luka was right, Carter knew. Despite whatever reasons he had to be angry with Abby – and there were several, to be sure – he now knew he hadn't been able to be there for her when she'd needed him. Carter recalled firsthand how traumatic it was to be confronted with a former attacker, even in a non-threatening, supposedly safe venue. When Sobriki had reappeared at the ER, Carter felt as though his insides were trying to evacuate his body, trying to reach a place of unattainable security. He knew what it was like to be torn apart by terror and alarm. Abby must have been frozen in horror upon seeing Brian again.
Even Carter's most violent egotism conceded that, if he couldn't have been there that night, he was glad Luka had been. Where Abby's safety was concerned, all petty competitions between him and Luka were forgotten. Brian might have tried something if it had just been Susan and Deb with Abby, but there's no way he would've confronted Abby with the hulking Croat there.
As the far-off sirens of an ambulance grew louder, Carter hugged the basketball to his chest and tramped back into work.
He resolved to show up at Abby's place after his shift to ask her forgiveness, his hands full of take-out and dried flowers.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
{Epilogue}
The sun had set and risen on Chicago a few times since Luka and Carter's contained squabble in the ambulance bay, and tensions ran remarkably more shallow in the ER.
Weaver's wrath was currently being directed toward Chen because of a misstep that was ostensibly Pratt's fault – but Pratt had since gone home, so Chen had to bear the brunt of Weaver's verbal assault.
As Chen walked down the hallway away from the admit desk, Hurricane Weaver thundered at her heels, still gesturing irately. "And another thing, . . . ." Her voice faded as the two turned a corner. Susan, leaning on the desk counter, blissfully watched her nemesis depart, happy to be out of the crossfire this time.
Abby, who had been standing nearby, begged Susan to continue the story she had been telling before being distracted by her boss. "So what was she doing with the candle?"
"Oh," Susan snapped out of her reverie. "So this patient had been trying to remove her . . . um . . . bikini hair with candle wax. Guess she didn't realize that the wax was going to be hot – she didn't strike me as a Mensa candidate. Anyway, she got startled and dropped the candle. Superficial second degree burns over the entire bikini area."
"Ouch!" Abby exclaimed, pressing her thighs together reflexively. "Guess a huge blistery burn kind of obviates the whole point of a bikini wax, huh?"
"That's not the best part," Susan laughed, barely managing to get out the punchline of the story. "It was Gallant's patient." Susan cracked up, and Abby joined in.
"What, did someone leave the nitrous on?" Carter strode up to the desk, a grin on his face. He wagged a petulant finger at the snickering women. "How about some decorum, ladies? Don't you know this doctor stuff is serious business?"
As Susan rolled her eyes, Abby countered, "Yeah, that was why I decided not to go back to med school. They just couldn't fit me for the giant stick they needed to shove up my ass."
Susan clenched her eyes tight, her body shaking with laughter at Abby's deadpan response.
"I could make a comment right now, but there's no way I'm spending another day hearing about the exciting world of sexual harassment regulations and inappropriate workplace behavior," Carter said, smiling. "Wanna grab a bite at Doc's?"
Abby nodded, and walked around the desk toward him. He took her hand in his as they passed through the doors.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Luka stood unnoticed, leaning against a wall and watching, his heart a battleground of regret and fulfillment.
Abby was not his for the keeping – he'd had her, but didn't know how to be with her. And now, she'd apparently found someone who could be with her the way she needed.
As he pushed away from the wall and headed off in the other direction, he held out a hope that he, too, would one day find someone who could be with him – someone who could ease this oddly familiar ache in his chest.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
END NOTES: Chapter title comes from the song "Pitseleh" by Elliot Smith, which includes the lyrics: "I'm not what's missing from your life now. I could never be the puzzle pieces. . . . The first time I saw you, I knew it would never last. I'm not half what I wish I was. I'm so angry, I don't think it will ever pass. And I was bad news for you just because I never meant to hurt you."
That's all, folks. Yes, I know there are loose ends, and angst still reigns supreme, but life doesn't wrap things up into tidy bows, and neither do I. And after watching "Chaos Theory" and "Dead Again," I don't know if Abby should be with anybody right now. Anyhoo, I'd like to leave you all with a song. I'd sing "Danke Schoen" a la Ferris Bueller, but I think "Real Bad News" by Aimee Mann is more apropos of Abby, especially with respect to her relationship with Carter (yes, I know Abby's got her problems and a lot of "ER" fans can't stand her, but for me, despising Abby would merely be an exercise in self-loathing). So without further ado:
You don't know, so don't say you do –
You don't.
You might think that things will change, but take my word –
They won't.
You paint a lovely picture but reality intrudes
With a message for you,
And it's real bad news.
I was undecided like you at first,
But I couldn't stem the tide of overwhelm and thirst.
You try to keep it going but a lot of avenues
Just aren't open to you
When you're real bad news.
I've got love and anger, they come as a pair.
You can take your chances, but buyer beware.
And I won't make you feel bad when I show you
This big ball of sad isn't worth even filling with air.
And, baby, let me tell you, you can get some things confused,
Like whose secrets are whose.
And that's real bad news,
Real bad news,
Real bad news.
