Chapter 5: Dating Again.
Carter took Abby out to dinner the week after they had, had their little talk. The second date he took her out dancing on Lake Michigan on a dinner cruise. He wasn't trying to rush her but taking it slow with what they were doing. Spreading the dates out so that while they did get to spend time together, they still had down time to do other things with other friends, not to mention that they were both busy with work.
They seemed to be getting along for the most part. The baby steps were taking them on the right track back to getting a relationship going, and while they were working on getting something a little more than a friendship going. Neither of them was quite sure if it was going to go past the friendship stage but as of right now it seemed like it had that chance.
At work they barely saw each other but when they did the others in the ER could see the spark that was working on being fanned into a burning flame. But then that little spark had never really gone out, they had just both managed to ignore it. To find another person to be that little spark, which backfired on them both. Destiny had plans that they might not have been able to see themselves.
For what fate had in store for Carter and Abby and their lives together was something that neither of them could have possibly imagined. Or would have even dreamed was possible. But the one thing that the two of them had come to consider a constant in their lives was just that to expect the unexpected. Happiness was elusive and it seemed to come at a high price at time. Patients with the person you were with an accepting them the way that they were, knowing that you could never make them be anything other than who they were was part of what you needed to do.
"John we need to talk." Abby said as she cornered him one morning shortly after he had arrived.
To him that sounded rather ominous and he wasn't sure what he might have done that she would feel that they needed to talk. "Sure Abby, can it wait until later today, the board is backing up at its not even 8 am yet."
"Yeah I suppose that it can." She said sounding rather disappointed that they couldn't have the conversation right then and there.
"I'm not trying to blow you off." Carter said defending what he had just not two seconds before said to her, "I just am really busy right now."
"No I understand it's okay really it is." The tone of Abby's voice hadn't changed a bit as she talked with him. She had her own backlog of patients that she needed to tend to herself. "Maybe we can grab lunch or something."
"Yeah that would be great." He replied back not knowing if he was going to be able to get that lunch break or not, once again it seemed like everyone was in County's ER today.
"Fine." She said changing her tone somewhat with him. She didn't want him to think that she was the queen of gloom and doom right now but what she needed to talk to him about was rather important in nature.
Carter just gave her that 'I'm sorry' look as he headed off with an arm full of charts, people who were waiting to be seen.
Abby didn't say anything else to him she just found herself buried under her own pile of patients. They worked the rest of the day neither of them seeming to find their way out from under their mountains of work. It was one of those days where if something could go wrong it did. Murphy's Law was down upon Carter and Abby with a force that left nothing to be reckoned with.
At about seven that night Abby was about ready to drop dead from exhaustion. She had been running her ass off all day long going from patient to patient, no one seemed to have a simple complaint all day long, her cases seemed to be the ones that were never clear cut and it had been a challenge to her new found medical skills.
Carter had been supervising Interns and residents all day long while trying to balance his own patient load and was about at his wits in. No one had simple easy to answer questions, and the questions that they did have seemed to come in four and five parts. He wanted to rip his hair out after the day that he had, had. He knew that he still needed to talk with Abby not wanting her to really think that he had blown her off. But as he wandered into the lounge after finally managing to sign his last patient off to the night crew he hit the couch and just sat there for a minute wondering what had been so urgent this morning that he hadn't been able to get a minute in to deal with at any point in the day. His lunch had consisted of a sandwich that had been grabbed from the vending machine inhaled while he cosigned charts.
Abby ducked into the lounge after signing out her last patient to Neela who Abby had never been more happy to see in the entire time that she had been there. They had an odd friendship ever since Neela had crashed on her couch. But she didn't say much to the other intern not wanting anything to end up sucking her back into that never ending vortex of complicated patients.
She flopped down on the couch next to Carter. "You off?" She said glancing over at him. His eyes were closed and she wasn't sure if he was sleeping or just sitting there vegetating from behind closed eyes.
"Yes, I am finally off, how about you?" He said turning his head to look over at her.
"Yes thank the gods." She let out a little laugh, "hell of a day."
"I second that motion." Carter replied back, "I just want to get out of here, go find something that is real food not out of a machine and then sleep."
"Why don't we go and get something." Abby suggested.
"Sounds like a plan to me." Carter answered as he started to pull himself up off the couch. "Before the find us and end up putting us back to work."
"God that's the last thing I want to do right now." Abby was following suit getting her coat from her locker now, "the sooner I get out of here the better I will feel."
"You and me both." He said as they walked out of the ER, or rather slipped out trying not to be noticed by anyone, afraid that if they were spotted someone would try and suck them back in. Carter didn't say anything until they were safely outside the hospital doors, "sorry I didn't have time to talk to you today, I ended up buried."
"Not a problem." She replied back as they headed off to find something that resembled real food. "I ended up busy too."
"Yeah I saw that you were taking the majority of the tougher cases." Carter said knowing that she had, had a very trying day. He was the one that ended up cosigning most of her charts.
"I wasn't taking them; I was getting the crappy luck of the draw." She piped back. Truth be told if she could have had anything other than what she had ended up with she probably would have been in a much better mood, but you couldn't pick and chose your patients, you took what you were given.
"Ah but you kept your head above water all day and didn't sink so that should tell you something." He said to her as they continued walking.
"What that I am completely nuts?" Abby asked him.
"No that you are actually a good doctor." He answered her.
"Well that is still up for debate." She said.
"I think that you proved today that you can hold your own in the ER." Carter told her, "You were about the only one today that didn't bombard me with a million and one questions."
"Well that's cause I saw everyone else running to you and figured that I should find another doctor who wasn't being plagued by medical students and interns. I pestered Pratt all day long."
"I see, well lucky for him then. No he needs the challenge. He can be a good teacher when he wants to be. Other days he can be just a…" Carter searched for the right word that would describe the resident. "A cocky pain in the ass."
"I bet you say that all about all the Interns, residents, and medical students that you have to supervise on a daily basis."
"Not all of them." Carter said, "I actually have faith in one or two, but I see the respect that he gets and it's about time he's earned some of that."
"Jealous?" Abby said giving him a very playful smile, but one that said that she was just joking.
"Oh so very jealous." Carter laughed a little at that one.
"You should be." She said, "I hear he is going after your job."
"I think my job is fairly secure beside that he's only a third year and has a few more to go before my job would be in any kind of jeopardy from the likes of him."
"Yeah I know there's only one Dr. Carter." Abby laughed, "God knows County would be in trouble if there was more than one of you running around."
"Glad that you find me funny." Carter said looking over at her as he held the door open for her and they went inside to get something to eat.
"Yes Carter, you are the funniest man alive." Abby said giving him a sarcastic eye roll.
He smiled at her as he pulled the chair out from the table for her. "So what do you want to talk to me about?"
"It can wait until after we have ordered." Abby said not in a rush to get into it right now she wanted to take a five minute breather and regroup before tackling this conversation, it wasn't going to be a good one that much she knew for sure.
He just nodded as he looked over and tried to decide what he wanted to eat. He wasn't going to push her into the conversation unwillingly and it might not be such a bad thing after all. Especially is she wanted to wait to talk to him about it?
They ordered and ate and then decided that they would have dessert together. It was once that dessert had arrived that Abby decided that it was time to broach the subject. She had been dreading having this conversation with him all day but it was one of those now or never situations and she knew that if she backed out now there wouldn't be enough time to have it with him at any other point in time. She had made the decision and couldn't change her mind about it. She felt guilty a little for not having discussed it with him first, but after all they were only dating. It wasn't like she needed his permission to do something with her life.
"There's something important that I need to talk to you about Carter." Abby said looking across the table at him with a somewhat serious expression on her face.
"What is it Abby?" Carter asked still wondering what this was that made her look so serious.
She looked at him for a minute trying to find the words, "I've been offered a position at another hospital." She said this wasn't going to be an easy one to have.
