Chapter 5
The week passed in a blur for Sarah. Connor and her had settled into something of a routine, meeting for coffee in the mornings, going out for dinner every few days. Connor had even insisted on taking her to the fancy kind of restaurants that her mother would love. When they were together, Sarah felt like the world was at rights. That they could talk about anything and everything.
Then the inevitable happened, Connor lost a patient on a table. A high risk patient, where the outcome was always a coin flip, but one that he really liked. Sarah refused to let him drive himself home in the state he was in, and uncaring who saw, packed him up into her car and took him home while Connor vented and rehashed the surgery, trying to examine it from all angles and figure out what he could have done better. Sarah sighed and made a last minute decision, turning the car around. In his mental state, it took Connor a moment to realise.
"Eh, Sarah, where are we going?"
"My place." Connor wasn't sure how to respond. In truth he wanted to lock himself up and cry, he wasn't really up for another round of guess-my-feelings featuring the brunette goddess beside him.
"Sarah that's a sweet offer but-"
"Nope." Well, confusion wasn't a feeling Connor had very often.
"I-"
"Nope." Connor gave up and let the car fall silent as he held back tears. Sarah pulled up in front of a bungalow, a smallish one story house.
"Come on then Dr Rhodes!" She said almost teasingly. He followed her up the steps to the porch as she fiddled with her keys. Lavender. Oh, there was a lavender bush on the porch. It was almost embarrassing the way his manhood reacted to that scent now, with distinct interest. He'd never be able to set foot in a nursing home again. Totally unaware of his thoughts, Sarah invited him in and sat him down on her couch, then excused herself to make tea. Connor looked around, somewhat surprised. Sarah's house was colourful, a sheer contrast to the uber modern black and white of his apartment. Yellow seemed to be her preferred colour here. He liked it. It soothed him as he hugged a lilac pillow to his chest. It wasn't enough to distract him, but he at least felt safe here as a sniffed. A box of tissues appeared in front of him, a mug of tea placed on a side table.
"Cry." That was all Sarah needed to say as he took the tissues and burst into tears. He tried not to feel totally humiliated, thoughts and feelings of his father's "boys don't cry" lectures flooded through him, making him cry harder. In truth, he hadn't let go like this in years, not since his mom died. Sarah didn't look disgusted though, she just rubbed his back, murmuring what he thought were sweet platitudes, her voice soothing and encouraging.
It wasn't long before he finished, his head on Sarah's lap as she stroked his hair.
"Thank you." He whispered hoarsely. The hand stroking him stopped for a moment.
"How long has it been since you let it out, Con?" Connor played with a loose thread on her pants before answering.
"A really long time. Not since Mom." Sarah took in the information, her eyes closed in a quiet rage, knowing, just knowing, this had something to do with his prick of a father.
"It's healthy to cry sometimes, Connor. Never feel that you have to pretend with me, not for a moment, kay?" She resumed stroking his inky black hair.
"Kay." He replied softly as his eyes fluttered closed.
When she was certain that Connor was sleeping, she took their mugs into the kitchen, pouring Connor's untouched tea away and microwaving her own. She rubbed her temples. Connor's scars were as deep as her own. She drank her tea and fetched a blanket for Connor, then curled up on a nearby armchair with a book, ready for him to wake up.
Connor woke up hours later, ever so slowly, his face stung like the devil from all the tears, his nose rubbed raw from tissues, but inside, beyond the emotional exhaustion, he felt good. It had felt good to have a good ugly-cry kind of breakdown. He spotted Sarah curled on her armchair, fast asleep, a book that she must have been reading at her feet. Connor frowned. That looked uncomfortable. He slowly got up and tried doors in the hallway until he found Sarah's bedroom, painted a relaxing shade of earthy green. He smiled, then turned on his heel to pick her up and take her to bed. Sarah barely even stirred as he put her on the bed, fully clothed. He didn't feel right undressing her, in his state he certainly wasn't in the right frame of mind either. But since she was fully dressed…the other side of the bed looked awfully comfortable, more so than her couch. Surely, if he were dressed too, she wouldn't mind? Too tired to count the ways of why it wasn't appropriate, Connor carefully lay next to her, facing the wall and drifted back to sleep.
The morning was more than a little awkward, Connor having woken up wrapped around Sarah and her trying to gently escape. Numerous apologies later that ended with Sarah snapping at him to shut up, they both had a cup of coffee in Sarah's petite kitchen. With barely more than a few sentences, Sarah drove Connor home to change, then into work. It was almost an unspoken promise not to discuss that evening where they shared a bed.
A few weeks passed, as Sarah and Connor worked passed the slight awkwardness and back into their coffee-and-dinner routine, neither one willing to lose the friendship they had built, where Connor didn't have to be strong 24/7 and Sarah could say what she liked without being thought of as weird, rude or downright hostile.
Things changed a little, when Dr Milton made his offer. Sarah took the offer home to go through and consider it, calling Connor to talk it through and talk about the challenges of balancing two specialities.
"You can do this, Sarah, you're bright, clever, so very compassionate. I have no doubt that if anyone could pull this off, it would be you." With Connor's inspiring pep talk, Sarah pulled out her old notes and brushed up on internal medicine. From the moment she accepted the offer, she would work half the week with her psyc patients, then the other half recapping and learning the internist side of ED medicine. She groaned, knowing her evenings would now be spent learning all of the ED protocols and reviewing medicine that she hadn't touched since her final year of med school.
Tracing the front cover of her old and tattered anatomy book, Sarah smiled and allowed pride to fill her smile. She could and would do this.
Dr Milton smiled as Sarah left his office after signing her revised contracts. That woman had spunk and he looked forward to seeing her in action. The conversation with her old mentor was enlightening, yet also incredibly vague at times. The main point that Dr Charles had seemed to want to make was that trust was a vital part of Dr Reece's relationships. Without trust, she would walk away. It was all very intriguing and made him wonder why she left Chicago mid-residency. Either way, he had another job to do, and requested a visit from Connor in his office.
When Connor arrived he invited him to sit.
"What's this about, Dr Milton?" Concern covered Connor's face. Other than the patient he lost weeks ago, his outcomes had been pretty good.
"This is about Dr Reese. As I am sure you know, she has accepted our offer for an advanced residency and fellowship program for the remainder of her time here."
"Yes, I can't think of any resident more suited to the challenge than Dr Reese." Connor felt a familiar pride at what his friend was doing. He was so excited for her, it almost felt like he was a resident again, being chosen by Doctor Downey all over again.
"We're pleased she accepted. But I need to clear some things with you. I'm sorry, Connor, but I'm going to be uncomfortably blunt. Are you in a relationship with Dr Reese?" Connor considered the question carefully. It wasn't quite within Milton's scope, but it wasn't none of his business either.
"Will our conversation affect Dr Reese?" He asked quietly. Milton smiled appreciatively.
"No, the contracts are signed. My only question is, should you be in a position of power over her if you are?" Connor nodded, it was a fair comment.
"We aren't in a relationship… but we're close. We're more than friends, I think. I care deeply about her. Honestly, I don't know what we are." Milton nodded, his dark eyes considering.
"Are either of you seeing anyone outside of work?"
"No. I'm not anyway, I don't think Sarah- Dr Reese- is."
"If you were?" Connor closed his eyes and pulled off his scrub cap. The question made him feel ill.
"It would feel like cheating." He finally admitted. Connor hadn't felt a thing for any other woman in the hospital. Milton nodded.
"Thank you Connor, for your honesty. So I think, moving forward, where possible you and Dr Reese should not be working together as an ED surgeon and resident. I don't see the issue on Dr Reese continuing to consult on psyc cases, she would be doing that regardless. Where I judge there is something that you're doing is something that Dr Reese needs to learn or would benefit her, I'll assign her but we'll work together to ensure patient care isn't compromised. I'll not have the quality of her education impacted negatively, but I also can't have you favouring her. You need to be there to teach our other residents too. Is that fair?" Connor considered. Given that many hospitals had pretty much outlawed relationships with residents, he thought it remarkably fair. He nodded and stood to leave.
"Oh, and Dr Rhodes? When you and Dr Reece do become official, we'll need to talk about filling in the correct forms for HR." Connor winced. Nothing says romance better than relationship disclosure forms. "I'll also inform Dr Reese about our little chat a bit later on." Oh boy. Sarah was going to love that chat.
And love it she did. Straight after the conversation she hid in a bathroom waiting for her blush to go down. 10 minutes later, she had cornered Connor, interrupted a conversation with snooty Dr Haven and dragged him into an on call room. She was beyond worrying about what others thought at this point.
"What the hell did you say to Dr Milton?" Sarah hissed, her eyes narrowing to dangerous slits.
"What did he tell you I said?" Hedging his bets seemed safe.
"Oh, not a whole lot, just that 'given the personal nature of your relationship with Dr Rhodes, we cannot in good conscience see you working with him regularly.' What personal relationship do we have Connor?" Rage seemed to pour out of her, and Connor couldn't find the right words.
"I need to kiss you." The words blurted from his mouth, as he guided Sarah against the door. Her face turned from rage, to shock, to desire in seconds. She hardly had time to process before his lips met hers in a heated dance of lips and tongue and teeth. Connor's hands were in Sarah's curls, Sarah's hands roamed his chest, his back, her nails scratching wickedly as her noise inadvertently left her throat. Then she was pushing him, pushing him away from her. As they both fought for breath.
"Sarah-" Before Conner could finish his thought, Sarah was out the door and half way down the hallway, cheeks flushed, curls loose, her body heated in a way it never had been before. She locked herself in a store room, not sure what she needed until she reached a hand into her panties, stroking herself until she saw a blinding white light and she came with her hand covering her mouth. Fuck.
Connor, similarly roused, forgot that grown-ass men do not fist their cocks in on call rooms and stroked his hard cock until he too saw stars, stars that smelt exactly like lavender soap.
What on earth were they going to do now?
