Present Day

Jay didn't know how long he stayed there, didn't even realize he'd moved from leaning against the wall to sitting on the floor but after a while he heard footsteps and looked up to see Adam sliding onto the ground beside him. He didn't say anything but it was obvious from his brief but heartfelt squeeze of his arm that he understood, that he was thinking about what he would do if their positions were swapped and it was Kim in that OR. She came after a while, with Natalie in tow, gently urging them up and back to the waiting area where everyone else still was. It helped to listen to her explain things, that she could go in and check on Tess's surgery to give them updates but there wasn't anything that could make him feel better after hearing that she needed to have a section of her gut removed. Not even the knowledge that the ulcer had likely been there for years.

Years of slowly eating its way through her body.

I get this twisting in my gut sometimes.

Maybe it hadn't been his fault it had formed but he knew as sure as he knew his own name that he'd been the cause of a lot of that pain. Knew that he'd had the perfect excuse just last week to demand Sam and Will do a full workup on her but he hadn't, something his brother also felt guilty about based on the remorse on his face when he finally showed up. And as if that was some silent signal everyone else chose that moment to 'stretch their legs', promising to bring back food from the cafeteria. He wasn't going to eat it but it was a nice gesture, if a little foreign. It wasn't that they'd never cared about each other but normally when one of them was hurt the rest were off finding the person responsible, plus they'd always been prone to giving each other space. They weren't like 51 who several times had camped out in the hospital when of their own was injured; he'd always liked that about them, but still hadn't felt right doing it for his own team.

Not until Tess came and gave him some metaphorical and literal slaps upside the head.

She'd be so angry if she knew how much blame he was putting on himself right now, especially after just promising not to, but how could he not?

Wasn't it his fault?

It was only the feeling of being intensely watched that pulled him out of his self-loathing and he turned to see his brother still standing beside him, his stare so focused he felt a surge of panic. "Did something-"

"I've been right here." Will said with a shrug, of course knowing where his mind had gone but he was still looking at him so strangely that although Jay settled back into his seat he knew something was wrong.

"What?"

"I didn't say anything."

"You're looking at me like you want to."

And because his brother huffed and fumbled over his words he knew he did. "It's not- it's fine-"

"Will-"

"Jay-"

"Just say it-"

"You look like dad!"

Well that wasn't even remotely close to what he'd been expecting.

Maybe it was because he'd brought him up but as Will let out a sigh as he looked him over all Jay could think was that he looked like their mom. "Every time I see the two of you together… you remind me of mom and dad."

Yeah.

He could see that.

He never had before, tried not to think about his parents but now that he mentioned it the similarities were undeniable.

"He loved her." He said quietly, watching as Will nodded and finally took the seat next to him.

"He did."

"He loved us too. Just… not as much."

His brother took in a slow and deep breath before nodding again. "I know. I think he tried, he just… He didn't know how to love us. How to show it."

No, he had not.

"I don't want to be like him."

"You're not." Will replied, immediately and strongly even though he was clearly surprised he thought so but Jay just shook his head.

"I am. I'm the grumpy loner who sits in the corner and glares at everybody. I don't know how to talk about my shit, I don't know how to show up for people, I put everything on the woman I love until it kills her-"

"Dad didn't give mom cancer."

Logically he knew that was true, he did, but…

"If we'd been better to her, if we hadn't fought all the time and made her so tired-"

"Don't." The harshness in his brother's voice immediately caught his attention and he turned back to find tears in his eyes, their moms eyes, but the stubborn jut to his jaw was all their father. "That's not how cancer works. Mom got sick because… because just she did. And dad did everything he could for her. Tess is sick because just she is. Because she fought too hard. And you're going to do everything you can for her and it is going to be enough."

"You don't know that."

"Medically speaking, I do."

They stared at each other for a long minute until Jay couldn't take it anymore and went back to staring at the OR doors, wondering just how long it took to fix a hole in someone's stomach.

How long it would take her to heal from this.

How long she would get before life and whoever else liked to fuck with her decided to intervene.

"Do you want to know the first time I thought you were like dad?"

"No." He said with a small, bitter laugh but the look on Will's face said he was going to find out anyway.

"It was your seventh birthday party."

That… was a lot sooner than he would've thought and it took him a second to flip through his memories before the day became clear. "He spent the whole day in the corner of the yard with Joe."

"So did you." Will replied smartly, raising a brow at him before he smiled. "You didn't stay there, you had fun but I kept finding you going back there, right across the yard from him and I couldn't understand why. Until you went up and decked Billy Myers."

"He was trying to pants all the girls." He defended, now remembering the fight he'd got in with his mom after solving problems with his fists before his dad called her away. And it never got brought up again.

For that fight anyway.

"He was. And while you beat him up our dad gave his dad shit." His brother gave him that look again, a combination of their parents that made his heart ache with their loss. "You stand apart from the crowd because you're looking to see who needs help. And yeah, you've made mistakes but so has everyone. And maybe you are like dad. But you're the best of him. And the things you don't like, you can change."

It sounded simple when he said it.

Not easy, but… simple.

And it felt nice, not just to have his brother's support but to get a new memory of his father, an appreciation for their similarities instead of hurt or disappointment over them.

"I miss them." He whispered, closing his eyes when Will put a hand on his shoulder and he instinctively started crying.

"Me too. But I know they're proud of us."

I'm sorry I ever made you feel like I wasn't proud of you. I always was. I still am.

Jay was positive his father had never spoken those words, at least not to him but he could hear him saying them so clearly, that gruff rumble that used to fill him with frustration but now gave him nothing but longing. And understanding. His dad had been a product of his time but he'd done the best he could, given all that he had to their mom and to them and he couldn't keep being mad at him because he'd wanted more. Feeling a weight lift off his chest he wiped his eyes and took his brother's hand, giving him a grateful smile before pulling him into an awkward hug. It was time to stop living in the past, and to stop waiting for the future to get here, to get better. He had to focus on what he could do and while he didn't have the power to wake Tess he could make sure things were taken care of in her absence.