Chapter Text
Sometimes you can just feel when something monumental is about to occur. The air will shift, tension starts to leak into the atmosphere. But you’re not really sure why. Like the universe had a secret and you weren’t in the know. That’s how Mel felt this morning as her alarm clock buzzed loudly on her nightstand.
She couldn’t rationalize her feeling of unease. It was an average weekday morning, nothing special in the slightest. In fact, it was excruciatingly mundane. Becca had begun staying over with Adam more often than not, so she woke up alone in her apartment once again. The creaking of her old hardwood floors as her feet touched them tepidly did nothing to help ease the unrelenting feeling of anxiety.
Maybe it was a full moon? She couldn’t remember the last time she made note of the moon cycle. But as a healthcare professional, you could always sense it. Everyone was off their game, patient’s attitudes flaring over the smallest of inconveniences. She could distinctly remember a few months back. She had accidentally grabbed an apple juice for her elderly patient instead of the orange juice they requested. She was rewarded with the thunk of the juice box upside her head.
Absentmindedly shaking her head like that would shake the memory off, or this sense of escalating dread. It didn’t. She would just have to do her best to ignore it, mustering the willpower to contradict her instincts.
Showering and getting dressed quickly, she pulled her thin wool jacket over her scrub top. They had just started getting into the cooler weather, September fading into October. She relished the sight of the changing leaves pooling on the ground as she made her way to the bus stop. But the thought was fleeting, as the bus missed her stop all together. Great. Now she would be late for work. Robby would be pissed at her.
Unless…
She could call him.
He did say she was welcome to a ride anytime. It was an open invitation, so why did she feel guilty about taking him up on it?
Because it would take him away from his family, Mel. She scolded herself roughly. He is a married man with two children and responsibilities. He doesn’t need another person to look after. Even if he did consider her a friend.
She considered him something else all together. But she couldn’t put a finger on what to call it. No word seemed adequate enough to stress his importance in her life. More than anything the thought petrified her. She knew how she felt about him wasn’t fair. Neither to him nor herself.
If she put the name to it, that made it real. The thoughts of him that crept into her brain at night while she tossed and turned. How she could easily pinpoint his location in a crowd just by the slightest hint of his voice. It was easier to ignore it. But how long could it be before it became too big to ignore?
She felt herself inching closer and closer to that ledge every time she was in his company.
The urge to just keep walking to the next bus stop took over. She bustled quickly through the throngs of people now starting to start their own commutes. A few of them knocking into her without apology. But that wasn’t anything new. It seemed like sometimes she only existed in her own world. The rest of the population overlooking her like a bug that they could step on and feel nothing about.
Naturally, because God decided that Mel King needed to suffer today for some reason. It began to pour the rain. She peeked in her backpack quickly, looking for her umbrella. Of course, it wasn’t there. The hard spattering of water droplets made it impossible to see through her glasses. She needed to get somewhere dry. Glancing around she was able to find a small tree that would at least block some of it while she got her phone out. Succumbing to the temptation of just calling him.
It only rang once.
His voice was alert, concern seeping through his words. “Mel… what’s wrong?” It was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Tears that she didn’t realize were imminent started to pour down her cheeks. She choked back a sob, trying to muffle the sound with her hands.
“Frank… I..” her words failed. She let out a long sigh, trying to wipe the moisture from her face but it was futile. The wind had started to whip the rain in her direction. Her clothes were soaking through; the wool jacket became overwhelmingly heavy as it absorbed the precipitation.
“No.. no… don’t cry.” His voice went incredibly soft, barely audible. It sent shivers down her spine, or maybe that was the chill from the wind. She couldn’t be sure. “Where are you?” He questioned gently.
She looked around to see if she could see the street signs, her glasses still covered with water. Taking them off to see if that helped, it didn’t. Feeling lost and hopeless. She didn’t know what street she was on and couldn’t make out enough to see if there was any kind of landmarks nearby she could tell him. There wasn’t anything she could really see, just a bunch of gray unremarkable concrete buildings. She slid her glasses back on, even though they weren’t any help.
Her voice was shaky as she spoke again. “I missed my bus….I tried to walk to the next stop… then it started pouring the rain.” She was pathetic, regret filling her as she heard his unsteady breathing on the line. “I don’t know where I am.” Embarrassed by how shaken she sounded. She shouldn’t have called him.
“Send me your location.” She could hear a car horn honking through his side of the call. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.” His voice dropping again, “It’s going to be okay, I promise.” He had a way of soothing her instantly with the way his voice changed with her. Cocky Bravado fading into a soft unspoken confidence. Quips that stung others were never flung in her direction. Only sweet praises. He was friends with a lot of people at work, why didn’t he talk to them like that? Possibly he did and she just never noticed, always too wound up in her own thoughts.
The guilt covered her like her drenched clothes. Why did he have to be so kind to her? Couldn’t he just treat her like everyone else and pretend she didn’t exist? He was different with her, whether he meant to be or not. It just made her conscience make her feel shittier about herself. Feelings for a married man. If her mother were alive, she would call her a lying jezebel.
But the only person she was lying to was herself, so did that even really count?
She pulled her phone into her jacket to block the moisture slightly as she sent him her location. Her arm jerking back to her ear quickly as she heard his voice back on the line.
“I got it Mel. I’m not far away… I’ll be there in a few minutes, honey.”
A sharp beep bellowed in her ear as the call ended. It felt like she had been knocked on the pavement. Honey.
Honey. Honey. Honey.
It sounded just as sweet from his mouth as if he had whispered a sweet nothing in her ear. It was probably just a slip of the tongue. Surely, he was used to calling his wife that, it was instinct she rationalized. But it didn’t change how she felt hearing him call her that. It made her blush furiously. It was natural for her to daydream about him laying kisses up her neck, to the soft patch of skin behind her ear. Laying a soft kiss on the lobe as he purred pet names inches away from her face. She bit back a moan.
Jesus, Mel. Here he was trying to spare her from a mental breakdown and she was objectifying him. What a great “friend” you are, Melissa King.
She needed to put herself out there. Make a profile on a dating app. Something. She needed to get laid expeditiously. By anyone at this point, a distraction from the space that Frank Langdon occupied constantly in her mind.
But if he wasn’t there mentally, she found he was there physically. It would begin a never-ending vicious cycle. She would try to ignore the pull that she had towards him, but it was useless. His gravity pulled her into his orbit, whether that was his intention or not.
Rain droplets came roaring down again. Water pooling on the ground beneath her feet. She felt her body begin to shiver from the coldness of her soaked clothes and the brisk wind whipping through the trees on the sidewalk. Reaching her hand behind her, she felt her backpack. The usually rough texture of it absorbing all the water coming down.
Now she was drenched, and without a doubt any of the spare clothes she usually packed in her backpack were probably the same, unusable. She would have to get a spare set of scrubs from the dispenser in the locker room. Adding on even more time to her tardiness surely. Shit.
She could call PTMC once she got in his (hopefully warm) car, explain her whole situation. Surely Dana would understand and pass the word on to Robby. Mel had never been late in the two years she had worked there.
It would give her something to do besides staring at his side profile longingly. But then again, she could do that while on the phone anyways. She needed a pair of those horse blinders to wear in his presence. Knowing him though, he would just stand in front of her staring a hole in her eyes with those dangerous baby blues. They were hypnotic, that asshole.
Except he wasn’t an asshole at all. He was excruciatingly sweet to her. Not in a pitying way either like others tended to do. Just a ridiculously handsome man who was kind to her, treated her as an equal, and made her days brighter just by being near. Who wouldn’t want that?
She was sure his wife would disagree with her assessment of him. If she was even aware of who she was to begin with. Mel wasn’t brave enough to ask about her at all. He didn’t speak of Abby to her either, she wasn’t sure what that meant.
A loud horn blaring caused her to jump out of her skin and the daze she was in. A sleek black SUV pulling up to the curb next to her slowly. Passenger side window easing down just enough to see his face without letting the torrential downpour flood into his nice car.
“Your chariot awaits..” with a flourish of his hand, he flashed a dazzling smile at her and her breath caught.
Quickly she grasped the door handle and jerked it open sliding into the passenger seat. As her ass hit the seat a beam of heat soared all over her body. It felt amazing even through her wet clothes.
He spoke again before she could say anything. “Does it feel okay in here? I can turn the heat up.”
She shook her head immediately. She felt like she had slipped into a warm bath, that smelled woodsy and it instantly soothed her anxiety. A low sigh left her lips, “This is great. Really.”
His hand reached across the console, giving her a small tissue. His palm grazing softly against hers. “For your glasses.” She accepted it willingly. “I usually keep lens wipes in here for Penny, but I must have ran out.”
“Penny wears glasses?” She questioned as she took the tissue and rubbed the condensation off her lenses in small circles. Carefully not to smudge her fingerprints against the glass. She inspected them for a brief moment then perched them back on her nose.
Looking up towards him for the first time since she entered his car, she couldn’t stop the slack of her jaw. His hair was wet and pushed back from his face, excluding those pesky strands that wanted to fall into his eyes. He wasn’t wearing scrubs yet. Just a form fitting gray athletic wear shirt and a pair of basketball shorts. Had he been working out? He had mentioned that he lifted weights before, which wasn’t surprising when you looked at his biceps for more than a millisecond.
“Oh yeah, when we can keep them on her she does.” A small chuckle slipping through his lips. Silence washing over the car soon after, his eyes never leaving hers. He moved to change the subject to the one she wanted to avoid. “Mel, are you okay?” His hand reaching out again to touch hers. “Don’t take offense to this, but you look like you feel like shit.”
She glanced at herself in the rearview mirror, he was beyond right. In fact, he was putting it very nicely. She had seen roadkill that looked better than her. Her braid had been soaked through and the wind had knotted it all together. Her eyes were puffy from crying, her cheeks red as if they had been slapped over and over. She laid her hands down on her thighs and could feel the water dripping from the fabric of her scrubs down onto the leather of his passenger seat.
‘I’m sorry… I think I’ve destroyed your seat.” She was ruining his stuff on top of everything else. His eyes followed the movement of her hands on her thigh, then her touching the seat.
His voice was soft again as he spoke, “Don’t worry about that Mel.” His hand moved to cover hers on her leg, squeezing gently. It made her stomach flip.
“I do have small children. I have a car detailing company on speed dial….” His smile was small and lopsided. “I’m thankful it’s water and not milk like Tanner did last week.”
“Oh yuck.” She couldn’t stop the disgust on her face if she tried, she wasn’t a fan of milk anyway unless it was a milkshake. Strawberry preferably, Becca was partial to chocolate.
“Yeah, we couldn’t get the smell out of here for days. So, trust me when I say that you getting the seat wet is the least of my concerns.” His eyebrows furrowed together as he studied her. “Now tell me what is really going on.”
She groaned, dropping her head into her hands. “I missed my bus.. I was going to try and walk a few blocks over to the next stop but then the rain came pouring down. I couldn’t see anything and I just got overwhelmed. I guess just the feeling of losing control just was too much to handle.”
He nodded once, but kept his eyes focused in on hers. “Did you call anyone else for help?”
She winced, embarrassed once again. She didn’t have anyone else to call. “No.”
“Just me?” His hand grazing her chin to tilt it upwards to look deep into his eyes again.
Nodding again, his hand drifted to the remnants of her hair that was once a braid. Lingering there at the base of her neck as he spoke again. His voice was barely a whisper, “Why? Dana would have sent a search party after you if you had called her.”
Their eyes found each other again, a magnetism that forced her to keep his eye contact even if she would rather die than look into that sea of blue.
“I didn’t want to call Dana.” She inhaled a deep breath and held it as long as she could before she forced her words out again.
“I wanted you.”
The silence that flooded over the car chilled her more than the rain ever could.
He pulled back his hand from her neck and brought it back to her arm on the center console. Not quite touching her, letting his hand hover just above the damp wool of her jacket. She had seen him make many facial expressions, but the one that occupied his face now was completely new to her.
Anguished. His eyes drawn tightly shut. His mouth pulled into a solemn frown. She had deeply upset him. That feeling made her chest ache like she was crawling through a tunnel of broken glass. Sharp, jagged edges tearing through her skin to her bones.
A deep sigh left his mouth as he turned his direction towards the road once again. Shifting his body straight towards the steering wheel instead of angling towards her. She felt the frigid breeze of rejection coming off him in waves. His knuckles gripping the wheel so hard she could see the strain of his skin against them. “We should probably head out. I texted Dana on the way over, so she knows we’re coming.”
He was right. As always, it seemed. But she didn’t want to move. She wanted to sit here until she could make things better. Say something to relax his features. Do something that could show him that she appreciated him for even helping her to begin with. Even if she felt he regretted it now.
But words wouldn’t come out as he began to pull away from the curb.
She couldn’t see anything in any direction. The wind thrusting the rain against the windshield furiously. The hard pattering of the rain on the glass, it turned her uneasiness into another snarling beast in her belly. What had she said that was so bad? That she wanted him. She had only meant she wanted his company over Dana’s when she was already upset. But maybe he read it differently.
Surely, he knew that she wanted him around? She wanted him in any way she could have him. If that meant that she would always be yearning from him from afar, she was fine with that. At least she could try to be.
The quiet hum of the engine would usually calm her, but not now. The heat of the seats started to feel like she was on fire. She looked over at him once again. His eyebrows still furrowed in a tight line. She glanced down and could see every muscle of his chest outlined through the skintight fabric of his shirt. His arm muscles drawn tight as he drove through the busy downtown streets of Pittsburgh.
Now was not the time to ogle him, but she couldn’t help it. Her hand had a mind of its own as she gently laid it across the console against his bicep.
His eyes looked down pointedly where her hand laid on his bare skin. They flashed back up to meet hers. They looked much darker than they had been before. He must really be angry with her.
“I’m sorry.” She didn’t want him to be upset with her, even though she didn’t really understand why he was.
His eyes softened immediately, his eyebrows finally relaxing to their natural state. Though the look of confusion still lingered.
Shaking his head slightly, “Why are you apologizing, Mel?”
“You seemed upset at something I said.” She said earnestly.
A dark laugh creeped out of his lips, the tone made her shiver even though she felt like she was currently a thousand degrees.
“You think I’m mad because you said you wanted me? Fuck, Mel.”