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Polar Nightmares
His therapist in Pittsburgh had told him once that he thought Jack preferred nights because the darkness was a source of comfort for him, and Jack didn't think he was wrong. He usually wasn't, which was the annoying part about therapy. A lot of people were scared of or disliked the dark, which he understood, but he’d never found it scary, even before he'd started working nights all the time. Jack thought it was a lot worse to see all the shit that was coming his way in the light, in a lot of ways, whether that was mortars or MVAs. All of that meant that this polar night thing Darrow suddenly had going on was just fine with Jack in terms of what he was doing and how he was doing it, but he knew that wasn’t true for most people.
Robby, in particular, had been getting incredibly fucking grumpy. He’d come over to Jack’s apartment after he finished another shift of caring for people who had been injured “running into shit because no one remembers to carry a goddamn flashlight or even just use the flashlight function on their fucking phone”. Jack had fed him huevos rancheros, given him a beer, and let him complain, then sent him off to shower and go to bed. Jack’s own body clock wouldn’t let him sleep for a few hours yet, so he read a book on the couch until he thought he could sleep.
When he went to his bed, he fell asleep easily in the new sheets Robby had given him, but he was also almost immediately dropped into a nightmare. He was back in Afghanistan but it was Sarajevo but it was Iraq. There were IEDs but there were missiles but there was friendly fire from tanks. He smelled burning cloth and hot metal and gasoline. He tasted sand and blood and sweat as he tried to tourniquet everyone and everything. He didn’t have enough supplies, enough time, enough skill. Soldiers were dying and Robby was dying and Diane was dying and neither of them should have been there. No one should ever have been there. He called out for suppressing fire, for more supplies, for anything that would slow the blood and death.
Robby, in particular, had been getting incredibly fucking grumpy. He’d come over to Jack’s apartment after he finished another shift of caring for people who had been injured “running into shit because no one remembers to carry a goddamn flashlight or even just use the flashlight function on their fucking phone”. Jack had fed him huevos rancheros, given him a beer, and let him complain, then sent him off to shower and go to bed. Jack’s own body clock wouldn’t let him sleep for a few hours yet, so he read a book on the couch until he thought he could sleep.
When he went to his bed, he fell asleep easily in the new sheets Robby had given him, but he was also almost immediately dropped into a nightmare. He was back in Afghanistan but it was Sarajevo but it was Iraq. There were IEDs but there were missiles but there was friendly fire from tanks. He smelled burning cloth and hot metal and gasoline. He tasted sand and blood and sweat as he tried to tourniquet everyone and everything. He didn’t have enough supplies, enough time, enough skill. Soldiers were dying and Robby was dying and Diane was dying and neither of them should have been there. No one should ever have been there. He called out for suppressing fire, for more supplies, for anything that would slow the blood and death.
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"Thank you," he said, mostly into Robby's shirt. "I promise not to fall asleep on you. Just needed a hug."
He could hear the little sounds of Robby's body under his ear, steady and alive. The dream had been just a dream. Robby wasn't dead. Diane still was, but Robby wasn't. Jack wasn't.
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"You can sleep if you want to," says Robby, and means it. He feels the moment that Jack relaxes, and his breath hitches before he can stop it. The hug is for Jack's benefit, definitely, but it settles something in Robby's chest, too.
After a moment, he lifts his other hand, brushing his fingers over the back of the hand Jack has reading on his chest.
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"I ought to be used to the nightmares by now," he said, a little bit to himself but also to Robby. "It's not like they're new. And it's not like they're every night anymore. But I just fucking hate it when someone sees me having one. I know it doesn't make any sense. Sam's given me very professional shit about it. But I hate it. I'm sorry if I was an ass."
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"It's only me, man," he says, quietly, tracing his fingers over the back of Jack's hand, the other curled around his shoulder, squeezing gently. But he knows what Jack means -- he can't imagine how he'd have felt if Jack had walked in on him on the floor in paeds. "You went through hell. It'd be weirder if you weren't dreaming about it."
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He felt warm and safe and ... cared for ... and all the adrenaline that had been running through his body was finally gone and he was probably going to fall asleep right here, if he wasn't careful.
"My pulse is finally down," he said, teasingly, since Robby had been checking that almost compulsively the whole time.
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This time, instead of going for Jack's radial pulse, Robby lifts his hand and presses two fingers to Jack's carotid instead, quiet for a moment. Jack is solid and warm against his side, and it's easy to sink into how comfortable it feels.
"You're right," he says, finally. "It has."
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Robby really did seem content to let Jack just fall asleep on him, although they both knew Jack shouldn't let that happen, even if Robby planned to slip out from under Jack as soon as Jack was asleep. Robby's back was not going to forgive either of them for that choice.
"Sam was pushing me on who in this world knows me, good and bad. Freckles and scars, I guess. And that's you, brother. It was Diane, but now it's just you. And for my diligence in acknowledging that, I got to watch you bleed out into the dirt, at least in my mind."
His pulse ticked up a little bit, but not enough that he was worried. Not enough that Robby would be worried.
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He takes his fingers away from Jack's pulse but curls his hand against the side of his neck instead, almost cradling him close for a moment. He'd suspected something like that and, if it's a surprise to hear himself named in the same context as Diane, it doesn't show on his face.
"Nothing happened to me, Jack," he says, quietly. "I'm right here."
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"There is a color that sand turns when there's a lot of blood soaked into it. You can't mistake it for anything else," he said. Robby had seen that color himself. They'd once played a very dark game of Conflict Bingo to try to count how many different ones they'd been in, respectively. No one won that game of Bingo.
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"I remember," he says, and he's not sure that this is the thing that Jack needs to be talking about, right now, but if the thing that he wants to talk about, then Robby's going to listen. The hand on Jack's neck shifts, moving to cup the back of his skull instead.
"You survived though. You're still here, man. You've survived every worst day of your life."
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As it turned out, his libido had not been cremated with his wife. He'd definitely felt a little zing of interest when he and Robby had gotten stuck under the mistletoe and now he felt another one when Robby cradled his head like that. Well, fuck.
"God, there have been some contenders for worst day," he agreed. "None of them have been here, at least."
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"Not yet," he says, but Jack's right. Mostly, life in Darrow has been pretty bearable. More so since Jack walked into Darrow General.
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Those things were annoying, certainly, and he'd been fucking worried about Robby when he'd been a statue, but no one was shooting at Jack every day. He wasn't riding in Humvees hoping no one blew an IED up under his wheels. He wasn't wearing so many pounds of body armor that he had lost weight from all the sweating and bent the St Michael pendant his grandmother had given him that he wore underneath it. He wasn't taking care of pimply teenagers and very carefully not assuring them that they'd see their moms again when he knew they weren't even going to see the next sunrise. He wouldn't lie to them even in that moment.
He wanted to stretch his arm across Robby's chest to his side. He wanted to put his knee up on Robby's leg, even though it was the bad leg. He was not going to do either of those things, but he was going to be glad he was not in his twenties and didn't have such a hair trigger.
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"True on all fronts," says Robby. He's spent time in warzones, but never anywhere like Afghanistan. He doesn't particularly like to think about Jack there, or the state that he must have been in when he came home. "How often do you have the nightmares now?" he asks. The grip he has on Jack's bare shoulder loosens, and he idly trails his fingers up and down his bare arm instead.
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"Not that often anymore," he assured Robby. "Fuck, when I was at Landstuhl and once they shipped me to Brooke for rehab, they had me on the highest allowable clinical dose of promethazine for awhile."
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Jack doesn't pull away, so he keeps up the idle, wandering touch, his other arm still looped around Jack's shoulders, even though part of him wants to slip it around his waist instead.
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"I did," he agreed. "I'm pretty sure I looked like I oughta be a patient instead of a clinician sometimes. Monty pulled me aside ... three times? Four times? To remind me about the hospital's leave policy but I had to keep working, you know. I had to not go home to an empty house and a closet full of her clothes."
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Without even thinking, he turns his head and presses a kiss to Jack's forehead, just below his hairline. He does it, and then he freezes.
"Shit," he says. "I'm sorry."
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Robby turned his head and dropped a gentle kiss on his head and then froze like he hadn't meant to do that. Jack froze too, then relaxed back into Robby's shoulder. He wasn't sure why Robby had done that, but he couldn't mind it. Fuck, he wanted to drop a return kiss on Robby's clothed shoulder, but he wouldn't.
"No worries, man. You're tired. I'm tired," he said, so Robby could have an out if he wanted it.
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It's more than that, and they both know it, but Robby isn't going to push anything on Jack because Jack relaxes back into him and, if that's all that he gets? It's enough. He combs his fingers through the short hair on the back of Jack's head, his fingers going back to trailing against Jack's skin because, somehow, he thinks its settling for them both.
"You ready to try and sleep, or is your brian still too busy?"
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The back of his neck was sensitive for reasons he didn't know, but everyone had their quirks. Having Robby run his fingers through the hair there, along with the kiss and the other fingers on his delt meant even without a hair trigger, he probably needed to get Robby to go back to his own room if Jack didn't want to have some very awkward explaining to do.
"Yeah, I think I can sleep. And you can go back to your room."
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"That's a me ignoring you until you shut the fuck up," says Robby, fondly. Jack suggests that he can go back to his own bed, and Robby realises how little he wants that to happen. Jack might be able to sleep now, but Robby's gotten too comfortable with Jack in his arms and, selfishly, he doesn't want to let go just yet. He breathes in, and lets it out slowly.
"What if I don't want to?"
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"I don't usually have another nightmare in the same night, but if you gotta be a mother hen about this, then you're the big spoon," he said lightly. He honestly didn't think Robby would stay and he certainly wasn't expecting Robby to actually be the big spoon, but that was up to Robby.
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Here's the thing -- if Jack point blank didn't want him to stay, he would have said so. Jack Abbot is many, many things but, in Robby's experience, he's never struggled to make his opinions crystal clear. Still on his back in Jack's bed, Robby looks up at the ceiling for a long moment. His phone (and, therefore, his alarm) is still in the other room, but he'd left the door open on the other side of the bathroom, so he'll hear it, when it goes. He glances at his watch; he's got time to get another couple of hours before he has to get up.
And then there's the fact that, if givent he opportunity, he really does want to stay.
Eventually, he rolls over, close to Jack but not actually touching him, and then he reaches out and touches Jack's hip, fingertips half on the fabric of his shorts and half on bare skin.
"Tell me to fuck off," he says, and hopes against hope that it doesn't happen.
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He shook his head with a little negative noise, because he wasn't going to tell Robby to fuck off.
"We are not fucking talking about this tomorrow," he said firmly. They probably would have to talk about it at some point, but he was just making that clear.
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