2001 AU

[jackabbot]

He’d gotten his orders two weeks ago, but he’d known they were coming down the pipe since September 11. The country was at war again and war meant casualties. Casualties meant medics and that meant deployment orders for one Sergeant Jack Abbot among countless others. He’d been given a week of preparation leave, which he was supposed to use to go visit his family and wrap things up, but there wasn’t a lot of family he wanted to visit and not much to wrap up. He didn’t even have a dog.

Instead he booked a flight to Seattle. If anyone asked, he said it was because Seattle was cold and rainy and he thought he was going to be short on cold and rain for a while, or at least rain. Afghanistan and Iraq could get really fucking cold in the winter. He knew that from the stories people told about the Gulf War. He ought to call it the first Gulf War now, he guessed.

He’d actually chosen Seattle because he’d texted Robby “just to check in” as soon as he’d gotten his orders and Robby had mentioned that he’d be at the ACEP annual assembly in Seattle this week. They’d seen each other several times after Jack’s first trip to New Orleans, but then he’d PCSed from Polk and their relationship had dwindled to text messages and emails, all of which were carefully written so that he was friendly but not too friendly, in case anyone ever saw something. Even still, if Jack was going to the other side of the planet and potentially (maybe even probably) not coming back, he wanted to see Robby again. He’d told Robby he’d be visiting Seattle at the same time and just left out the part where he made his travel arrangements after he’d talked to Robby.

He had a room at a hotel near the convention center and its hotels but not too near, and he had arranged to meet Robby in a bar that was between the convention center and Jack’s hotel. They tended to meet in bars since it was a completely public and defensible place to be, even if they didn’t always stay in the bar.

He was sitting in a booth this time instead of on a barstool, turning a beer bottle in his hands and waiting for Robby. He was late. Jack wondered if Robby would actually show or if this whole trip had been a stupid idea.

Comments

[jackabbot]

“Oh, great, more things for me to look out for next time I’m on pecker checker detail,” Jack groused. He fortunately wasn’t on that detail very often anymore since he had made Sergeant, but occasionally everyone had to do it.

“Agreed on both counts. Are you done being a lowly resident and making the big doctor bucks yet?”

He’d sort of lost track of how many years of residency Robby had to do?

[physicianheal]

"I bet you don't have to deal with as many foreign objects in various orifices as I do," he says, mouth twitching into a smile at the look on Jack's face. Under the table, he shifts his foot, nudging it against Jack's.

"R4. Starting to think about where I might want to start applying for Attending positions."

[jackabbot]

“That is true,” Jack agreed. “Those don’t usually come to sick call.”

He smiled slightly when he felt Robby’s foot nudge his. No one would notice so Robby was finding ways to touch him anyway.

“Whoever gets you is getting a hell of a doctor.”

The waitress brought the wings and Robby’s beer and Jack waited for her to walk away.

“I’m at Fort Carson in Colorado, at least for now.”

Robby was probably going to be able to read between the lines, but there was a little more Jack could say without violating OPSEC if he didn’t.

[physicianheal]

"You don't know that. You've never been my patient." He takes a sip of his beer, nodding. "Never been to Colorado," he says, carefully neutral. He's also aware of the news, about everything that's brewing. "I guess you'll be out of the country for a while, anyway." He sets his beer down again. "I'm glad we have a chance to catch up. Really glad."

[jackabbot]

“And I think we should keep it that way,” Jack noted. He’d trust Robby to be his doctor, but he didn’t think either of them would enjoy that for a lot of reasons. For one, if he was ever under Robby’s care, he was in the ER and that just wasn’t a good day for anyone.

He nodded when Robby carefully suggested that Jack would be out of the country.

“I have my orders,” he confirmed. “I went to see my grandma recently. She gave me this just in case.”

He pulled the shiny St Michael medallion out from under his shirt with a fond half-smile. He was Catholic mostly so far as it was on his dog tags, but he also knew Robby would understand wearing a religious item from a grandma.

[physicianheal]

It's under his shirt, but Robby touches his fingers to the Star of David hanging against his chest. The waitress had brought a couple of side plates with the wings and he takes one, mainly to have something to do with his hands.

"How long are you in town?"

[jackabbot]

Jack smiled when Robby touched the pendant Jack knew he was wearing. He tucked the medallion back into his shirt and relaxed back against the booth cushions.

“A couple more days. I told everyone I wanted to go somewhere cold and rainy,” he joked. “And I get to catch up with an old friend too.”

He was pretty sure Robby would know that the second reason was more important than the first but neither of them would say so. Not in public, anyway.

He looked at the plate of wings.

“Did you order those for both of us or just yourself?”

[physicianheal]

"Interesting. I don't fly home until Friday." He nudges the spare side plate towards Jack in answer to his question. "Plenty of time for us to..." He shoots Jack a look, shifting his foot under the table so his ankle is between Jack's. "Catch up."

[jackabbot]

Jack took the plate and then a couple of wings. Robby’s foot was between his in the shadow of the table and neither of them was going to let on. He did squeeze his ankles together to acknowledge it, though.

“Other than this conference you gotta go to,” he corrected, because there was probably some stuff Robby really couldn’t or shouldn’t skip. Jack didn’t want him to get in trouble or have problems with anyone because he’d played hooky.

[physicianheal]

The corner of Robby's mouth twitches at the press of Jack's ankles. He shrugs, eating a wing and, when he's done, he looks up.

"There's a few things I need to go to, but I can definitely blow some of it off. You probably have better things to do than hang around waiting for me, though. Tourist shit."

[jackabbot]

These were good wings and Jack ate another one, then sucked the wing sauce off his thumb. He probably should have used a napkin but whatever. He shrugged.

“There’s some tourist shit I’ll probably go see, but I bet we can work something out in terms of schedules.”

If Robby wanted to spend time with Jack, Jack would make sure he was available, whether that was for a meal or coffee or something else.

[physicianheal]

Robby gets distracted, watching Jack suck on the pad of his thumb like that, and he actually shakes his head a little to get him back on track.

"The rest of my evening tonight is free," he says, reaching for another wing. "And tomorrow, I'm done by five. And then I'm all yours."

Two nights. That's a lot of possibility.

[jackabbot]

"Do you have a roommate at this conference?" Jack asked easily. "Wouldn't wanna disturb them if we want to see if we can find a Saints game on the TV or something. I'm guessing those won't be showing at any of the bars around here."

They had done a lot of not watching Saints games before he'd PCSed, although Jack made sure to always know a few details about the games in case anyone asked him when he went back to Polk.

"I don't have a roommate, obviously."

His hotel was probably not as nice as Robby's, but it was also not a conference hotel. Robby was the one who knew how likely it was for someone to stop him in the lobby "just to catch up", at which point Robby would have to figure out how to explain Jack being next to him.

[physicianheal]

"No roomnate, but I'm staying at the conference hotel, so it's not exactly private," he says. The main concern, obviously is being discreet, for Jack's sake. Robby would quite happily blow it off and spend the whole time in a hotel room, reacquainting himself with the man in front of him.

[jackabbot]

Jack ate another wing and then sucked the sauce off his thumb again. He glanced at Robby as he did, but kept his face neutral. He was teasing Robby and Robby would know that, but no one else was likely to catch it. They were wings. They were messy.

"My hotel room might be better, if only so no one tries to talk to you about some boring presentation you didn't go to but said you would," he agreed. "No minibar, though."

He wasn't staying in the minibar kind of hotel.

[physicianheal]

Jack's doing it on purpose and Robby knows that, but he's also not complaining. There's something intensely hot about knowing that they're talking about whole edging around the whole thing.

"That does sound better. And we can always swing by a liquor store."

[jackabbot]

"And a pharmacy," Jack added. "Forgot to pack a few things."

What he hadn't packed was condoms and lube because he hadn't wanted to presume that Robby was still interested in this. It had been three years, more or less, and Jack had been prepared for Robby to just want to have a meal with an old friend.

"You seeing anyone seriously?"

He doubted that, since Robby hadn't seemed like the type to be seeing someone seriously and flirting with someone else, but it was worth asking. Jack had continued to be seen with women the entire time he'd been going to New Orleans on a regular basis, but that was self-preservation and every single one of those women had known it.

[physicianheal]

"I bet you did."

Robby shifts down in his seat a little. He's tall enough that, when he does that, he can lift his foot, the toe of his boot coming up to rest against the bench between Jack's legs under cover of the table.

He shakes his head.

"Been a few here and there, but nothing serious. I get bored quick."

[jackabbot]

They were definitely playing footsie now and Jack was amused at how Robby made it look like he was just slouching a little. He nodded when Robby confirmed he wasn't seeing anyone, though.

"I was seeing someone, but she decided it'd be better if we split up as soon as I got the news."

He'd been hurt by that, but he'd respected it. She hadn't wanted to date a deployed soldier and that was fair. There was a reason Dear John letters were a thing everyone knew about it. It was probably nicer that she'd told him upfront instead of him hearing about it downrange.

[physicianheal]

Jack doesn't immediately knock his foot away so Robby leaves it where it is. The idea that it's stopping Jack from closing his legs sends a shiver of heat through him.

"I'm sorry, man. That sucks."

Jack doesn't strike him as the kind of guy who'd be here if he had a girlfriend, so Robby supposes that he ought to be grateful that she tapped out. Even if he does hate the thought of Jack deploying to somewhere like Afghanistan.

[jackabbot]

"It did," he agreed with a shrug after he ate another wing ... and sucked the wing sauce off his finger. He wasn't doing it every wing because that would be too obvious, but he definitely wasn't using a napkin as much as he could have.

"But I don't blame her. She wanted someone who was actually around, not on the other end of a really bad phone line for however long it is. And that's assuming I actually come back."

He wasn't being defeatist. He was being realistic. It was a war. People died. Medics died. She didn't want a boyfriend who might come home in a coffin.

[physicianheal]

Jack's doing it on purpose and Robby knows he is, but that doesn't stop him feeling like he's going to go out of his mind every time Jack sucks on one of his own fingers. He doesn't, though. He settles for shifting his foot beneath the table, nudging Jack's legs a little further apart, his expression carefully blank as he does.

Robby's an emergency physician. He knows that people die. Soldiers die. He still doesn't like thinking about it.

"I could do that," he says. "The bad phone line, I mean."

It feels like a big admission.

[jackabbot]

Jack wasn't exactly sure what Robby was going for with this game of footsie but hopefully he wasn't about to get kicked in the balls. That would not turn the evening in a good direction.

"That'd be nice," he agreed. As far as he knew, the phone booths were like the shower booths -- private only so far -- but he wasn't likely to be saying anything that an old friend wouldn't say anyway.

"Don't feel obligated, though. The time zone differences aren't great and I know you prefer day shifts.

[physicianheal]

"Let me figure that part out," he says. Honestly, he'll put up with a little sleep deprivation if it means he gets to talk to Jack regularly while he's gone. He sips his beer.

"What about email?"

[jackabbot]

"In theory," Jack shrugged. Robby had been in a war zone. He knew that theory and reality when it came to all of that shit was not the same thing. However, Jack was supposed to have email access, at least for official shit, and he'd heard that no one looked at anyone funny if they logged into a personal email account now and then on an official computer. It meant it went through various filters and who knew what desk jockey was going to be reading it, but it was there. "You gonna send me some fucking e-cards or something?"

There was one wing left and he motioned to it.

"All yours, man, if you want it."