Chapter Text
Heather Collins had always been a smart woman. She’d consistently achieved the highest grades all throughout her education and despite being doubted, she had attended a prestigious college and ended up in med school.
During her first day as a resident at the Emergency Deparment of Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital, she had vowed to gain the favour of her seniors and show off her hard work.
So of course, she had been a smart woman, to end up a doctor, but she had felt so incredibly stupid when she had first met Frank Langdon. The young doctor had been a hurricane - with his big blue eyes and intelligent quips, he’d quickly taken over the hearts of every doctor and nurse in the ED.
When she first met him, she could tell he was starved; he hung off every word from any and every staff member that spared him a second, drinking in every drop of knowledge offered like it might disappear if he didn’t memorise it fast enough. And he never made the same mistake twice.
She’d disliked him at first. He was too sharp and stubborn, he approached every task with the intent of acing it like he always had something to prove. They’d bounced off one another, her with her incessant competence and him with his obnoxious adaptability. One too many nights spent together studying smoothed out their rougher edges, leaving them closer than they could’ve anticipated despite their blaring differences.
So yeah, all in all, Heather Collins was a smart woman. But looking at Frank Langdon now made her feel stupid like it did four years ago when they’d first met.
She didn’t know the exact details of what had happened ten moths ago, but when she came back he wasn’t there. She’d heard the rumours - he was using, he’d left after a big fight with Robby, who avoided mentioning him like the plague.
When Heather first saw him that morning, ten months later, lingering quietly in the shadows, hoping to not be seen, she almost hadn’t recognised him. He carried himelf with an awkwardness that felt so wrong on him.
His smile felt as hollow as he looked; the scrubs that he’d filled out now hung losely on his frame. His blue eyes were dull and framed by deep eyebags that weren’t there when he left. For not the first time since Frank came back that morning, she wondered how it had all gone so wrong so quickly.
She hadn’t tried to approach him yet. Her morning was full of cases, from a teenage girl who’d tried to self-abort her baby to a man who’d gotten into a severe motorbike crash. Frank, who for some strange reason was working in triage with Donahue, hadn’t crossed her sight since she’d last seen him hovering by the hub. If the murmurs about the waiting room being more empty than ever held any truth, then he must’ve been keeping pretty busy too, even though she wondered why he, one of the most brilliant doctors she knew, wasn’t working alongside her.
When, during her break, she hears him talk to Robby, she understands.
Heather hadn’t meant to eavesdrop on the two of them, she’d never done it before despite their odd dynamic always intriguing her.
“Robby, listen, can’t I- can’t I work here?” She heard Frank’s quivering voice.
She’d never heard it waver once while at work, not even when he used to get lectured by Robby years ago, when the two of them stood shoulder to shoulder and snickered at Robby’s chiding after bantering in front of patients.
“Dr Langdon. Is triage not busy enough?”
Robby sounded all wrong - she’d never once heard him speak with this tone to anyone, especially not Frank. Judging by the rumours, triage had never been this empty, so what was Robby talking about?
“No, it is. I, uh…” Heather strained to hear Frank’s voice as it trailed off.
Robby sighed.
Heather frowned. Robby knew how highly Frank thought of him, how desperately he desired Robby’s praise and yet Robby had still decided to put a wall between them. She’d seen the way Frank had been throwing himself at that wall since that morning. Whether he knew the wall was there and tried hopelessly to break it anyway, she wasn’t sure.
It was all too much like years ago, when they’d just started and Frank had done the same thing with Jack Abbot. He’d almost ruined himself trying to break these walls. She hadn’t been sure back then either.
She heard Frank’s sharp intake of breath. When he next spoke, she could hear the frown in his voice.
“Robby, I’m- please, I’m sorry, man.”
She didn't know what exactly Frank was begging for. She just knew she didn't like it when he sounded like this.
“Then do better.”
For a second, Heather thought she may have misheard. Robby wouldn’t- Robby would never speak to anyone like that. But then again, Frank was never just ‘anyone’ to him.
As a set of footsteps receded, the door to the break room swung open, then shut and Heather almost jumped back when she came face to face with the person she’s been wanting to talk to all morning.
Big blue eyes met her own dark ones.
“Frank,” she said.
She watched him as he picked up fragments of himself and placed them together, a little disjointed.
“Heather,” he greeted in return. “How much- how much of that did you hear?”
His eyes darted around as he licked his lips nervously. She tried to catch his eyes, but he seemed very happy to not make eye contact.
“Frank,” she said again, softly, but there was a frown on her face.
Finally, he met her gaze and almost flinched back, looking back down at the floor.
“He’s right,” he said. “He’s right.”
“No, he isn’t. And for the record, that doesn’t give him the excuse to talk to you like that.” She said, a weird urgency in her voice. She didn’t know she was capable of it, but she needed her friend to understand. “You know that he can be a real asshole when he wants to be.”
“Don’t,” he said, even though they both knew the truth, and if Heather didn’t know better, she would think that he was pleading. “Don’t say that about him.”
Frank leaned against the door, back curled into himself. He tilted his head back, where it hit the door with a loud thump.
“If you let him say this to you, what else will you let him say? What else will you let him do?” She prodded gently as she tried to find his eyes again. An uneasy feeling crept up her chest when he paused.
He raised his arms and dug the heels of his hands into his eyes.
“Anything,” he whispered, “Anything.”
Heather was a smart woman, always had been, but looking at her friend hurting like this made her feel so stupid.