(here is prelude again, and I’m gonna go ahead and slap a big ol trigger warning on this one: tw: miscarriage. sorry folks, this is the soap opera AU.)
It’s generally considered that the nightmare scenario for a dispatcher is to take a call in which a friend or family member is involved, but John’s got three brothers in three separate lines of emergency service, and it’s not that big a city. He’s pretty sure if he worked it out, he’d find he routes a call to one or the other of them at least once a week, and this is compounded by the fact that he hears about it, any time one of his colleagues dispatches one of the Tracy brood for whatever reason. John and his brothers are halfway to being city mascots, by this point.
It’s probably because he and his brothers are almost city mascots, and that John’s already a senior dispatcher despite being in the younger half of the crew, and because John hasn’t frozen on a call in years that his supervisor stands him down immediately.
It’s probably mostly the latter.
It’s a minor miracle that John’s here. She so easily could’ve been alone.
Gordon’s feeling good as he saunters the half-block down to Penny’s cafe.
His shift had ended on time, and for once Gordon finished it in the same uniform he started with. The worst thing on the call sheet today had been a badly broken arm, another eight year old learning the hard way that he couldn’t fly. But he’d been so hopped up on excitement and the attention that he’d laughed at Gordon’s weak jokes as he gently probed the break and set the temporary inflatable cast onto his arm to prepare him for transport.
No gruesome car wrecks, no suicides, nothing that made Gordon grieve for humanity. He’d even gotten to pat a puppy waiting at the bus stop.
He couldn’t wait to tell Penny about the puppy. It had been so tiny.
He’s grinning as the bell above the door chimed, the place mostly empty in the lull between the lunchtime rush and post-school surge. Gordon waves at Moffie where she’s clearing a table. He frowns and rushes forward as she fumbles the greasy plates and almost drops them. “Gordon,” she breathes, eyes wide, cheeks pale. “What are you doing here?”
Gordon placed the mug he’d caught back on the table. “Meeting Penny,” he said. True, it had been a while, but that’s why he was looking forward to this afternoon’s date before he had to head back and take a spell sitting with Grandma. He glances back at the kitchen door. “Where’s Penny?”
Gordon knew he shouldn’t, he might get Penny in trouble, but some instinct had him striding for the swinging doors that separated cafe from kitchen. The transition from warm and homey cafe to industrial kitchen was immediate, the lights in here a blue-white, flickering fluorescence that flattened shadows and turned the giant bloodstain Miss Edmunds was scrubbing off the tiles an earthy, dirty brown.
Gordon was too familiar with blood in all its stages, wet or dry or curdled, to allow himself the illusion that this was just a dropped pot of gravy. “Miss E?” he asks, his hand gripping the cool metal edge of the prep bench hard enough to dig in against his knuckles.
He hadn’t heard the door swing again, but Moffie’s there, smelling of stale coffee and the faintest edge of blood as she hugs him. “Gordon,” Miss Edmunds says, taking his hand. She’s stripped her rubber gloves, but her fingers are still blood-warm from the bucket of hot, soapy water by her feet. “I’m sorry, we didn’t have your number. It’s Penny.”
He doesn’t remember sitting down, but between one blink and the next he’s been slotted in the back booth, a large mug of sweet tea in front of him. Behind the counter, Moffie is finalizing her register, already in her coat, as next to her Miss E. is packing up some leftovers into a takeaway box.
Gordon still feels a bit woozy as he levers himself off the worn upholstery. “I really need….which hospital did they say?”
Moffie takes the bag from Miss Edmunds and starts shooing Gordon towards the door. Gordon only starts moving when she says the magic word. “I have a car.” Her tone indicates she already has a plan. “You can navigate.”
His fingers twitch to flick a non-existent switch for lights and sirens he’d left behind with his other ride. Moffie drove like a paramedic anyway, fast and smooth, weaving in and out of traffic like it was her birthright. She didn’t try to talk, and for that Gordon was grateful.
The lot by the hospital was packed, visiting hours in full swing, but Moffie snaked a spot from a waiting driver without a backwards glance. Ignoring the glares, they strode together through the entrance and into reception. Gordon’s still in his uniform, his ID clipped onto his pocket. “I need to find a recent admission, Creighton-Ward?” he asks the charge nurse. He knows all the staff by the emergency entrance, but he manages to smile like they know each other too anyway. “Brought in this afternoon by some of my colleagues?”
The combination of uniform and smile get a room number out of her regardless of family visitation protocols.
Moffie shifts her bags to her other hand to twine her fingers with Gordon’s as they are crushed together in the packed elevator.
Gordon takes a deep breath as the bell dings and the doors slide open.
Rent Day Blues 