Chapter Text
One medical intern and one fourth year medical student in his prac are not, maybe, a roommate match in heaven. The hours are pretty terrible, the pay is nearly nothing, and there’s an endless supply of ridiculous drama between their shared coworkers.
The upside of all that is this: Trinity and Dennis learn the messy parts of each other first.
He has recently-unhoused-person hygiene practices. His towel is too small and he leaves water drops in a path from his room to the bathroom every morning. She screams in her sleep. She has a violent intolerance for anyone before 12am.
She likes reality TV and she likes to watch it on her laptop on the couch. He likes to watch reality TV from the kitchen while he’s “cooking” except he gets so distracted by her screen that his ramen noodles overboiled once.
She does tai chi on their tiny balcony. He meditates out there. Neither activity gives either of them much peace of mind, as evidenced by their mutual penchant for straight liquor when the team goes out drinking on the weekend occasionally.
Trinity learns that Dennis is a pretty decent roommate, actually. He’s a nerd who likes embarrassing eighties music and enjoys disco and dancing in his socks. He always offers her a portion of what he’s cooking even though its nutritional content remains pretty firmly zero. He sticks to his room unless she signals to him that she wouldn’t mind company.
Sometimes, when their day shifts in the ER line up, they smoke from Trinity’s stash afterwards. She rolls while he picks up takeout from the chinese place down the road, and then she runs him through what he misses from Perlah and Princess (the chismosas) while he goes over the latest from Robby and sometimes Abbott (the white men).
On the more summery days, they squeeze together on the balcony and she paints her toenails while he sits and reads a banged-up paperback that’s been taking him two months to work through.
“Are you sure it’s okay for me to be here,” Dennis asks, the third time they share a spliff. His eyes are red-rimmed but they always kinda are, so Trinity doesn’t think she did anything to warrant how watery his tone is.
“Dude, I already gave you the place,” she responds, irritated. “And it’s been, like, two months.”
“Okay, but, it’s only that, um.” He hesitates, and she wants him to reconsider, but he stumbles forward regardless. “You sound scared, at night, and, like, I don’t want to make things… worse for you?”
Trinity blows a cloud of stinging smoke at his face in sharp rebuke. “You don’t make things worse,” she tells him unkindly. “Sorry someone’s told you that before, or whatever.”
Dennis scowls at her. “You’re a dick sometimes.”
Trinity smiles her first real smile with him, and hands him the joint. “I know,” she says. “I’m not scared of you, Huckleberry.”
Dennis rolls his eyes at the nickname, and coughs pathetically on his inhale. “It was one of my brothers, for your information. And my mom, once or twice.”
Trinity laughs, and he’s laughing too, at how well they know each other now, and how easy this is, and she thinks maybe they’re going to be great roommates, actually.
Little Javadi doesn’t seem to totally know how to interact with people, but that’s okay, Trinity Santos is on the case. She’s great at provoking a reaction - she always has been, it’s easy! What she’s not so skilled at is making sure the reaction is positive.
“Stop calling me Crash,” Javadi tells her sternly for the whole first week they share shifts.
“No, why,” Trinity whines, then offers, “What if I let you call me scalpel? We could match.”
Javadi scowls, and Trinity can hear Dana laughing a little bit from behind the office dock. “It’s not funny if you give me the joke,” she hisses.
Trinity sighs dramatically. “Well, I’ve always believed in giving to those less fortunate than me,” she starts, solemn, “and it’s not such a burden to share my comedy skills when I have just - so - much - of it- hey - Crash!” Halfway through her declaration, Javadi starts whacking at Trinity with her clipboard.
Dana is definitely laughing, now, but Dr Robby calls out across the room - “Ladies, that’s enough. What is this, a zoo? Javadi with me now please.”
Javadi’s arms shoot to her sides, the clipboard whacking against her leg, and she makes a little noise of alarm like meep!
Her big doe eyes shoot sideways to Trinity, like help! or maybe like, fuck you! Knowing Javadi it is probably more of the latter, but Javadi’s default expression is almost always some variation of dismay or shock, so Trinity pretends she doesn’t know better and shoves lightly at the other woman’s shoulder.
“Ignore him. You just got here. Jessie’s had his phone in his hand for five minutes and nobody said shit about that. Ignore him, seriously. Go kill ‘em, tiger,” she says, and Javadi’s face wavers strangely, like she’s touched but doesn’t want to show Trinity that.
“Yeah,” she agrees breathlessly. “Um, yeah. Kill… ‘em. Sorry, Doctor Robby! Coming!”
Trinity snickers as she watches Javadi speed off, but she can feel Dana’s gaze lying heavy across her collarbones.
“Careful, Doctor Santos.”
Trinity spins to face Dana, smiling her most guileless smile. “Hm?”
Dana raises an unimpressed eyebrow. “She’s a student, Santos. She’s here to listen to the doctors; you know that.”
Trinity nods in agreement, says an unapologetic sorry, and picks a case off the list to start with for the morning. Unintentionally, though, Trinity finds that her eyes keep seeking out Javadi with Robby at a patient’s side until she’s picked up by McKay a few hours later, and then Trinity can relax a bit more.
She can’t help it.
The first and most lasting impression Doctor Robby made on Trinity was when he reported a desperate mother for drugging her piece of shit husband, and told her to the forget about the likely-molested kid left in the crossfire.
Trinity is not a forgetful person.
Also, incidentally, she is also not a forgiving person. If she ever was, it was beaten out of her so long ago that she can’t remember it.
Back on her first day in the Pitt, when Trinity noticed that Langdon was stealing and taking medication, she also noticed something else. She noticed that he was Doctor Robby’s favourite. She noticed that nobody except Samira even acknowledged the Langdon-shouting incident, which meant everyone around her either agreed that Trinity is stupid and arrogant (which she later categorically disproved vis-a-vis REBOA) or that everybody else simply… followed Doctor Robby’s cue when it came to these things. Like calling Mahan Slo-Mo.
Trinity was never not going to report Langdon. He was a doctor and he was stealing from his own patients and, fuck, he was using. How many patients suffered because he stole medicine from them? How many people did he hurt through poor bedside manner, or needless physicality, or too-tight stitches?
Christ, it’s not even the first time Trinity’s blown the whistle on something that she knew would blow up on her.
She could see the explosion coming but she was never not going to report Langdon, so she could try and at least minimise the fallout: “I didn’t want to get anyone in trouble,” Trinity tells Robby afterwards, hoping she looks authentically remorseful enough when she wrings her hands, making her voice a little soft. Robby smiles at her like she’s a kid so it must work.
It’s a lie, obviously.
She never wants to see Langdon again; hopes he loses his license like he would if he wasn’t a white and well-liked man in his early thirties. Imagine that.
Imagine that, a doctor pocketing half the pills in a prescription, re-sealing bottles of benzodiazepines, falsifying records and compromising medical standards… placed on leave. Temporary. Conditional. Undisclosed.
Nobody at the Pitt knows what happened between Langdon and Trinity and Robby. They know something happened, and that’s enough for conclusions to be drawn, and those conditions are wrong, because nothing has been disclosed.
Nothing has been reported, so nothing is going to happen to Langdon.
Lying, shouting, stealing, using, white man Frank Langdon will get off free.
Just like they always do.
Mel brings her sister to work, sometimes.
Trinity fucking loves those days.
“What’s up, Becca, my g?”
Becca turns the full force of her smile onto Trinity, shifting her shoulders and nearly dislodging Mel from where Trinity’s coworker has been trying to wrestle Becca’s jacket onto her.
“Hi, Doctor Santos!”
Trinity holds out her fist for bumping and Becca obliges, avoiding Mel’s immediate spluttering.
“Becca,” Mel sighs, “Please put your cardigan back on? You will be cold in five minutes.”
“I am not cold right now,” Becca informs her sister primly.
Trinity grins. This is why she loves days that Becca visits. Absolutely nobody’s attitude phases Mel, but Becca’s comes closest, and it’s a thing of beauty to witness.
Trinity hops up onto the desk surface next to Mel, which makes Becca gasp in conspiratorial joy because she knows it’s not allowed. Mel nudges at Trinity’s thigh in reprimand, but Trinity winks at Becca (who claps in delight) and doesn’t move.
“What’s on the agenda today, ladies?”
Mel hums, tilts her head to the side in that way she has when she’s thinking multiple things at once.
Trinity, breaking rules on her desk; Becca, still not wearing the cardigan; the work in front of her; the question Trinity asked.
Trinity gives Mel a second and kicks her feet back and forth, sticking her tongue out at Becca, who giggles.
“The agenda,” Mel says, system rebooted. “I need to finish these notes, and then Becca and I are headed to the movies.”
“Ooh, the movies,” Trinity says in appreciation. “Very classy. I’ve been meaning to drag Whitaker with me; I want to take him to Final Destination: Bloodline but say it’s a romcom and see how long it takes him to figure it out.”
“I do not think Whitaker would like that,” Mel informs her, and Trinity shrugs.
“No, he will.”
“He hates horror movies,” Mel says firmly.
Trinity leans in close to Mel’s face, leaning over Mel’s keyboard to do so. “But he loves to complain about me.” She grins, leans back to give Mel space, and slides off the desk. “He’d be bored without me!”
Mel is smiling, when Trinity looks down at her. “Yes, we all would be,” Mel agrees after a moment, and Trinity can’t help the little thrill of delight she feels at that. Mel’s one of those people who are both always honest and never mince their words - so Trinity knows she means that, and she also knows there’s no hidden meaning.
It’s why she loves talking with Mel. Mel doesn’t play any games because she’s not aware that’s even a function of language.
“We will not be watching Final Destination: Bloodlines,” Becca interjects. “They are doing a showing of Blue Planet.”
“Sick,” Trinity tells her. “Your pick, Becky G?”
Becca rolls her eyes exaggeratedly. “No,” she answers, “Mel likes to watch David Attenborough. She thinks he has a calming voice.”
Trinity bursts out laughing while Mel splutters: “Hey! He does, but I didn’t say it like that!”
Trinity reaches out, waits for Becca to bump their fists together again. “Sure thing, Doctor King.” The rhyme makes Mel smile, while Becca says yes you did say it like that, Mellie, I heard you.
“Hey, Doctor Santos,” Mel says abruptly after a moment, “Your, um… your shift ends soon too, right?”
“Yeah,” Trinity answers. “I’d offer to finish your notes for you, but I can’t remember the last hour of this shift, honestly.”
“Hm, concerning,” Mel says lightly, “I wasn’t going to ask you to do that.”
“No, I know,” Trinity reassures, and Becca tugs on her sleeve.
“You should come with us to the movie,” she suggests. She tilts her head towards Mel and says, “She takes too long to ask.”
Trinity laughs. “Oh, that’s okay, I’m no gatecrasher.”
She glances nervously at Mel, looking for an exit, hello, abrupt change to routine probably not ideal for your afternoon, help?
Mel stares evenly back, curious.
Oh.
Wait, really?
“You should come, it’ll be fun,” Becca says firmly.
Trinity waits another half beat, but Mel doesn’t say anything, and Trinity doesn’t have plans, she never really has plans, so she says, “Um, that’d be… fun, actually. Yeah, I’ll come.”
Becca beams and claps her hands. Mel’s smile is less toothy but still there.
Right before walking into the documentary screening, Trinity slips off to the bathroom and takes half a weed gummy to avoid feeling claustrophobic when the lights go down.
Mel keeps up a running commentary the entire movie, little exclamations of “god, how amazing,” and “did you know that, Becca?” and every animal-assorted fact she knows. Becca responds to this with furious shushing. Unbelievably, this appears to have no affect whatsoever on Mel’s level of enthusiasm. Also, she sighs more dreamily than can be denied at certain inflictions of David Attenborough’s tone. Becca leans around Mel’s body to send Trinity an incredulous look, like, do you hear this shit? See what I mean?
Trinity nods solemnly back. I see it, girl.
It’s the first time in years that she manages to sit in a cinema without compulsively checking the seats behind her every few minutes, feeling phantom hands on her shoulder, phantom breath on her neck.
There’s a big fat plant of resentment that sprouts in her chest, during the early weeks after her first shift in the Pitt.
People eye her sideways for Langdon’s disappearance, because he very much vocalised his displeasure with her before mysteriously vanishing from the ER, and there’s plenty of conclusions that people draw. The most natural of these conclusions is of course that Langdon disappeared to punish him for how he treated Trinity, and it’s nice of Doctor Robby to listen to women and all, and to be sensitive like that, but one bad day does not a bad man make, and we all know Langdon is no bad man.
All this Trinity hears and pretends not to hear, while the nurses sidestep her in the hallways and the surgeons exchange snide glances from behind their masks.
Trinity doesn’t know which of her working theories are correct: that Robby didn’t report Langdon because he truly has a personal interest in Langdon’s success, or that he has a professional interest in his own. The first theory hinges on Robby’s biases and preferences being a little more devotional than Trinity would’ve guessed, so she’s leaning more towards her second theory — Robby won’t report Langdon because his head would be placed right next to Langdon’s on the chopping block.
Theory one: Generous Doctor Robby, considerate Doctor Robby.
Doctor Robby who pulled her aside on her very first day in the ER to unsubtly convey that someone had complained about her, and who else would have complained about her on her very-first-fucking-day except her supervisor? The supervisor who screamed so loudly at Trinity that she had to count seven-four-eight in her head to keep her breathing steady. Nobody checked in on her after that except for Mohan, but she did later get reprimanded for not meshing well enough with the team. Whatever that even means, barely ten hours into the first shift in a new emergency room.
Theory two: Medicinal theft and treating patients high is kind of a giant fucking deal, not only for the resident but for the supervisor. Obviously.
Robby listened to her about Langdon, sure. After ransacking Langdon’s locker and running the data checks and finding himself newly complicit in theft and forgery, yeah, of course he had to listen to her about Langdon. If Trinity was right, and she knew from the fucking start that she was right, she’d have kept going, over his head like she’d already done with Dana and Garcia. Robby had no stake in that little girl’s safety at home, though, so she got thrown to the wolves while her mother got reported to the police.
Nobody saved Trinity back when she needed it most, either. She’s learned from it. She reports Langdon, and she apologises for it to Robby. She asks Ahmed to just stand for a second outside a patient’s door while she grabs something, and she leans in close to that patient and deals with the problem herself.
Any patient after that, she goes to McKay first if she can. She thinks McKay is one of the realest bitches she’s ever met - the ankle bracelet is hardcore. Also, she called the cops on a kid who was planning femicide and vagueposting about holy damnation. She dealt with the problem. Trinity has held nothing but admiration for McKay ever since she heard about the stand-off between McKay and the apparently incel-sympathetic Robby — no, no, that’s too mean, Trinity knows that’s not who he is, but come on. Nobody but a man or his mother could’ve looked at that kid and thought victim before active threat.
Dana. Princess, Collins. Abbott or Jessie or Ellis in a pinch, if they’re available. Kiara as a last resort or if she’s required to. Robby as a never resort. Trinity talks to them all and listens to them all and respects them all, but if she has a patient who she thinks is in danger, if that patient is a woman or a child, Trinity never once considers going to Robby again.
She knows he won’t notice because her mother still asks her to come home, every Christmas and Easter. Her mom’s sober now, has been for over a decade. She goes to AA meetings every week. Trinity’s twin brothers are twelve years old and have no memory of Trinity’s gymnastics career or the uncle who used to live with them.
They don’t have memory of Trinity really, either. She moved out as soon as she turned eighteen with a full-ride sport scholarship, back when they were three or four and almost entirely in their dad’s care. Trinity’s mom only managed to win split custody after the whole sobriety thing kicked in, and everything for Trinity had already crashed and burned by then: the court case, the gymnastics career, the scholarship, the friends and the parties and the pills.
Trinity stayed in university, cashed in some very meagre checks, and changed paths to medicine. Her mother won split custody of her other kids and moved into a house with one less bedroom and one less uncle. It’s like the first seventeen years of Trinity’s life have been paved over. Even the photos all disappeared one day.
If Trinity did go home for those Christmases, for an Easter, she imagines how it would feel; she’d look like a mistake. She’d stick out like a sore thumb. An eyesore.
Trinity tells her mom she’ll try and make it another year.
She’s said that every year since 2016, and every year, her mom still calls and asks. Trinity listens to the updates about the little brothers who have no memory of Trinity’s shoddy attempts at dinner via microwave mac’n’cheese. Her mom never asks her anything about her life - she doesn’t really want to know. It was all good news with Trinity, good student, good athlete, something special, something to watch; then it had been bad, bad, bad.
Once a year, Trinity answers the phone and finds an excuse that lets her join in on this game of charade, pretending she won’t come home because of work or cramps or whatever, instead of the truth. The truth of course that Trinity kind of hates her mom, and hates that she loves her mom, that Trinity sometimes even hates those well-loved brothers of hers.
Most of all Trinity hates that it was her mother who enrolled Trinity in the sport her brother coached, who watched through an alcoholic haze as it took over Trinity’s life and then let her brother move into the house and take over that too, and now they just never fucking speak about it.
As though it wasn’t the entire structure of Trinity’s entire foundational life, as though she didn’t set it all alight the night that Audrey died.
They just never fucking talking about it. Sorry, mom, I’m working that weekend. Yeah, next year, for sure. I’ll call. I’ll try to call. I’ll see if I can call. Say hi to the boys for me.
That feeling, the one she gets on the phone looking for an excuse and despising that she can’t just be honest and mean, that’s kind of how it feels when she sees Kiara and Robby at work.
Dennis sticks his feet in her lap sometimes when they watch their shows.
They figured out the ideal set up on the third month of cohabitation: They each stick their legs straight out on either end of the single coach, and then slot their knees together so they can both slouch. It’s not a very big couch, and this position means that if one of them needs to get up, it always involves a fumble, and an elbow or two in an unfortunate few places, and disgruntled spluttering.
The laptop goes onto the coffee table (ikea, $15) and each of them gets a plate wedged between their knees and chest. Trinity thrifted a wok and she likes to make big dishes of stir fries and risotto, steamed vegetables, things that are warm in their laps.
When Dennis cooks it’s nachos, or $2 ramen, or fish fingers one time which was an affront to Trinity’s senses frankly.
He’s an incredible baker, though. Pies, of all varieties. Cookies, the weird vaguely Amish-coded ones. Oatmeal. Pumpkin. Cornflake. Brownies, upon her request. They make edibles a few times and, one time, nearly have a joint heart attack when Jack Abbott catches them on their way out of their shift already pulling out the chunk they’d salvaged for their walk home.
“Whitaker! Did you bake that?”
“Um,” says Dennis, getting that deer-in-the-headlights look that he specialised in. “Yes…?”
Abbott crows in delight and claps his hands. “No way! Robby told me you baked a few things last month - can I try? Gimme,” he says eagerly, and reaches out a hand for the edible.
Trinity’s pulse stutters for a second and she glances at Dennis, hoping she’s giving off vibes that said BE COOL but also DO NOT GIVE HIM THE FUCKING EDIBLE.
“Yes for sure,” Dennis manages, and holds out the ugly, chunky brownie, and then - wow. Drops the entire brownie onto the ground. Belatedly, he stumbles forward a little, so his foot nudges into and over the fallen chunk. Trinity notices, with a quiet sense of amazement, that Dennis’s battered sneakers appear to be splattered in blood, despite the protective layers used in the bays. “Oh, no,” says Dennis faintly, and then, “Oh my god, Dr Abbot, I am so sorry! It’s been a really long shift. I’m, uh. hungry. I… guess.”
Abbot sighs mournfully. “Man. I was so pumped for that. I hope you left some in the break room?”
“Ha ha yeah totally I think so,” Trinity agrees quickly, raising her eyebrows at Dennis like TIME TO GO! She feels like a teenager again. The good times teenager, not the rest. She grabs at Dennis’s arm. “Gotta go Doctor Abbott have a good shift!”
“I’ll make a fresh batch, Doctor Abbot!” Dennis promises, calling over his shoulder as Trinity hustles him away, leaving a bemused Jack Abbot waving a hand in goodbye.
“People pleaser,” she hisses at him in accusation, gripping his sleeve.
“I didn’t know what to say! What should I have said, Trinity, huh? Yes Doctor Abbot please try this illicit substance - oh my god. Trinity. Stop laughing, Trinity, it’s not fucking funny!”
The thing with Garcia is really good when it’s good.
It’s hot. Garcia is hot, obviously. She’s beautiful and she’s confident and strong.
Fucking somebody smart and intimidating and respected, that’s hot.
Fucking a direct supervisor? Yeah, okay, that’s less defensible and definitely not advisable, but still hot.
They sit on the couch with their knees touching, and watch Black Mirror together. Trinity likes to provide running commentary about her theories and opinions on each episode; Garcia likes to shut her up. Garcia likes to cuddle in bed after they fuck; Trinity gets squirmy after too many gentle touches without some kind of verbal indication on what it signifies.
Garcia asks, “Is your roommate a homophobe?”
Trinity barks out a laugh, and then stares, squinting. “Whitaker?”
Garcia shrugs, crawls back into Trinity’s bed, tugging her into place until they’re spooning. Her arms encircle Trinity, sliding under the divot in Trinity’s waist so Garcia can move both her hands up and down Trinity’s chest. “You only have the one roommate, yes.”
Trinity blinks, tries to focus. Garcia’s fingertips stroke over her shoulders, her collarbones, travelling down to trace her bellybutton and glance at the lining on Trinity’s boxers.
“He’s not homophobic,” Trinity explains, bemused. “He’s just undersocialised. You see him at work, he’s the same there. Farm boy.”
“Mm,” Garcia hums into Trinity’s ear, but her interest has moved on, she doesn’t care about Dennis anymore. It’s not a lie, anyway, Dennis isn’t homophobic. He definitely doesn’t like Garcia, though. Trinity’s just pretending she hasn’t noticed. It’s easier for everyone that way.
One of Garcia’s hands slips into Trinity’s underwear, sliding down, down, down. If she diverts to either side, she’d find Trinity’s scars. They’ve only ever addressed it once: the very first time, when Garcia had paused and said, is this something I need to report? Trinity should have said no, but she’d been so unsteady that she’d said without thinking, Report? We’re not at work, are we? Garcia had scoffed, and shrugged, and kissed Trinity, and that been it.
“Good,” Garcia tells her, her mouth moving closer, hot breath landing on Trinity’s ear before Garcia’s lips press forward in an openmouthed kiss. “Because I want you to be loud.”
Trinity snorts. “Loud and proud, baby,” she snarks, and then breaks into a moan when Garcia manhandles her impatiently into the next position.
Trinity thinks the night shift crew seem cool as fuck. The hours are hell, but somehow every time she interacts with them, the vibe is just… slightly different. Maybe it’s because there aren’t as many assumptions as there are during the daytime. The night shift has different priorities. They’re no-nonsense, level-headed, blunt… Trinity likes the ones she’s familiar with, at least.
Crash thinks her tiktok was viewed by Doctor Shen.
“Look,” she says, shoving her phone under Mel’s nose. They’re standing in the ambulance bay for a five minute non-smoking-smoke-break.
“That does look like him,” Mel offers, squinting slightly. She shrugs at Trinity over Crash’s head, who moans in mortification at the confirmation.
“I don’t think it’s him,” Dennis says dubiously. “That could be any guy.” It’s true, the profile picture doesn’t even really show his face. The man is sitting in a very hipster-adjacent cafe. The walls are faux brick. The table is white. Trinity is making judgements.
“You just think it’s him because of the coffee,” Dennis accuses.
“No,” Javadi insists. “Dennis. Look at his username. Look.” She redirects the phone. Dennis stumbles away from her flinging arm — they’ve all been victims of Javadi’s enthusiasm by this point. Crash is very much here to stay.
Dennis observes the username. “Let me see,” Trinity says, and shoves her way in between Dennis and Javadi, grabbing the phone, bringing it up. @shendog. Trinity clicks on his profile and, yes, that is John Shen, upon closer inspection of his enlarged profile picture.
Javadi, meanwhile, gasps and then shrieks in horror. “Trinity! Oh my god! No! No, did you just click his profile?”
“Yep,” Trinity says, and swipes to his reposts.
“He’ll see that I viewed his page, Santos! I’m going to kill you. Oh my god, I’m going to kill you!”
Trinity dances out of reach of Javadi’s arms, now whirring in rage, and whoops with glee at the first repost she sees from Shen: promo for the next week’s episode of Keeping up with the Kardashians. “Huckleberry,” Trinity calls, now evading Javadi on foot, “Shen’s got even worse TV taste than you do!”
Javadi catches up to Trinity and tackles her for the phone with entirely too much enthusiasm. They both go tumbling to the ground, Trinity whining as though she’s the victim while Javadi snaps at her furiously to act-her-age! Dennis bends over with laughter while Mel hides her own smile behind her hand.
“You would not think this was funny if it was Ellis’s page,” Javadi hisses, helping Trinity up to her feet at she does so.
Trinity gasps, pretending to be scared - then she pauses, as though she’s had a thought. “Hm, should we check? Maybe Shen follows her. I bet she makes unintentional thirst traps.” She makes a grab for the phone, making Javadi scream, and they’re off again across the pavement.
There’s a patient who has cuts down their legs. A patient with a years-old line across their throat. A patient with open wounds along their forearms.
There’s a patient with scars. There’s another patient with scars. There’s another patient with scars. They blur into each other, one after the other, a long line of marred and mutilated bodies.
Maybe half of the young women Trinity sees in surgery have self harm scars. It’s a little humbling. Like, oh, you thought you were special? You thought this was just for you?
She can’t held but let her gaze linger every now and then, a bad habit she can’t kick, sometimes looking and thinking that’s nothing, mine are worse or glad mine are nothing like that. Either thought is bad. One makes her feel like a monster and one makes her feel weak. Both make her feel mean, and disgusting, and deeply ashamed of herself.
Most of the time, that doesn’t happen. Trinity’s a good doctor. She cares, deeply, about every person she sees. Connecting with patients about bits of her life that match theirs and using that connection to help them, that’s not a weakness. Or, this is what Trinity tells herself when Robby tells her to stop overextending and Abbot tells her to disconnect and Garcia tells her to refocus.
There was a time that Trinity had very little control over her life and what she could do in it. That’s not true anymore, and Trinity can do what she wants now, and what she wants to do is help.
She’s only ever tried to help.
Trinity and Dennis go to the zoo.
It’s a weekday in autumn so most kids are in school and adults are at work, meaning that they feel pretty comfortable swearing as loud as they want (Trinity) and taking as much time as possible in each exhibit (Dennis). He’s got sunglasses on, making him look like a dork, and she’s wearing a particular type of uniform: a flannel over a wifebeater with a bleached pair of jorts. Even though it’s not particularly hot, Dennis’s cheeks are sunburned. That boy is white as anything, especially for someone raised on a farm.
“You’re like that meerkat,” Trinity tells him, and then does the same thing for a particularly bedraggled beaver, a tiny hedgehog, and a disoriented baby giraffe.
“Look at the lashes on that little diva,” Trinity says in appreciation. “Seriously, that really is you, Huck. Aw, look, it’s even clumsy like you are! You walk exactly like that on your way to the bathroom when I’m trying to sleep. ”
Dennis no longer blushes at her badgering, and pulls a comically irritated face at her instead. “Yeah and I noticed you never assigned me a predator animal.”
Trinity coos at him, pats his cheek. “I’m not one for non-fiction.”
Dennis glares. “Not true. Haven’t you been trying to read that one book for like, three months? The biography. Julia Fox? It’s been sitting on the table so long that it’s covered in dust.”
Trinity straightens up to glower at him. “Hey! I told you that in confidence!”
“You told me nothing,” Dennis retorts. “I noticed that your bookmark hasn’t moved in weeks.”
“What happens in the apartment is meant to stay in the apartment!”
Dennis rolls his eyes in exasperation. “Who’re the giraffes going to tell? Perlah? Princess?”
Trinity laughs and shoves at him. They watch the few families around them, and a moment passes in silence. That happens, sometimes, when Trinity’s on her own. She’s never had it happen with someone else, though, a moment where she knows they’re both thinking the same thing, feeling the same thing. For just a moment, she lets herself think, that looks so fucking nice, and I wish that was mine and I am so lonely.
Dennis tilts to the side and bumps his shoulder into hers. Trinity bumps back.
“Do you think that Robby’s only nice to me because he thinks I’m stupid?”
Trinity has never once said that to Dennis, and she wouldn’t, because it’s mean. She also doesn’t agree - she thinks Robby is nice to Dennis because Dennis is white and a man and very easy to be nice to. He has one of those faces. He looks perpetually besieged, like a kitten left in the rain to drown in a gutter or something equally tragic. She also thinks Robby is nice to Dennis because Dennis is a good doctor who has the potential to be a great one.
“No! Who the fuck has been saying that to you?”
Dennis shrugs. “Just, I see him interact with Samira sometimes, and… she knows so much more than me, and I really do appreciate all the patience he has for me, but I know I’ve made a lot of mistakes, and…”
Trinity pauses, and thinks. “You’re not stupid. I think Robby has prejudices he’s not aware of, but he’s a good doctor, and so are you, and the fact that he’s mentoring you isn’t something you have to feel bad about.”
“But should I?”
Trinity doesn’t really know how to answer that. She considers suggesting that Dennis talk to Robby himself about his noticeable double standards. She considers telling Dennis that he should stick up for Samira next time.
“Huckleberry, is your issue that Robby is nice to you, or that he’s not always nice to everyone else?”
Dennis scuffs his shoes uncomfortably. “I don’t know. I guess both. It doesn’t feel good to feel like I, um. Get let off easy sometimes. It’s not fair,” Dennis mumbles.
“Aw, is this your first time encountering sexism? Have you heard of racism yet? It’ll blow your mind, farm boy. Come on, Dennis. It’s always like this, all the time. Everything works like this. Anyone who says it isn’t just doesn’t want to admit it.”
Dennis frowns, his lips pulling down lopsidedly. “Do you really believe that?”
Trinity shrugs and looks away awkwardly. People aren’t normally that receptive of her honesty or her worldview, but this feels weirdly pitying. Yes, Dennis, people are inherently bad. How is this news? “I mean, I don’t know. But yeah, pretty much.”
Dennis bumps gently into her shoulder again. They’re quiet for a minute. He doesn’t apologise on behalf of all men or white people, which is at least a relief. She thinks about those twitter celebrity videos from during covid and wonders if she should’ve been nicer or meaner in this conversation.
“Do you really think I’m a good doctor, though?”
Trinity groans. She shoves at his arm, pushes him away from herself. “Yes, you weirdo. Stop watching your coworkers and start focusing on your job, man. Nobody thinks you’re stupid, okay?”
Dennis is grinning at her, and she wants to be annoyed at how quickly the conversation derailed, but maybe it’s just easier like this. He’ll never totally get it, anyway. It’s good that he can at least notice it, but who knows? How many doctors just like Dennis have passed through the ranks on their career journeys, and at what point do they all start acting and thinking the same? Will Dennis one day have a woman on his team who he instinctively writes off, or a person of colour who he talks down to? Statistically, probably yes. Trinity paints her nails next to him and orders Dominoes with him and watches reality shows with him until they fall asleep on the couch, and still, she thinks statistically probably yes.
“We should get ice cream,” she tells him. “I’m bored of these animals.”
“This is really much more of a summer activity,” he agrees, long-suffering. “Can we go somewhere cheap?”
Sometimes, the thing with Garcia doesn’t feel as good.
It’s great to have something casual, and no-strings-attached, except Trinity works with Garcia so it’s never really felt all that stringless.
If she doesn’t hear from Garcia for a few weeks, it’s not like she gets a break from seeing her. Instead of blissful ignorance, she’s wondering if Garcia is with someone else, if she keeps a roster of needy, desperate girls in her phone.
It’s great to have something casual, though!
A relationship isn’t something that Trinity wants, with or without Garcia. She doesn’t need to be monitored or chained down or whatever. She doesn’t want someone to hold her hand and say just tell me what happened, Trinity, because there is so much that has happened and Trinity does not want to talk about any of it. Some version of that talk is inevitable, because she does an okay job of pretending otherwise, but Trinity is maybe not so okay. She’s okay until she thinks about it. It gets noticeable, she knows it does, that’s why Dennis starts watching his tone around her after a few months of living together and it’s why she avoids relationships entirely.
Casual is cool, casual is easy. It would still be nice, though, if Garcia could… like, Trinity knows Garcia knows that Trinity doesn’t like chilli, but every time they share post-fuck ramen, she adds the chilli packet. It’s not that she doesn’t remember, because she’s a great doctor and it’s her job to notice everything. She adds the chilli to remind Trinity that she isn’t owed special considerations, because she is not Garcia’s girlfriend. Which is fine! Except, sometimes, when Trinity has a horrible shift and Garcia’s coming over, she sort of wants to be held instead of fucked.
They do not have the kind of relationship where Trinity feels like she can ask to be held. Garcia does it anyway, though, which makes it all worse - she likes to cuddle after, she even likes to stay the night, which Trinity never lets people do normally, but it’s so nice. It’s so nice, to go to bed with Garcia’s warm body at her back, waking up to Garcia kissing her neck and guiding Trinity’s hand to where she wants it. She feels… kind of small, and seen, and cared for, and then Garcia will disappear without a goodbye kiss and the next time Trinity sees her will be on shift. Maybe she’ll be nice, but normally she’s not.
Trinity knows she’s Garcia’s favourite of the newbies, but that means getting pulled into difficult surgeries to perform well under pressure. It’s not like McKay favouriting Javadi by playing wingman for her and teaching her breathing exercises and giving her encouragement to be a little meaner when she needs to be. It’s not Robby favouriting Dennis by giving him the most training and the most opportunity for growth handed over with limitless patience.
Sometimes, especially if it didn’t last long, and if Garcia leaves straight after, it actually doesn’t feel so good to be Garcia’s favourite. Trinity will lie in bed and stare out of her window and feel small in a bad way. Forgetable. Like something being willingly used and discarded. That’s the worst part of it, too, because Trinity’s not a total fucking idiot and she knows this whole thing is maybe more than just a bad idea. She’s fucking her supervisor. She’s keeping it casual with her supervisor. She’s doing it of her own volition.
For someone who likes to think she’s good at taking care of herself because she’s been doing it for such a long time, keeping it casual with Yolanda Garcia feels a little bit like dragging a razor over her thighs. It reminds her a bit of the months before everything exploded with Audrey. There were these college parties that the girls on the team used to find, pre-gaming with cruisers and vodka straight from the bottle, ordering bags of coke and weed off of one of the girl’s cousins.
Back then, before Audrey died and everything blew up, every girl in the room would be trying to outdo the others in their efforts to forget how bad things had gotten. They’d snort whatever, take whatever. Maybe it wasn’t the same for all of them as it was for Trinity and Audrey, but the team coaches at that level were almost always heavy-handed and verbally abusive. It was bad for all of them, Trinity knows that now and she knew it then, too. That’s why they’d go to the parties, take the drugs, sleep around, binge and purge, whatever; anything self destructive they could do, they did.
Getting more attached to Garcia and her loveless attention but continuing to see her anyway makes Trinity feel like she’s seventeen again. It’s not the best feeling in the world.
As a known rule-breaker, Trinity mostly avoids Collins, who is an established rule stickler. She’s like Walsh, but with less ego.
Doctor Collins does not seem to care about Trinity’s attempts at avoidance. She calls Trinity over any chance she gets, no-nonsense, straight into it - every step, Doctor Santos. Walk me through it. Clearly, please, thank you.
It’s fucking stressful, having to complete tasks under supervision, let alone the supervision of steely-eyed, cool-toned Heather Collins. Some of the team physiotherapists used to be like that. Confident and in control, all of the team.
It’s a shock, then, when Trinity walks into the break room for an emergency ramen and finds Collins alone at the table and crying into her hands.
“Fuuuuck,” Trinity mouths to herself, and genuinely debates walking backwards to escape, but her shoes squeak underneath her and the chance for that slips away.
“Oh, hello, Doctor Santos,” Collins says, sounding surprised and miserable.
“Heyyy,” Trinity says, and switches the kettle on with a quick flick of her fingers. It’s going to be so awkward to peel back the ramen lid like this. “Sorry to interrupt. I’m, uh, just pretend I’m not here.”
Collins laughs wetly from behind her fingers. She sounds different. More relaxed, if that word were more contextually appropriate. Less uptight, maybe?
“Too late,” she says wryly, and lowers her hands. Her eyes are wet, and her cheeks glisten. Despite herself, Trinity’s heart twinges. She sinks into the seat across from Collins. She can’t stop herself, she always wants to help.
“Are you okay?”
Collins glances away and nods, but she sniffles loudly and then her throat bobs with the effort of keeping her crying shut off. Trinity hops up and searches for a Kleenex box, placing it awkwardly in front of Collins with an uncomfortable smile. “Here. Is there, uh… can I help with anything? Do you want me to grab anyone? Did something happen?”
Collins closes her eyes and shakes her head again, waving a hand in the air dismissively. Her other hand holds a Kleenex up to her nose. “No, no.” She inhales, long and deep. Exhales, slow and shaky. Does it again, twice more, then rolls her shoulders and says, “I’m alright, Doctor Santos. Thank you.”
Trinity smiles at her in return, but can’t help how unsettled she feels. She doesn’t want to be annoying, or cross boundaries, but… “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Collins nods firmly, dabbing at her cheeks with an air of finality. “Yeah. Yeah. I just, uh…” She pauses, and clears her throat. “I’ve got some big choices to make, and I’m exhausted.”
Trinity nods. She can’t really relate right now, but she gets it.
Collins laughs. “I’m fine, Doctor Santos. Really. Eat your ramen.”
Trinity does as instructed, filling up the little cup, stirring after the noodles soften. She sits back down and doesn’t eye contact when she asks, “Is it, um. Did someone who works here… do something?”
A long pause.
“I get the sense,” says Collins, sounding very careful, “that you’re not asking about gossip. Which I do not share or listen to, by the way.”
“Oh, I wasn’t implying —”
“Which is why I’m saying you’re allowed to ask,” Collins continues firmly, steamrolling ahead. “Robby’s a special person to me, I know you know that, I don’t want to know how you do, but you can still come to other people when you need to. You can still come to me. Do you understand me?”
Trinity blinks. “Um. Not really?”
Collins wipes her cheeks off and leans forward, folding her hands in front of her chest. She’s gathering herself up as though the little breakroom breakdown never happened. Trinity has had a breakroom breakdown once or twice herself, and appreciates the performance.
“I don’t know exactly what happened between Langdon and Robby and yourself,” she says, going guns-blazing into the topic that everybody talks around with Trinity. Everybody wants to know. Nobody wanted to listen when she wanted to talk, and now that it’s done she’s not allowed to talk. “I don’t know if Langdon did or said something that made you feel unsafe,” Collins continues. “But whatever happened, Robby has made it clear that it was not your fault. If there is something you need to talk about, something you can’t go to Robby about, you can always come to me. You understand?”
Trinity squints. What the fuck.
Collins sighs. Her post-cry softness is gradually being eclipsed by her more standard exasperation. “Santos,” she says. “Did something happen with Robby?”
Trinity’s eyes bug out of her head. “What.”
“Calm down, I’m just asking,” Collins answers carefully. “But I’ve noticed your body language can get very tense when Robby is talking to you.”
Trinity is starting to get very offended, very quickly. “My body language?”
“I’m not assuming anything, I’m just saying that if you need to talk to someone, you can always—”
“I can not,” Trinity snaps. “Jesus christ! I don’t need to talk to anyone about anything! I was just asking if you were okay!”
Collins side-eyes her. “You said cannot. Why? You can talk to someone, Trinity. You can talk to me.”
Trinity glares. “I don’t need to talk to anyone about anything. I just thought maybe you were upset. Clearly you’re fine.”
Collins rolls her eyes, and leans back in her chair. “You know, it happened to me too.” Trinity’s eyes shoot to her in confusion, and she tilts her head in acknowledgement. “Yeah. I had a supervisor once, early on in my medical career, who acted inappropriately with me. Commenting on my body, my clothes… all the time. I didn’t know what to do. It was only a decade ago, you know, but things were different back then, you wouldn’t… believe what was allowed to happen. What still is happening, anyway, in a lot of places.” She clears her throat, which is good, because Trinity has no idea what she’s meant to do about all this. “My point, Trinity, is that it’s different now, for you, okay? You have me. If Robby has done something to make you uncomfortable, you can tell me, okay, and I will help you.”
Fuck.
Trinity’s tearing up a little, and she knows that’s not helping her case. Collins is going to get entirely the wrong impression. “Fuck,” she says after a second.
Collins has inched her hands across the table and she’s close enough now to press her skin against Trinity’s hands curled around her ramen cup. “I’ll help,” she says again, earnestly, and Trinity has to close her eyes and focus hard on breathing.
“Um,” she says, after a few long minutes have passed and she can breathe again, “sorry. That was, um… that wasn’t about Robby. I just, needed to hear that, for other reasons, but I really don’t need to talk to anyone about Robby, okay?”
“Santos,” Collins says gently. “Hey. Whatever it is, you can tell me. That wasn’t the reaction of a girl who doesn’t need to talk, okay?”
Trinity groans and scrubs her hands over her face. This is exactly her fucking problem. This is why she doesn't do relationships, doesn’t date, doesn’t normally have roommates she actually talks to. Given enough time, apparently anyone can notice that Trinity’s still kind of fucked up.
“No, really,” she insists. “Doctor Collins. I appreciate your concern, Robby hasn’t done anything to me. The stuff with Langdon was fucked up, but not because he hurt me. I mean, he was a dick, but he didn’t hurt me. I just accidentally got involved in something, and… whatever. My point is, no, Robby hasn’t hurt me, Langdon didn't hurt me.”
Collins waits, wary.
“Robby does put me on edge sometimes,” Trinity says quietly. It is deeply embarrassing to admit. “It’s not because of him. I just have prior associations with, um, male authority figures, and… anyway, that’s why I… I mean, it was nice, what you said. I didn’t need it, because I don’t need to complain about Robby or whatever you thought, but it was, um, yeah, it was nice.”
Collins curls her hands over Trinity’s and squeezes. “Okay,” she says, gentle and firm. Something wobbly inside Trinity’s chest feels like it’s being steadied. It feels more vulnerable than stitching a wound together. “I’m glad you don’t need to complain about him right now, but I meant what I said, anytime. It’s important that you understand, okay?”
“Okay,” Trinity whispers, and she’s humiliated to be affected by this but she is affected by this.
“I’m sorry that nobody told you that when you needed it,” Collins continues, which is just entirely too much for Trinity to deal with right now. “Someone should have helped you, and I’m sorry they didn’t.”
Trinity pulls her hands roughly away and swipes at her cheeks, thankfully dry. She shrugs, jostling herself. “It’s fine,” she says brusquely. “Really. I didn’t need help.” She could say: someone else had to kill herself to get it to stop, or he did time in prison but he’s already out and free somewhere in the state, or my mother still keeps his fucking photo on the mantle, or I retired from the sport anyway. All that for what.
Trinity says, “I don’t need help.”
Collins takes her hands back, and squeezes too harshly so Trinity has no choice but to look at her. “Trinity,” she says. “We all need help. You are a doctor. I know you know this.”
Trinity shakes her head, stubborn. Collins doesn’t get it. Trinity can’t need help.
She has nobody to beg it from.