Archive of Our Own ^beta

The fluorescent lights of the Pitt never dimmed. They hummed quietly above the chaos of the emergency department, illuminating the constant flow of gurneys, charts, and weary faces. But for once, Nurse Y/N wasn’t running between trauma bays. Her scrubs were still spotless, her badge already clipped to the inside of her locker, and her belly — round and impossibly heavy at eight months — pressed against the counter as she signed off the last of her notes.
“End of an era,” muttered Princess as she passed. “You sure you’re not gonna miss this madhouse?”
Y/N smiled faintly, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “I’ll miss the people. The smell of antiseptic and adrenaline? Not so much.”
Princess laughed and hurried off to respond to a page. Y/N took her time, double-checking her charting even though she didn’t need to. Her fingers trembled slightly — exhaustion, maybe, or just the weight of the moment. After years of long nights, bruised feet, and endless coffee, tonight was her last shift for the foreseeable future. Her maternity leave officially started the moment she walked out those sliding glass doors.
“Hey, you planning on sleeping here instead of home?”
The familiar, teasing voice drew her head up.
Dr. Jack Abbot leaned against the nurses’ station, his stethoscope slung around his neck, his scrubs wrinkled in the exact way it always was after twelve hours of near-constant movement. His greying hair was sticking out in every direction, and that crooked grin of his — the one that softened her every time — was firmly in place.
“Someone has to make sure your notes are readable,” Y/N replied, setting her pen down.
He chuckled, coming closer, his tone lowering just enough for only her to hear. “You look tired, sweetheart.”
She gave him a pointed look. “You try carrying your son and working nights for seven months straight.”
Jack’s eyes softened. “I told you that you didn’t have to keep working this long.”
“I know,” she said quietly, “but I wanted to. I needed the distraction.”
Before Jack could answer, a familiar voice echoed from the main desk.
“Dr. Robvinavitch to triage, please. Dr. Robvinavitch.”
Y/N felt her pulse jump — not out of surprise, but anticipation.
A few moments later, Dr. Michael ‘Robby’ Robvinavitch strode through the ER entrance, his ID swinging from his scrubs pocket, his coffee steaming in one hand. Morning shift had officially begun. The attending physician on duty. His dark brown eyes swept the room, calm yet commanding, until they landed on them — and for a split second, that professional mask faltered. His smile was small, private, and only for them.
“Good morning, Nurse Robinavitch-Abbot,” he said when he reached them, his tone perfectly neutral for public ears. “Finishing up your last shift?”
“Trying to,” she said, fighting the urge to lean into him. “Assuming you two let me leave.”
Jack smirked. “I’ll catch up with you at home soon. Just finishing up a consult.”
Robby’s gaze lingered on her belly, then rose to meet her eyes. “I’ll see you tonight,” he said softly, but there was warmth hidden beneath the words — the kind that came only from shared promises and stolen nights.
Y/N smiled. “I’ll hold you both to that.”
As she turned toward the staff exit, she could feel their eyes on her — her husbands of six years. The two men who shared her home, her life, and soon, the child she carried. No one in the Pitt knew the truth. Not about the three wedding bands tucked safely away at home. Not about the late-night dinners, the quiet laughter, the way their lives had intertwined so completely that she couldn’t imagine one without the others.
To everyone else, they were just colleagues.
But to each other, they were family.
And as Y/N stepped out into the crisp Pittsburgh morning, she rested a hand on her belly and smiled to herself.
Just one more secret between them — for now.
The Pittsburgh sky had just begun to pale when Y/N stepped out through the hospital doors. Her breath clouded faintly in the chill air. She pressed a hand to her lower back, wincing, and waved down a yellow cab that slowed by the curb.
“Just this side of Lawrenceville, please,” she said softly as she slid in, sinking back against the seat.
The driver nodded, pulling into the street. The familiar hum of the city began to fade into the background — early commuters, the smell of wet asphalt, the soft rattle of traffic lights swinging in the wind.
For the first time in months, Y/N allowed herself to exhale. No beeping monitors. No trauma pages. No blood or sirens or adrenaline. Just the promise of home.
She rested her head against the cool window, her palm instinctively drifting over her belly. “Almost there, little one,” she murmured. “Just a few more weeks.”
The driver flicked the radio on. Some morning DJ was rambling about roadworks along the freeway, something about detours and heavy congestion. Y/N half-listened, eyes fluttering shut.
Then, in a blink, everything changed.
The shriek of tires tore through the air — the blare of a horn, a flash of light, a shattering of glass. The cab lurched sideways. Y/N’s scream caught in her throat as the world spun violently — metal twisting, the thud of impact echoing again and again. Something heavy slammed into the side of the car, crushing metal into metal.
Her shoulder struck the window. Pain exploded through her arm, white-hot and blinding. She could hear the chaos outside — the crunch of more collisions, the distant sound of other cars slamming into one another, the faint, rising wail of sirens.
Then silence.
Her ears rang. Smoke filled the air. Her vision wavered in and out as she tried to move, but the seatbelt bit into her chest. She tasted blood. Somewhere in the blur, she thought she heard someone shouting, “There’s a pregnant woman in this one!”
Her fingers brushed against her stomach — a reflex more than thought. “Please… please, stay with me,” she whispered hoarsely.
And then, darkness swept her under.
…
Inside the Pitt, Dr. Jack Abbott had just finished dictating his final chart. His coat was folded over one arm, his phone in the other. He was already thinking about breakfast at home, about kissing Y/N’s temple while she slept.
That was when the overhead alert blared through the ER.
“Attention all available staff — mass casualty incident. Repeat: MCI declared. Multi-vehicle collision on I-376. Incoming ETA five minutes. Trauma bays one through four prepare for immediate intake.”
Jack froze, every muscle locking tight. Around him, chaos erupted — nurses calling out bed counts, techs rushing stretchers into position, trauma carts rolling fast across linoleum.
He pulled out his phone instantly, thumb hovering over her name. Y/N.
He hit call. Once. Twice. No answer.
His pulse thudded painfully. She was supposed to be home by now. He told himself she was probably already in the shower — her phone left on silent or the counter. That had to be it.
“Jack!” someone called from across the bay. “You staying to help or heading out?”
He hesitated only a moment. “I’m here,” he said firmly, sliding his coat off his arm and grabbing gloves.
As he tied his mask behind his head, he caught sight of Robby heading his way — his expression calm, controlled, though his eyes were already scanning the incoming patient board.
“Multiple vehicle pile-up,” Robby said briskly. “Looks like a fuel truck involved. They’re sending us the worst of it.”
Jack’s voice dropped low. “I can’t get onto Y/N.”
For a heartbeat, Robby froze. The tiniest flicker of fear passed behind his professional façade. But then he swallowed, nodded tightly. “She’s probably showering or sleeping. You know how she gets after nights. Don’t jump to—”
The automatic doors burst open.
The first gurney barreled through, paramedics shouting vitals, blood streaking the wheels. The noise swallowed them both — sirens, monitors, barked orders, the raw, electric hum of emergency medicine at its peak.
Jack shoved his fear down deep and moved to help lift a patient. Robby was already calling out instructions, his voice cutting through the chaos.
But beneath it — beneath the layers of professionalism and control — both men shared the same unspoken terror:
Please, God. Don’t let her be out there.
The Pitt had descended into organized chaos.
Every available doctor, nurse, and tech was on deck. Stretchers lined the hallways, patients crying out in pain, the smell of gasoline and smoke thick in the air. Overhead, the loudspeakers barked codes and requests, but inside the trauma bays, it was just noise and motion — a rhythm only the staff of the Pitt could follow.
Jack was elbow-deep in triage, sweat streaking down his temple as he stabilized a young man with a compound fracture.
“Pressure’s dropping!” a nurse shouted.
“Get me two large-bore IVs and hang a liter of saline, now!” Jack snapped, voice steady even as his stomach churned.
Across the room, Robby worked another case — a middle-aged woman with blunt chest trauma. His movements were calm, precise, commanding. His tone alone kept his team focused. But every so often, his eyes flicked toward the bay doors. He hadn’t stopped looking for a moment of calm long enough to process anything — because processing meant thinking, and thinking meant imagining Y/N on that highway.
Another wave of gurneys rolled in. Paramedics were shouting vitals over one another, chaos spilling into the halls.
“Female, mid-thirties, severe abdominal trauma — possible internal bleed!” one medic yelled.
“Male, thirtys, trapped in vehicle for forty minutes, BP crashing!” another called.
“Pregnant female, approximately eight months, restrained passenger. Vitals unstable. Lost consciousness en route. ETA thirty seconds!”
Robby froze mid-instruction.
Jack looked up from across the hall, eyes narrowing.
They both knew how many pregnant women were eight months along and lived within five miles of the Pitt.
“Bring her straight through!” Robby barked, his voice sharper than anyone had ever heard. He ripped off his gloves and was already heading for the entrance before anyone could respond.
The gurney burst through the double doors — paramedics moving fast, calling out over the roar of the ER.
“She’s got a possible uterine rupture, decreased fetal movement, severe bruising from the belt—”
Robby stopped cold. The world fell away.
He knew that hair. That bloodied ID badge barely hanging from her scrub pocket.
“Y/N!”
The name tore out of him before he could stop it. Every head in the bay snapped toward him.
Jack spun at the sound, chest tightening. “What—”
He didn’t finish. He saw her then — limp, pale, half-covered in a bloodied blanket, her stomach rising and falling shallowly. For a split second, everything around him went silent.
Then he was running.
He nearly collided with the gurney as Robby caught the side rail, helping the medics steer her into Trauma One. “On my count — one, two, three!” Robby barked. They lifted her onto the table.
Jack was already pulling on gloves, voice breaking. “What do we have?”
“Trapped in a cab — severe crush impact. Fetal heart rate was 90 on route, dropping fast. She lost consciousness twice. We had to cut the door to get her out.”
“God,” Jack breathed, pressing his hands to her pulse point. It was there — weak, but there.
The rest of the Pitt staff stood frozen for half a heartbeat. Nurses exchanged wide-eyed glances, no one daring to move. Y/N’s last name — Robinavitch-Abbott. The same as theirs. Blinked onto the ER patient screen.
One of the residents stammered, “Wait… she’s—?”
“She’s my wife,” Jack snapped before he could stop himself.
Robby’s head whipped up. “Our wife,” he corrected, his voice low but unflinching. “Now move! Get me a crash cart, fetal monitor, and page OB trauma, now!”
No one argued. They scrambled into action, adrenaline spiking through the room.
Jack brushed a strand of hair from Y/N’s blood-matted face. “Come on, sweetheart. Stay with us. Just stay with us.”
Robby’s jaw was locked, his hands steady as he worked to control the bleeding. “She’s going to make it,” he muttered, more to himself than anyone else.
But beneath the clinical precision, their world was falling apart. Every beep of the monitor was a countdown, every second an agony neither man could show — not while the room was watching, not while the Pitt buzzed with the shock of revelation.
No one dared whisper, but the truth had already spread faster than any code blue could travel.
The Pitt’s best kept secret was out — in the most brutal way possible.
________________________________________
Trauma One was a storm of sound and movement. The clatter of metal instruments, the hiss of oxygen, the overlapping orders — but underneath it all, the steady, unrelenting beeping of the heart monitor filled the air like a pulse.
Robby stood at Y/N’s left, gloves streaked with blood, eyes flicking between the monitors and her face. Jack was on her right, one hand keeping pressure on a wound along her side, the other gripping her wrist as if sheer contact could keep her tethered.
“BP’s dropping — 70 over 45!” a nurse called out.
“She’s hemorrhaging internally,” Robby said, voice clipped, controlled. He pointed to the trauma tech. “We need a liter of O-neg, now. And someone get OB down here before I go up there and drag them down myself!”
Jack’s throat was dry, his voice raw. “Fetal heart?”
“Still dropping,” came the reply.
For a moment, the two doctors locked eyes over her still body. That brief exchange said everything — the fear, the disbelief, the refusal to lose her. Not here. Not like this.
“Come on, Y/N,” Robby muttered, leaning in, his tone softening for just a heartbeat. “You promised me you’d rest. This isn’t what I meant.”
Jack swallowed hard, blinking against the blur in his eyes. “She’s fighting. She’s always fighting.”
“Pressure’s at sixty,” a nurse warned.
Robby moved fast, adrenaline pushing him past the panic clawing at his chest. “Jack, we’re losing her. We need to get ahead of this bleed or—”
“Don’t finish that sentence,” Jack snapped. His hands were shaking, but he forced them still. “You keep her pressure stable. I’ll start a second line.”
“Already on it,” Robby said, grabbing a fresh syringe. His hands moved on instinct — clamp, inject, assess — but every beat of the monitor felt too slow, every number too low.
“Blood’s in!” someone shouted.
Robby glanced up at the monitor, lips moving silently as if counting along with every beep. When the rhythm steadied slightly, he exhaled through his nose — one breath, one fraction of relief.
“Okay,” he said quietly. “Okay, she’s responding.”
Jack didn’t look away from her face. “Hey,” he whispered, leaning closer to her ear. “You hear that, sweetheart? You’re doing good. Stay with us, okay?”
For a fleeting moment, her fingers twitched in his hand. Jack froze. Robby saw it too — just enough to make something break inside him.
Then another alarm screamed.
“Fetal heart rate’s crashing — 60!”
Robby’s head snapped toward the monitor. “No, no, no—” He barked to the nurse, “Get that OB team down here now! We don’t have time for protocol — she’s decompensating!”
Jack looked at the monitor, horror settling deep in his chest. “If that baby’s in distress, we don’t have long.”
“She won’t survive an OR transfer in this state,” Robby said tightly. “We stabilize here.”
“You can’t—” one of the residents started.
Robby turned on them, eyes sharp. “You don’t tell me what I can’t do when it’s my wife and my son on this table.”
The room fell silent. No one moved. The authority in his voice was absolute — but so was the grief behind it.
Jack pressed his hand to Y/N’s stomach, voice trembling. “Come on, kiddo. Hang in there. Don’t you do this to her.”
Robby leaned over, checking her airway again. “She’s slipping. We need to intubate before she—”
The monitor flatlined.
The world froze.
Then, chaos.
“Code blue! Crash cart, now!” Robby barked, his tone snapping everyone into motion.
Jack was already at her chest, starting compressions. “Come on, Y/N, come on!”
Robby grabbed the ambu bag, eyes wide, his voice cracking between orders. “Epinephrine ready — on my mark! One milligram, IV push!”
“Epi’s in!”
“Clear the line — charge to 200!”
Jack’s voice broke as he kept compressing. “You’re not leaving us. You hear me? You’re not leaving us!”
The air was thick with fear and desperation. Every beep, every breath, every second stretched like a lifetime. Staff members who had never seen Dr. Robvinavitch lose composure watched him now — raw panic barely restrained by duty.
“Charging!” a nurse shouted.
“Everyone clear!” Robby called.
The defibrillator pads pressed to her chest. The jolt lifted her body off the bed, the sound echoing through the trauma bay.
The monitor beeped again. Once. Twice. Then — a rhythm. Weak, slow, but there.
“She’s back!” someone cried.
Jack slumped forward, his head dropping, his hand still on her arm. Robby exhaled shakily, closing his eyes just for a second.
“Let’s get OB in here now,” he said hoarsely. “She’s still bleeding. The baby’s still in distress. We’re not out of this yet.”
As the team scrambled again, the weight of what had just happened settled over the room. Everyone at the Pitt had seen miracles before — but never one that came wrapped in so much love, fear, and revelation.
And at the center of it all lay Y/N Robinavitch-Abbott.
The sliding doors at the far end of the trauma bay burst open, and the OB trauma team poured in — led by Dr. Bennett, the hospital’s chief obstetrician, still pulling on gloves as she moved.
“What do we have?” she called out briskly, eyes flicking to the monitors.
“Thirty-two-year-old female, eight months pregnant, restrained passenger in an MVC,” Robby rattled off, voice tight but controlled. “Severe abdominal trauma, probable uterine rupture, coded once, resuscitated. Fetal heart’s unstable.”
“Alright, we’re moving her to OB trauma,” Bennett ordered immediately. “Let’s go!”
The nurses began detaching monitors, switching to portable oxygen, unclipping lines and prepping for transport. Jack stepped to Y/N’s side, his hand never leaving hers. Her face was ghostly pale, her hair tangled and streaked with blood, but her chest was still rising — shallow, uneven, but alive.
Robby grabbed the end of the gurney to help steer, but Bennett’s voice cut through. “We’ve got it, Dr. Robvinavitch. You’ve got a floor full of trauma still incoming.”
He hesitated. His hands clenched on the railing. “I’m not—”
Jack turned toward him, meeting his eyes — the silent plea between them immediate and raw.
Robby swallowed hard, fighting the instinct to go, to stay by her side no matter what. But he could already hear the next round of paramedics rolling in, shouting new vitals, new numbers. The Pitt was still bleeding patients, still drowning in chaos. Someone had to stay.
He reached out, gripping Jack’s arm hard enough to leave marks through the gloves. “Go with her,” Robby said quietly, fiercely. “She needs one of us there. I’ll handle things here.”
“Robby—”
“Go!” The word came out sharp, almost desperate. Then softer, barely audible beneath the noise: “Bring them both back to us.”
Jack’s jaw tightened. He nodded once, eyes burning. “I will.”
As the gurney moved, Robby stepped back, his chest aching like something was being ripped out of it. The trauma bay doors slammed shut behind them, leaving him standing amid the chaos he couldn’t escape.
For a long second, the room was silent — or maybe the silence was just around him. The other doctors and nurses glanced at one another, the whispers starting quietly, like ripples spreading through still water.
“Did he just say wife?”
“Wait—both of them?”
“Jack and Robby—?”
“Holy hell…”
Robby ignored them. He scrubbed a hand over his face, straightened his coat, and snapped back into command. “Let’s move, people! We’ve still got criticals out there. I want trauma two cleared and another bay ready in five. Let’s go!”
The sharpness in his tone scattered them instantly. Orders were shouted, stretchers rolled, the rhythm of the ER resuming its relentless pulse. But under the hum of voices and machines, the gossip still buzzed — disbelief, curiosity, shock.
The Pitt’s calm, controlled attending wasn’t calm anymore. His mask had cracked, and everyone had seen what lay beneath: a man terrified of losing the woman who made his world make sense and the little boy he hadn’t yet met but was already his everything.
…
Jack jogged alongside the gurney as they rushed through the corridor, one hand gripping the side rail, the other still holding Y/N’s limp fingers. Her hand was cold, too cold.
“She’s crashing again!” one of the nurses called.
“Get her in here!” Dr. Bennett ordered as the OR doors swung open. “We’re going straight to prep. Let’s move!”
Jack forced himself to stay out of the way, every instinct screaming to do something. But he couldn’t — not now. He wasn’t her attending. He was her husband, barely holding it together as they wheeled her into the sterile white light.
He stopped just inside the door, watching as the team surrounded her. His breath hitched when he saw the fetal monitor — the sound faint, irregular, struggling.
“BP’s crashing again!”
“Fetal heart rate— forty-eight and dropping!”
“Get me that incision tray, now!”
Bennett’s voice cut through the panic. “We’re not waiting. We’re going in for an emergency C-section, right here, right now!”
Jack’s vision blurred at the edges. He pressed a hand to the doorframe, whispering under his breath, “Come on, baby girl. Come on, little one. Stay with her. Stay with us.”
Through the glass, he caught one last glimpse of Y/N as the curtain closed — pale, motionless, the monitors screaming around her.
And somewhere downstairs, Robby Robvinavitch was still running the ER, pretending like his world hadn’t just fallen apart.
…
The lights were blindingly bright, bouncing off steel and sterile white walls. Y/N lay motionless under the drapes, her skin ashen against the blue of the surgical sheets.
“Scalpel.”
“Scalpel.”
Dr. Bennett’s voice was crisp, her hands moving fast. Every sound echoed — the snip of scissors, the suction hiss, the monitor’s strained beeps.
“BP’s dropping — fifty over thirty.”
“Epi, now!”
“Fetal heart’s at forty-two!”
Jack stood at the far wall, scrubbed in but unsterile, forced to watch as the team worked. His fingers clenched the railing so hard his knuckles blanched. He’d seen thousands of emergency procedures in his career — but never like this. Never with the person he loved most on the table.
His mind kept flashing — the last time he’d seen her smiling, her hand over her belly, teasing him about painting the nursery. That soft laugh that reached her eyes. And now…
Now, she was fading.
Dr. Bennett’s voice cut through his spiraling thoughts. “Incision made — uterus is ruptured. We’re going to have to move fast.”
The suction picked up, red pooling too quickly.
“Sponges! I need more suction here!”
Jack’s chest heaved. His throat closed. Every instinct screamed to step in, to take over, to save her. But his training warred with his heart — he couldn’t. He’d compromise her safety. He’d compromise the baby’s. He could only stand there, helpless, praying to a God he hadn’t believed in for years.
“Baby’s crowning,” a nurse said.
“Come on,” Bennett murmured. “Come on, little one…”
The next sound was one that every parent fears and hopes for all at once — a silence so deep it made the air itself seem to hold its breath.
Then a tiny, broken cry.
Weak, strained, but real.
“Got him,” Bennett said, relief flooding her tone. “Baby by\oy, approximately five pounds. Get NICU in here!”
Jack exhaled shakily, his knees almost giving out. But his eyes shot immediately to Y/N. Her heart rate was still erratic.
“Her pulse is fading again!”
“Pressure’s tanking!”
“Clamp that artery — now!”
Jack pressed a fist to his mouth, his voice breaking. “Come on, sweetheart. You’ve got to hang on. You’ve got to see him…”
…
The ER still buzzed with chaos, though the worst of the influx had slowed. Blood, debris, and exhaustion painted every corner of the floor.
Robby moved like a machine — steady, precise, refusing to stop. He’d sutured, stabilized, and called codes on three patients in the past hour alone. His scrubs were soaked, his eyes red-rimmed, his voice hoarse from giving orders.
But no matter what he did, every sound that wasn’t Y/N’s voice tore at him.
“Dr. Robby, patient three’s ready for transfer to surgery.”
“Good. Next.”
“BP’s still unstable in trauma five—”
“I’m coming.”
He didn’t allow himself a second to think. Thinking led to feeling, and feeling led to losing control.
But as the lull finally settled — the kind that comes when there are no more bodies rolling in — he found himself standing at the center of the ER, surrounded by silence for the first time in hours.
Nurses whispered at the far end. One of them glanced at him, then looked away quickly. He could feel it — the ripple of shock, curiosity, pity. The looks. The questions.
But none of it mattered.
He reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone with blood-smeared fingers. No updates. No messages. Nothing from Jack. Nothing from OB.
He pressed the phone to his forehead and closed his eyes. Please let them be okay. Please.
“Robby?”
He turned to see Dr. Langdon, one of his residents, hovering awkwardly. “I, uh… we’ve got post-op updates ready. You should—”
“I’ll look at them later,” he said, voice rough.
Langdon hesitated. “They’ll be alright. She’s strong. Y/N always—”
Robby’s head dropped for a moment, the tightness in his chest finally breaking. “She shouldn’t have even been out there,” he whispered. “She should’ve been home.”
Langdon said nothing — just nodded once, then quietly slipped away.
Robby took a shaky breath, wiped his eyes, and squared his shoulders again. “Alright,” he murmured to himself. “You’re not falling apart. Not yet.”
He turned back toward the central monitors, forcing his focus to the glowing vitals, to anything that wasn’t the silence of that phone.
…
“Clamp secured,” Bennett said quickly. “BP’s rising — sixty, seventy, eighty… good. Good. Keep the fluids going.”
The nurse held up the infant, now wrapped in a small blue blanket, and moved toward the NICU team waiting by the door. “Tiny but breathing on his own.”
Jack’s eyes followed, his breath trembling. Relief and terror collided in his chest.
Then he heard Bennett again — lower this time, urgent. “We’ve still got uterine bleeding. If this doesn’t stop, we’re going to lose her.”
Jack’s heart stopped.
He stepped forward without realizing it, voice cracking. “Please. Do whatever you have to.”
Bennett didn’t look up, her hands moving fast. “We are.”
A tense few seconds passed — suction, clamps, hushed commands — until finally, the monitor beeped steady.
“Bleeding’s controlled,” the anesthesiologist said softly.
Bennett let out a long, shaky breath. “Alright. She’s stable. Let’s get her to recovery and monitor closely. NICU’s got the baby.”
Jack pressed his hand over his mouth, blinking rapidly to keep from breaking down in front of the team. When Bennett finally met his eyes, her tone softened.
“She’s alive, Jack,” she said quietly. “They both are. For now, that’s what matters.”
He nodded, unable to speak.
…
Robby’s phone buzzed once.
A message from Jack.
She’s alive. So is the baby.
Robby exhaled, his whole body sagging against the counter. For the first time all night, his eyes closed — and a single tear slipped free before he could stop it.
The ER was still, hushed, watching their attending finally crumble for just a heartbeat.
Then, as always, he straightened. “Alright,” he said quietly. “Let’s clean this place up.”
The Pitt was finally still.
The buzz of chaos had faded into a low hum — monitors steady, gurneys parked, the faint hiss of oxygen the only sound left in the air. The aftermath of the mass casualty had left everyone hollow-eyed and silent, working through the motions of cleanup.
Robby stood at the main desk, his scrubs stiff with dried blood, his pulse still echoing from hours of adrenaline. He could feel the stares. Could hear the whispered fragments — his wife, Jack’s wife, the baby.
He didn’t blame them. They deserved to know the truth.
He exhaled and set his chart down, straightening. “Alright, everyone,” he began, his voice low but commanding enough to draw the room’s attention. “Before this gets out of hand, I need to clear the air.”
Every conversation in the ER fell silent. Nurses froze mid-cleanup, residents looked up from their notes.
“Yes,” Robby said, eyes scanning the group. “Nurse Y/N Robinavitch-Abbott is my wife. She’s also Dr. Jack Abbott’s wife. And yes Jack is my husband.”
The words landed like a dropped tray. The air was thick enough to choke on.
Robby didn’t flinch. “The three of us have been married for six years. It’s… unconventional, sure. But it’s built on love, trust, and mutual respect. We kept it private because this place — the Pitt — is our second home, and we wanted our work to speak louder than our personal lives.”
A soft murmur rippled through the staff. Someone whispered, “That’s why they left at the same time,” and another, “I always thought they were just close.”
Robby managed a small, weary smile. “Yeah. We are close. We share a home. We share a life. And tonight…” His voice faltered for the first time, eyes dropping to the floor before he forced them back up. “Tonight, I almost lost both of them.”
That silence hit different — heavier. No one moved. No one even breathed.
He swallowed hard, letting the professional shell finally crack. “Y/N’s stable. Jack’s with her upstairs. The baby—” he paused, a faint tremor in his voice, “—the baby’s holding on strong. It’s a boy.”
A few of the nurses smiled through tears. Someone muttered a soft “Thank God.”
Robby nodded, exhaling shakily. “I know this might take time to adjust to. But we’re still the same people you’ve always worked with. The same team. And I’m asking you to respect that — for Y/N’s sake. For Jack’s. For mine.”
He paused, looking around at the faces that had fought beside him for years — people who’d trusted his leadership through the worst nights and the longest shifts. “You all showed up tonight. You worked your hearts out. And I couldn’t be prouder of this team. Thank you… for how you handled everything — even when you didn’t know what you were handling.”
The staff began to nod, one by one. There were no more whispers now, only quiet understanding. Compassion.
Robby let his shoulders sag slightly as he turned back to the counter. He braced his palms against the cool surface and bowed his head for a moment, just breathing. The image of Y/N lying on that stretcher wouldn’t leave him — nor the look in Jack’s eyes as the doors closed behind them.
Six years of love, chaos, and shared laughter. Nights when they’d all fallen asleep tangled together after back-to-back shifts. Moments spent in a cramped kitchen making pancakes because Y/N insisted they needed “a family breakfast,” even if it was 4 p.m. Their life wasn’t conventional — but it was theirs.
He straightened, changing into clean scrubs, his exhaustion etched deep but his purpose clear.
He could almost hear Y/N teasing him from memory, her voice soft and warm: Don’t work yourself into the ground, Robby. Come home to us.
He swallowed hard, forcing down the lump in his throat. “I’m coming, sweetheart,” he whispered under his breath.
And with that, he headed toward the elevator — not as Dr. Robvinavitch, attending physician, but as Robby: the man who loved his wife, the man who loved his husband, and the man who would fight tooth and nail to bring their family safely home.
The hum of machines filled the OB recovery room — softer here, almost gentle. The chaos of the night had faded into a heavy, fragile calm.
Robby stood near the warmer, the soft glow casting light over the tiny bundle wrapped tightly in a hospital blanket. Their son. Their boy. His chest rose and fell in quick, rhythmic breaths, a faint, squeaky cry escaping now and then as the nurse made her final checks.
Jack stood beside him, still in his scrubs, hands trembling slightly as he adjusted the edge of the blanket. “He’s so small,” he whispered, voice rough with emotion.
Robby smiled faintly, eyes fixed on the baby’s tiny face. “He’s perfect.”
When the nurse nodded and stepped away, Robby carefully slid his hands beneath the bundle and lifted him close, the weight almost nothing — but the significance everything. He turned, his eyes glassy. “Do you want to hold him?”
Jack hesitated for a heartbeat before nodding. His hands shook as he took the baby, clutching him close against his chest. The little boy let out a quiet sigh and nestled into the crook of Jack’s arm.
“Hey, little man,” Jack murmured, a tear slipping down his cheek. “You really made an entrance.”
Robby gave a soft laugh, wiping at his own eyes. “He takes after his mother.”
Jack smiled at that, eyes flicking toward the hospital bed. Y/N was still out cold, pale but peaceful, her hair damp against the pillow. The monitor beside her beeped steadily, reassuring and steady.
For a while, the two men just stood there — silent, reverent, the baby’s faint breathing the only sound between them. Then, softly, Robby said, “We should talk about names.”
Jack looked down at the tiny face in his arms. “Yeah. I was thinking about that on the way up here.” He smiled faintly. “You remember what Y/N always said she liked?”
Robby chuckled under his breath. “She had a list longer than my residency notes.”
“She wanted something strong,” Jack said, rocking the baby gently. “Something that meant hope. Or light. She said… if he ever came into the world, she wanted his name to remind us we fought for him.”
Robby nodded slowly, his throat tightening. “Then we give him that. Something that means strength — like her.”
They fell silent again, their voices fading to whispers. The baby let out a small sigh, one fist waving lazily in the air.
A faint sound pulled their attention back to the bed. Y/N’s fingers twitched. Her brow furrowed before her eyes fluttered open, slow and heavy, the light above her bed blurring in and out of focus.
Jack was at her side in seconds. “Hey. Hey, sweetheart.”
She blinked, confused for a moment — then her gaze dropped to the bundle in his arms. “Is that…?”
Robby’s smile was soft, trembling at the edges. “He’s here.”
Jack gently lowered the baby into her arms. Y/N stared down at him, her lips parting in disbelief. The tiniest face, the smallest hands she’d ever seen — and yet, he felt so impossibly theirs.
Tears spilled freely as she brushed a fingertip across his cheek. “He’s beautiful.”
Jack leaned down, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “He’s stubborn too. Just like you.”
Robby took a seat on the edge of the bed, his hand resting lightly over hers. “We were talking about names,” he said softly. “Didn’t want to decide without you.”
Y/N smiled weakly, eyes never leaving the baby. “You already know what I want.”
Jack laughed quietly. “Something strong. Something with meaning.”
She nodded, whispering, “Eli.”
Robby’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Eli?”
“Yeah,” she breathed. “It means ‘my God’ or ‘ascended.’ He made it here when everything said he shouldn’t.”
For a long moment, none of them spoke. Robby reached out, brushing a thumb across the baby’s tiny hand. “Eli,” he repeated softly, tasting the name on his tongue. “Eli Abbott-Robvinavitch.”
Jack smiled. “Has a nice ring to it.”
Y/N looked up at both of them, her voice barely above a whisper. “Our boy.”
Robby leaned down and kissed her forehead, his voice breaking. “Our boy.”
Jack placed a hand on her shoulder, the other resting protectively over the small bundle between them. “We did it,” he whispered.
And in that quiet hospital room — filled with soft beeps, sterile air, and the faintest cry of new life — the three of them let themselves breathe for the first time all night.
The baby had finally settled, his tiny chest rising and falling in soft, rhythmic breaths as he slept in Y/N’s arms. The world outside the little room felt miles away — the chaos, the whispers, the hospital gossip. In here, it was just them.
Jack brushed a hand through Y/N’s hair, careful not to disturb the baby. Robby sat on the edge of the bed beside her, his palm resting against her knee. The low hum of machines was the only sound for a while, until Robby’s voice broke through — hesitant, quieter than usual.
“There’s something I should tell you both,” he said, glancing between them.
Y/N looked up, still a little dazed, one hand instinctively tightening around Eli. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” he said quickly. “It’s just…” He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. “I told the staff. About us.”
Jack blinked, his brow furrowing. “You what?”
“I had to.” Robby’s voice stayed calm, steady. “After what happened in the ER — the way people were talking, the looks, the whispers… I couldn’t let them turn this into something ugly. You both deserve better than that. He deserves better than that.”
Y/N’s eyes softened, though fatigue weighed heavy on her face. “What did you say?”
“The truth,” Robby replied simply. “That we chose this — all three of us — and that it isn’t anyone’s business but ours.”
Jack exhaled slowly, leaning back in his chair. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“I did,” Robby said, his gaze steady on both of them. “You’ve both protected me more times than I can count. The least I can do is return the favor.” He smiled faintly, though his eyes glistened. “Besides, if they can’t handle knowing I love both of you — and that you love me back — that’s their problem, not mine.”
Y/N blinked hard, trying to keep the tears at bay. “You said that?”
Robby chuckled softly. “More or less. Maybe with a few less curse words than I wanted to use.”
Jack let out a quiet laugh, shaking his head. “You really told them?”
“I did,” Robby said, reaching out to brush a thumb along Eli’s cheek. “And you know what? They listened. Maybe it won’t stop every rumor, but at least now they know where I stand.”
Y/N’s eyes flicked between the two men, her voice soft and fragile. “You didn’t have to protect us like that.”
Robby smiled, tender and sure. “I wasn’t protecting you. I was telling the truth. We built this together — you, me, and Jack. I’m not ashamed of that.”
Jack looked at him for a long moment before reaching out, his hand resting on Robby’s shoulder. “You’re a better man than I am.”
Robby gave a small, tired laugh. “No, I just have better timing.”
The three of them fell into a quiet stillness. Y/N leaned her head back against the pillow, the baby sleeping soundly against her chest. Robby’s hand lingered against her knee, while Jack’s thumb traced gentle circles against the back of her hand.
It wasn’t perfect — not by any definition. But in that small hospital room, with their son safe and sleeping, it didn’t have to be.
Robby looked between them again, his voice barely above a whisper. “We’ll figure it out. The world can talk all it wants — but this… this is ours.”
Y/N reached for his hand, squeezing it softly. “Yeah,” she murmured. “It is.”