Chapter Text
Sometimes Mel can’t believe it, how quickly she started to feel at home in Pittsburgh. Well, at PTMC specifically, among the people she works with. It’s not like she hasn’t had friends in the other places she’s lived, but she’s never made so many so quickly, and maybe it’s just the trauma bonding (as Samira calls it) of emergency medicine or how much more of a routine she and Becca are able to find these days, but whatever it is, she’s so grateful for it.
It’s just kind of new: people invite her to things and it doesn’t seem to be out of obligation, and while she doesn’t always love the setting or the activity (bowling alleys seem designed to overstimulate her, and she hadn’t stayed long at Jesse’s birthday party), she’s just so happy to be really and truly included that it doesn’t even matter most of the time.
But four months into her residency at the Pitt (two months before Frank came back, because that’s how she keeps time these days), she’d found herself in a situation that felt like a reenactment of some of the most uncomfortable moments from her past, and she’d almost regretted all of the easy companionship of the ED.
It wasn’t the crazy-making music (Mel has to listen to enough Christmas music at home from Halloween through New Year’s; it seems like a special kind of punishment for it to be waiting for her everywhere she goes from the bus to the grocery store to this trendy bar) or the lighting (too dim but punctuated with glaring neon) or the temperature (the heat was turned way up to compensate for a Pittsburgh December), though all of those things had set her on edge. It wasn’t the fact that Victoria was definitely intoxicated and Trinity was well on her way (even though she’d had probably four more drinks than Victoria had. Well, Victoria is a very small woman and alcohol tolerance is correlated to body size, as Mel knows from firsthand experience) and even Samira’s laughter, which usually fills Mel with affection, was starting to grate a bit.
Those were things she’s learned to tolerate; even if she’ll never be fully comfortable with them, they’re the price she pays for being with people, and it’s usually worth it. So they weren’t what was making her want to bolt that night. It was that she could see what was coming.
Victoria’s twenty-first birthday had been right before Thanksgiving, and Trinity had been trying to get ‘the girls’ (“I am right here,” poor Dennis said every time she used that phrase) out to celebrate ever since, but they had only just found a time they could all do it because Samira was on night shift at the moment, and Mel had caught a bad head cold on Black Friday. She had kind of thought that they would just go without her while she was down, but to her surprise, they’d all insisted on waiting, no matter how much she protested.
it wouldn’t be girls night without you, babe! Samira had texted, a comment that had gained a 100 emoji from both Victoria and Dennis and a don’t think you can get out of this, pippi longstocking, from Trinity (that one day when Mel had worn two braids instead of one because it was easier on her aching shoulders had been a mistake).
She usually enjoys girls’ nights, she just prefers when they take the form of trivia night at the very mellow pub around the corner from the hospital or movie night in Samira’s spotless apartment. Bars are not her favorite places, as they combine bad lighting, noise, and drunk people all in one space (actually, when she thinks about it, that’s kind of an accurate description of the ER sometimes, too), but, as Trinity said, you only turned 21 once, and Victoria’s face had lit up at the idea, so here they were. Crushed in around a table in a corner at some place Trinity had found, and Dennis and Samira were both doing their best not to crowd Mel, but sometimes they jostled her just because of lack of space, and she’d had her one cider (she hates beer, brown liquor, and fruity cocktails, which really narrows the selection, but the cider wasn’t bad) and was regretting the fried mushrooms she and Samira had split. But the churning in her stomach wasn’t because of the mushrooms or the alcohol. It was because of the conversation.
It felt inevitable, the way Victoria finished her story with a little sigh that sent Trinity into a fit of snort-laughing, folded her hands in her lap and turned to Mel.
“What about you, Mel?” Victoria asked, all big, eager eyes. “What was your first time like?”
Mel, wistfully thinking of her own couch, briefly considered that this might actually be a nightmare, but it was way too coherent for that. Her dreams were always plotless, no real beginning, in media res, and she could remember every detail of today, could trace the steps that led to this moment.
Three minutes ago: Victoria’s blushing and stammering through the (awkward, even Mel had to admit it, but very sweet) ending of her tale of her first time with Mateo
Eight minutes ago: Dennis’s reluctant, terse answer (“A literal hayloft, farmboy? Are you fucking with me?”)
Nine minutes ago: Samira’s nostalgic ramblings about the boy from her organic chemistry class in college (the ‘dorm room deflowering,’ as Trinity called it, did not sound very romantic to Mel—she’d only lived in the dorms for a year, but she didn’t have fond memories of them; between the cinder block and the bad mattresses and the cardboard-thin walls and the general smell, she didn’t think it was a place she’d ever want to have sex—but it had clearly made Samira happy, so Mel was happy for her)
Eighteen minutes ago: Trinity telling the (way too detailed for Mel’s taste) story about her friends-with-benefits situation with a girl on her gymnastics team (Mel had not known that anyone really had a friends-with-benefits situation when they were 15 until that moment)
Thirty-five minutes ago: a conversation about movies that had come out lately that they wanted to see (though probably wouldn’t get around to for several years), including the romcom with the friends-with-benefits situation that had raised the topic in the first place (Mel would have inexplicably negative feelings about that movie for the rest of her life, even though she’d never watch it)
Fifty-one minutes ago: Heather and Cassie stopping by for twenty minutes before Cassie went home to Harrison and Heather did…whatever Heather did when she wasn’t working (the topic of much speculation from Trinity)
Fifty-seven minutes ago: their food arriving (Mel had never seen so many jalapenos on nachos before, but Victoria didn’t seem to feel the heat at all)
An hour and twelve minutes ago: the argument about whether EDs needed their own chaplains (Mel’s firm opinion: no, they weren’t necessary unless someone specifically requested one, and that didn’t happen enough to warrant a dedicated one in the department)
An hour and thirty-seven minutes ago: the debate about what drinks to get (Trinity, no surprise, had very strong opinions on this topic)
An hour and forty-one minutes ago: the Uber ride over
back and back to Trinity flirting with that patient with the rebar through her shoulder (4:45pm exactly), lunch (a granola bar, 2:19pm), the Sengstaken-Blakemore tube placement she’d done with Heather (very cool, 1:07pm), then back and back some more to running from the bus stop to the ER (7:12am, the bus had been late, and it had been very stressful even though both Dana and Robby told her not to worry about it) and her alarm going off (4:30am).
All of it had led, inexorably it now seemed, to 9:24pm with her shoes sticking to the floor, her fingers twisting a sugar packet, and her stomach churning as she braced herself to have the virginity conversation. Again.
It had been a while, honestly. More than a year, at least. The good thing about not having many friends besides Becca was that she didn’t find herself in situations like this very often. Of course it happened now and then, but her best friend in med school had been Eduardo (gay, blunt in a way that was a giant relief to Mel, very sweet) and he’d told her early on in their friendship that if he ever asked anything she didn’t want to answer, she didn’t have to answer it. And he had asked, and way earlier than she thought was appropriate, but he had taken one look at her face, patted her hand and said, “It’s okay, garota. We can talk about something else.” (She did end up talking to him about it, much later, and he’d been great.)
But there’d been the conference in Denver during her internship, that one late night with her med school study group, more than once in undergrad when she’d forced herself to do the kind of socializing everyone said she was missing out on. Each time, it got harder and easier. Harder because each time she was older and so it all seemed more awkward, but easier because she didn’t have to try as hard to find the words.
She didn’t mind talking about it, actually, not with someone like Eduardo who she knew and who knew her and who she trusted not to judge her. He’d been a self-described slut, but he’d said, “Don’t just do it to do it, fofinha. It’s okay to wait till it feels right.”
“What if it never feels right?”
He shrugged and leaned over to bop her on the nose (he was the only one she let do that because she loved him and because he telegraphed his motions to her so she could pull away if she needed to). “That’s okay too.”
(She hadn’t liked that answer, really, but it was kindly meant and they had a lab at 8 the next morning)
She could imagine having a similar conversation with Samira while baking cookies or going for a run. Samira would probably be a little too supportive because Samira was like that, but Mel didn’t mind her knowing. She wasn’t ashamed. She just…really hated talking about it with people who didn’t understand.
And there was no way Trinity would understand. “Oooh, yeah, Melanoma, tell us about the first time you got it on,” she said now, leaning over her violently-colored cocktail till Mel was afraid the ends of her hair were going to get wet. “I bet it was freaky. It’s always the politest ones who are kinkiest.”
Mel was very uncomfortable with this speculation, and it must have shown, because Samira reached over and took her hand. Mel wanted to pull away, the touch just one more thing her overstimulated mind had to process, but thankfully Samira only squeezed it once before letting go. “Ignore her,” she said. “She’s terrible about things like this.”
“She’s terrible about everything,” Dennis said, which resulted in Trinity wrestling him into a headlock and trying to give him a noogie. For a moment, Mel thought that might derail the conversation, but then Trinity released, muttering as he smoothed down his hair.
“Sure, fine, I’m an asshole,” Trinity said, attention back on Mel. “But it’s only fair—we all shared. You aren’t going to hold out on us, are you, Watermelon?”
Dennis was studying the label of his beer, but Victoria was watching Mel with expectant eyes. Samira was trying not to look interested, but Mel knew she was curious. Okay, so this was happening.
“I, um, I haven’t had sex yet,” she said and waited for their reactions. Mel frequently found it difficult to anticipate how people would react to things she said, but she had enough experience, both with this conversation and with these people, that she’d had a pretty good idea. And sure enough, Trinity’s jaw dropped and Victoria let out a little gasp and Dennis blinked once and Samira’s eyes went wide before she quickly pulled her expression back to neutral.
Samira opened her mouth to say something, but Victoria beat her to it.
“Aren’t you, like, 30?” she goggled. Mel felt her face going tight. She was 28, actually, would turn 29 in a month and a half, but she didn’t think her age was relevant.
Trinity smacked the table, making the dishes rattle and Mel jump. “Dude, are you ace? I had you pegged as a straight girl for sure, but if you’re queer, I’m buying you a flag pin for your backpack.” Which was weirdly sweet. Mel had noticed the lesbian flag sticker on Trinity’s water bottle and thought it was nice that Trinity felt comfortable showing it off in the workplace even though Mel didn’t understand why you’d want random people or even your coworkers to know what kind of attraction you felt. It just seemed very personal. (And then she wondered what about her said ‘straight girl’ to someone like Trinity.)
“No. I’m not asexual. I just…haven’t found the right person. I’ve been very busy.”
“So you want to have sex?” Trinity pushed (Trinity always pushed). “Because I can set you up with somebody. I know a few bi guys who don’t suck. Chicho would treat you right.”
“Chiho?” Dennis echoed. “You want her to have sex for the first time with a guy named Chicho?”
“Don’t be a douchewad, Huckleberry, I’ll have you know that he’s very handsome.” And then, thoughtful, “Kind of like a Latino Tig Nataro.”
Samira finally found a moment to interject. “Well, I think it’s nice that you’re waiting for the right person,” and skillfully pivoted the conversation. And then, incredibly, it was over.
Samira must also have given the others a talking to at some point, because no one ever mentioned it again, not even Trinity. Well, that wasn’t entirely true: Trinity still kept offering to hook her up with guys with nicknames like Weasel and The Ax Man, but from Trinity that was restraint, and after a while even Trinity seemed to realize that Mel wasn’t going to take her up on that and the offers became just another one of Trinity’s jokes.
It really hadn’t gone badly at all. In fact, it had gone better than any of the other times she’d had that conversation, other than with Uardo. She couldn’t stop herself from resenting a little bit that it had happened, but that was more amorphous resentment towards society at large and its expectations about sex than it was resentment towards her friends. Because these people were her friends, as different from her as they were, and like no one had since Eduardo, they accepted her. It was…refreshing?
And besides, she was so busy with so many other things that she didn’t have time to dwell on it too much. One of the benefits of emergency medicine: it keeps her so busy that it’s hard to spiral about things. So she went back to her default: her vibrator when she felt too pent up, observing all the dysfunctional relationships she saw coming through the ER and thinking, So much better to be single, and, sometimes, when she had a moment, thinking wistfully, Someday.
Then Frank kisses her and it’s everything she ever dreamed of.
And then she realizes she’s going to have to tell him.
Mel isn’t ashamed, she knows that for sure. It’s more that she hates being the cliche. She knows what people think when they look at her because sometimes they say it out loud (usually they don’t know she’s listening, but sometimes they do and just don’t care): sexless, cold, prude.
And none of that is true. She’s private, but she’s not a prude; she likes reading an erotic novel as much as the next girl, knows that works for her much better than porn, which she has tried but wasn’t into (she kept fixating on the mechanics of it all and wondering about what the off-screen relationships between the partners are like and honestly getting icked out by some of the fluids), and her rabbit lives in the drawer of her nightstand (she even bought Becca one when she asked, though she doesn’t know how much Becca uses it), and she’s thought (quite a lot actually) about what things she would and wouldn’t want to do and under what conditions. She just doesn’t like talking about it with people she actually knows, because people are so weird about sex. She can talk about with complete strangers on the internet—or at least she could if she could find the time—but with people who know her, it just feels fraught and judgmental.
And she doesn’t like playing into the stereotype. People on the spectrum have all kinds of different relationships with sex, and it’s infantalizing and othering that so many people assume otherwise. No one can look at another person and guess what kind of sex they do or don’t have, but people think they can, and that makes her angry, honestly. When people ask her or make insinuations about other autistic people, she wants to push back, to say, “Actually, I have sex all the time. With lots of partners.” Not because she wants to have lots of partners—that doesn’t appeal to her—but just to defy their expectations and make them look at her (and everyone like her) as a real person.
She does, occasionally, say things like, “The girl with the most active sex life at my high school was on the spectrum,” or, “I know lots of autistic people who are married or have partners and are very happy,” or, “Polyamory is very common in the neurodivergent community, do you want a link to a study?” or “Do you think Wentworth Miller has a difficult time finding sexual partners?” She mostly doesn’t because she can’t get the words lined up in her head quickly enough or because the conversation is moving too fast, but she always thinks less of someone for putting her in that position.
And she hadn’t felt ashamed when she told the others that night at the bar, just anxious about whether she was going to have to change her opinions of them. (She’s so grateful she didn’t have to.)
But she is anxious about telling Frank. Not because she thinks he’s one of those guys who would either be horrified at the idea of being with a virgin or, worse still, one of those guys who would make a big deal about it in the other direction. He’s always so gentle and caring with her, she really doesn’t think he’d do either one. But she’s heard so many men say so many things about women without experience, both in real life and on TV and in the movies, that makes her feel dirty, and she’s having a hard enough time believing that Frank loves her romantically. Internalizing that he not only wants her sexually but is also willing to wait for her to be comfortable with that…it’s so much. Good much, but much.
And it’s intimidating, imagining how things might unfold between them, because while she has a lot of theoretical knowledge, pursuing medicine has taught her again and again about the gap between theory and praxis. Sometimes it’s puddle-sized, natural to step over without breaking the rhythm of her steps; other times it’s wider than a canyon and she has to take the time to build a bridge. She really isn’t sure which one this will be, but the thought of embarrassing herself in front of Frank makes for some restless nights.
It’s not that she doesn’t want to be intimate with him. She wants to do everything with him (well, everything on her mental list of things she’s always wanted to do and a few on the list of things she’s intrigued by but has never been sure about). She wants him so much, now that she’s given herself permission to do so; all the desire she’d tamped down on when she’d believed she didn’t have a chance with him is now tornadoing through her body, almost scaring her with its intensity.
She fixates on his wrists or his neck, the line of his shoulders, the place where his bangs brush the wrinkles in his brow, the small of his back. Mostly not when they’re working, but between times, and in the few hours they manage to spend together outside work. Usually, they’re with either Becca or Tanner and Millie, so they don’t have a lot of time to do much. They kiss sometimes in his car when he gives her rides to and from work or the Center, but the divider between the seats makes it uncomfortable, and even though she thinks he’d like to sneak off to the roof sometimes, she isn’t going to do something like that at work. (It’s bad enough that he kissed her like that in the lounge. For the first couple of weeks after that, she blushes furiously every time she goes in there, eyes averted from the wall where the open enrollment poster’s corner is bent from where he pushed her against it. She simply will not be able to survive if she has more associations with his mouth and his hands and his heat here in this place where she has to work.)
But then auditions for the fall musical at the Center are held, and Becca’s going to be Irene in Hello, Dolly! (the joy of it keeps the King sisters giddy and celebratory for a solid two weeks and involves a lot of cupcakes and glitter), and rehearsals are going to start soon, and Mel’s schedule will open up. Frank only has his kids on the weekends now (the possibility of 50/50 custody will be revisited once he finishes his residency and gets an attending job somewhere), so that means there will be time during the week when they can actually be alone, so she’s on a bit of a timeline. She has to figure out how to talk to him about this because it’s only fair for him to be warned, but she’s finding it’s very different to think about this conversation in specific terms instead of hypothetical ones.
Because of course she’s thought about what she’d say to a potential partner. She had a decent script, she thinks, straightforward but not clinical (hopefully—she’s not always good at knowing when she’s being too objective about something), but somehow it seems insufficient with Frank. The way he looks at her makes her weak at the knees, now that she understands what she’s seeing. His gaze has always been intense, has made her feel…held, if that makes any sense, but now it’s so much more because she knows what he’s saying when he looks at her like that. Samira says he’s been looking at her like that for a long time, but she’d needed to hear him say it out loud before she could decipher it.
It shakes her, knowing that this beautiful man she cares about so much wants her. She’s been drawn to a few men before, but except for Cory in undergrad, none of them seemed interested in her at all, and the guys who have paid her attention, she hasn’t been interested in. Which has always been frustrating, but she sees now that there was a safety in that too. She could fantasize about Harshad in her first biology class in undergrad or Avi in her med school cohort, but it wouldn’t go anywhere because Harshad had a girlfriend and Avi had told her once that he always wished he’d had a sister like her. (That stung, even while she was thrilled that he really liked her in any way at all.) And when Jake at the VA asked her out, she felt guilty for being relieved that she had the excuse that she was only going to be in town for another month and didn’t want to start something right before she moved to Pittsburgh. (Jake was nice, but she was quite sure she could never be attracted to him.)
And now she’s here, and Becca’s got this whole life that Mel has always dreamed of for her, and there’s this man that she just likes so much who inexplicably likes her too (she tries, sometimes when she’s lying in bed at night, to calculate the odds of that), and even if she wanted to, she wouldn’t be able to find excuses.
But she doesn’t want to. She wants to be with Frank, no question. Eduardo had told her to wait till it felt right, and it does. She’s just a bit…anxious about pace.
She goes to Samira, of course, because there is no one else she can imagine having this conversation with. (Eduardo would talk with her about it, if she called, but she’s learned the hard way that his approach to mating rituals—she hates it when he uses that phrase, but he thinks it’s hilarious—is never going to be applicable to her, so his advice would be less than helpful. She definitely needs to tell him that she’s found her first real boyfriend though! He’ll be so happy for her.)
The script that had sounded fine in her head sounds silly when she says it out loud to herself in the mirror as she’s getting ready for bed at night, so she really needs a second opinion.
“I would love to workshop this with you!” Samira says when they’re sitting on the little balcony of her apartment enjoying green tea and the autumn evening. The balcony doesn’t have a view since it faces the rear of the strip mall that backs up to Samira’s complex, but it’s quiet, at least, traffic just a dull roar in the distance. “But Mel, I really don’t think you need to worry. No matter how you say it, Langdon’s going to take it well. Anyone can see he’s head over heels for you.”
Mel’s smile pulls so wide it makes her face ache, but it just feels so good to hear that. Not as good as hearing it from him, but almost. “Really? Anyone?”
“Anyone,” Samira confirms. “Esme said something to me about it the other day.”
“Oh, wow.” She’s not sure how she feels about that. It makes it feel more real, that other people can tell that Frank cares about her, but also she doesn’t love being the subject of gossip. “What, um, what did she say?”
“Oh, she just said it was cute, how happy he looks when he smiles at you.”
Well, that isn’t bad. That’s sweet, actually. If that’s the level of conversation, she can live with it.
“I’m just saying,” Samira continues, “I don’t think there’s a wrong thing to say in these circumstances so long as you’re honest, and you’re always honest.”
“I don’t know. There are some things that might be hard to balance.”
Samira looks intrigued. “Like what?”
“Like…like how I want to move slow but I do want to move? I don’t want him to think that I don’t—” She flushes crimson. “—that I don’t want him. Because I really, really do.”
Samira’s grin is a bit wicked. “Well, you could just say that. Though it might give him a heart attack.”
Mel laughs, thinking how nice it is to have someone to laugh with about something like this. She’d hoped when she started at the Pitt that she would find friends, but she hadn’t dreamed they’d be as good as the ones she has found. It makes her fizzy with energy sometimes, just thinking about the fact that Samira told that heart patient the other day that Mel is her best friend and that Trinity has actually stopped calling her disease-based nicknames and that Dennis gave her that little ceramic frog he found in a thrift shop with a small shrug as he said, “It made me think of you.” Cassie asks about Becca, and Dana has had Mel and Becca over to her house for dinner twice (her daughters are very beautiful and very cool and very intimidating), and sometimes she and Donnie eat lunch together, sitting side by side on the bench outside and not saying anything the whole time, but he always smiles at her and gives her a fist bump as they go their separate ways. And there’s Frank. She’d had no warning about Frank.
“I guess I just want a…steady progression.”
“You could make a list,” Samira suggests; she knows how Mel feels about lists. “It might make you more comfortable to check things off.”
“No.” She’s thought of that herself, but she rejected the idea. It would make sense with someone she cared about less than Frank, someone who made her less…well, crazy. But she knows that she would get hung up on the list, get unnerved if something happened out of order or that wasn’t on the list at all, and she wants a little bit of room for…spontaneity with Frank. She doesn’t have it anywhere else in her life, and it’s been a really long time since she’s wanted it, but she feels so safe with him that she thinks it might be nice to try.
“Okay, well, what if you tell him not what you haven’t done, but what you have?”
“Well, I haven’t done much.”
“Not even alone?” Samira asks it neutrally, but at the way Mel looks down at her hands, flustered, she grins. “I have a feeling he would be very interested in what you’ve done by yourself. Guys are into that sort of thing.”
Not just guys. She’s thought about it some, Frank touching himself, and it makes her feel like the top of her head’s been blown off like in Looney Tunes. That’s one of the ways she knows she wants him, that even that is appealing to her. In the past when she’s thought about men masturbating, she’s mostly thought about it in clinical terms and it seemed about as interesting as bowel movements, and the times she’s thought about a man masturbating while thinking of her, she’s always been alarmed and a bit grossed out. It’s not that she doesn’t want anyone thinking about her like that—she knows other people’s thoughts can’t touch her—but she doesn’t want to know about it, the way she’s never wanted anyone to know what goes on in her head when it comes to sex. But with Frank…well, it’s different with Frank. Oh God, she’s blushing so hard.
Samira is still smiling at her when she looks up, but it’s softer now. “Mel, I think you hit the jackpot with this. Not that I think of Langdon like that, oh my God, he is so not my type. But I just mean having found someone who cares about you so much, who you know so well, who you also have chemistry with.”
“You think we have chemistry?”
Samira raises an eyebrow. “You don’t?”
Mel thinks of the way it felt back before he kissed her, when she didn’t think he’d ever look at her that way. Sometimes he stood so close to her that his smell and his warmth seemed to wrap around her, and it had been so hard not to take a step back, to lean against him. Once he had put his bare hand on the back of her neck and given it a squeeze, and those few inches of her skin felt more alive than any other part of her has ever been.
And then when he kissed her…well, when she and Cory, the closest thing she ever had to a boyfriend, made out in college, she’d enjoyed it and gotten hot and restless, but there was also a tiny part of her sitting back and squinting and saying, “Exchanging saliva? How did humans evolve to find this appealing?” That voice is not there when Frank kisses her.
“Yeah,” she says softly, twisting her fingers in her lap, feeling like her skin’s temperature has risen several degrees. She knows it hasn’t, that if she pulled out a thermometer right now and scanned her skin, the results would say 97.9, just like they always do. But she feels like a radiator.
“You’re seeing him tomorrow night after he gets off, right? While Becca’s at rehearsal?”
“Yeah.” She’s so excited that she’s almost not anxious.
“What are you planning on doing?”
“Getting takeout from the Turkish place and taking it to my house.” He’s never been to her home. She’d been inside his apartment once, but other than the profusion of pictures of his kids on the fridge and the messy containers of toys, it kind of made her sad, and when she’d suggested hers, his face had lit up.
“So you two will be alone for a while together in a place you feel safe. I’m sure whatever you say in the moment, it will all work out.”
Mel hopes she’s right.