People always told you never date a resident, never date an attending, and never date as an intern… well, you only listened to one of those.

For the past year or so, you’d been in a secret relationship with Dr. Frank Langdon. You were both so happy—the only reason it was a secret was because of how everyone would react, even if you were both senior residents.

Everything was fine. The secret stayed hidden, and no one seemed to know. You were happy—truly happy. Even through everything you’d seen in the Pitt, he made you feel safe, grounded. Then came the addiction.

You had no idea he’d been stealing meds from work. You only knew he’d gotten injured helping someone and hurt his back. He told you he was fine now, that he didn’t need them anymore.

Then, all of a sudden, he was gone. He left early during a shift. Mel said he came back later for extra help, but you never got a chance to see him.

Now, ten months later, you seemed to have lost yourself because you lost him. He was the one person you had. You loved him—and yet he had just disappeared.

You later found out, from being nosy, that he was in rehab and counseling, and somehow that only made it worse. You quit trying. You barely spoke to anyone. You only talked when spoken to. You just didn’t have the energy.

July 4th

Ten months later, you seemed distant from everyone—low all the time. Everything annoyed you. It felt stupid. You didn’t know if he would ever come back. You’d never heard anything from anyone, especially not from him. No one would tell you anything. They had no idea about the two of you.

Until today.

You saw him—and ignored him.

Dana seemed to notice, because all day she’d been asking if you were alright. you could see it in the looks she was giving both of you whenever he was near. even though you avoided him. he kept giving looks all day. he wouldnt stop staring. wouldnt stop trying to talk to you but you would just walk the other way. you avoided him enough to be able to just stand at the nurses station for a bit to do a chart