Your shift was supposed to be 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM, but what can you really expect when you work in the E.R.?

The chaos of what happened at PittFest led to chaos in the emergency department, which led to the day-shifters getting off a few hours late.

Once the night-shift doctors and nurses came in to relieve you and the others, you went to the one place you knew you could find solace: the roof.

“You’re in my spot,” is the first thing you hear in that gravelly voice of his.

It’s a bit ironic, you think: Abbot finding you on the roof more than half the day after you found him up here. Although, that’s not how irony works, is it?

Maybe it’s more of an inconvenience that he’s found you. After all, you just want to be alone. Then again, he’s only returning the favor of encroaching on your alone time.

Now it’s you who’s standing in front of the railing, looking down at the night life of the city. He walks up to the other side of the railing.

“Just so you know, Grubhub will not deliver to the roof. But there is a DoorDash guy… uh, Marco, who will trek up here for an extra ten bucks, twenty if you want beer.” You know he’s trying to lighten the mood, but it’s hard to let out a laugh when you just worked fifteen hours without a proper break.

He takes your silence as a sign to keep talking, for some reason. He leans forward onto the railing, “I think I finally understand why I keep coming back now; it’s in our DNA. It’s what we do, we can’t help it. All you can do is focus on the medicine. The medicine’s the only thing that saves the patient, and your sanity.” You turn around to lean forward on the railing, too, closing your eyes.

“You rocked that shit down there tonight, yeah? You rocked that shit down there tonight,” he says a little more aggressively, trying to make his point stick. You finally open your eyes again, and he can see the redness and the tears that threaten to fall.

He pulls back just enough to make eye contact with you. “That is a compliment, so accept the damn thing for once.”