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Brendon fucking hates Christmas. He hates when he gets Christmas off, because he has to go home and see his parents and pretend they're not making his blood pressure shoot up. He has Garcia write him a propranolol script ahead of time, because he ended up with a stress and tension headache the last time he'd gone to their place for the holidays.
“Just come to my dad's,” John says. “I'm off this year, too. He usually just makes prime rib and we get buzzed and watch Die Hard and Muppet Christmas Carol. My family does all the big stuff on Christmas Eve, so we literally don't have to see anyone else.”
For a long moment, he considers refusing. But John's doing that thing where he's acting nonchalant but it's probably a big deal, and that's how they'd accidentally almost broken up over moving in together one time. It's not an experience he'd care to repeat, he's pretty sure his entire surgical team feels the same.
“I'll tell them I can't make it this year,” Brendon says, also grateful for the out. “What does your dad drink?”
“Bud Light,” he replies, and Brendon snorts. “No, seriously. But if you want him to like you, bring a bottle of whiskey. He'll literally never drink it, but it's one of those things that he thinks is cool.”
And Brendon finds that he really does want John's dad to like him. He knows that his mom was the hardass, the one who pushed John to do well and succeed. His dad is the relaxed one, the one who'd caught John trying a cigarette in high school and said he looked like an idiot and couldn't pull it off instead of grounding him. To his credit, John never tried smoking again.
They don't need to go to his dad's until later in the morning, so Brendon makes peppermint mochas while John makes breakfast. They open their gifts to each other and get into another debate about getting a cat, because John wants one and Brendon doesn't want to have someone come feed it when their shifts line up for long stretches. He doesn't like having other people in his space if he's not there. So he starts looking into automatic feeders, water fountains with filters, litter boxes that clean up for them, and how to keep a cat enriched when it's alone for an entire day.
“You ready?” John asks from where he's bundled inside his new big wearable blanket thing. He has the hood pulled over his head, so all Brendon sees is a mug and a chin when he looks over at him.
“Are you?” he counters, and John flings the hood back and nods.
John sets the mug on the end table and climbs over Brendon’s feet to kiss him. It makes Brendon’s stomach flutter. “Don’t do the hair helmet.”
“I won't,” he says, sighing. It's mostly a work thing, because his hair doesn't read as professional when it's curly and all over the place. Plus, it's easier to scrub in without loose strands flying around.
“Then put on some shoes and let's boogie,” John says, kissing him again before jumping up. He takes the hooded abomination off and drops it over the armchair. He's wearing a Christmas sweater underneath that Brendon got him that's got the Tree of Gondor on the chest. How he's not boiling alive is a mystery.
They put on their shoes and grab their coats, the whiskey, the box of Bud Light, and venture out into the cold.
Brendon’s met John's dad a few times, but they'd spent the first eighteen months of their relationship barely even seeing each other. So they already lived together when Brendon finally met him, and he'd liked him. It's clear where John's laid-back nature comes from, and his dad has the same sense of humor. And Brendon had expected John’s dad to maybe have been a retired teacher or something based on his demeanor, but his dad's a fucking retired FBI agent who still trains people in cyber-forensics.
He answers the door wearing a sweater with a pickle in a Santa hat that declares Christmas a “big dill,” and he's already holding a beer.
“Hey, kids!” he says, grinning. “Come on in, I've got food.”
“And we've got alcohol,” John says, hugging his dad. “Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Sh—Alan,” Brendon says, handing over the bottle of whiskey.
“Nice stuff,” he says appreciatively before hugging Brendon. “Merry Christmas, thanks for coming.”
They settle in and drink a 24 pack of Bud Light between them, watching the promised Die Hard with a foray into the Rankin/Bass Rudolph when Brendon mentions it being his childhood Christmas movie.
“You're not that much older than him, are you?” Alan asks.
“Just seven years,” Brendon says, shrugging. “But I like old movies.”
“Yeah, John mentioned. We'll have to kick him out and marathon some classics one day,” he says, sipping his beer. “Kid thinks Terminator counts as one.”
John comes back in with a bowl of hummus for the veggie tray. “Hey, Bren has expanded my horizons, I watched something from the fifties the other day.”
“Thirties,” Brendon corrects.
“That's what I said.” He sits up against Brendon almost uncomfortably until Brendon realizes he's expecting him to lift his arm and let him cuddle in like they're at home. When he does it, John scoots close and rests his head on his shoulder. “Alright, let's watch Michael Caine act his ass off with a frog.”
It's after dinner and sometime around Charlie Brown that Brendon nods off. He wakes up to John gently rubbing his chest.
“Sorry,” he mumbles.
“It's almost like you were up late with a traumatic amputation,” John says softly, and Brendon smiles at how fond he makes it sound. “We can crash here, I've got a double bed in my old room.”
“That sounds awful,” Brendon admits.
“You say that, and yet—”
“I'm not having sex with you if your dad is in the house,” he says flatly.
“What, ever?” he asks incredulously. “What if he has to move in with us when he's old?”
The question is like a shot to the chest. John does this, and it always catches him off guard. He asks questions or says things that imply a big, long future ahead of them. He knows that people don't ever really expect a relationship to end, not a serious one, but it always sounds like a forgone conclusion coming from John.
“I'll reevaluate my stance if that happens,” he concedes, and John’s eyebrows waggle obnoxiously. “Unless you keep doing that, then it's not happening even if we're alone.”
“Hater,” John accuses, kissing him before standing up. He pulls Brendon to his feet, and they gather stuff up from the coffee table to bring it to the kitchen.
Alan is wrapping up two plates and piling other leftovers into takeout containers. “Welcome back. Good nap?”
“Sorry,” Brendon says, wincing.
“Eh, it's fine, we all do it,” Alan says. “John mentioned you had a surgery run late last night, too.”
“Yeah. Ran about six hours, a lot of revascularization issues.”
“No clue what that means, sounds complicated and gory,” he says, putting the leftovers in a bag and handing them over. “But I hope it went well.”
Brendon nods. “It did. She'll keep her hand, might even retain most of her motor function with time.”
“Good for you, kid,” he says, sounding like he actually means it. “My buddy says his ortho surgeon was a dick, I'm glad you're not one.”
“Uh—”
“He's a little more serious at work,” John says diplomatically. “But he's good. He's one of the guys in the city, so he's gotta be.”
Brendon just nods. He doesn't want to pretend he's nice or jovial at work, even to impress the guy who's functionally his father-in-law. But maybe total honesty isn't the best idea.
The way he sees it is that he knows what he's doing and other people don't know what he's doing, so he just needs to take care of the patient, make sure no one fucks up in the meantime, and that he has a complete set of information when going into any surgery. He doesn't lose people often, he doesn't even have much of a history of failed surgeries, and he wants to keep it that way. And when hotshot newbies skip steps, assume they're doing something right when they're not, or think they can earn brownie points by doing shit they shouldn't be doing, then Brendon gets pissed. Patients don't have to know what they're doing, a doctor needs to.
Sometimes, though, the newbies are okay.
Sometimes they're even sweet and funny and patient even if they've probably got ADHD based on how much they self-medicate with caffeine.
“Yeah, I knew agents like that,” Alan says. “Biggest assholes you ever met on the job, good bowling buddies. You bowl?”
“Can't say I do,” Brendon says. “But I'd be willing to try.”
As they walk toward the car, John bumps him lightly with his arm.
“What?” Brendon asks.
“You really wanna go bowling with my dad?” he asks.
Brendon shrugs. “Yeah, why not?”
John loops an arm through Brendon’s, because Brendon doesn't have a free hand from carrying the food. “I know you hate this, but: you're really cute sometimes.”
“I do hate that,” Brendon confirms, suppressing a smile when John laughs.
—
“How was Christmas?” Garcia asks as they put their stuff in their lockers.
“Good,” he replies. “You?”
“Exhausting. I don't need to see my family for another year,” she says, rolling her eyes. “How'd you survive yours?”
Brendon shrugs. “Didn't see them. John and I hung out with his dad.”
“I still don't see it, but I guess I wouldn't,” she says, clipping her ID badge to her scrubs.
Personally, Brendon doesn't see the appeal of leaving a trail of broken resident hearts, but he wisely doesn't say anything. John’s an exception to his “don't date at work” rule, Garcia uses the residency program like Tinder.
“Hey,” John says, and Brendon looks over his shoulder. “Brought you something.”
He holds out a coffee, and Brendon is about to say something disparaging about it. He doesn't drink shitty chain coffee.
“Just try it,” John says, smiling.
Brendon sips the coffee and squints at his boyfriend. It's good. Too good. “Did you…use our machine and pour this in a Dunkin cup?”
“To fuck with everyone? Yes,” John says.
“Mm, I approve,” he decides, taking another sip before kissing him. “Why do you still taste like artificial caramel?”
“Because this one's real and I can't be tamed,” John says, shaking the Dunkin cup he's holding. “Sorry, babe, you knew what you signed up for.”
“Don't you have patients to butcher for me to fix?” Brendon asks.
“I do, thank you for reminding me.” John kisses him again, waves to Garcia, and leaves.
The looks on everyone's faces when they see Brendon walk in and slowly sip from a Dunkin cup is probably his favorite Christmas present after the Jaws edition of Operation John got him.
—
Brendon doesn't know why he'd agreed to pick John up, because the man can afford an Uber. But here he is, walking into a karaoke bar because his boyfriend is drunk with other ER doctors.
He recognizes the one that always looks scared, the one that Garcia is dating (or whatever), the smaller med student that always looks scared, Parker, the smart med student who Brendon will remember the name of if she stays, and the tall med student who honestly has left zero impression on Brendon. There's a couple others he doesn't totally recognize, and then he spots a few nurses clustered around a table. But no John.
“God, where the fuck is he?” he mutters, looking around.
“Next up, we have John singing ‘Kiss From A Rose,’” a man announces over the speakers.
“Fuck,” Brendon groans, pinching the bridge of his nose.
John bounces onto the stage and butchers one of the greatest pop songs of all time, and he unfortunately notices Brendon not long after he starts in on the chorus. So Brendon is getting pointed at way more than he would like to be.
There's a round of cheers the goes up when he's done, Brendon claps a bit. When he ends up with an armful of heavily tipsy John, he smiles at the dopey grin on his boyfriend's face.
“Do you have a tab to settle?” he asks, and John nods. “Let's do that, and then you need to go home and drink electrolytes.”
“You're so bossy,” John sighs, rubbing his face into Brendon’s neck. “Can I get McDonald's?”
Brendon rolls his eyes at the ceiling. “We'll see. C'mon.”
He waits while John gets his card back and signs his tab.
“Up next: Trinity singing ‘good 4 u,’” the bartender announces on a microphone before tapping something on a laptop.
She sounds good, but she also sounds like Garcia needs to have a long talk about their relationship. Brendon makes eye contact with Matteo, who nods to him, and Brendon dips his chin. When the kid who always looks scared sees him, he does a double-take and almost chokes on his drink. The tall med student sitting next to him does the same thing. They're supposed to be unflappable emergency doctors, the future of their hospital is fucked.
“Ready to go?” John asks.
“Absolutely,” Brendon says, pressing a hand to John's lower back to steer him toward the exit.
In the car, John unlocks his phone and announces that they're getting Wendy’s.
“I can make you fries at home,” Brendon says, sighing.
“Yeah, but you make good fries, I need shitty fries,” John argues. “Do you want anything?”
“Chocolate Frosty.”
“They have a Thin Mint one.”
Brendon waffles for a moment, knowing John will eat most of it anyway. “Yeah, okay.”
They're in the drive thru waiting for their food, and Brendon looks over to see John watching him with big, slightly mournful eyes normally reserved for him asking Brendon for a slightly inconvenient favor.
“Can I help you?” he asks, smiling a little.
“Do you love me?” John asks.
Brendon frowns, because he'd been expecting a request that they also stop at McDonald's for nuggets, and moves his hand from the gear shift to John's hand. “Yeah, of course I do.”
“You're not just…used to me?”
The question is so out of left field that it throws Brendon off even more. “No, I don't think I could ever get used to you. Who the hell said—”
“Parker broke up with Brooke because she realized she didn't love her anymore, she was just used to her being there,” John says.
Brendon is about to speak when the window slides open and he has to take a bag of food and their Frosty. He pulls into a parking space and turns as much of his body toward John as possible.
“I'm not gonna say this a lot, because I don't do that,” Brendon says. “But I think you need to hear it.”
John shifts and curls up more or less on his side, facing Brendon. “Okay.”
He looks at John's flushed, still kind of drunk expression and knows he doesn't have to do this but also knows he should. At the very least, John deserves to hear it spelled out after almost three years. “I love you more than I think I've ever loved anyone in my entire life, and you're the best thing that's ever going to happen to me,” he explains, trying to keep his tone calm and even. “Past or future, I know that's true. So no, I'm not just with you out of habit.”
There's a long beat of silence and then a soft: “Oh.”
And then John is reaching across the center console and pulling him into a kiss. It's sweet and slow until Brendon curls a hand over the side of John's neck, and then he's almost got John in his lap as his boyfriend deepens the kiss.
“Fuck, I love you so much,” John says when he breaks for air before diving back in. “Backseat?”
“No,” Brendon says firmly, pulling back. He's forty-two, he's not getting in the backseat in a Wendy's parking lot. “We're almost home.”
“Then get us there maybe,” John says, reaching across again for another kiss before pointedly buckling his seatbelt again.
Brendon does, John's hand covering his the whole way. At the light before their neighborhood, John leans across and kisses his cheek.
“You make me really happy,” he says, and Brendon looks over at him, his chest doing something funny when he sees the soft smile on John's face. “You know that, right?”
Brendon isn't an inherently insecure person, but he's been a trainwreck in relationships his entire adult life. John is the first person he feels like he's not fucking things up with. “I'd hoped so.”
“Well, you do,” John says. He reaches out and pokes Brendon’s cheek, pushing his face a little. “Eyes forward, the light’s been green for a bit.”
—
It's only a few days after the karaoke bar pickup that Brendon gets called down for a double open fracture. Parker is there with the tall med student that he's pretty sure was at the bar, because the kid waves to him when he walks in. Brendon arches an eyebrow at him, and the hand drops immediately.
“Would anyone like to present a single fact about this case or am I supposed to guess?” he asks, bending to inspect where the left tibia has broken through the skin. Bad luck that it's left tibia, right femur. The unconscious teenager attached to the legs is going to have a hell of a recovery. Smooth, if Brendon has anything to say about it, but it's going to hurt like hell.
Parker, thankfully, is good at her job and jumps in immediately, pulling up films and rattling off just what he needs to know. When the med student starts to say something, she and Brendon look at him and he shuts up.
“He'll be brought up soon, we've got an open suite,” Brendon says, palpating the area around the broken skin on the thigh.
“Lucky break,” John says from the doorway.
“Go away, Dr. Shen,” he says, barely holding back an eye roll and smile.
“Yes, sir, Dr. Shark, sir,” John says. “But what am I supposed to do with this bag of drugs for the patient?”
“Give it to Parker and go away?” he guesses, standing up straight and ripping his gloves off.
“He's right,” Parker says, grabbing the bag from John. “Go back to your rectal spasms guy.”
“Hate when I've got a rectal spasms guy,” John sighs, turning and walking out just as Brendon crosses the threshold of Trauma One. “Breakfast after shift?”
“I'll make it,” Brendon says, glancing over at him. “You can have it in bed.”
John bumps his shoulder. “Don't talk dirty to me in the ER, Bren. You gonna make me one of those souffle pancakes?”
“If you earn it,” Brendon murmurs, pushing open the stairwell door.
“Cruel! So cruel!” John calls at his back.
Brendon looks over his shoulder and risks a wink, and John makes a heart with his fingers.
Then he goes upstairs to scrub in, smiling as he takes each step up.
—
—
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