“Are you a pulmonary embolism? Because you take my breath away.”

Baekhyun’s at it again.

It’s the same every year, but it’s the worst in February. Something about a highly commercialized holiday and discounted candy brings out the sleaze in him.

Jongdae is used to it.

“Are you food poisoning?” He pauses for a beat, watching Baekhyun tilt his head like a curious puppy. “Because you make me sick.”

A nurse charges up to the desk and holds a file for Jongdae to read. She marches back down the hall, the picture of efficiency. Jongdae’s pretty sure she worked in the hospital when he had busted his arm in fifth grade.

“Don’t you have work to do, Doctor Byun?” Much like drugs, Baekhyun should come with a warning. Where there is a pulse there is a chance. Before the pediatrician can make a smart comeback, his pocket vibrates.

“I do, now. Don’t miss me too much,” he chirps.

Jongdae watches him scurry down the hall and take long strides down the stairs, just because he can. One of these days, he’s going to take a tumble again, and Jongdae hopes to be around to witness it, because Baekhyun’s been told plenty of times to walk normally.

He’s got time between appointments. If people can hold off on life-threatening situations, he can catch a quick nap in one of the exam rooms.

Draping his jacket over a chair, Jongdae slips off his shoes and climbs under the woven blue blanket and crisp sheet. The mattress crinkles beneath him, made for easy cleaning rather than comfort, but it’s actually not too bad. He’s blessed with the ability to sleep anywhere.

It seems like he just gets comfortable--as comfortable as he can, anyway--and closes his eyes when the door opens.

“Excuse me.” Of course it’s Baekhyun. “I was wondering if you had an extra heart. Because mine was just stolen.”

“So call security.” He cracks an eye open. Baekhyun lets the door fall shut, crossing to the bed comfortably in the dark. “I thought you had a patient.”

“A kid’s fever finally broke. We’re keeping them for observation.” Baekhyun sits on the bed and lies down when Jongdae shifts to a side. “Their mom is finally sleeping, too. I was getting ready to give her a sedative.” He stretches with a whine. “Is it eight, yet?”

“Not soon enough.”

“The bosses know that repeated graveyard and rotating shifts are bad for our health, right? I know someone’s gotta do it,” he rolls onto his side to face Jongdae, “but isn’t it your third consecutive weekend of a double shift?”

Ambient hospital sounds work like crickets and TV snow, calming Jongdae back to a near-sleep state.

Baekhyun tucks an arm over Jongdae’s chest and hikes up a leg to get as close as physically possible without crawling into one another’s flesh.

It’s quiet for maybe thirty heart beats, and then Baekhyun says, “Is your name Osteoporosis? Because you're giving me a serious bone condition.”

“You must be meningitis, because you’re giving me a headache.” Jongdae laughs, though, bringing his hand down just hard enough on Baekhyun’s to make him jump.

A nurse knocks on the door. “Doctor Kim? Your head trauma patient is awake.”

“Oh, good. I’ll be right down. Keep him awake. Get him to drink something.”

“Yes, sir.” They listen to her footsteps get farther away, and Jongdae reaches back to turn on the incandescent overhead lights. Baekhyun squeezes him with an unhappy whine, grudgingly releasing him when Jongdae sits up.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” he grinds the heels of his palms into his eyes with a grimace, “there must be something wrong with my eyes…” He smiles at Jongdae. “I can’t take them off you.”

Jongdae scoffs. “You want the lights off?”

“Nah.” Baekhyun stretches out over the whole bed. “They don’t bother me.”

Jongdae tends to his conscious patient, calling up for a CT scan. A pro of working late is there isn’t much of a waiting period for procedures. Unless the staff isn’t in. Jongdae remembers his stint in radiology and is relatively confident he could operate the machine, but it would probably be unethical and set him up for a malpractice lawsuit.

A kid is brought in with severe abdominal pain. Jongdae hears Baekhyun being paged. The pediatrician doesn’t have time to hit on Jongdae again. Police bring in a couple drunks who brawled and need stitches. They’re still too intoxicated to feel much of anything, but Jongdae’s nice and numbs the area before suturing, anyway.

Finally, it’s time to hand the safety and well-being of the patients over to the morning shift. Doctor Park is much too bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for Jongdae to look at for more than a minute, so he gives a brief rundown of what patients are still receiving treatment, who’s ready to be released, and quietly slips away to his office to change.

A bouquet of flowers sits on Jongdae’s desk. There’s a little card in an envelope held with a plastic stick, and he already has a good idea of what it says.

“‘Blood is red, cyanosis is blue, I get tachycardia when I think of you.’ Cute.”

A knock on the door draws his attention. Surprise, surprise. It’s Baekhyun.

He leans against the door frame, arms crossed over his chest. Scrubs are not the flattering outfit, being glorified pajamas, but Baekhyun wears them well. “Did we have class together?”

Jongdae grins, pulling on a T-shirt. “I could have sworn we had chemistry.” Baekhyun blinks, off-guard, then smiles broadly.

“Is that what it was?” He invites himself in and perches a cheek on Jongdae’s desk, commenting on the pretty roses, as if he didn’t order them. “What’re you doing later?”

“I have a date.” Jongdae flips through some of the papers on his desk. He can hand off a few of them to the other doctors on his way out. “And so do you, so don’t be late and go change.” He balls up his scrubs to toss into the laundry.

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Baekhyun leans over and kisses Jongdae’s cheek. “See you in a bit.”

a/n: This was supposed to be posted for Valentine's Day. I got sick.

This is written more for the pickup lines than any plot, and I had to look up some of the lines, but the rebuttals are my own. uwu Go me.

My hospital knowledge comes from ER, an American drama. It's not super accurate, but it's also not important.