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Perry could tell it wasn’t going to be a good day as soon as he opened his eyes.
The first thing that threw him off was the empty sheets beside him. It was only the sudden remembrance that oh, right, Newbie had a night shift and that’s why he’s not asleep next to me where he should be that calmed his minor heart attack.
About nine seconds after that epiphany, he realized he was late for work and quite literally leapt out of bed, growling “Shit,” under his breath as he dove for his dresser. If it were any other day he probably wouldn’t be too worried, except that today was the first day for a group of new interns and Kelso would probably drop-kick his ass all the way to the east coast if he was any more than ten minutes late.
So that was how Perry left his apartment - disheveled, pissed off and without his morning cup of coffee.
Once he actually got to the hospital, things only got worse.
As he stormed in through the doors, muttering under his breath, he automatically glanced around for JD. Unfortunately, the kid was nowhere to be seen at the moment. This wasn’t entirely surprising - he was known to crash in the on-call room for a bit after he worked a night shift - but nevertheless, Perry felt a small tug of disappointment in his stomach.
Shaking his head, he was about to go hunt him down when he heard what could only be described as the high-pitched screech of a demon straight from hell.
(Okay, so it was actually just one of the new interns laughing rather shrilly, but it could easily have been mistaken for the demon-from-hell thing.)
Perry turned, already glaring - damn new interns and their damn annoying laughter, how dare they think they were allowed to laugh in his hospital - and then stopped cold. There was JD; he was leaning against the wall, chatting casually to Carla and a tall, curvy woman with long, bright red hair.
A tall, curvy woman who was leaning way, way, way too close to him.
Perry felt himself stiffen. Of course. Of fucking course!
He growled out a semi-intelligible rant (one that, if he was being perfectly honest, he himself didn't even totally understand) under his breath as he stormed towards them, arms swinging dangerously at his sides. As he got closer, Perry let out a piercing whistle. “Hey! Samantha! Jessica Rabbit!”
JD turned around at “Samantha” but the intern kept chatting away to Carla. After a moment, JD nudged her arm. “I think he means you.”
She turned around, looking confused (they always were the first time the formidable Dr. Cox addressed them with some sort of semi-insulting nickname) and Perry was enraged to see that her front was just as pretty as her back. Meanwhile, all his logical thoughts were screaming at him to calm the hell down. He wasn't jealous, since when did he get jealous?
(Oh, I don't know, maybe since random gorgeous women start hitting on your boyfriend, who isn't allowed to get hit on by anyone but you, not even by Elliot when she's drunk and doesn't know what the hell she's saying, not even -)
Shaking away that train of thought, he fixed them with a cutting glare. “I know how much you girls must enjoy chit-chatting about your latest manicure or the cute guy at the coffee shop or whatever, but I’d re-he-heally appreciate it if you could oh, I don’t know, maybe do your damn jobs?” He gave an exaggerated shrug, splaying out his calloused hands. "Just a thought!"
The intern looked terrified and immediately scuttled in the other direction. JD, however, simply grinned fondly at Perry and leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek.
“Good morning to you too, Per,” he said, flicking him on the nose.
Perry fought back a smile and instead glared (though not nearly as intensely as before) at the younger man. “If you ever flick my nose again, Veronica, I’m not kissing you for a week.”
“Yeah, sure.”
“I mean it, Carrie-Ann! Don’t test me!” He didn’t mean it.
Okay, so maybe it wouldn’t be quite as bad a day as he’d been expecting.
* * *
Of course, things only got worse the next day.
Every damn time he turned around, there she was. That tall, pretty redhead - or Jessica Rabbit, as he now not-so-fondly referred to her as - was always there, hanging on JD’s every word, fluttering her long eyelashes, laughing too loudly and too long. She was relentless. And not that this was particularly surprising to him, but JD didn’t seem to notice a thing. The kid was as oblivious as always.
Perry didn’t bother going to the cafeteria for lunch. He wasn’t hungry, and anyway, seeing that soulless banshee put her hand on JD’s arm for the millionth time that day would probably cause him to projectile vomit any food he’d manage to choke down within minutes. Instead, he went to the break room and flopped down on the couch. It was only lunchtime and he was already exhausted; fantastic!
He’d been sitting there, head in his hands, for about ten minutes when he felt the couch shift and heard a voice. “Okay, what’s the matter with you?”
Without looking up, he growled “If anyone other than Carla or Newbie is sitting next to me when I open my eyes, somebody, and by somebody I mean you, is going to find themselves suddenly, mysteriously possessed to quit their job and never come within ten miles of this hospital again. Ya got it?”
“Oh relax, it’s just me,” replied an exasperated voice that he realized moments later was Carla. At that, he lifted up his head and raised an eyebrow at her.
“Most unfortunately, I know you’re pretty much the only living, conscious human at this hospital I can’t intimidate, and I suppose that means you won’t be going away.”
“Good guess,” she said sarcastically.
“Damn. Thought so.”
Carla fixed him with a one of her familiar X-ray-esque looks. “Since we both know I’m not leaving until you answer the question, why don’t you just make this easier on both of us and tell me what’s wrong?”
“If you must know,” he said sourly, crossing his arms, “it’s that damn intern. The red-headed she-devil.”
“Oh, you mean the one who’s been hanging all over Bambi?”
“Yes! That one!” he felt a surge of victory, glad he wasn’t the only one who’d noticed. “It’s driving me insane, Carla. I swear, I’m going to end up ‘accidentally’ injecting her with some semi-deadly disease if she doesn’t cut it the hell out.” Perry imagined her convulsing on the floor, porcelain skin turning a delicate shade of sky-blue. It was a beautiful image. He only snapped out of it when Carla started talking again.
“Yeah, I’m sure that’d go over great,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “Look, why don’t you just talk to Bambi about it? I’m pretty sure he’s the only person in this entire hospital who hasn’t noticed her, somehow.”
Perry sighed. “Yeah, the kid’s pretty oblivious. Always has been. It took him almost two months to notice when I started hitting on him, y’know.”
Carla raised her eyebrows. “Yes, I do know, as well as everyone else who works here, because we’ve all heard the story about eighteen times, thanks to your boyfriend. But seriously, just talk to him about it if you’re this worked up. I don’t think your interns can take handle any more of your fiery rage.”
“That’s because they’re wimps,” Perry muttered, but closed his mouth quickly when Carla glared at him. “And I would talk to him, but I...I don’t know.”
He trailed off, looking uncharacteristically anxious. Carla reached for his arm, then pulled back. It was unusual to see Perry Cox feeling nervous. Or, well, any emotion at all, pretty much.
She settled for moving closer to him and giving him a concerned look. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t want the kid to think I’m just some jealous, overreacting asshole, okay?” he said roughly, rubbing his temples. “I don’t want to make him worry about something that’s probably just me being pissed off and bitter, as usual. It’s not his problem if the sight of some supermodel breathing all over him makes me feel like I’m about to burst a blood vessel.”
Carla was silent for a moment, but then she spoke up again. “Well then why not talk to her? Let her know Bambi is spoken for. I’m sure she’ll understand.”
Perry snorted so hard he actually choked a little bit. “Understand? Carla, that woman is a - a - a demonic ginger vixen with no soul! She’d probably laugh if I tried to tell her JD was with me! She’s the evil high school cheerleader of this hospital. The one who steals your boyfriend and then invites you to her Halloween party to ‘make amends’ only to watch you walk up her three mile-driveway and then throw an entire cooler of year-old spoiled yogurt into your face as soon as you open the door. She’s -”
“Okay, first of all, that was kind of worryingly specific,” Carla interrupted, cutting him off mid-rant. “Second of all, have you even talked to her, Perry?”
“Yeah,” he mumbled sullenly.
“Like, a conversation? One where you weren’t bellowing at her to do her job and calling her Jessica Rabbit?”
“Y’know, sometimes you talk and I just want to -” he made a violent twisting motion with his hands while grinning rather maniacally. Carla gave him a completely unimpressed look.
“Look,” she said, standing up, “whenever you decide to stop sulking and actually do something about this, let me know, and I’ll be happy to help. Until then, please try not to traumatize any more of the interns! They’re just trying to do their job, and they’re scared. Try to have a little sympathy, okay?”
“I have plenty of sympathy!” he called after her retreating back. “They’re just being pussies! And Carla, I am nawt going to go have a showdown with some bubble-brained intern and tell her to stop flirting with my boyfriend! This isn’t one of your drama-filled romance sitcoms!”
“Whatever you say, Perry,” she said over her shoulder.
With a groan of frustration, he collapsed back onto the couch.
* * *
On the third day, Perry was off work. He’d been looking forward to it all week, planning to spend the day relaxing in front of the TV with a tall glass of scotch. Or, y’know, multiple glasses of scotch. His only regret was that JD did have work that day, so he wouldn’t be there snuggled up next to him begging him to watch a Disney movie instead of whatever sports channel he ended up settling on.
(Not that he liked the kid’s constant whining about Disney movies and all his insufferable cuddling habits. Not that he found it sweet, or anything. At all.)
Of course, that’s not how the day went at all.
Sure, he had his scotch and his sports channels. What Perry didn’t have, however, was some peace of mind. Every time he blinked it was like an image of JD and that evil intern, ridiculously close together and smiling like idiots, was burned into the underside of his eyelids. It was all he could think about. He was practically sick to his stomach thinking about all the things that could be happening without him there to bark orders at everyone.
(Not that he specifically tried to keep Newbie and that intern apart as much as possible. That would be unfair. Obviously.)
Perry groaned, pressing his cold glass to his forehead. For all he knew, they were making sweet love to each other in the third-floor supply closet this very minute. At that thought, he actually shuddered almost as hard as the time he'd accidentally seen Kelso without a shirt on. (The images never faded.)
He paused. Okay, maybe that was stretching it a bit. He knew, of course, that JD loved him, and trusted the kid completely to not cheat on him. But still -
Perry clenched his teeth. He’d never felt like this before, even with Jordan. Sure, he’d punched a guy or two at the bar for “looking at her the wrong way” but that had been more because he’d felt like she wanted him to do it. He wasn't used to feeling actually, literally jealous, and he didn't like it one bit. Currently, pretty much every fiber of his being was screaming at him to drive to the hospital and drag that pretty intern out of there by her ridiculously long hair before tying her to the railroad tracks, laughing for a good three to five minutes, and then going home with JD for some good, long sex.
It was a very, very long day.
* * *
On the fourth day, Perry absolutely could not take it anymore.
At first, he thought he’d be fine. He’d woken up next to JD, had a great cup of coffee, even had a nice little before-work handjob in one of the supply closets. Things were going fabulously. It was a good day.
Then, right after lunch, as he was on his way to the doctors’ lounge to work on some paperwork, it happened.
Perry saw the intern first (he’d learned from Carla that her name was Joanne, but he still refused to call her anything other than “the intern” or “Jessica Rabbit”) leaning up against the nurses’ station, talking loudly and flirtatiously to someone. Then he walked further and saw that the person she was talking so animatedly to was none other than his very own Annabelle, who was listening intently and smiling politely.
As he watched, a blood vessel jumping in his neck, the intern leaned forward and flicked JD on the nose.
Perry was fairly certain steam actually came out of his ears.
That was it.
Before he even realized what he was doing, he was striding toward the nurses’ station, his face steadily growing redder. He reached out and tapped the intern on the shoulder.
She turned around and, upon seeing him (and the murderous expression on his face) the color drained from her doll-like face. “Oh, uh, hi Doctor Cox!”
“Skip the formalities,” he snapped, crossing his arms. “Look, Jessica Rabbit, you see that sweet-looking gal right behind you? The one with the blue eyes and ridiculously gelled hair? The one you’ve been oh-so-smitten over for the past week? Also known as Samantha, Lucy, Angela, Irene, Bambi, Newbie, or occasionally, if I’m in a good mood or if we’re having sex, JD?”
Her mouth dropped open, trying and failing to sputter out a response. Carla choked on her coffee at "having sex." Behind her, he heard JD mumble something that sounded like “Ah, shit.”
“I’ll take your incoherent gargling there as a yes,” he went on, ignoring Carla’s smug I told you so expression. “Well, darlin’, I hate to break your poor little ice-cold and probably very dead heart - and by that I mean this is the most gratifying thing I've done all week - but said doctor is taken, and by taken I mean my boyfriend, probably soon to be husband, and I swear on my dead mother’s grave, if you ever so much as look at him again with a-ah-any spot, speck or drop of lust, love, or anything related in your soulless blue eyes, I will personally hunt you down and personally suture your eyes shut so you have absolutely no chance, any at all, of looking at my Newbie ever again.” He grinned dangerously. “And actually, y’know what, I didn’t like my mother all that much, so we’re gonna change that to me swearing on my dead grandmother’s grave. Did ya get all that, princess?”
He didn’t even notice that the entire room had gone dead silent. Across the hall, Ted had fainted. Nobody seemed to notice.
Finally, Jessica Rabbit managed to choke out some words. “B-boyfriend?” she said in disbelief, looking from JD to Perry and then back to JD. “But he - he calls you girls’ names!”
Perry could feel his face practically going purple. He swiped a finger across his nose, crossed his arms, straightened his back - falling into his natural "fighting stance." Whenever Perry Cox assumed this position, people ran for their lives. Children sobbed. Angels' wings dropped clean off their backs and killed off a few birds on their way down from the sky. The demon living in Bob Kelso shifting its position, looking warily out into the world. And interns - oh, interns fell to the ground, convulsing with spasms of pure terror.
Just then, Newbie cut off his (rather fantastic) inner monologue. “Ah, yeah, that’s his way of showing affection,” he offered, shrugging. “It’s grown on me.”
Perry snapped his fingers. “Mary-Lou? As delightfully endearing as you are, could you maybe close your yapper for just one, maybe two minutes here? Perry’s busy eviscerating someone.”
JD obediently fell silent, although Perry did hear him whisper to Carla, “Did you hear that? He thinks I’m endearing!”
Carla giggled. “Yes, Bambi, I heard. Now shut up and watch the show.”
Perry turned his attention back to the terrified intern. “As I was saying,” he said in a voice of deadly calm, “you are not to go near John Dorian ever again unless it’s for professional purposes only. Savvy?”
She bit her lip, looking like she wanted to argue, but upon seeing Carla with wide eyes desperately mouthing just say yes, she huffed and turned back to Perry. “I understand.” Her voice practically dripped with disdain.
Bad move, sweetheart. Real bad move.
“Good,” he said pleasantly. “Now get the hell out of my sight before I change my mind and decide to ‘accidentally’ lock you in the morgue and ‘forget about you.’”
“Oh,” he added as she hurriedly turned around, “and if you eh-ver talk to me like that again, I’ll cut off that ridiculously long mane and choke you with it. We clear?”
Without replying, she was gone within seconds. The room was, unsurprisingly, still dead silent. Everyone was staring at Dr. Cox, wondering if the storm would have any kind of aftermath.
Sure enough, moments later he took a look around and bellowed “What are you waiting for? Get back to work! Show’s over, morons!”
Everyone sprang into action, carefully avoiding the spot where Ted was still passed out. Perry turned back to JD. As the violent surge of rage faded, he started to realize that he may have slightly overreacted. (Just slightly.) All she’d really done was flick JD’s nose, and he’d gone off on her with a rant worthy of Jack the Ripper himself.
Feeling sheepish, he looked at JD. “Well. Uh. Good morning?”
It was then that he noticed, with a slight shock, that JD looked nothing short of thrilled. He was literally bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Very good morning.”
“Say, uh, Newbie -”
He was cut off as JD kissed him on the mouth, hard. Perry blinked in surprise, but soon leaned into the kiss. They broke apart only when Carla groaned “For the sake of everyone who can see you right now, please get a room.”
Perry winked at her. “Will do.” She groaned good-naturedly and walked away, pausing only to call over her shoulder, “And Per, you’d better be planning on apologizing to Joanne at some point!”
“You know you enjoyed it!” he yelled back. Once she had disappeared around the corner, he added, under his breath, “and not a chance.”
Realizing what he’d said, Perry quickly looked down at JD. “Unless you want me to, of course. Then I’ll apologize. Even though it will be very, very painful and very, very awkward for everyone involved. Mostly me.”
To his surprise, Newbie was already shaking his head adamantly. “Nah. To be honest, she was really starting to get on my nerves. I mentioned that I had a boyfriend about twelve times, but I think she was purposely ignoring it.”
Perry sputtered, waving his hands around. He’d stopped listening after I mentioned that I had a boyfriend. “Wait. Wait, you knew she was hitting on you? Agatha!”
“I’m not that stupid,” JD grumbled. “And yeah, what?”
“Why didn’t you just tell her to knock it off? You could’ve saved all of us the pain of experiencing that entire soap-opera scene!”
“I dropped hints!” JD said defensively. “She just...didn’t get them. Anyway, you totally enjoyed that, don’t deny it. You need someone to go off on now that I’m off-limits for your rage-induced ranting.”
Perry snorted. “Cathy, you know very well you aren’t off-limits. I’m just a teeny-tiny little bit nicer than I used to be.”
“And you kiss me a lot more,” JD said, grinning.
Perry waved a hand. “Details, details.”
JD cleared his throat and looked down, shuffling his feet. “There also may have been another reason I didn’t put a complete stop to it right away.”
“Well what was it?”
“Um.”
“Spit it out, Terese,” Perry snapped, in no mood for dramatic pauses.
“I may have wanted to see what you would do if you got jealous.”
Perry felt pissed for about two and a half seconds before the sight of JD’s cherry-red face and awkwardly fidgeting hands shattered his resolve. “Yeah? And what’d you think, Newbie? Did I deliver a good performance? Were you riveted?”
JD looked up, staring him straight in the eyes. “To be honest, it was one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen you making pancakes while shirtless.”
There was a long pause, both of them staring each other intently in the eyes.
Then Perry, his voice rather breathless, said, “You’re such an idiot, Newbie,” and pulled him into the nearest supply closet for a very long, very satisfying half hour.
It was the best day he’d had all week. All month, actually.