Chapter 6 Max #2
“I have to go,” Asha said, her voice hardening back into professionalism.
“Asha, wait.”
“Please.” The word was almost a plea, her eyes searching Max’s face. “Just... give me some time. Please don’t push me.”
She moved past Max, their shoulders brushing, and slipped out the door before Max could find the words to stop her.
Max stood alone in the supply closet, surrounded by boxes of gloves and sterile gauze, her heart pounding in her chest. She didn’t know if she’d made progress or made everything worse. All she knew was that Asha was running, and Max didn’t know how to make her stop.
At 2:45 AM, the alarm shrieked through the unit.
Max was at the med cart, restocking syringes, when the sound cut through the quiet like a blade. Her body reacted before her mind caught up—feet moving, adrenaline spiking, every sense sharpening to a point.
Pod seven. Baby Chen.
She was running. So was Asha, converging from the opposite side of the unit, both of them reaching the isolette at the same moment.
Baby Chen—28 weeks, chronic lung disease, the fighter who’d been doing so well—lay motionless in his warming bed. His chest barely moved. The monitor screamed: O2 sat at 62 and dropping.
All personal conflict evaporated like steam.
“Bag him,” Asha ordered, already reaching for the IV line to check placement.
Max had the ambu bag in her hands before the sentence finished, mask sealed over the baby’s tiny face. She squeezed, watching for chest rise. Nothing.
“Bagging,” Max reported, voice steady despite the spike of fear. “No chest rise.”
“Suction.” Asha’s hand was already outstretched.
Max handed it over before Asha finished the word, their movements synchronized like choreography they’d rehearsed a thousand times.
Asha suctioned the airway—quick, efficient, gentle. Max repositioned the mask, squeezed again. This time, Baby Chen’s chest lifted, just barely.
“Better,” Max said. “Still dropping. Fifty-eight.”
Asha didn’t hesitate. “Increase oxygen to hundred percent. Prepare epi.”
Max’s hands moved on autopilot: adjusting the dial, pulling the medication, drawing it up in the syringe. She handed it to Asha, their fingers brushing again in the exchange, and documented the time with her free hand.
“Administering,” Asha said, injecting into the line.
They worked in perfect silence after that—no full sentences, just looks and gestures and absolute trust. Asha reached for the laryngoscope; Max had the correct blade size ready.
Max called vitals; Asha adjusted vent settings without needing to be told.
They moved around each other like dancers, like they shared a single nervous system.
Three minutes. That’s all it took.
Baby Chen’s O2 sat climbed: 65, 70, 78, 85. His tiny chest began rising and falling in steady rhythm. The alarm silenced, replaced by the normal beep of the monitor.
Asha stepped back, breathing hard. Max did the same. They stood on opposite sides of the isolette, the baby between them, both of them still riding the adrenaline high.
Their eyes met.
Neither spoke. The moment was too honest, too raw.
The resident burst through the door, flustered and late. “What happened? Is he—”
“Stable,” Asha said, not looking away from Max. “We’ve got it under control.”
Max nodded, barely perceptible. Asha’s lips parted, like she wanted to say something—something real, something true—but then she blinked and the professional mask slid back into place.
“Continue monitoring closely,” Asha told the resident, finally breaking eye contact. “Page me immediately if there’s any change in status.”
She turned and walked away, but slowly, like it cost her something to leave.
Max watched her go, her pulse still racing—not from the code, but from the truth she’d seen written across Asha’s face.
At 3:30 AM, Max went looking for her.
The break room was empty. The staff bathroom, dark. Max checked the charting room, the conference room, and finally stood outside the on-call room, where a sliver of light leaked from beneath the door.
She pushed it open slowly.
The room was dim, lit only by the glow from the hallway. Asha sat on the edge of the narrow bed, still in her lab coat, head in her hands. Even in the low light, Max could see the way her shoulders shook—just slightly, just enough.
“Hey,” Max said softly.
Asha’s head snapped up. Her eyes were red-rimmed, the careful composure finally cracked.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically, but her voice betrayed her.
“You’re not fine.” Max stepped inside and closed the door gently behind her. “And that’s okay.”
Asha looked away, staring at the wall. “I don’t fall apart. I don’t—” Her voice cracked. “I don’t do this.”
Max crossed the small space and sat beside her on the bed, careful to leave a few inches between them. “Do what?”
“Feel like this.” Asha’s hands twisted in her lap, fingers knotting and unknotting.
“Out of control. Afraid. Vulnerable. I’ve spent my entire life building walls, maintaining discipline, staying in control of everything.
And then you—” She stopped, took a shaky breath.
“You make me want to tear it all down. You make me want to tear it all apart and let go of it all. But it’s so alien to me. You’re so… frustrating.”
Max’s heart clenched. “Would that be so terrible?”
“Yes,” Asha whispered, and the word came out desperate. “Because what if I do? What if I let myself want this, want you, and then it all falls apart? What if I’m not good at this? What if I disappoint you, or ruin everything, or—”
“Asha.” Max reached out slowly, giving her time to pull away, and took her hand. “I’m scared too, but that’s what comes with big feelings. It’s not like either of us planned that kiss, right?”
Asha looked at her, surprised.
“You think I’m not terrified?” Max continued, her thumb tracing gentle circles on Asha’s palm.
“My last relationship ended because she couldn’t handle the job—the hours, the emotional toll, the way I give everything to these babies and come home empty.
I swore I wouldn’t do this again. Get involved with someone at work.
Let myself feel this much.” She smiled sadly.
“But then you happened. And trust me, I did not expect it.”
Asha’s fingers tightened around Max’s. “I don’t know how to do this,” she admitted, her voice barely audible. “Be with someone. Be open. My relationships have always been distant. Safe. Easy to walk away from when they became inconvenient.”
“And this isn’t?”
“No.” Asha’s breath hitched.
They sat in the darkness, hands intertwined, the hospital humming around them. Max could feel Asha trembling—small tremors that traveled through her fingers, betraying everything the rest of her tried to hide.
Max shifted closer, closing the space between them until their shoulders touched.
“I think it’s worse avoiding the intense chemistry between us. It must be pretty clear how badly I want you,” Max said softly.
Asha turned to look at her, and in the dim light from the hallway, her expression was completely unguarded—no walls, no masks, just raw vulnerability as her eyes watched Max’s lips.
She leaned in slowly, hesitantly. Max’s breath caught in her throat.
Their faces were inches apart. Max could feel the warmth of Asha’s breath, could see the way her eyes flickered down to Max’s lips and back up, uncertain and wanting. Hungry.
“Fuck. We should—” Asha started, voice barely a whisper.
“Yeah,” Max breathed back, but neither of them moved away.
Asha’s free hand came up, trembling, and cupped Max’s cheek. Her touch was feather-light, tentative, like she was afraid Max might disappear if she pressed too hard. Her thumb traced Max’s cheekbone with tenderness.
Max’s eyes fluttered closed. Her whole body felt like it was vibrating at a frequency only Asha could hear. This was it. This was—
Voices in the hallway, sudden and loud.
“Did you see the schedule? Doctor Patel’s got that consult at seven, and then the—”
They sprang apart like teenagers caught sneaking out. Asha shot to her feet, smoothing her lab coat with shaking hands, rebuilding her armor in seconds flat. Her bun had come loose—just slightly, a few strands escaping—but she tucked them back with precision.
Max stayed seated on the bed, breathless and frustrated, her skin still burning where Asha had touched her.
Asha moved to the door, her hand on the handle. She paused, back still turned, shoulders rigid.
“Max,” she said—just the name, soft and almost broken.
“Yeah?”
Asha looked back over her shoulder. In her eyes, Max could see regret, longing, and something that might have been hope.
“I do want this,” she said quietly, each word deliberate. “I just... I need time.”
Then she was gone, slipping out into the brightened hallway, leaving Max alone in the dark on-call room with her racing heart and the ghost of Asha’s touch still warm on her skin.
Max sat for another minute, her hand drifting up to touch her own cheek where Asha’s fingers had been. She could feel the wetness between her legs building up inside of her.
Her emotions were a tangle she couldn’t begin to sort—frustration at the interruption, hope from Asha’s confession, intense sexual energy, lingering fear that maybe wanting something wasn’t enough to make it work.
But underneath it all, steady and sure, the thought, She wants this. She wants me. She’s just terrified.
And Max understood terror. She’d felt it herself—the fear of being left, of giving too much, of loving someone who couldn’t love her back the same way. But she’d also learned that the only way through fear was straight ahead, eyes open, heart exposed.
She stood, straightened her scrubs, and headed back out to finish her shift.
The NICU was coming alive with the early stirrings of day shift: nurses trickling in with travel mugs and tired eyes, families arriving for morning visits, sunlight starting to filter pale and gold through the windows. The night was ending. A new day beginning.
Max caught sight of Asha across the unit, standing with the attending on morning rounds, her posture perfect, her voice steady as she presented Baby Chen’s overnight events. As if sensing Max’s gaze, Asha glanced up.
Their eyes met across the space.
Asha didn’t smile—couldn’t, not here, not now—but something in her expression softened. Just for a second. Just for Max.
Then she turned back to rounds, professional and contained.
But Max had seen it. The crack in the armor. The possibility.
Martha appeared at her elbow, pressing a paper cup of coffee into her hands. “You look like you need this more than I do.”
“Is it really that obvious?” Max took the cup gratefully, wrapping her hands around the warmth.
Martha studied her with those knowing eyes that had seen two decades of NICU drama. “Whatever’s going on with you and Ice Queen over there,” she said, nodding subtly toward Asha, “just... be patient with her. That kind of woman takes time to thaw.”
Max didn’t deny it. There was no point. “Oh. That’s obvious too? And what if time isn’t enough? We all know life’s short, right?”
“Then you’ll know you tried,” Martha said gently. “But my money’s on you two figuring it out. I’ve seen the way she looks at you when she thinks no one’s watching.” She patted Max’s shoulder. “That woman’s in deeper than she wants to admit.”
Max sipped her coffee—burnt and bitter, perfect—and let herself smile. Small, but genuine. The fact that Martha had picked up on meant it really wasn’t just her own imagination.
Across the unit, Asha was still on rounds, but her hand had drifted up, almost unconsciously, to touch her own cheek. The same spot where she’d touched Max.
Max’s smile widened.
She feels it too.
Progress, not perfection.
She finished her coffee, signed out her patients to the day shift, and gathered her things. As she headed for the elevator, she allowed herself one last glance back.
Asha stood at the nurses’ station, pen in hand, face composed. But as Max watched, she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear—the same gesture from the on-call room, tender and unconscious—and Max felt something settle warm inside of her. She couldn’t wait to taste her kiss again.
The elevator doors opened. Max stepped inside, pushed the button for the ground floor, and leaned back against the wall as the car descended.
Her phone buzzed with an incoming text:
Thank you for being patient with me. I really wish we didn’t get interrupted. You seriously make me feel all kinds of things. Too inappropriate to text you it, though. - A
Max stared at the screen, her heart doing something complicated and wonderful. She typed back:
Maybe you should just show me sometime. See you next shift.
The reply came immediately:
Yes. You will.
Max smiled all the way home, exhaustion and hope tangled so tightly she couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began. She rode through LA’s early morning traffic, the city waking up around her, and thought about Asha’s hand on her cheek, the vulnerability in her eyes, the careful admission.
For now, it was enough.