"Well, well who is that you're texting?"

Sophia glared at May before slamming her locker door closed. "I have worked way too many twelve-hour shifts this weekend to deal with that right now," she shot back.

But May just shook her head. "That smile you had on your face right now was way too big given the amount of twelve-hour shifts you worked this weekend," she argued.

May was right, although Sophia hadn't noticed the smile on her face until her friend had mentioned it.

"Are you ever actually going to see him again?" May asked.

Sophia shrugged, her stomach twisting slightly. "I don't know," she said, trying to sound nonchalant. "We haven't had time, lately. We both have such busy schedules."

"Uh-huh."

"Which doesn't exactly bode well for anything other than a texting relationship," Sophia argued. "We'd never see each other."

"First off, look at you, admitting you might want something more," May teased. "And second of all," she hurriedly continued as Sophia's lips pursed in annoyance, "it's not like people's schedules can't change."

"I'll see you later, May," Sophia said pointedly. She swung her bag over her shoulder and stalked out of the changing room.

The Memorial Day holiday weekend had come and gone, and quite frankly, Sophia was exhausted. She had been mostly working the night shifts, so now as she headed out into the parking lot, it was just past seven in the morning.

Her stomach growled. "Alright, breakfast it is," she mumbled to herself.

More often than not, Sophia found herself unable to head home directly after her shift and crash. Her mind buzzed, especially now with the chaos of the holiday weekend, and her adrenalin ran higher than usual. There was nothing like fresh orange juice and pancakes to help calm her thoughts.

She was a regular at a small diner off of Santa Monica Boulevard, and even though it wasn't super close to the beach, the food made up for the lack of location. In fact, being farther away from tourists meant that there was always a table available, and Sophia could eat relatively undisturbed.

"Usual table?" the hostess asked when Sophia walked in.

Sophia gave her a tired smile but nodded. "That would be great."

The hostess, Ruby, as Sophia had learned after her many visits, led Sophia back through the diner to a small table in the back corner. "Pancakes?" she asked.

"Yes, please."

Sophia sank into her seat, the scent of bacon and coffee and the sound of sizzling grease already permeating her senses and coaxing her into sleep. She liked sitting in the back because it let her watch the people coming in and out, but today she sat with her head propped up on her hand, her eyes staring at the grooves and graffiti on the table. She was just so damn tired.

Her eyelids began to fall as she shoved pancakes into her mouth. The first couple of times she came here she had been concerned about getting home safely, but she came to realize that the sugar rush hit her just as she got back on the road, and she would crash about half an hour after reaching her apartment.

"So, it seems we both have a preference for back corner tables."

Sophia's eyes shot open and her heart rate and adrenalin spiked. Butterflies the size of blue whales teleported into her stomach as she looked up into Dean's tired, but smiling face.

God, his smile was beautiful.

"Dean!" Sophia said with a little too much enthusiasm. She cleared her throat and forced down her excitement. "What are you doing here?"

Dean pointed at the other chair at the table, and Sophia nodded. "Just got off a 24-hour shift," he explained. "As I assume you've experienced as well, it's been a hell of a weekend, so there hasn't been that much time to do things like eating."

Sophia nodded, rolling her eyes. "People are stupid."

Dean laughed. "They really are."

"I hate Memorial Day weekend. It's just a prelude to the Fourth of July when people are even worse."

Dean shrugged. "True, but at least they're having fun. Stupid fun, but fun." A waitress came and placed food in front of him. He must have ordered before approaching Sophia. "Other than idiots, how's work?" he asked, shoveling eggs into his mouth.

"Mostly idiots," Sophia confirmed. "But in all honestly, that's what keeps it entertaining. You always think you've seen it all, but then someone comes with some new, wild injury and you have to keep yourself from either laughing or just standing there, staring at them in disbelief."

An unfortunate side effect of Sophia's exhaustion was, if given a window, she rambled until someone cut her off. "I do have this one patient, though, she comes in a lot. She's just a kid, but she's got lung cancer and it's not really going well. She came in a few weeks ago, not breathing well and getting severe headaches, and it turns out it was just a side effect of her chemo so the doctors adjusted her dosage, but—"

Why would he even want to hear about all of this? You're really not that interesting.

The voice in her head shut her down in a split second. "Sorry," she mumbled. "I ramble when I'm sleep-deprived."

But Dean just frowned, his eyebrows drawing slightly together. "I don't know why you'd be sorry," he said. "How's your patient now?"

Sophia blinked in surprise. "Um, the same, mostly," she told him. "Adjusting the medication helped with those side effects, so now she's just continuing with the chemo."

Dean shook his head. "I don't know how you do it," he told her. "Seeing all of that."

"It's not like you don't see your fair share of shitty things," Sophia said.

"I know, but it's like, we only see the beginning of things. And then we patch people up, get them to the hospital, and then it's out of our hands. We never have to deal with seeing long-term suffering."

"Well, I don't know how you do that," Sophia threw back at him. "I don't know how I could deal with not knowing what happened to the people I treated."

Dean nodded. "It does suck sometimes; I'm not going to lie. But it helps to know that we're dropping them off with people like you."

"People like me?"

"Yeah, people who are damn good at their jobs."

Sophia felt a blush working its way up to her cheeks, so she took a gulp of orange juice to try and cover the awkward moment. It probably didn't work, but they were both too tired to care. "How do you know I'm good at my job?"

Dean stared at her behind his water glass. "Are you saying you're not good at your job?"

"I'm damn good at my job."

Dean snorted. "There we are then."

Things just felt easy with him. Easier than Sophia had experienced in a long time. Even though his eyes were ringed with red, he looked intently at her when she spoke, actually listening to what she had to say. A man hadn't made her feel so heard or seen in, well, ever.

"Well, I hope she pulls through," Dean said. "I imagine it must really suck to see people go through all of that, especially kids."

Sophia nodded. "It really does, although I take it you have some experience in that, as well. In some ways, though, kids are the strongest when it comes to this kind of stuff."

"They're always the bravest ones," Dean agreed. A soft look came over his face, and Sophia's heart melted just a bit. "Sometimes their parents will be in full panic mode, and even though the kid is the one who's injured—"

"They're the ones trying to keep the calm," Sophia finished for him. "Yeah, it's amazing."

"But it still sucks," Dean said after a moment of silence.

"Yep. Still sucks."

"So," Dean said, bringing back the upward curve of the side of his mouth, "what's the craziest thing you saw this weekend?"

They sat there talking for so long, Sophia lost track of time. After getting through their Memorial Day weekend tales, they continued on to past experiences. Sophia had seen her fair share of weird shit in the E.R., but Dean, being out in the field, had probably twice what she had.

All the while, Sophia took him in. The way his entire face, not just his eyes, lit up when he told her about his favorite patients and some of the crazy stories that, against all odds, had happy endings. The way he rolled his eyes when he recounted incidents with the rude and obnoxious citizens of Los Angeles. How when he smiled, like really, truly smiled, the right side of his mouth lifted higher than the left, and how when he laughed, lines appeared at the corner of his eyes, and his entire body shook.

Sophia figured that when she was comfortable enough to tell him stories about all the crazy things people got stuck up their butts, it was probably time to wrap things up.

"So, you're leaving me with the advice to never stick anything up my butt that wasn't designed to be there?" Dean asked, amusement ringing through his voice.

Sophia snorted. "Precisely," she said. "But not to worry. L.A. has plenty of adult stores where you can buy stuff for that if you're into that type of thing."

Dean choked on the water and coughed for a solid thirty seconds before recovering.

Oh, God. Sophia hadn't flirted in, well, she couldn't even remember the last time she flirted with someone. And now here she was, talking about sex toys.

Thankfully, the waitress came with their bills, saving both of them from more embarrassment.

"Here, I got it," Dean said, reaching for both slips of paper.

Sophia snatched her receipt out of the waitress's hand. "Uh, I can pay for my own breakfast," she said. This was already feeling too much like a date, and if Dean paid for her food, that would just put it over the top.

Dean looked like he wanted to argue, but she gave him a severe look. "Do you really think you'll be able to win an argument against me, Firefighter Hawthorne?"

Dean's lip twitched. "Not in the slightest."

For some reason, his words seemed to hold more meaning than just talking about a restaurant bill.

They walked out into the parking lot together, Sophia very aware of how his hand rested by his side, just a hair's width away from her harm. "This is me," she told him when they reached her car.

"Are you going to be okay getting home?" Dean asked her.

Sophia nodded. The sugar rush had come and gone, but pancakes had nothing on the energy spending time with Dean filled her with. "You?"

He nodded. "Then I guess I'll text you later."

"Yeah, sounds good."

He stood there awkwardly for a moment, and as Sophia stared up at him, her eyes briefly flickered down to his mouth.

But then he gave her a nod and turned around, heading farther into the parking lot. She felt a small surge of unexpected sadness as she watched him walk away from her. She couldn't pinpoint why, but it just didn't feel right.

Sophia got into her car, shaking her head to try and get some sense in her brain. She really, really needed to get some sleep. Kissing him wouldn't have ever crossed her mind if she wasn't so exhausted.

But with the exhaustion came some positives. She hadn't even noticed that Graham's voice hadn't reappeared in her head since Dean told her not to be sorry.