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"How are you doing?"
Jamie looked up from her cramped desk to find Lance standing in the doorway of the temporary building she had called home for the last three weeks. The other girls she was living with smiled and waved in Lance's direction before turning back to their own work. Jamie allowed a smile to come to her face. "I'm good now that you're here."
Lance crossed the floor and came to stand behind her chair, stooping down to give her a hug. "Hanging in there all right?"
"You should be the one to ask. How was today's training?"
He sighed. "Rough. Like always. It's hard, you know, going through all that physical fitness training and trying to cram it all in before we're shipped out next week."
"I know. Come on. Let's try and get something to eat."
"You read my mind," he smiled. He grabbed her hand and the two walked over to the cafeteria. After grabbing a couple of trays, they found themselves sitting at the end of one table across from each other. "So are your courses going okay?"
"All the refreshers I've had to do take make sure I don't buckle under pressure?" she joked across the table to her husband.
"Something like that," he grinned back as he reached across the table to grasp onto one of her hands.
"They're not bad, you know. We do take continuing education courses for a reason so it's not completely new. If anything else, I know there's going to be a lot more blood and guts once we get down there than what I'm used."
"You're a surgeon! Shouldn't you already be used to the blood and gore?"
"Used to it when it's only one patient at a time in a sterile environment where I have the proper resources. I don't normally have mass surgeries going on every day, you know. This is going to be different."
He nodded his head an agreement and put a spoonful of the mashed potatoes he'd gotten into his mouth.
"You know, you two are so lucky to have each other right now," Joey said as he, Chris, and Justin joined the couple at the table, their trays also laden with food.
"Missing your ladies back home?" Jamie asked, already knowing the answer.
Justin nodded. "But I did get a letter from Katie today. She's doing well and she says hi to everyone. I suspect it's the last letter I'll be getting from her in awhile though. God, what's the likelihood that this war will end before we ship out next week?"
"You want the real stats? Probably nill," Chris replied with a sigh, his mood uncharacteristically gloomy as he pushed the food around on his plate for a bit before taking a bite.
"Well isn't that the saddest thing I've heard come out of your mouth in a long while," Jamie said. "Cheer up, old man. At least you're not going into this one alone."
"She's right, you know," Lance said as he squeezed Jamie's hand a little bit again. "We're here together, now, right this moment. Let's be thankful for that at least."
Chris nodded, a small smile coming onto his face. "I know. It's just weird, being all together but not being all together, you know?"
"Together as in here we are, minus JC but with Jamie, but not on stage and instead in a cafeteria in the middle of nowhere together?" The group looked at Joey. "What?"
Justin just smiled. "I still find it very amusing when the words coming out of your mouth make sense."
"Oh, shut your gabber Sprout. We were all thinking the same thing."
The group of five friends laughed, easing the tension for a moment and leaving them thankful that there were still things in the world that could leave them laughing. Lance glanced over at Jamie and smiled. "I love you," he murmured as the others continued to gang up on Joey.
Jamie looked back into the eyes of the man she loved and saw the love radiating out towards her. "I love you too," she said in return, squeezing his hand a little to emphasize her words. "We're going to pull out of this one together, all right?"
He answered with a smile and a kiss to her hand, sending her heart jumping with joy.