Author's Note: Part 2. Enjoy. :)
It was one of those rare, productive days where Kenzie had, so far, saved more lives than she had lost. It was always these days that she felt better, cleaner, and the blood seemed not to stain her hands so much. When she told a soldier they were going to live and knew that it wasn't a promise to be broken, she was happy. Such an overused word, happy, but she'd rather be that than aggravated or miserable or forlorn or any other number of things she felt on any other number of days.
"You're going to be fine," she sighed. But it wasn't the sigh she normally used, when she knew that what she'd just said was going to be a lie in about ten minutes when the man would convulse and pass away. It was a sigh of relief that she accompanied with a smile.
"Thanks, Nurse. You're a life-saver, literally." The man, an Anthony Lewis, smiled up at her also and visibly relaxed now that the nasty piece of shrapnel was out of his leg. It had just missed his main artery and Kenzie wondered if it was the work of God or merely luck.
Someone grabbed Kenzie from behind around the middle and hoisted her up with a laugh before setting her back on the ground again. She wasn't paranoid this time. Over the course of two days, she'd learned that George Luz had a habit of sneaking up on people.
"Hello, beautiful." He leaned over her shoulder and kissed her on the cheek.
"Hi." Despite her clipped greeting, the grin that spread across her face was bigger than when her father had bought her a puppy when she was ten years old. And that had been a pretty momentous occasion.
"How are you this lovely day?" George asked, leaning on the edge of the wounded man's cot.
"I'm fine…I'd be better if you'd stop hurting my patient." The added weight on the cot had made Anthony's leg shift and he was grimacing in pain.
"Him? He'll be fine! Won't ya, buddy?" George squeezed the man's leg, at which the man groaned long and loud and Kenzie slapped Luz's arm.
"Not funny."
"It was a little funny."
Kenzie ignored him and gathered the bloodied rags scattered around the man's leg. She bustled off to attend to a soldier who had a bullet lodged in his left arm and was only half-conscious. George followed.
"So, I was thinking you could accompany me tonight to the bar across the street. We're havin' a dance."
"A dance?" Kenzie stared at George like he head two heads.
George shrugged. "Well, y'know. You'll be the only gal there and we'll really be the only ones dancin', but you get the idea."
"No." Kenzie reached for her metal tongs.
"Why not?" George looked aghast.
"This gonna hurt a lot, Nurse?" The wounded man asked, swaying a little where he sat.
"Not with this…" Kenzie caught site of the man's dirty dog tags as she administered the morphine. "…Robert."
"How'd you-" Robert, however, was cut off by the sight of Kenzie digging the tongs into his wound, stretching the skin apart, and extracting the bullet. Robert gave a low groan, but otherwise only uttered, "That's disgusting. Thank God for morphine…"
Kenzie smiled at the man and began dressing the wound. She addressed George again. "Because I have a lot of work to do."
"Can't argue with that..." Luz seemed in awe of what she'd just done, staring openmouthed at the man's gaping arm before he seemed to snap out of it. "Look, Kenz. Come with me…just for an hour. It'll be fun!"
Kenzie glanced up at George and then at Robert. "What do you think I should do?"
The man grinned a bloody smile and laughed. "I say go with him. He looks desperate."
Luz kicked the man's boot with his own. "Yeah? You look like you got in a fight with a Kraut and he won. What happened, they not have enough mouth guards for the front lines?"
"Enough you two." Kenzie nearly snapped, bandaging Robert's arm. "…I'll go, George. But only for an hour, right?"
"Right!" Luz grinned and swooped down again to kiss her on the cheek before leaving, singing some Marlene Dietrich song he'd heard on the radio in town earlier.
"Bagged yourself a winner there, Nurse." Robert chuckled.
"Oh, he's a real charmer."
The night had been fun, she couldn't argue with that. She was glad she'd gone, actually, whereas earlier she figured she would have regretted it. Felt guilty, as it were, for leaving wounded men back at the aid station and not being there to help them. Really, though, they were only across the street. If the other medic's and nurses had needed her, she would have been there in 2 minutes flat.
But no one had come to call. And she found herself being introduced to other men of Easy Company, a rowdy, rambunctious group, especially one Joe Toye, who took every opportunity he could to hit on her. For instance, when George had gone to get drinks, or when George had played a game of darts. Kenzie also found herself laughing more than she'd done in the entire time she'd been overseas. The funniest time being when Joe Liebgott cracked a Jewish joke and no one else laughed except Kenzie, whose aunt had married a Jewish guy. Kenzie nearly spit her drink all over the table trying to contain her raucous laughter.
"I told you you'd be glad you came," George told her when they were finally leaving for the night. The man could brag, she would give him that.
Kenzie nodded. "It was fun. I think Joe's my favorite, though."
"Liebgott?"
"Toye."
George rolled his eyes and laughed. "Bastard." He'd caught the man in action when he'd come back from buying the third round of drinks and almost socked him one in the mouth when the guys told him Joe'd been hitting on her nearly all night. Kenzie could do nothing but sit back and laugh some more.
"George?"
"Hm?"
They were nearing the aid station now and Kenzie had to get something off her chest.
"Uhm…" She swallowed hard. "…you're leaving…tomorrow."
George looked down, biting his lip. "Yeah."
Kenzie shook her head. "I just…I'm worried?" She had no idea why it came out as a question. "Yeah, worried. That…it'll be you." That the next time she saw him would be under a river of blood and a mound of broken bones.
"Shit, Kenz." George placed both hands on either side of her head and leaned his forehead against hers. "It won't be. I mean, I'm no fortune teller, but I ain't had one scratch my whole time here and I'm pretty confident that it ain't gonna happen any time soon."
"How do you know?" Kenzie hated herself for wanting to cry on their last night together. She wanted George to have a happy memory of their last night together, not some depressing vision of Kenzie with tears running down her cheeks and red splotches all over her face.
"Because how can I die if I'm gonna come back and marry you?"
Kenzie wasn't even sure if he was being serious or just joking around like he always was, but she surged forward anyway and her lips crashed into his. She had never been a particularly romantic type, but as George's mouth opened up beneath hers and they breathed each other's air, Kenzie quite liked the idea of a white wedding with George Luz. And maybe Frank Perconte would be George's best man and they could put Joe Toye in a dress to be her Maid of Honor.
Kenzie found herself laughing at the thought and that was more like it. That was what people did around George Luz. They laughed, because he was just so damn funny. And that was what she wanted George to remember if they never met again. A smile on her face as they kissed in the chilly night air outside of a bar in a city that she couldn't even remember the name of, but it didn't matter.
All that mattered was them.
End.
