"Serena!" Fletch put down the file he'd been holding and rushed towards his boss as she tried to sneak from the office to go and get a coffee.
"You caught me." She held up her wallet with a guilty smile. "Can I get you anything?"
"Ah, no. I just want to have a quick word with you about Bernie." Fletch fell into step beside her.
"What about Bernie?" Serena glanced sideways at him and then took particular interest in the lift button she pressed.
"Was she assessed after she left the army? Like…mentally?" Fletch frowned, not quite sure how to phrase what he wanted to say.
Serena let out a laugh at this. "I'll tell her you asked me that. What's she done now?"
"Nothing! Well, I mean-"
"Spit it out, Fletch. There's a coffee downstairs calling me." Serena sighed.
"I think she might have like PTSD or something. I've just walked into your office a few times and she'd been really jumpy. It happened in the pub last night, and in the on call room a minute ago."
Oh, Serena had every idea why the blonde was so jumpy, but somehow managed to keep the amusement from her face. "I'll go and talk to her. Would you mind trying to keep anyone from interrupting us for a while?"
Relieved that it was apparently not just him who'd noticed this, Fletch smiled and gave a nod.
Bernie's eyes were shut and a deeply set frown was on her forehead as she concentrated. Her mind was focused on the night before, the feel of Serena's lips on hers. The shake in the brunette's voice when she'd admitted she needed her. The feel of her-
"My, my! What have we here?!"
Bernie practically leapt from the bed, tripping over her shoes that rested beside it, hand pulling guiltily from the waistband of her scrub bottoms as her eyes flew open. "Oh, it's just you."
"Well thanks very much." Serena responded sarcastically as she rested her back against the locked door to the on call room.
"I didn't mean it like that." Bernie sighed, a blush slowly creeping up her neck. "I was just…ah…"
"I could see what you were doing, Major. Often shirk your work for a quick-"
"Please don't say it." Bernie interrupted her, shutting her eyes again. "I've only just stopped forcing myself into cold showers every time I think of you saying the word fuck."
Serena gave a laugh, eyeing the woman before her thoughtfully. "Fletch wanted me to talk to you about how jumpy you've been. He's worried you might have PTSD."
"Well I have been having Pretty Terrific Serena Dreams of late, if that counts?" Bernie ran a hand through her hair. "If we've finished here, I think I might go for another cold shower."
"Oh, we have not finished here. I think I'd quite like to see the rest of the show." Serena pushed herself away from the door, smiling when Bernie looked back at her, startled.
"I want to, believe me I do, but our first time can't be in the on call room!" Bernie protested, managing to take a step back as Serena stepped forward.
"If we keep our clothes on, it doesn't really count as our first time, does it?" Serena questioned, a smile still playing on her lips. "Because I can guarantee however many times you've thought about me when you lose control, I've thought about you more."
Bernie whimpered then, accepting Serena's offered kiss readily.
"Missing something?" Fletch asked good naturedly when Serena walked back onto the ward looking a little lost about half an hour later.
"What?" Serena looked down at herself, suddenly worried she was having one of those horrible dreams when she turned up to work naked. Or maybe Bernie had slipped something off her and she hadn't noticed. Serena felt her cheeks beginning to burn.
"No coffee." Fletch offered.
"Oh! Right! No, I-"
"She doesn't see the point of getting her own when she has a lackey to get it for her." Bernie offered as she approached, one coffee in each hand.
"Well, you are only ALMOST equals, after all." Fletch grinned, receiving an amused wink from the blonde.
"Have you told everyone about that conversation?" Serena huffed as she accepted the offered coffee from her colleague...and now lover? Did what they'd done count? Serena had no idea. Perhaps now would be a good time to stop thinking about it, however, because she was beginning to feel an all to familiar feeling between her legs.
"Thinking of anything interesting?" Bernie murmured in Serena's ear, and the feeling of her warm breath sent a shiver down the brunette's spine.
"Just that you've put too much sugar in my coffee." Serena responded, head lowered so no other colleague could see the blush creeping onto her cheeks.
"I thought you could do with the energy boost." Bernie responded before walking away, although not without first pinching Serena's bum.
"Are you okay?" Fletch glanced up from the file he was reading with a frown when Serena gave a squeak.
"Oh..peachy. Listen, I've spoken to Bernie about what you were worried about, and I think she's fine. I'd probably be quite jumpy too if I'd been through what she has." Serena rested herself on the edge of the nurse's station, suddenly overcome with tiredness and something else she thought Bernie had extinguished, at least for the time being.
"If you say so. Let her know she can talk to me anytime she needs." Fletch smiled and then returned to his patient, allowing Serena time to survey the ward in silence.
She soon caught sight of a certain blonde talking to a patient. Laughing quite openly with said patient, in fact! Another feeling came over Serena then- a happy warmth. When she first arrived Bernie had been so standoffish with patients and colleagues alike, and now she was actually laughing with one. Serena liked to think she'd had something to do with that. Perhaps I've rubbed off on her? Well, I did half an hour ago! Oh, stop it, Serena! Get on with your work, you're not a horny teenager!
Serena found her cheeks burning again when Bernie glanced up her way, a knowing smirk settling on the lips that Serena already ached to kiss once more.
