Chapter 3
She's never known anyone like Bernie Wolfe.
She'd heard the rumors, of course, the legend of Darwin. Fastest recovery on record, apparently, though she'd never put much stock in gossip. Attributed it simply to the inflated egos of Jac Naylor's team, which was nothing if not to be expected.
What she hadn't expected was a woman that could be her equal. And, irrational as it may be, she feels… usurped somehow.
Annoyingly, Bernie is everything Hanssen had said she would be; knowledgeable, infinitely skilled, mature, and direct.
She also has a knack for setting Serena's every nerve ending alight. The woman is messy, outspoken, prone to meddling, frequently insubordinate, and devastatingly attractive. God damn it!
"Everything okay?" Bernie enquires from her side of the desk. Her face is a picture of delicate concern and her blonde locks glow like a halo in the afternoon sun that streams in through the window.
"What? Oh yes, yes," she says, somewhat distracted. Wonders how Bernie always manages to know when she's struggling. She shakes the thought from her head and glances away. Frowning, she rubs fingers over the aching crease between her eyebrows, points the pen she's holding toward the desk.
"Just editing this report," she lies. Rewriting from scratch would be more accurate, but even Bernie's velvet voice isn't enough to make her admit it.
"Do you need some help?"
"No, no," she says, refusing on instinct, the words out of her mouth without much thought. It's still her ward after all. The report will show her name alone, even if she has to spend the entire evening working on it at home.
"Thank you, though," she adds, offering a tired smile.
The gold specks that glint in Bernie's eyes must just be a trick of the light, she thinks, as the woman smiles easily in return.
"Any time."
She's let too much pile on top of her again. Just like the months prior to Bernie's arrival. Some of it isn't her fault, though she's fought valiantly regardless.
It's an unfortunate situation. Embarrassing enough without having to swallow her pride, too, but she does it because she needs help. She can admit that now. There's just too much work to be done, too many people to save to be endlessly preoccupied with mind-numbing reports and arrogant men in bad suits.
The realization hits her hard when it comes, almost knocks the wind out of her as she thinks about the deep brown eyes that have done nothing but try to look out for her since they arrived.
Her distrust and suspicions vanish in an instant. There one minute, and then gone the next… just like her bloody car. And she knows now, she can play nice and share her ward with Bernie, halve her burdens and still be in charge.
And she feels silly, because if she's honest with herself, she'd prayed for this. Not literally, of course, not by wailing to some non-existent sky fairy, but in some form or another she'd thought it. In quiet moments, late at night, buried in paperwork, she had genuinely wanted someone, anyone, to swoop in and give her a break.
A human disaster with disheveled hair and skinny jeans is not what she'd imagined. Something about it feels right though, oddly comfortable, and a smile tugs at the corners of her mouth.
This feeling is miles away from the irritation that used to fester, the resentment that someone else was overseeing her territory while she'd been banished. All of that is gone, evaporated, and she sighs, because they could have been friends so much sooner if only she hadn't been so stubborn.
"I may be no action woman, but I'd be happy to have your back," she says, meaning every word.
"I'd like that," Bernie purrs. "We are equals after all." A smirk, somehow both teasing and utterly charming, makes Serena chuckle.
Friends, she grins. They are friends now.
They work well together, she finds. And when Bernie suggests Serena might have to let something go in order to get what she really wants - a backward idea if ever there was one - she has to admit that the woman was right.
"You just have to do what's right for you," Bernie had said. And though the words were slow to sink in at the time, she now understands the true value of self-care.
Even the memory of Bernie's comforting low tones makes her feel warm. She has never been happier.
Though it turns out the bickering never really ends. That wherever Bernie is, some battle or other is sure to follow. Serena doesn't welcome it necessarily, but she also doesn't cower. She feels emboldened, despite never having shied away from hard work, because she has someone to rely on now, someone who will fight her corner with her, for her.
And not just her, she finds out, when Bernie goes behind her back to get a job for Jason.
"I asked you not to do that!" she seethes, staring daggers at the blonde.
"I didn't," Bernie shrugs, infuriating Serena even more by leaning casually back against the doorframe, arms folded and a smile tugging at her lips as Jason waves an application form in her face.
"I picked it up from HR myself," he says, smug one second, ecstatic the next. "I'm going to be the best porter at Holby City."
"Well… yes…" she says, carefully weighing her words. Looking from him to Bernie's proud gaze and back again, she manages a smile. "Of course you will, Jason."
And of course he is.
She can't even be mad when he's injured on the job.
"Oh my god, Jason!"
"It's all my fault, Auntie Serena," he says sadly as Bernie gets him to lie back on the bed. "I should have been paying more attention."
"What happened?"
"Knocked down by a gurney," Bernie explains, handing Serena an x-ray. "Don't worry, it's not broken, and we'll have him fixed in a jiffy."
Without any fuss, Jason's shoulder is popped back into place, and Bernie runs her hands over him to check its placement.
There's a tenderness to her movements that Serena has rarely witnessed. And for a split second, she wonders what those hands might feel like on her own skin.
Bernie meets her eye momentarily but shyly looks away. She puts the pang in her chest down to gratitude, thankful that someone was here to care for her nephew in her absence.
The woman always did have a knack for showing up when help was needed. She knows she'll be fine for as long as Bernie is by her side. And after that, well – another pang.
"Oh dear," she mutters to no one but herself.
To be without Bernie is unthinkable.