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Yeah, he and Max were good friends, the best of friends, which is why this was killing him slowly. He could only imagine the betrayal and anguish that his brother-at-arms felt. His leg had been extremely bad, and a mild break above his ankle hadn’t set right, becoming infected, and had gone untreated for much too long, spreading to above his knee.
The doctor had taken Max’s entire lower limb in one fell swoop, hoping to save his life. Jake had stopped crying twenty minutes ago when the screams began, and threw up a third time when Max was sedated once more, falling blissfully silent.
Sitting there, lost in his thoughts, his fingers locked together in front of him in prayer as he stared at the wall, he felt himself falling apart on the inside. If he let go of his hands, he was going to put a hole in the wall – or someone.
This was too much,too dang much, and he didn’t even feel this broken when Reed had been injured. That had been horrible, but he’d barely known the man. Max was like the brother he didn’t know he had, after being dumped in the desert.
“Finally…” Houghton said bluntly and rose to his feet beside him. Jake looked over, expecting some other nightmare to be walking around the corner - and instead, it was Jill walking around the corner with a very nervous-looking Daphne… and Lena.
It was his salvation.
“You come with me,” Houghton began speaking to Daphne, taking her by the upper arm and pulling her into an empty room to talk.
Lena took one look at Jake and rushed to his side. She sat down in the chair directly beside him, immediately putting her arm around his shoulders as he turned to her and broke down.
“Shhh…” she said tenderly. “I’ve got you.”
Jake hated that he was crying, hated that the pain within him was so overwhelming, so deep and cutting, that he was losing the fight. Her hands stroked the back of his head like he was a child, rubbing up and down his spine in a comforting manner, and she simply hummed softly as she held him close.
Even when no more tears came, she still held him.
He wasn’t sure how long they sat there. Neither spoke, but instead, she held his hand, touched his back, or laid her head on his shoulder as he just sat there reeling. Every time a nurse or doctor walked into Max’s room, he felt it again as a stab of pain in his heart.
Max would live – but Jake was certain a part of his soul died today.
“You know what we need?” Lena said softly, and he turned to her numbly, so exhausted from the crying and the emotional damage within him.
“Pills?” he snapped and instantly regretted it as she flinched. “I’m sorry. I’m an a…”
“You are a person who is hurting,” she interrupted pointedly. “Try again.”
“Booze?” he uttered hoarsely and felt tears sting his eyes as she smiled at him tenderly, touching his temple. He did not deserve her kindness or her attention, but he couldn’t turn away.
“Cheesecake,” she answered softly. “See, growing up, we had a theory that anything in life could be solved with chocolate, ice cream, or cheesecake… and to me, cheesecake was for true dire emergencies or emotional moments that are just too much to handle.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You would deny me cheesecake?”
“Lena, I could deny you nothing,” he admitted openly, not looking away from her eyes as they softened.
“Sitting here is not going to help your mindset,” she urged softly. “But walking with me down to the cafeteria for our first date would.”
He blinked back tears as he laughed painfully, resting his head on the wall behind him.
“Lumberjack, our first date is not going to be in some small-town hospital cafeteria… and technically, it's our fourth date.”
“Fourth?”
“All those walks in the moonlight and holding hands – does that not qualify as romantic or a date to you?”
“You never said anything or kissed me. I just figured you wanted to walk off dinner and needed the company.”
“I never kissed you because I said I was going to earn that right someday,” he reminded her, turning his head slightly where it rested against the wall to look at her. In that instant, he wondered for a moment if maybe she wasn’t feeling the same way he was, because he was definitely falling for this amazing woman before him.
“Cheesecake,” she repeated softly, reaching up and wiping a tear off his cheek while holding his gaze steadily. “Cheesecake will help get you elevated to kissing status,MisterOrtega.”
“Aww crappola,” he groaned painfully, chuckling. “I guess we are having hospital cheesecake or whatever other gelatinous monstrosity they have down there. I mean, if you want bad food? I could get you some field rations. There ain’t a torture worse than reconstituted chicken-a-la-king.”
