For the first few months while Pete was in Space he still felt like he was making the progress he wanted. Each day he felt more confident that his ex girlfriend on earth would be jealous of him. That she ewould be attracted to him more once he finally returned to earth.

It kind of sucked being up there away from everyone he knew and very little opportunity to contact them. He ended up just fantasizing this imagination of his ex missing him but he later found out that she had moved on from him fast and was dating his friend within weeks.

This made him sad but he was glad to not have learned this until much later. Had he learned it in real time he would've probably lost his grip and might've asked management to just shoot him back down to earth.

But because he was able to be away from current events happening down there he was able to stay for his full enlistment. That was something he was still proud of, which was strange to him. Why did it matter whether he stayed the full time or not up in 

Spacecity

?

Nearly everyone he knew there had stayed their entire enlistment. The only people who didn't stay the full time were those who had sudden health issues or some emergency that took place with a family member down on earth. Management was pretty good about being flexible on those grounds.