I'm quite happy to have as much editing as you feel you've got time and energy to give, deborah.
Speaking of which, this is the fic that's been eating my brain for the past couple of days. Uses fairly obscure MASH fandom details, but I think they're fairly obviously explained.
- **
I may not be clever the way you have to be to be a doctor, the way BJ is; I may not even be as clever as I think I am, but I’m not stupid. Ever since I first met BJ I could see that when we walked down the street together and turned our heads to look at whoever caught our eye, the way teenage friends will, BJ’s head was as likely to turn for some handsome man as for a beautiful woman. He’d never have admitted it, of course, and I wouldn’t have dared to ask.
Anyway, when he came back from the war and started talking about Hawkeye Pierce, it didn’t take a genius to see that he’d fallen in love. I couldn’t blame him, of course, and even from his letters I’d guessed. I wasn’t even angry, and I surprised myself a bit when I found I wasn’t jealous. When things are tough you need a way out, something to obsess you so that you can stop thinking for a while. Heaven knows I’ve taken the odd bit solace when it came my way—if an old friend was in town for a week, or with a man I happened to meet.
BJ talked about Hawkeye almost all the time. He didn’t mention being fired at, even when he dreamed about it; he didn’t talk about the operations he’d done out there, though he was clearly affected by them; instead, he told me—and Erin—about Hawkeye until I felt I knew the man. I’d been starting to feel that way from his letters, but in a letter it’s somehow easier to look back and make sure that what you’re saying is balanced.
At home, though, all we heard about the war focused on Hawkeye, as if he was the lens through which all BJ’s experiences out there had been filtered. We heard about Hawkeye’s wit, as dry as the Martinis he drank; we heard about his sill, in which the alcohol was lucky if it stayed around for half an hour; and I can repeat some of the stories about Hawkeye’s battles with Frank in my sleep.
The final straw was the night BJ rolled over, put an arm around me, and muttered sleepily, “Love you, Hawkeye.” When we were alone the next evening, I asked why we didn’t get to meet the guy who obviously meant so much.
“You go on and on about him, BJ. Invite him over for a few days—the guest room’s empty. You can tell each other stories about Frank Burns for a change.”
“Um… look, Peggy, it’s not that simple.”
Erin was in bed, and we were sitting on the veranda, supposedly simply enjoying each other’s company. BJ was starting to sound a little worked up, but I kept my voice low and clam. After all, I could guess what was really going on here. “What’s not simple, BJ? He’s your friend. You’d like to see him again, and I’d like to meet him.”
BJ takes a deep breath. “Aren’t you jealous?”
“Should I be?” Keep it light, teasing.
BJ looks at me in the twilight, frowning, but then quickly nods as if he’s afraid he’ll lose the courage he’s summoned if he doesn’t do it soon. So I was right. I keep the grin of triumph internal, something in me rejoicing in the power I have here. “Okay. Well, let’s just say I’m not jealous yet, then.” And I find I’m really not. I love BJ enough that I want him to be happy, even if it’s not with me.
BJ nods again, a rare smile creeping onto his face and up into that terrible moustache. “I’ll see if I can phone him, then,” he says, getting up. He must have been waiting for a chance for ages.
“You do that. I need to tidy the living room.”
- **
A few days later, Erin runs in form where she’s been playing in the garden. “Mommy, someone’s here!”
“Who is it, darling? Do you know them?”
She thinks for a minute, and then says with a smile, “I reckon it must be Hawkeye.”
I peer out the kitchen door, and see him. I’ve never seen a photograph, but from what BJ’s said, I know she must be right: a tall man, with dark hair and sparkling blue eyes. There’s something about him—in his smile, perhaps—that shows his sense of humour, too.
He walks along the back of the house with long, easy strides until he’s standing in front of me. I straighten up and put on my best ‘visitor greeting’ smile. He drops his suitcase onto the dirt and asks, “Mrs Hunnicutt?”
“That’s me,” I say, and we shake hands. I can see why BJ’s attracted to him, when I look into the handsome face and shake his hands with their clever surgeon’s fingers. There’s an air of danger to him, though, as if some of the shrapnel from the war is still inside him, waiting to burst out, that makes me wonder if I’m doing the right thing in welcoming him to my home.
“Hawkeye Pierce—and this must be Erin,” he says, looking down to where she was, but the girl’s been overcome by shyness suddenly and has run off, probably to watch from the next room. “BJ didn’t tell me she was invisible.”
“She’s just a little shy. Come on in. I’m afraid BJ isn’t here at the moment—something must have kept him late at the hospital.”
“I know that feeling. Where’s he working now?”
“Lady Alice Hospital—down south of here.” I wave him through to the sitting room, and offer something to drink.
He accepts, and we sit in awkward silence for some minutes. Apparently the silver-tongued Hawkeye that BJ knows so well is reduced to the same dumbness everyone else suffers in the face of meeting the wife of their lover. It’s comforting to know he is human, because if you listened to BJ you might wonder.
Erin creeps in to look at the stranger, and Hawkeye finds a smile for her. It’s warm and genuine, so she smiles back.
“Hi,” he says, nodding at her just the way I guess he would nod to an old friend. There’s a familiarity there at once.
“Hello,” she replies, and—getting bolder—goes over to stand in front of him. “You’re Daddy’s friend, aren’t you? The one who was always being funny and fighting with Major Burns?”