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B.J. spends most of his time in Korea not thinking about it.
It doesn’t mean he’s unaware of it, but there’s nothing he can do about it, not without losing one of the rare things keeping him sane: his hope for a picture-perfect future. So he makes it into something small, as small as he can, and pushes it to the back of his mind. It still appears in his dreams. The kind of dreams B.J. should want to forget all about but can’t help—when he wakes up gasping in the middle of the night, heart beating fast, fast—holding on to. A little longer. Just a little longer. (His fingers tracing the shape of the scar above Hawkeye’s upper lip, his mouth brushing against Hawkeye’s knuckles, his palms pressing against Hawkeye’s naked skin.)
More dangerous than the dreams, though, is how it slips out from time to time. It’s not that surprising considering how often B.J. ends up drunk or exhausted, or both, and in those moments not even his iron will can prevent it from bleeding from the myriad invisible wounds the war has inflicted on him.
Once, it looks like this: him, drained from struggling to save everybody at the same time —the kids in the OR and a Korean family that reminds him too much of home—choosing to sit closer to Hawkeye than necessary on that bench where they’ve collapsed a thousand times before. Wait a minute, B.J. says, letting his head fall against Hawkeye’s shoulder. Wait a minute, I gotta rest. He finds himself nuzzling it, all too aware of the layers of clothes separating his lips from Hawkeye’s skin. Let me have this, is what B.J. means, although he’s not sure who he’s talking to. Praying to. If it’s God, his wife, or simply himself. Let me have this one moment of peace. And, for a few seconds, before Hawk’s hand pushes him away and Radar comes in, he does.
Or it looks like this: him, lying on the floor of Colonel Potter’s office, drunk and mad with something that’s not just a desperate longing for home but for a better life. One where he isn’t sent to Korea, away from his family. One where he meets Hawkeye anywhere but here. One where he doesn’t come second. He can’t meet Hawkeye’s gaze as he attempts to explain this, as he lets it slip, the name they never mention. Trapper. He can’t meet Hawkeye’s gaze, afraid of what he might give away. Instead, he speaks until his voice breaks and he starts to cry in earnest. When Hawkeye’s hand comes to rest on his forehead, B.J. closes his eyes and the world mercifully goes dark.
Sometime toward the end, it looks like this: him, standing next to Hawkeye in Post Op, searching for a way to blackmail him into taking over charity collection officer duty. If asked, B.J. wouldn’t be able to pinpoint what makes him do it. Maybe it’s exasperation at having lost so much of his evening to this. Maybe it’s his annoyance at Hawkeye for all the talk about his upcoming weekend with the nurse from the 8063rd. Maybe it’s curiosity. The bad kind, the kind you end up regretting. So he says, how do you think the weekend will go after she’s seen a photo of your wife and child, and when Hawkeye doesn’t get it right away he adds, Peg and Erin Pierce. And yeah, there it is. The bitter taste in his mouth. The sharp tang of regret. But it’s too late to back down now, and so he continues to do what he does best, joking his way out of it. (The jokes, B.J. decided long ago, don’t count as slipping. If anything, they help reign it in.) To show his determination, he takes the latest picture Peg sent him out of his wallet and laughs at Hawkeye’s disbelief, knowing that he’s won this one. He doesn’t dwell on the sound of his voice saying Peg and Erin Pierce, on irreconcilable things.
There are, of course, other times. Too many, in truth, to recount them all. But considering that they live together, work together, scheme together, that they breathe together—always so close to each other that it often seems to B.J. that Hawkeye inhales the air he exhales—B.J. believes he does a pretty good job of not thinking about it.
B.J. definitely doesn’t think about it when he gets his orders to go home. It's survival, pure and simple. Like some part of him, deep down, understands that if he opened that door there would be no home to go back to. That it and the house in Mill Valley are two things that can’t coexist. So when he goes to visit Hawkeye at the hospital and when he jumps into that helicopter and on his way to Guam, B.J. repeats to himself the same thing he’s been telling himself since he first landed in Korea and miraculously stumbled upon Hawkeye. Later. When it’s safe. When it doesn’t feel like it could break him. When surrounded by Peg and Erin and the normalcy of his day-to-day life, he can be sure it won’t take home away from him. When this future that he has done everything he could to hang on to, has become his present and whatever he’s living now is a thing of the past, a faded memory. When he stops dreaming in shades of khaki.
In the end, though, the army catches up to him and he has to turn around. If he senses, crashing through his veins, something very much like relief, well. B.J. doesn’t think about that either.
***
It’s not the only inescapable thing B.J. tries to ignore.
On the plane bringing him to Korea, B.J. had sketched out a simple and straightforward plan. He would do what he had to do. He would stay alive. Then go home and forget any of it had ever happened. He wouldn’t let the war change him and he wouldn't let it break him.
It’s not so complicated to stick to that plan, at first. B.J. arrives right in the middle of the war and having missed the beginning makes it easier to focus on the future. To think of the present as a bad dream (you can never really remember how a nightmare started, can you?), something to be erased from his memory as soon as he wakes up. Most of him isn’t even here anyway. Most of him is thousands of miles away, on the other side of the Pacific Ocean.
As for the part that is here… That part is fucking grateful to have found Hawkeye. Hawkeye who was hurting and barely spared him a glance when they first met; Hawkeye who was funny and the brightest thing in that gloomy Officers’ club; Hawkeye who was missing his best friend but looked back at him when B.J. said, Rudyard Kipling. And even though B.J. resents the idea of being a replacement, he can’t help but be glad that the position as Hawkeye’s partner-in-crime had become vacant just in time.
(He imagines it, once or twice, what it might have been like if he had had to replace Frank instead of Trapper. Wonders if he and Hawkeye would still have managed to create something resembling what they have, or if he would have been condemned to stay outside of what Hawkeye and Trapper had built together, the third man in a two-man show, always one step behind, always longing for more—and that’s when B.J. usually puts an end to that particular train of thought. Before he gets too close to dangerous truths.)
For a while, with Hawkeye next to him acting as his shield and Peg’s letters acting as a daily reminder that there is a life for him at the end of this, it almost seems like B.J. will succeed in upholding the insane bargain he made with himself during that first, terrifying plane ride. Time passes. B.J. misses his daughter’s birthday and his wedding anniversary. Everything gets a bit harder than it already was and their laughter gets a bit sharper. B.J. doesn’t notice the way Hawkeye is bending further and further under the weight of each endless day, each new kid he has to sew up, each kid he has to give up on. Or maybe he tries not to. He ignores the way he’s starting to come apart too, how those invisible wounds are steadily widening, until he has to cut a rope instead of help to save a life and he knows then, with absolute certainty, that he has lost the fight. The war has won and whoever goes back to Mill Valley won’t be the person who left.
Shortly after, Hawkeye does break down, and B.J.’s heart shatters as he takes in the vacant look on Hawkeye’s face as he sits in that jeep; the aftermath of his own self-deception. The details of what happens next are blurry, but he distinctly remembers walking toward Post Op, an unresponsive Hawkeye cradled against his chest, while Colonel Potter ordered Klinger to call Sidney right away.
“I’m sorry Hawk,” B.J. says, low enough that no one will hear him, before laying Hawkeye down on an unoccupied bed. What for, exactly, B.J. couldn’t tell. There’s so much to feel sorry for. How B.J. didn’t do anything to prevent this. How it’s not up to him to fix it. How, even if it were, he isn’t sure he would be able to. And a thousand other things he can’t articulate to himself, let alone to Hawkeye—no matter that he’s passed out. “I’m sorry,” he repeats, settling his fingers against Hawk’s wrist.
“How is he?” Potter asks from somewhere behind him.
“Still unconscious,” B.J. says. He doesn’t turn around, keeps his gaze fixed on Hawkeye. “Pulse regular.”
“Klinger is trying to get Sidney on the phone. He’ll know what to do.”
B.J. nods in response. Potter sighs and pats his shoulder. “It’s not your fault, son,” he adds, and B.J. wonders when he became so transparent. He doesn’t say that out loud.
“I know,” he replies instead.
As with most things, B.J. figures that if he repeats it to himself often enough, he’ll end up almost believing it.
***
It slips out one last time. After B.J. steps out of the chopper bringing him back to Hawkeye and Hawkeye barely acknowledges his presence—or his previous absence. After Hawkeye picks a fight with him in the mess tent and B.J. walks out on him shaken to the core by the image of Hawkeye dying and upset with him for forcing B.J. to confront something he had every intention of ignoring until the very end. After they listen to the sound of peace which, for them, is nothing but a respite.
They’re all gathered in the mess tent for a farewell dinner, Hawkeye’s side pressed against his, their earlier disagreement discarded for now. Not that either of them has forgotten about it, but if it’s their last evening here… Well, no sense in wasting more time than they already have. Colonel Potter asks them to say a few words about what they’ll be doing next and B.J. tries to conjure up the images he’s found comfort in again and again—listening to Peg give Erin a bath, spending Sunday afternoons cleaning the gutters, picking up furniture for the Stinson house —but comes up with nothing. He can’t think of it, can’t imagine it. In his mind, there’s only the ringing echo of Hawkeye’s voice, his words on a loop, we’ll never see each other again and it is goodbye, so strong and final despite B.J.’s attempts to deny them. B.J. swallows what’s left of his glass of wine and drinks another for good measure while Hawkeye talks about his future life as a small-town doctor. Then it’s B.J.’s turn to stand up. Maybe to silence Hawkeye’s voice in his head, maybe because the mix of wine, exhaustion, and relief has left him giddier and more vulnerable than usual, maybe because it is so fucking absurd that he can’t currently envision the one thing that has kept him going for so long, B.J. makes a joke.
“Well,” he says, “as you know, I was all set to go back to Mill Valley. To Peg and Erin and all that. But uh… I’ll tell you, I had the best time on Guam. I met this cookie at the airport bar and she begged me to run off with her, and I figured, what the hell? You only live once, you know?”
It elicits a few laughs from the nurses but none from Hawkeye. So B.J. adds, just kidding, I’m just kidding, as he collapses against him, to let him know it’s okay, it’s just a joke, Hawk, albeit one that cuts a bit too close to the things B.J. doesn’t think about. Eventually, Hawkeye starts to laugh too and they move on to Father Mulcahy, and Charles, and Margaret, and Klinger.
“C’mon,” Hawkeye says, after everyone is done cheering and congratulating Klinger on his big news. “Let’s go for a walk.”
“Our last midnight stroll,” B.J. agrees. He stands up, swaying a little, and offers Hawkeye his arm as if they were a couple exiting a fancy party early, rather than two surgeons leaving behind them a place holding countless memories. Hawk takes it, crinkles forming at the corner of his eyes which means B.J. did something right. All of a sudden, it’s easier to breathe. There aren’t that many things he’s gotten right when it comes to Hawkeye, lately. In fact, it seems like he’s been getting everything wrong.
“What are we gonna get Klinger?” Hawkeye asks, pulling B.J. out of his pensive mood. He’s used to Hawkeye acting like B.J. can read his mind—which he can, except when he can’t at all—but, distracted as he is, it takes him longer than usual to grasp what Hawk’s talking about.
“A dress?” B.J. offers.
“Nah, he’s got enough of those.”
“Rice? Our best wishes? Our eternal gratitude?”
“You’re right, he’s already got everything he needs. What about… What about Margaret?”
“Margaret isn’t getting married,” B.J. points out.
“I’m talking farewell present, Beej!” Not waiting for a reply, Hawkeye goes on, “Margaret gets a kiss.”
“And what do you get?” B.J. laughs. “A punch?”
“Can’t be worse than that awful swill they tried to pass for wine tonight.”
“If you say so, lover. A kiss for Margaret, then,” B.J. concedes, dismissing his vague annoyance at the thought. It’s not like Hawkeye means anything by it. “What about the Colonel?”
“He isn’t a punch or a wine kind of guy. Scotch?”
“Only if we can steal it from Charles.”
“Oh, oh! Beej, I know!” Hawkeye exclaims, squeezing B.J.’s arm excitedly. “Forget the scotch, let’s give him a salute! A proper one. What d’ya think?”
“A salute? That’s perfect, Hawk!” B.J. replies, squeezing back. “He’ll love it.”
Their walk has led them to the outskirts of camp. They could go on, for once. There’s no more shelling. No more risk of being taken prisoner. Instead they stop, facing each other. Old habits die hard, B.J. supposes. The lights coming from the tents are bright enough that B.J. can make out Hawkeye’s features, yet the night is dark enough for him to feel bold. Almost reckless. Which is when it slips out.
“So, do I get a kiss or a salute?”
Hawkeye lets out a small laugh, something fragile. B.J. can’t see his eyes but he doesn’t need to, he knows how Hawkeye must be looking at him. It’s the way Hawkeye had looked at him earlier today in the mess tent when he said one year, Peg and I and Erin will come east. The way he’s been looking at him more and more these past few months—although B.J. can’t recall when it started. Like B.J. is hurting him. And, once again, B.J. has no idea how to fix it.
“You get my socks, you thief,” Hawkeye says, and his voice is as light as ever. “You love them so much, I’m surprised you haven’t packed them already.”
“Was gonna wait ‘till you’re asleep,” B.J. jokes back. It’s feeble but he’s tired, drunk, and more than a bit miserable.
“And now you won’t have to,” Hawkeye says generously before sighing. B.J. can tell he’s just as tired, drunk, and miserable as B.J. “Back to the Swamp?”
“Yeah,” B.J. says. Then, because for a few hours it’s still true, “Back home.”
It’s not lost on B.J. that Hawkeye didn’t ask him, and me? What do I get? Is it because he thinks B.J. is already aware of what he wants? Or is it because he’s afraid that B.J. wouldn’t give it to him? The second one, probably. And, even though it stings, B.J. has to admit that he hasn’t done anything to convince Hawkeye otherwise. Well, that won’t do, B.J. decides as he follows Hawkeye inside the Swamp for the last time. That won’t do at all. There’s plenty he can’t fix but this he can. He can give Hawkeye what he wants. What B.J. didn’t leave him the first time around. What Trapper never left him.
A proper goodbye note.
***
(In the end, B.J. gets neither a kiss nor a salute. What he gets is a hug, his face pressed against Hawkeye’s, Hawkeye’s hand in his hair, holding him tight. A hug that seems to last forever yet has to end way before B.J. is ready to let go. And when Hawkeye tears himself away from B.J.’s arms to get into the chopper, it feels a bit like B.J.’s heart has been torn away from him too.)
***
B.J. does his best not to think about it on the various planes bringing him back to San Francisco. It’s not that easy when his chest is one giant, open wound but that’s what B.J. does anyway. He’s going home, this bright vision that has sustained him for so long, and Peg and Erin deserve for him to try. What about what Hawkeye deserves? What about you? a voice within him argues back. What about him? There is such a thing as being unfaithful to yourself; B.J. remembers telling Hawkeye that once. He still stands by that. Maybe B.J. isn’t the man who left Mill Valley anymore, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t owe him something. As for what Hawkeye deserves… B.J. can’t bring himself to examine the thought.
Peg is waiting for him at the airport, Erin in her arms, and B.J. shakes and shakes and shakes as he embraces them both. He’s crying and Peg is crying and Erin looks like she’s wondering if she should start crying too. For the first time since he heard the sound of peace, it hits B.J. that it’s real. The war is over. He survived. He won’t wake up tomorrow to the screams of half-dead teenage boys waiting for him to resurrect them, to Klinger telling him to go check on a patient in Post Op, to Hawkeye’s singing. The sudden rush of grief and relief is overwhelming.
“God, Peg,” he chokes out.
“Come on. Let’s get you back home,” Peg says, her words echoing the ones he offered Hawkeye less than forty-eight hours ago.
And so she does. She leads them out of the airport and to the car and drives them all the way back to Mill Valley. Everything seems both familiar and foreign to B.J. It’s the same roads, the same white houses, the same tidy backyards as when he left. He had wanted so badly for something to remain intact, untouched by the war, but now that he’s here, in this unscathed part of the world, it seems almost inconceivable that what happened to them hasn’t bled all the way to Mill Valley and reshaped the landscape.
“Is everything okay, darling?” Peg asks, as they get out of the car.
“Never better,” B.J. answers, because he’s home and that’s how it’s supposed to be. He can’t tell her about his sudden realization that he not only didn’t come back whole but brought back a piece of the war with him. “Just tired, you know?”
“You should get some rest,” Peg frowns. “How long has it been since you got a good night of sleep?”
B.J. laughs. “How long has it been since I left?” It comes out more harshly than intended. “I’m fine, Peg. I don’t really want to leave you and Erin, not when I just got you back.”
Peg opens the door and B.J. follows her and Erin inside the house. His house. The same sensation of familiarity and foreignness greets him as he steps into the living room. The last time he saw it, he was sitting in Colonel Potter’s office, struggling not to fall apart. Peg puts a hand on his shoulder, startling him. He feels dizzy.
“You can barely stand up,” she says. “Go take a nap. We’ll still be here when you wake up.”
“One hour,” B.J. finally concedes and Peg nods.
B.J. presses one kiss against his daughter’s forehead, then one at the corner of Peg’s mouth, reluctant at the idea of going for something less chaste. He tries not to dwell on it as he makes his way to their bedroom. He fully expects to pass out as soon as his body hits the bed—a real bed, with real pillows—but ends up staring at the ceiling instead, too full of nervous energy to fall asleep. After half an hour of this, he gives up and decides that he might as well do some unpacking. He opens his suitcase and starts dividing his possessions into two piles: the things he wants to keep (his suspenders, a picture of him and Hawkeye in Tokyo, a piece of the still he took) and the things he never wants to set eyes on again (his fatigues, his class A uniform, the medal they gave him for cutting a rope). He’s nearly done when he finds, at the bottom of the suitcase, a pair of socks. One labeled “B.F.P.” B.J. barks out a laugh.
“Hell of a parting gift, Hawk,” he mutters to himself, voice cracking a bit.
Later that evening, after putting Erin to bed, he writes Hawkeye his first letter. It says: thanks for the gift, and, I hope you liked my note, and, write back soon. It doesn’t say: coming home is both exactly what I wanted it to be and nothing like it, and, I have spent every second since you got into that chopper missing you, and, when can I see you? After all, B.J. just got back. It’s normal to feel adrift after such a big change.
It’s normal and it will pass.
***
B.J. gets a job at a nearby clinic. He completes the list of chores Peg had planned for him when he was still in Korea. He spends as much time with Erin as he can. Yet, the sensation that there’s something wrong doesn’t go away. Part of it is his fault. When you have wanted something as badly as B.J. has wanted to go home, the reality of it can hardly ever live up to your expectations. But part of it is that he and Peg can’t seem to find their footing. It’s not that they fight because they don’t. It’s that they’re out of sync. Maybe this has always been the case and B.J. never noticed it before because he never had anything to compare it to. They were both pretty young when they got married and she was the first (and only) person outside of his family B.J. had ever lived with for such a long time before the army assigned him to Hawkeye’s tent. Or maybe, as B.J. had always feared, the war broke what was between them. Whatever the reason, though, there’s no denying that their relationship has changed.
Peg appears to have grown accustomed to his absence, to needing him a little less than she used to. She doesn’t stay up waiting for him when he comes home late from one of his shifts at the clinic. Her own career as a real estate broker takes up a lot of her time and when B.J. points out that she doesn’t have to work so much anymore, she replies that she enjoys it. B.J. guesses it’s the freedom she relishes, the idea of having something that’s just hers. When he doesn’t come home in the middle of the night, he more often than not finds Peg on the phone with Vivian, a friend she made while he was stuck on the other side of the world. In turn, B.J. needs her, or the idea of her, a bit more than he used to—to distract himself from the gaping wound in his chest. Except it doesn’t really work. Even though she wants to help, she never says the exact right thing, the one B.J. so desperately needs to hear. It’s not her fault. If anything, it’s B.J.’s.
One evening, a couple of months after B.J.’s return, they go to the little restaurant in Sausalito he used to fantasize about when the war seemed to weigh more heavily than usual, to close in on him. The seagull is still sitting on the windowsill, as blissfully unaware of the concept of shooting as B.J. remembers it to be. B.J. stares at it, trying to recapture the illusion that if he comes here often enough he’ll be able to erase the war from his mind, trying to remember what it felt like to have something to hang on to. But he can’t, and something very much like envy burns at the back of his throat. Not towards the seagull, but towards that past version of himself.
“You know, I thought about this place a lot, back there,” he tells Peg, later that night, as they get ready for bed. He’s not usually forthcoming with war stories, and she sends him a surprised glance.
“Was it everything you wanted it to be, then?” she asks, tone even.
He can’t determine if she’s talking about the food or something else entirely.
“It was real,” he answers. Which is both a yes and a no.
Peg sighs. For a moment, it looks like she might say more, but she doesn’t. Instead, she slides under the sheets and closes her eyes.
They don’t make love. They tried a few times, in the beginning, but B.J. couldn’t— B.J. couldn’t and he is too grateful that Peg hasn’t pressed it so far to question it. Sometimes, when Erin is already in bed and B.J. is pretending to read a medical journal but, truly, focusing on not counting the days (hours, minutes) since he last saw Hawkeye and Peg is laughing on the phone with Vivian, he can’t help feeling that she is no longer his. It should bother B.J. It used to drive him crazy to think that he and Peg might grow apart. Now, it’s just one more thing to mourn.
Amidst all this wrong, Erin is the one right thing. B.J. can’t give her back the years during which he was away—hell, he can’t even give those years back to himself—but he can be there for her now. It’s not a smooth, painless ride, but the difficulties don’t matter to B.J. as long as he gets to experience them and learn from them. It’s when he and Peg go out with her for a walk, or bring her to the playground, that B.J. can almost touch that future he had built so many dreams on. They’re playing at the perfect family, and he is aware of it, but he believes it could be enough, that he could make it enough, if there wasn’t this huge Hawk-shaped hole in his life.
And that’s what it boils down to. B.J. misses him. He misses him constantly, relentlessly. It’s different from the way he used to miss Peg and Erin. Back then, it was not only them he missed but the life he had been robbed of. With Hawkeye, it feels like he’s been robbed of the life in him. Of something so essential B.J. wasn’t even conscious it existed before it was torn away from him on a helicopter pad, one July morning. Worse than the ever-present ache, though, is when B.J. forgets about it. When, still half-asleep, he searches for Hawkeye on the other side of the room, where his cot should be, and sees nothing but a blank wall. Or, when he starts a sentence and waits for Hawkeye to complete it, only to be met with silence. Then the grief hits him all over again, and B.J. wonders how he’s supposed to go on when there’s so little air left to breathe.
That Hawkeye isn’t answering his letters doesn’t help. It would be more bearable if B.J. could see his familiar scrawl on a postcard or a sheet of paper and have the tangible proof that somewhere, on the other side of this country, Hawkeye sometimes remembers him. Maybe then, he would stop being haunted by Korea. So B.J. sends Hawkeye another letter. And another. And another.
“Why don’t you try calling him?” Peg asks when one day she catches B.J. absently staring at the mail.
Why? Because, that way, B.J. can maintain the pretense that his letters may just not have reached Hawkeye. A phone call is a different affair. What if Hawkeye doesn’t answer? Or what if he does answer but everything in his voice indicates that he doesn’t want to be speaking to B.J.? What if Hawkeye is busy and promises to call back soon but never does? B.J. has no idea how he would react if his last shred of hope was taken away from him. But there’s no way to say any of that out loud without also telling her that, once upon a time in Korea, B.J. left without saying goodbye and, even though he came back, Hawkeye convinced himself that they would never see each other again. And there’s more to it. Maybe all the time they were stuck in that nightmarish faraway land, there was a thing happening between them. One B.J. never put into words because some things can’t be defined in the middle of a war. One B.J. spent two endless years ignoring. But now that there’s no promise of a better future for him to hold onto and no Hawkeye to distract him from Hawkeye, B.J finds it harder and harder not to think about it. And, because he can’t explain any of it, B.J. says,
“You’re right. I’ll try.”
***
The first time B.J. calls Hawkeye’s house, palms sweating and heart pummeling, no one answers. B.J. had readied himself for that eventuality so it’s fine. He lets a few days pass and makes another attempt. This time, Hawk’s dad picks up the phone. Dr. Pierce sounds delighted to hear B.J.’s voice again, after all those years, and tells him to please call him Daniel and that although no, Ben isn’t here, he moved into his own place a couple weeks ago he will let him know B.J. called as soon as he can. He also gives him Hawkeye’s new address. It’s not much but it’s still more hope than B.J.’s had in months. If Hawkeye hated him, surely, his dad wouldn’t have treated B.J. like he’s a long-lost friend? And if Hawkeye doesn’t hate him… If Hawkeye doesn’t hate him, he’ll end up calling back. Or writing. It doesn’t matter to B.J. as long as he breaks his silence.
The following days, B.J. feels optimistic in a way he hasn’t felt since he stood in an airport and thought, I made it. It’s over. There’s a lightness infusing his veins and it’s easier to wake up, go to work and come home smiling. Which is not lost on Peg.
“It’s good to see you like this,” she says, one evening, putting down her copy of Mrs. Dalloway. B.J. looks up from his crossword. “It almost feels like…” She pauses and smiles, something sad. “Anyway, I’m glad you’re doing better.”
B.J. doesn't need to ask her what she was about to say. He knows and he hates himself a little for all the promises he made—to her, to himself—and broke, even though he didn’t intend to. I tried so hard, he wants to confess. I spent every day there trying to keep myself whole so I could come back to you and Erin. But the war kept chopping off bits of me and with every piece I lost I felt myself getting further away from you and closer to something I can’t name. Instead, he nods and presses a goodnight kiss to her cheek.
A week goes by, then two, and no sign from Hawkeye. Still, B.J. keeps on waiting. Maybe he’s a fool, or maybe he’s that desperate. But after more than a month has passed, B.J. has to resign himself to the obvious. Nothing is coming. No letter, no phone call. Not even a telegram. That night, B.J. keeps tossing and turning in bed, unable to sleep. He wishes he could just show up at Hawkeye’s house and demand answers from him. He wishes, he wishes, he could knock back drink after drink to numb himself like he used to in Korea. But no. This isn’t war and he can’t rationalize it anymore. B.J. sighs. Careful not to wake Peg curled on the other side of the mattress, he gets out of bed and makes his way to the guest bedroom. There, sitting on a narrow bed, he writes three letters in quick succession.
The first one reads like this—
Dear Hawk,
Is this some sort of punishment for not leaving you a note the first time I left? Because I really tried to make up for that and—
He doesn’t go any further. Even though they’ve had their fair share of fights, Hawkeye’s never been deliberately cruel to him. B.J. crumples the piece of paper and starts again.
Hawk,
Here’s a funny story for you: I miss Korea. Hilarious, right? Except I don’t, of course. It’s you I miss. You and me. PierceandHunnicutt. But since I only got to know you in Korea (your fault, we had plenty of time to see each other again in all the months you refused to answer my letters) and we only got to be PierceandHunnicutt in Korea, I find myself missing it.
I hate it.
Please write back so I can stop missing it.
Yours,
B.J.
Closer to what he needs to say but not quite there yet. B.J. grabs a new sheet of paper and draws in a breath. If he can’t admit it now, in the middle of the night, with no witness but himself, if he can’t name it, then he never will. So, for the first time since he landed in Korea and heard Hawkeye’s voice, a lifetime ago, B.J. doesn’t shy away from the ever-present thought. Doesn’t try to ignore it or dismiss it. He lets it grow and grow and when it feels strong enough that nothing could shatter it, not even the weight of a thousand fears, B.J. picks up his pen.
Would you write back, if I told you I’m in love with you?
And there it is. The truth B.J. has avoided for so long and for so many reasons. It’s not… It’s not as terrifying as he had imagined it to be. It’s almost restful. As if, suddenly, the world made a little more sense. As if B.J.’s place in it was a little clearer. As if he could finally stop fighting. B.J. closes his eyes and exhales. Everything is quiet except for the steady beating of his heart.
It sounds like peace.
***
B.J. wakes up in the guest bedroom. He must have fallen asleep, at some point, although he can't remember it. In the grey and unforgiving light of early morning, last night’s admission seems much more frightening. But even though the sensation of peace is gone and B.J.’s throat is tight at the idea of what he has to do, he can’t go back to lying to himself. And it’s not like he ever wanted to lie to Peg. Still, he’s relieved when he enters the kitchen and sees that Peg isn’t up yet. He uses this small respite to make some coffee and is halfway through his mug, sitting at the kitchen table, when Peg appears in the doorway. B.J. looks up at her.
She doesn’t look different from any other ordinary morning. Everything about her is familiar, from her messy hair to the way she ties her bathrobe, and B.J. loves her but he isn’t in love with her. The thought barely hurts.
“Hi,” she smiles, seemingly surprised that he’s already up. “Early morning?”
“Something like that.” He can’t muster a smile of his own. “Could we… Listen, do you have time to talk? I think we should talk.”
“Oh.” Peg’s smile falls. She leans back against the kitchen counter, facing him, and crosses her arms against her chest. “Go on, then.”
B.J. stands up and begins to pace. He doesn’t know where to start. How to start. “You remember Hawkeye, right?” he ends up blurting out which is the stupidest thing he could have said. Of course, she remembers Hawkeye. B.J. mentions him at least once a day. She was the one to tell B.J. to call him. Hell, she has two years’ worth of letters talking about little else but Hawkeye. “I mean…”
“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” Peg interrupts, taking B.J. aback. There’s no anger in her voice, though. No disgust. She asks like it’s a simple question that demands a simple answer. The least B.J. can do is give it to her. He swallows.
“I, yes. How do you know?”
“Darling, you’ve spent the past few months acting like someone broke your heart. And I know it wasn’t me.” Peg sighs, before repeating, mostly to herself, “It wasn’t me.”
B.J. thinks he might have broken his own heart. “You didn’t say anything.”
She sends him a sharp glance. “I didn’t think I was the one who should say something.” Then, kinder, “I wasn’t even sure you were aware of it.”
“I wasn’t,” B.J. says. “Or I guess I was, but I tried to make myself forget about it. I wanted—” And, for the first time since this conversation started, B.J. feels himself choking up, each word burning his throat. “I wanted to come back to you and Erin. This idea... It's what kept me sane, you know? But I found something in Korea and I can’t pretend I didn’t any longer.” Because he did. He found Hawkeye and, with Hawkeye, a part of himself that may have been there from the beginning but that had, until then, remained hidden. Unacknowledged.
“You found something. And I lost you.”
“I’m sorry, Peggy.”
“It’s okay,” Peg answers, as her voice breaks. “I think… Maybe I found something too, while you were gone.”
B.J. stays silent, waiting for her to go on. When she doesn’t, he makes his way around the kitchen table. “Can I hold you?”
Peg nods and he takes her in his arms. She’s crying now and B.J.’s crying too. In relief, at first. That this discussion is over, that they survived it. Then it morphs into something else, into a kind of mourning. B.J. mourns a life he had always believed would be his, that had sustained him for two long years. A life that he did love, even if it wasn’t right for him. He mourns it like he mourned his life in Korea. As exhausting and painful and terrible as it was, as much as he hated it, it was his for a little while. And so were its joys and its victories and the nuances of Hawkeye’s smile. “It’s gonna be okay,” he hears himself whispering again and again to Peg. To himself. “It’s gonna be okay, it’s gonna be okay, it’s gonna be okay.”
***
It’s snowing heavily when B.J. parks the car he rented in front of what he hopes is Hawkeye’s house. Crabapple Cove is a small town but the snow has somehow managed to turn it into an inextricable maze. B.J. supposes that’s what he gets for showing up uninvited in the middle of January.
It’s been barely more than a week since his late-night confession and his early morning talk with Peg, but B.J. couldn’t bear to wait any longer to get the answers he so badly needs from Hawkeye. Why he didn’t write back. If it’s because he never wants to talk to B.J. again or because, maybe, he feels something for B.J. too. (B.J. wants to believe that he must, that he can’t be carrying something so huge and encompassing all on his own, but wanting something and getting it are two very different things, B.J. has learned). If they have a future together. So, he crosses the distance that separates the car from Hawkeye’s front door, shivering and cursing himself for not bringing gloves and, not leaving himself any time to hesitate, knocks on it. A minute passes, then another—and B.J.’s heart is in his throat, everything around him spinning—before the door opens, revealing Hawkeye. B.J. lets out one shuddering breath.
“Beej?” Hawkeye asks. He sounds like he can’t tell if he’s hallucinating or not. B.J. doesn’t blame him. Not only didn’t he warn Hawkeye he was coming but, like that, standing in the middle of a snowstorm he must look like a character who just stepped out of a Grimm fairytale. B.J. decides to run with it.
“Hiya, innkeeper,” B.J. answers, teeth chattering. “Got any room for a weary traveler?”
Hawkeye lets out an incredulous laugh—and God, B.J. has missed that sound—before grabbing B.J.’s forearms and ushering him in. He closes the door behind them and turns around, pulling B.J. into a hug. B.J. clings to him, shaking from the cold, the rush of adrenaline, and sheer relief. Hawkeye is here—real and solid and warm against him. B.J.’s arms are wrapped around Hawkeye’s back, while Hawkeye’s fingers have settled in his hair and if he wasn’t half-covered in snow, B.J. could almost believe that they’re still standing on a helicopter pad in Korea.
He thinks in a way they are.
Hawkeye keeps repeating his name, as if afraid that B.J. will disappear if he stops, and B.J. is both elated that Hawkeye seems to have missed him too and desperate to understand why he hasn’t answered B.J.’s letters then. Before B.J. can say anything, though, Hawkeye takes a step back and starts talking.
“Are you okay?” he asks, concerned.
“Fine, I think I only lost half my fingers.” B.J. wiggles said fingers to show that he’s joking. They are kind of blue, though.
“Well, aren’t you lucky that I’m an innkeeper and a doctor,” Hawkeye says, with a relieved smile. “I prescribe a good old-fashioned fire to help find those fingers. But first, strip.”
B.J. laughs and bends down to take off his shoes. Angling his body so that Hawkeye can’t see what he’s doing, he transfers a small package from his coat to his pants’ pocket. Then, he removes his coat and follows Hawkeye into the living room where the prescribed fire is burning, two cozy armchairs in front of it. B.J.’s heart misses a beat.
“You get company often?” he asks, aiming for casual, as he sits down in one of the chairs. Hawk’s dad would have told him if Hawkeye had moved in with someone, right?
Hawkeye sends him a curious glance. “Oh yeah,” he answers. “All of Crabapple Cove gathers every night in my living room and listens to the tales of Hawkeye the Bard. What kind of inn do you think this is?”
“Nothing wrong with asking.”
“Huh. D’you want something warm to drink? I have tea, coffee… I make a mean hot toddy but I’m out of honey. Care for a honey-less hot toddy, Hunnicutt?”
“No, thanks.” B.J. chuckles, shaking his head. “I don’t need anything, I just… Will you sit down? Please.” B.J. isn’t sure he could bear for Hawkeye to disappear, even for a few minutes.
So Hawkeye does. They’re so close their knees are brushing and B.J. allows himself a moment to drink him in. His hair is greyer than the last time they saw each other, some of the lines at the corner of his eyes are more pronounced and there are dark circles under his eyes but there’s also something… softer in the way he holds himself up. As if he’s hurting a little less than he used to. As if the weight on his shoulders is a little easier to carry. He’s staring back at B.J., the same kind of hunger currently twisting B.J.’s stomach etched on his features, his blue eyes roaming all over B.J’s face. He is everything B.J. has never allowed himself to want.
“So, what brings you to my humble inn on this dark and stormy night?” Hawkeye asks, breaking the silence. His words are light but B.J. can discern a touch of uncertainty in his tone.
“I’ve got something of yours,” B.J. says. He gets the package out of his pocket and unwraps it, revealing a pair of socks. “Thought you might like to have those back.”
“You came all the way from California to give me back my socks?” Hawkeye seems so utterly taken aback that B.J. would laugh if there wasn’t so much at stake.
“Yeah, see, I heard it gets cold in Maine during the winter.” B.J. gives a pointed look toward the window. Outside, the snow keeps falling. “Looks like I heard right.”
But Hawkeye keeps his gaze fixed on the socks in B.J.’s hands. “They were a gift,” he says, voice soft.
“And I promoted them to excuse,” B.J. replies, just as softly.
Hawkeye lets out a small laugh. “From gift to excuse? I think you mean demoted.” Their eyes meet and they share an easy smile before Hawkeye asks him again, “Come on. What are you really doing here, Beej?”
“You didn’t answer any of my letters,” B.J. tells him. Hawkeye winces at that. “Or my phone call. If it’s… If it’s because I said something that I shouldn’t have said or because you don’t want to talk to me anymore I thought I’d rather have you tell me in person, you know?” B.J. swallows, forcing himself to go on. “I don’t think I can spend the rest of my life wondering what I did wrong. Why I lost you.” When Hawkeye doesn’t say anything, B.J.’s voice breaks. “Please Hawk. Please tell me. If I did something wrong, I can fix it.”
“Shut it, Beej, you did nothing wrong! How could you…” Hawkeye shakes his head and gets out of his chair. He starts pacing in front of the fire, agitated and a bit wild. Then, sounding very close to pleading, he says, “I didn’t write back because I thought you were happy. I wanted you to be happy. Aren’t you happy?”
B.J. stands up too and grabs Hawkeye’s arms mid-pacing, forcing him to stand still, to face B.J. I was downright miserable until I saw you again, B.J. almost replies. Out loud he says, “I don’t think I can be happy without you. You’re my best friend, stupid. Remember?”
For a split second before he hides it behind a smile, Hawkeye looks hurt. Like that time B.J. asked, Do I get a kiss or a salute?, and the time B.J. said, Peg and Erin Pierce, and the time he danced with Margaret at a party Hawkeye had organized to make him happy. And it wasn’t only B.J. and the weight of all the things they couldn’t say that was hurting him, of course. It was also the war, the countless days spent drenched in the blood of teenagers and the fear that it would never end. B.J. can’t erase what Korea has done to Hawkeye but he can give them to him now, all those words he tried so hard not to think about back then. Heart in his throat, B.J. takes in a breath and says,
“You’re my best friend. And I’m in love with you.”
“Beej…"
“Actually, it’s kinda crazy how in love with you I am.”
“Are you—”
“I’ve never been more serious in my life.”
“What about Peg?” Hawkeye whispers. “Your marriage?”
“Peg and I are gonna get a divorce,” B.J. explains. “She knows I’m here. I’ll tell you the whole story if you want. Coming home was not… It was what I thought I wanted but it wasn’t what I wanted at all, you know?”
Despite B.J.’s efforts to reassure him, Hawkeye still looks like he doesn’t dare believe him. So, even though B.J. is slightly terrified that he’s ruined everything, he makes one last attempt. He lets go of Hawkeye's arms to cup his jaw. Slowly, giving Hawkeye ample time to protest or push him away, B.J. brings their faces together. Hawkeye doesn’t say a word and B.J. kisses him, light and delicate, just enough to make him understand that this isn’t a joke, that it’s real, the most real thing in B.J.’s life.
“It’s okay if you don’t feel the same. If I’m too late,” B.J. murmurs against Hawkeye’s mouth, even though it would be the furthest thing from okay.
That seems to do it. Hawkeye entangles his fingers with B.J.’s hair like he did when he hugged B.J. hello half an hour ago, like he did when he hugged B.J. goodbye half a year ago, except this time Hawkeye kisses him. And maybe those hugs were kisses too, B.J. thinks, or the closest thing to a kiss they could then share. Now, though. Now, Hawkeye’s lips are soft against B.J.’s, almost tentative, and it breaks something in B.J. that Hawkeye could be so unsure about this, about him. So B.J. opens his mouth, deepening the kiss. I want this, B.J. tries to tell him with his mouth, his tongue, his hands. There’s no part of me that doesn’t want this.
“You’re not… You’re not too late,” Hawkeye says, when they break the kiss. He sounds dazed. Confused. Happy. “Even ten years from now you wouldn’t be too late.”
The thought makes B.J. kind of sick. “Would that make me Odysseus?”
“How many suitors are you ready to fend off?
“Every single one of them,” B.J. promises. Then, “Just to be clear, this means that you’re in love with me too, right?”
“Oh, I’m in love with you,” Hawkeye says simply. “I wouldn’t know how to be anything else.” He states it like he can’t imagine anything more obvious. Like it’s an unalterable fact of the universe. Maybe for him it is. For B.J., though, it’s something of a miracle.
“It was kinda hard to tell from your letters,” B.J. says, because even though it still stings, he can joke about it now. He kisses Hawkeye again before he can come up with a reply, wondering how he’s ever managed to keep himself from doing that. There’s nothing hesitant or delicate about it, this time. Hawkeye’s lips part immediately under his and it’s hot and frantic and demanding, as if they’re both scared that this is their last chance, their last kiss. It’s not. B.J. is going to kiss Hawkeye every day for the rest of their lives, as long as that’s what Hawkeye wants too. But he can’t help it, the way his hands slip under Hawkeye’s sweater and grip his waist, the way he clings to him. Hawkeye is letting out tiny, broken noises and B.J. won't be able to take much more of this.
“Hawk,” he says, mouth moving onto Hawkeye’s neck, the corner of his jaw, “Hawk, what about that room?”
“I—No room left, I’m afraid,” Hawkeye manages to say. “But I might be able to do something for you. Mind sharing with the innkeeper?”
“No,” B.J. laughs. “I don’t mind at all.”
***
“I’ve dreamed about this,” B.J. says, later, as one of his fingers traces the scar above Hawkeye’s lip. They’re both lying in bed, Hawkeye half-dozing and B.J. propped up on one elbow next to him.
“Funny,” Hawkeye mumbles. “Me too.”
B.J.’s finger abandons Hawkeye’s lip for his cheekbone, then the corner of his eye. “D’you still have nightmares?”
Hawkeye opens his eyes at that, gaze searching. B.J. waits. “Nightmares, memories…” He shrugs. “I’ve got enough of both to start a shop.”
B.J. can tell that Hawkeye doesn’t really want to have this conversation but B.J. kind of needs to. And it’s easier like this, in the middle of the night, when everything is quieter and wounds less. “You know,” he says, “I used to believe that once I was home, I would remember Korea as a nightmare. I kept telling myself that it would just become a bad dream. That I’d forget all about it. But it wasn’t like that.”
“How did you remember it, then?”
“As the place where I met you. I hated it when we were there. I hated the idea that it could mean anything to me.” He’s aware that this is hard for Hawkeye to listen to and B.J.’s fingers curl around Hawkeye’s arm, his thumb caressing the smooth, naked skin in an attempt to soothe the pain. “But after… After, it was all I could think about. I even wrote you a letter about it.”
“I think this one got lost.”
“It didn’t,” B.J. says. “I never sent it. What did you think it would be like? After?”
For the longest time, Hawkeye doesn’t reply and B.J. wonders if this is the end of it. Then, voice so quiet it’s almost inaudible, “I didn’t think it would be like anything. I couldn’t imagine anything.”
“After the war?”
“After the war. After you.”
“God Hawk, I’m…” B.J. wants to say he’s sorry. Sorry it was war and he hurt Hawkeye. Sorry he had to survive and couldn’t tell Hawkeye he was in love with him, couldn’t even put a name on it. But how can he, when he doesn’t know if he would have been able to do it any other way? “I’m sorry you thought I didn’t love you,” B.J. ends up telling him. At least, it’s true. “Because I did love you. Spent a lot of time trying not to think about it but I did.”
“I loved you the whole time,” Hawkeye says. He lets out a fragile laugh. “Sometimes I could feel… I wondered if I was making it up, you know? If I was crazy.”
“You weren’t.”
“Did you forget about our romantic rendezvous at the madhouse?” Hawkeye retorts, although there’s no real heat in his tone. “But remind me to tell Sidney that’s one item off the crazy list.”
“Wait, Sidney knows about us?”
“He knows about me. Does he know about you?”
“How would I know?”
“Beej,” Hawkeye frowns, “Why are we talking about Sidney in bed?”
“You started it!”
They look at each other for one, two, three seconds before they burst out laughing. B.J. buries his face in the crook of Hawkeye’s neck, as Hawkeye catches his wrists, and suddenly they find themselves kissing again. B.J. can’t imagine he’ll ever get tired of this. He doesn’t believe it’s possible.
“I love you,” B.J. says, mouth brushing against Hawkeye’s collarbones. “I love you,” he repeats, fingers gripping Hawkeye’s waist. “I love you,” he whispers, watching Hawkeye fall asleep.
It’s not enough to make up for all the time that was stolen from them but it’s a start.
***
B.J. wakes up to an empty bed and the distant sound of Hawkeye singing Over the Rainbow. He feels a slight pang of regret at the missed opportunity before telling himself that he’ll have plenty of other lazy mornings with Hawkeye. At least, he hopes so. He rolls out of bed and takes a look out of the window while getting dressed. The snow must have stopped falling at some point during the night and everything is white—the kind of white B.J. hasn’t seen in years. In Korea, the snow was never entirely white, there was always a tinge of brownish green to it, as if no part of this country could escape the color of war. B.J. blinks, chasing away memories of nights when it was too cold to sleep, of days spent sewing up children with freezing hands.
Somewhere in the house, Hawkeye is still singing and B.J. smiles, turning away from the window. He knows that nothing is solved, really. That nothing is healed. His mere presence won’t keep Hawkeye’s nightmares at bay and Hawkeye’s love won’t erase B.J.’s bone-deep guilt. But it’s the promise of something new, of what B.J. wishes to be a better future. He just needs to make sure that he and Hawkeye agree on that future.
B.J. gets out of the bedroom, letting Hawkeye’s voice guide him through the house. He finds him in the kitchen, at the stove, thrumming with a mix of excitement and nervous energy.
“Beej,” Hawkeye greets him, beaming. “Finally!”
“What’s on the menu?” B.J. asks. He slides one arm around Hawkeye’s waist and presses a small kiss to his neck before peering at the stove.
“French toast,” Hawkeye replies, waving the spatula he’s holding toward a towering pile of what does look like French toast. “Wait ‘till you try these. You’ll be on your knees begging me to marry you.”
“But I already want you to marry me,” B.J. says and it’s not so different from a thousand conversations they’ve had before, a thousand jokes they’ve made. This time, though, there is no bitter aftertaste, no wish that it was real. It is real. The jokes don’t count, B.J. remembers telling himself, except, of course, that they did and each one of them was like poking at a tender bruise.
Hawkeye almost drops his spatula and B.J. laughs. “Need any help, chef?”
“No, no. Go away, you’re distracting me.”
B.J. hops on the kitchen table.
“Speaking of marriage,” Hawkeye says. “You owe me a story.”
So, while Hawkeye busies himself with making them enough French toast to last them through the winter, B.J. tells him about coming home and not finding what he was searching for and feeling even further away from Peg than he did when he was thousands of miles away. About the evenings spent trying not to miss Hawkeye while Peg was on the phone, laughing with someone else.
“Maybe Peg’s in love with Vivian,” Hawkeye comments, as he puts one last slice of toast on top of his pile.
“Oh. Oh!” B.J. remembers how Peg hadn’t pressed him when it came to making love, how she had told him that, maybe, she too had found something while he was gone, how she had whispered, it wasn’t me. “You know what? You could be right.”
“Vivian or no, I think she’s crazy for letting you go,” Hawkeye says, seating himself next to B.J. on the table and balancing the plate on his knees, “but I’m not gonna complain.”
B.J. frowns. “You know this is not… This is not a default thing, right? I’m choosing you.”
“And he hasn’t even tasted my French toast yet,” Hawkeye announces to an imaginary audience.
“Hawk, I mean it.”
“I know,” Hawkeye answers softly. “I’m not sure I believe it yet. But I know.”
B.J. supposes he’ll have to work on making Hawkeye believe him, then. He picks up a slice of toast and takes a bite. “Oh, this is good!” he exclaims.
“What did I tell you?” Hawkeye replies, looking awfully pleased with himself.
For a while they eat, their legs pressed together, their fingers touching as they keep going for more slices of toast. If someone who knew them could see them now, they probably wouldn’t appear to be doing anything out of the ordinary. And yet. When Hawkeye is done with his toast, B.J. lifts up his hand, brushing off the crumbs at the corner of his mouth, and kisses him. It’s as miraculous as it was the night before.
“What about Erin?” Hawkeye asks, picking up the conversation again.
“We’re gonna split it. One week with Peg and one with me,” B.J. says. “I can’t… I can’t fail her again.”
Hawkeye must sense something in B.J.’s tone because he replies, “How long are you staying?”
So much has happened since B.J. arrived, so much has changed that they haven’t even talked about that. Or maybe they have been avoiding it; they’re both good at that. Now, though, it looks like it’s time to have that discussion about the future. “Only for the weekend,” he says, hating himself for the way Hawkeye’s face falls. “I’m sorry, I wish I could stay longer. I don’t want to leave you but...” But he can’t leave his daughter for too long either.
“Of course. Of course, you need to go back to Erin,” Hawkeye says before B.J. can go on. He sounds like he’s trying not to panic. “Okay, I guess we can still make this work? I can come visit next time and we can—”
“Write letters?” B.J. finishes for him. “Wasn’t a big success last time.”
“I’m sorry,” and Hawkeye’s tone is getting more and more frantic, “I’ll write back this time, I promise, but I can’t—”
“Hawk,” B.J. puts his hands on Hawkeye’s shoulders in an attempt to help him calm down, “I’m not… I’m not leaving you. Do you really think I came all the way to Crabapple Cove and confessed my undying love to you only to wave goodbye two days later? I chose you, remember?”
“People have been known to do crazier things to have a shot at this body,” Hawkeye sniffs, but the manic edge has left his voice.
“I’m sure.” B.J. shakes his head. “Listen. What I was gonna say is that I know you wanted to live the peaceful life of a small-town doctor, but please move to California with me instead? Maybe not at the end of the weekend but as soon as you can. As soon as it’s possible. I don’t want… I don’t want to say goodbye again.”
“Deal,” Hawkeye answers.
“Just like that?” B.J. wonders. Can it be so simple?
“Just like that.” Hawkeye shrugs. “If it’s a choice between Crabapple Cove and you, I choose you. I’ll miss home and I’ll miss my dad, but he will be glad to have his patients all to himself again. We can come back for the holidays.”
“That’s a relief, let me tell you.”
“It is?”
“Oh yeah. I had no idea how to top that goodbye note.”
“B.J.?”
“Yes?”
“I agreed to move to California for you. Why are you still making terrible jokes when you could be kissing me?”
So B.J. does. They kiss, sitting on a kitchen table, half a year after saying goodbye on the other side of the world. They kiss and it means, hello.
***
Sometimes, the sound of peace is a brief silence after the guns have stopped shooting, before going back to saving lives. Sometimes, it’s a heart that keeps on beating in the middle of the night, despite a life-changing confession. Sometimes, it’s a beloved voice singing on a crisp winter morning, and the promise of a future.
Over the years, the sound of peace becomes something less and less distinctive, less and less remarkable until it’s almost impossible for B.J. to tell it apart from all the other noises that make up his daily life.
The one he treasures the most, always, is Hawkeye’s laugh.