Chapter Text
When BJ Hunnicutt, unshaved at 5 in the afternoon, opens the front door of his beach house to see Hawkeye Pierce for the first time in six months, all BJ does is sigh, and say, blankly;
“Oh. It’s you”.
Hawkeye is fresh from the airport, in a worst state than BJ. And, for maybe the 4th time in his life, doesn’t quite know what to say.
The world stops for a few moments as they look, breathe.
The day is sunny, bright, calm. One of them, Hawkeye, decides to pipe up.
“Peg called me.” He explains.
“That sounds about right.” BJ replies coolly, with a bite.
“Beej.” Hawkeye implores. “Can’t you let an old friend in? Whatever happened to ‘Hello, how are you? I crossed the country to see you, doesn’t that mean anything?”
BJ waits all of five agonising seconds, before his eyes soften a bit and he acquiesces, letting Hawkeye in through the doorway. Which, considering Hawkeye did ask they pretend what happened in Montana never happened, and that BJ did agree that they would pretend what happened in Montana never happened, seems fair enough.
As Hawkeye walks past, the other man puts a firm hand on his shoulder in a gesture that once, in Korea, would have felt as natural as breathing. Now every touch feels about as light as a grand piano.
“Welcome” BJ says in his best, most hospitable tone of voice, even if there is a stilted air to it. “to the house that was built by an good, old fashioned California split.”
Hawkeye, carrying the duffel bag back from their army days, follows BJ. He doesn’t hesitate to deliberately ignore the cardboard boxes on the table. The place is nice though, he can admit that. If you like wicker, that is. Not that he’s an expert in newly built houses intended for vacationing repurposed into bachelor pads.
BJ offers him a drink, and Hawkeye asks for just a coffee.
“You sure you don’t want anything stronger?” BJ asks.
“No thanks, I quit drinking”
“Since when?”
“Oh, I’d say about half a year”
“You quit cold turkey?”
BJ doesn’t ask if Hawkeye stopped drinking because of him. Because of what happened.
“Just about. Easy when you’re not living in a war zone.” Hawkeye says.
“I’ll say”
BJ makes him a coffee and grabs a beer for himself. He puts on a jazz record, as if it might soften the atmosphere. They move to sit in the living room and talk about nothing, which they never did before.
BJ is......hardly torn up, barely ripped, except for the encroaching beard, which threatens to cover all the man’s face by 1954. The slight animosity from when he opened the door seems to have dissipated somewhat. But Hawkeye won’t shelve his worry about that, he knows BJ can hold a grudge if he wants to. Right now, he has bigger fish to fry.
After witnessing the effects on BJ from just the risk of cheating on his wife, and after what happened in Montana, Hawkeye was expecting a different kind of BJ. A drowning in guilt BJ. An emotionally fraught BJ. Hell, he’d settle for a unprepared-for-bachelorhood BJ, with a mountain of dirty dishes in the sink and beer cans in the compost. Instead, BJ seems mostly perturbed by Hawkeye’s presence, which perturbs Hawkeye. Even if BJ seems to relax a little as they talk. It was always easier when they talked, they joked, they drank. Despite everything, Hawkeye is happy to see the man.
BJ asks him if he’s seeing anyone. Hawkeye answers in the very clear negative.
“So there’s been no-one since Korea? Renounced your lothario ways?” BJ asks.
“Something like that”
“Hawkeye Benjamin Franklin Pierce, sober and chaste, I never thought I’d live to see the day!”
“Most people call me Ben now” Hawkeye says soberly.
“Is there anything left of the man I knew in Ouijabou? What next? Have you given up knitting?”
“Hey, I still have the same hobbies, goofing every chance I get, saving lives and collecting nude magazines” Hawkeye half-heartedly jokes.
BJ must know why Hawkeye is here. But it feels like waving a red flag in front of a bull, mentioning the divorce. Or it’s a troop of elephants hiding in the corner, each carrying its own little unanswered question. Something like that. Hawkeye’s Dad always told him to never mix alcohol or metaphors.
Hawkeye sometimes feels like the luckiest man alive, to know BJ inside and out.
The downside is that he knows that means BJ, the stubborn son of a gun, is going to stay quiet and frustratingly still until Hawkeye forces his feelings out of him.
It’s seven o’clock now. They’ve been talking in the sitting room for two hours, saying nothing much. BJ tells him all about Erin, every lost tooth, every amusing cute little thing she says, that literally every other toddler does. But it’s interesting, interesting to Hawkeye, because it’s Erin. Because it’s BJ. Despite that, Hawkeye’s mind is preoccupied on how the hell to save the man’s marriage. As BJ talks, he silently goes through every instance he managed to convince BJ of something, for inspiration.
The two of them seem to ease closer to that familiarity he missed so much, when BJ’d talk for hours about Erin and Peggy, rubbing his thumb against his best photograph of them while Hawkeye shaved. But of course, Hawkeye has to break that lovely, practically domestic pace and allude to reason he is here in the first place.
“Where is Erin staying?” He interrupts, hoping to get a least one of the elephants out of the room. BJ announces that he’s going to grab another beer, before walking out to the kitchen, pointedly, annoyingly, frustratingly, not answering. Hawkeye follows him.
“You still fish from time to time?” BJ asks.
Hawkeye doesn’t answer. BJ gets his beer and Hawkeye doesn’t answer.
“So I’m guessing Peggy told you about the divorce.” BJ says to the open fridge.
“Ding ding ding, got it in one! The brand new chevvy goes to a Mr. BJ Hunnicutt!”
The coffee must be getting to him.
BJ doesn’t seem as if he feels like joking or carrying on a bit. He just closes the fridge, opens his beer, leans against the counter and obviously waits for Hawkeye to say his piece. He even cocks his head and raises his eyebrows, just to get the point across.
The coffee, honestly the best Hawkeye’s probably had since Korea, is really getting to him. Along with the righteous anger, which fuelled him all of the war, and has now finally found a reason to return.
“What’s happening here, BJ, really?”
“You tell me.” BJ shrugs.
Hawkeye begins to pace energetically. “What the hell are you doing, lounging about it shorts and a…. t-shirt, drowning in Budweiser at your beach house and growing a quite frankly frightening beard, which should be banned under the Geneva convention. You should be….. running back to Mill Valley, getting on your knees and begging her to take you back!!” he articulates his arms widely, more and more at every word.
“Are you done?” BJ asks calmly.
“And another thing! I know I’m in no position to judge, but I think you must have gone completely crazy, to spend a whole war on the other side of the earth doing everything to keep the marriage with the love of your life going, who is perfect in every way, or at least I’ve heard, and then abandoning it as soon as you hit a.......slight snag.” He’s shrieking hysterically now, waving his arm towards the other man.
“A slight snag?”
“Yes. Your marriage has gone through tougher challenges that this! And you kept fighting! Why give up now?”
“Did Peg tell you why we’re getting a divorce?”
Hawkeye runs a hand through his hair “She mentioned something about drifting apart, wanting different things....”
“We’re divorcing because I’m a homosexual” BJ says causally.
Hawkeye collapses onto a chair on the kitchen table, brushing his hands across the Formica.
“You’re not a homosexual, Beej. You’re just confused.” He says quietly.
“No, I’m not” BJ replies, a hint of animosity in his voice.
“Confused or homosexual?”
“Confused”
“How can you be so sure!?”
“I’ve never been surer about anything in my life.”
Hawkeye runs his hand across his face, exasperated.
“How can I prove to you that you’re not?” He says.
“Confused or homosexual?”
“Homosexual!”
“You can’t.” BJ says smugly, in that matter-of-fact tone of voice that means he’s made up his mind, and no tantrum is going to affect his cool nerves.
“Come on, Beej. Be serious.”
“I am completely serious.” He’s right. There’s not even the usual hit of a grin, which would give away that he’s planning something mischievous.
Hawkeye is fed up after his fifteen hour journey, and he knows he’s not going to win this battle, at least not today.
He rubs his eyes and leans on the table. All his sprit, saved up for months, leaves him.
BJ stands next to him, places his hand on Hawkeye’s shoulder and rubs it comfortingly.
“It’s getting late, how about we get you settled for bed?” He says softly.
“Fine, fine. But we are going to talk about this tomorrow.”
“Whatever you say, Hawk.” BJ shrugs and glides his hand away.
Hawkeye is unnervingly still, interrupted when BJ asks him how long he’s staying.
Hawkeye replies that he’ll stay until BJ gets back with Peg. BJ rubs his hands together, grabs Hawkeye’s bag and says, almost happily; “Guess you’ll be staying forever then”.