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Chapter 1: The Ring
Margaret stood with her hands on her hips in the middle of the tent as the clutter surrounded her. All morning she had been frantically searching through her stuff, like some mad woman.
“Margaret,” Frank gently called from the other side of the door. “I think we should go ahead and discuss that lieutenant’s x-ray now.”
She huffed, tightly shutting her eyes and dropping her arms to her sides. She was not in the mood. All he would do is get in the way and nag her about the item that was lost. Really, she needed to be left alone for the next few hours to keep searching. Or, at the very least, to get. The place cleaned back up.
“Come in,” she called, simply to keep him from lingering around the outside of her tent. She didn’t want to cause a scene and she was well aware of how persistent he could be.
She went back to searching through her desk drawer as he entered the tent and quietly shut the door. She didn’t have to turn and look to see the stupid grin on his face. Normally, it would have been a welcomed sight. Now, while flustered and agitated, she needed to not have him following her around and whining like some lost child.
“Oh Margaret,” he cooed, wrapping his arms from behind her and planting a kiss on her neck. “I have been waiting all day for this.”
“I have a headache,” she told him, tensing under his touch.
Frank dropped his arms, but remained uncomfortably close. “What’s wrong snookims?”
“My ring is missing,” she sighed, turning to face him. “I kept it on my chain with my dog tags and now it’s not there.”
Frank stepped back, confused. “I thought I was the only man in your life,” he whined.
Margaret rolled her eyes, realizing just how ridiculous he sounded. He had a wife back home, but she was supposed to remain exclusive with him. Sure.
“You are, Frank,” she assured him, walking passed him over to her night stand to start tidying up the area. “It was a small gift given to me by a friend a long time ago. I haven’t seen him since. We were practically children.
She could see him nosing around the place through the corner of her eye. “Is it real gold? Or silver?”
“No, Frank. It’s a small fake gold colored band with a tiny pink rose on top.”
“Then why is it so special?”
Margaret stood, turning back to him and placing her hands on her hips. His pestering was striking a nerve and she was about to clobber him if he didn’t stop soon. “Not everything revolves around money. We were thirteen years old at the time and the kid used all the money he had to buy it for me. I was going through a rough patch and he was the only one who really cared.”
“If you want another ring darling,” Frank started. “I could always find another one for you.”
Margaret just rolled her eyes and went back to her search.
Oooooo
Hawkeye sat over in the Swamp on the edge of his cot, examining the small ring in his fingers. There was a small smile that tugged at the corners of his lips. He knew very well who it belonged to. It was someone that he never really gave all that much thought to after the whole ordeal, and it was someone who had looked strangely familiar to him when they met at the camp.
He heard the door close and softly laughed. “Do you know what this is?”
BJ plopped down onto his cot, fetching a book that he had been reading for the past month. “I think it might be a ring.”
“Ha ha, very funny,” Hawkeye replied, moving to the chair to scoot closer to him. He held out the ring, ensuring that he was paying attention. “This happens to be the ring that I gave to a very lucky girl some years ago.”
“Must not have been too lucky if all she got was some costume jewelry,” BJ quipped, barely paying attention.
“We were just kids,” Hawkeye told him, glossing over the insult. He was too excited to fully argue with him. He pointed to the little spot beside the chipping rose. “Do you see that indent?”
BJ sighed, sitting back up and taking the ring into his own hand. “It looks like a small scribble.”
Hawkeye stood and retrieved the ring. “That happens to be an inscription. B and M,” he explained.
“Bowel movement?”
“Ben and then whoever my girlfriend was at the time,” Hawkeye corrected.
BJ laughed, setting down the book. “You took all the time to do that and you don’t even remember the name of the girl?”
“Well,” Hawkeye started, taking his seat back on the cot. He smiled at the ring, his eyes lighting up at the fond memories that raced through his head. “At the time, she was very important to me.”
“I take it this was more meaningful than the first girl to give you all access?” BJ inquired.
“A lot more. I met her right after my mom died. I was only about twelve, maybe thirteen.”
1933
Hawkeye sat on the front porch of his Aunt Jackie’s beach house in Charleston, South Carolina. He had just lost his mother at the age of thirteen. His father had been having some issues getting his life back on track, still reeling after the loss so he had decided that they needed to be staying with his sister for a while.
The entire town was quiet, not all that different from Crabapple Cove, but it still irked him. It wasn’t his quiet. It wasn’t the quiet that came after he had spent a good amount of time running around with his friends. It wasn’t the quiet that led to a bonfire or a camping trip out in the woods.
His dad came out to sit next to him, staring out into the street just as he did. “Nice night out,” he commented, sounding all too desperate to break the silence.
“Beautiful,” Hawkeye sarcastically retorted.
“It’s Sunday, what did you expect?” Daniel questioned.
Hawkeye ignored his attempts at conversation. If anything, he was still pouting about moving here. He was going to be gone for an entire year of school and he had to start all over with finding friends.
“Tomorrow will be better, you’ll see,” Daniel assured him.
Hawkeye’s eyes widened as he turned towards his father. “Better? How could tomorrow be better? It’s the first day of school! Do you know what that means?”
“Yes, I do,” Daniel huffed, offering him a look of warning. “It means that you’ll finally be able to make some friends and stop feeling sorry for yourself.”
“Right,” Hawkeye reluctantly gave in. He didn’t fully agree, but the look was enough to get him to back down from arguing. “I think I’m just going to head up to my room.”
He gave his dad one last look, he could see Daniel’s expression soften, almost sorrowful. He didn’t press it though. He just went inside and up to his room to hide out for the rest of the night.
Oooooo
Just a few blocks down, a young Margaret stood in the front yard, clutching a bag to her chest. They were just finishing up the process of moving in and she was dreading the fact that the day was almost done. The sun was setting and that meant that tomorrow she would restart the never ending cycle. She was going to have to find new friends, and really start to like them just in time to move again.
Sighing, she marched on into the house, passing the living room where her mother was touting orders on how the furniture was supposed to be arranged and her father was sitting in his armed chair in the corner smoking a cigar.
She climbed the stairs and picked the bigger of the two empty rooms. The biggest one with the extra bathroom was her parents, that was off limits to the girls.
“Here we go,” she said to herself as she walked in and placed her things on the bare mattress.
“Move your stuff, we need to switch.”
Margaret rolled her eyes. Tara. Her sixteen year old prom queen of a sister. She knew that this day was moving along too smoothly.
“Tara, me and Becky need this room because we’re two people. You get the smaller room because you don’t have to share it with anyone,” she explained, turning and crossing her arms. “You might have figured that out if you actually something in that head of yours.”
“I’m older than you, hence more seniority. Now get your things out of here you snot nosed little princess.”
“And yet you don’t know how to tie your own shoes,” Becky quipped as she walked into the room, passing both of them.
Tara just rolled her eyes and knelt down to begin tying her laces. Margaret never really got along with her, and it was in these moments that she understood why - Tara was EXACTLY like their mother. She was prissy, she was the socialite. She expected everything to be handed to her in such a way that fully infuriated her. The worst part was the fact that their father seemed to think that she would be the one with the most successful marriage. He would set up dates between her and the sons of well known officers that he worked closely with.
“Need help with that?” Becky asked, laying her stuff out on her bed.
Becky was different. She reminded Margaret of their grandmother. She… rarely cared about anything. She was only eleven, but she couldn’t see her growing out of this attitude. She had the most gorgeous blonde hair she had ever seen, and Becky did nothing with it but pull it back into a ponytail. She had beautiful blue eyes and cute rosy cheeks, she was the most feminine looking of the girls, the prettiest. She was even well developed, nearly grown out of her training bra, and yet she dressed like a slob when given the chance.
“Stop acting like such a little brat,” Tara hissed, standing.
“Go back to your room and you won’t have to deal with it,” Becky told her.
“I am in my room,” Tara challenged. “I need more space for my stuff.”
Becky approached the girl, standing eye to eye with her sister. There was a glimmer of fury in those baby blues of hers, and Tara was about to ignite the light.
“Get out of here before I knock out those pretty little pearly whites of yours and ruin your prom,” Becky threatened.
Tara stepped back, eyeing the fist that Becky made at her side. “Fine.”
Margaret watched in amazement as Tara turned and left the room. She had always admired that about her little sister, the way that she could assert herself and truly stick up for herself.
“What a jerk,” Margaret mentioned as she turned and began unpacking her bedding.
“You know, one of these days I would like to see you actually get angry. Not just mad, but angry. I want to see you instill the fear of God into her eyes. Then, and only then, will she listen to you,” Becky explained.
That was a piece of advice that Margaret would carry with her throughout the entirety of her life.