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Hawkeye and BJ are able to honor the request Charles makes repeatedly until he’s breathless: to be taken somewhere out of sight to suffer. He doesn’t want anyone else in the camp to see him in such a sorry state. His bunkmates barely know him, and he’s already quite confident they’re going to lecture him and mock him about this until he dies. Which, from the way he’s feeling as they haul him into a disused, dusty cot in the supply room, might be any moment. BJ has two fingers to his throbbing wrist and Hawkeye has the back of one hand to his clammy forehead. Margaret tags along as soon as she sees them struggling to haul Charles across the compound. They settle him beneath the moth-bitten blanket and Charles thinks he might as well be tossed into a shallow grave, dirt kicked over him. But then, neither of his fellow physicians leave the room, nor does Margaret. Not right away.
“When did you take your last dose?” BJ asks, all business.
Charles gives up on opening his eyes. His lashes are starting to feel like red hot needles, jabbing him every time he blinks. Margaret clicks on a lantern, reserving generator power for the hospital tents, which are full to capacity.
“I don’t know,” Charles admits. “After breakfast.”
Hawkeye nods curtly. This does not narrow anything down.
“I think you’re about due for your next one,” he says.
Charles gulps down air, reluctantly realizing how dry his mouth is.
“His next one?” BJ is incredulous on Charles’ behalf. “Hawk, you must be joking - but it isn’t funny.”
“Do you think cold turkey’s doing him any good?” Hawkeye observes. “Look at him, he looks like death warmed over.”
“What prescription is he taking?” Margaret asks.
Charles groans, ready to have his shame uncovered in front of the only person in this wretched camp he considers a friend. They might as well strip him naked of everything, up to and including his license to practice medicine. Margaret could tear it apart in her teeth and he’d thank her.
“One that doesn’t belong to him,” Hawkeye is vague, but damning enough. The room is starting to feel a little too cramped for his liking.
“Dexedrine,” BJ adds.
Margaret towers over him as he thrashes in bed, ready to deliver her wrath.
“Of all the thoughtless–!” she starts, but the men intervene.
BJ shushes her and escorts her away by the arm, just a few paces backward, stopping when their heels touch a box of saline bottles. Hawkeye gives her a glance over his shoulder.
“Don’t worry, Margaret. We already let him have it,” Hawkeye says.
She only raises her voice to ensure she is heard, and she only wants to be heard when the subject is one she cares about. Though she does not know exactly how much she cares about Charles, or in which particular way, she’s certain he’s worth the worry. Her care runs hot - that’s all - like a leaky faucet. Charles can either wash his hands or slip in the puddle, for all she cares. And she does. She does care.
“All week in OR, I could tell something wasn’t right,” Margaret grumbles.
Down in the bunk, Charles’ cheeks are flushed red with illusory exertion, as if every subconscious function now takes great effort. When he reminds himself to breathe, he is aware of his heart rattling out of control in his chest, between lungs heavily laden and ribs brittle. He blinks again and feels the jagged edges of his lashes poking dry, reddened eyes. Nothing is comfortable, but he decides against getting up and trying to situate himself somewhere else. Besides, Hawkeye has one hand on his shoulder, barring him effectively in his weakened state.
“Is there anything I can do to help, Doctor?” Margaret asks, to whichever will answer.
BJ puts up his hands, surrendering the case to Hawkeye. Far from heartless, he simply would have taken a different approach to Charles’ treatment. He’s prepared to circle back around with a placebo or a douse of cold water, if that turns out to be what Charles needs later.
“I start Post-Op duty in ten minutes,” BJ adds to his defense. “Someone needs to make sure all those kids he just operated on, in this condition, recover okay.”
“You pigheaded–” Margaret spools up to yell, but promptly stops herself. “I’m sorry, Charles. Clearly you’re very ill.”
“I’ve got something you can do for us, Margaret,” Hawkeye employs the plural to encompass all four of them, urgent and tender. “You can get another Dexedrine tablet out of the lockbox. They’re scored; go ahead and split it in half, and then in half again.”
She nods and excuses herself to do so. BJ follows, winding his way to Post-Op to take report from Colonel Potter. That leaves Hawkeye alone with Charles, who has fallen into a fitful, shivering sleep. He looks miserable, and it’s obvious he feels the same. Misery must be as foreign to him as anything else in Korea. Even when he confronts it head on in the operating room, he never doubts his ability to pull a patient out alive. It occurs to Hawkeye that Charles was never a child to have his hand smacked by the conspicuous lid of a cookie jar well after bedtime, nor by the bolt on a window slamming behind him sneaking home after curfew. If he ever had his hand slapped at all, it would have been quite literally, if he was not performing to the absolute highest standard in his classes. Charles has always gotten exactly what he wants, exactly when he wants it. The weight of unrealized repercussions must hit more heavily upon the shoulders, Hawkeye thinks. Here is a man who should know better, but who believed himself to be superior to any side-effects.
Hawkeye draws his seat - a crate of bandage rolls - close to the side of the cot. Charles stirs, but does not open his eyes.
“You’re gonna be fine,” Hawkeye says. His hand grazes down from Charles’ shoulder, and he realizes how uncomfortable the sweat-laced uniform and the musty blanket must be, especially for a man who attunes himself to luxury. There wouldn’t be any other reason for him to consider undressing Charles, surely. “Hurts falling off your high horse, huh?”
“Hhhnnggh,” Charles gives a prolonged groan.
“No, I know. I’m not making fun of you. It could’ve happened to any of us,” Hawkeye rubs his hand around, over Charles’ breast pocket. “I guess that doesn’t make you feel any better, though, does it? His Royal Highness, Charles Emerson Winchester the Third, suffering the plight of a commoner? But you know what– if it could happen to any of us, you’ll have all of us on your side.”
Charles grunts, affirmative enough. Hawkeye checks around both shoulders, hoping to find Margaret rushing to their rescue. Instead, all he gets is an eyeful of precariously stacked supply crates. Funny how they always seem to be running low on everything they need, but the room is packed tighter than a tin of sardines. Though he knows, rationally, that the boxes are not about to come tumbling down on him, and that taking cover in an occupied cot will not give him any sense of freedom, he is not always the most rational man. Folding himself in half, he sits on the open sliver at the side of Charles’ bed. His body heat radiates through the blanket, and Hawkeye feels as if he is there to trap those shivers in place, stowing heat, insulating Charles against trembling too much. When Hawkeye tucks his leg in tight against the railing, he can lean over Charles more completely. It’s not like he wants to suffocate the guy - nor cast himself in the role of a headstone - but he finds that gazing down on Charles makes him feel better. The room feels a whole lot bigger, when he ponders the vast emptiness between their arms. If they were to embrace–
Margaret comes back in, stomping along the plank floor in her boots. One hand protects the quartered pill, and the other incubates a little paper cup of water to a pleasant temperature. Hawkeye stands up in a hurry; he hates being caught doing something, when he isn’t even doing anything. Margaret scoffs and he scoffs right back, teasingly.
“The water’s a nice touch, Margaret,” he tells her, earnestly. “Come on, Charles. Sit up. We need you to take your medicine.”
Margaret grips his shoulders and hoists him up like he’s a sack of flour and she’s about to jam a measuring cup down his throat. He gapes at her and receives only a carefully-tempered sip of the water, and two quarter-pieces of the tablet, popped in afterward. He gulps this all down while Margaret keeps a judicious hold on his chin, making sure he swallows before he opens his mouth again. She dabs away a stray dribble of water from his chin with her coat sleeve as she sets the glass aside. With her hands freed, she fetches the lantern and posts it on a nail protruding from the wall, beside the cot.
“Perfect,” Hawkeye observes, pulling out the crate again. “I’ll sit with him for a while, don’t worry. You can go back to whatever - or whomever - you were busy with.”
“I’m off duty,” Margaret has learned by now that it’s best to stifle any reaction to his antics. “I’d like to stay, and make sure he’s all right. If anything were to happen to him, I– I don’t know what I’d do. He’s such a gifted physician, we–”
Hawkeye can tell she’s trying to talk herself out of a circle. Maybe she’s afraid he’ll let loose one of those hopeless, honking belly-laughs at her, if she admits that she cares about the guy. Against his better judgment, he crosses his legs to make a sliver of space available on the crate, and he pats it for Margaret to sit on. He leans most of his weight forward onto the mattress, and Margaret decides to take the bait, since Hawkeye is the only one this trap seems to be ensnaring, stuck in the middle of herself and Charles. Holding her lab coat out of the way, she sits.
“If you’re staying…” Hawkeye ventures to say.
“Which I am…”
“...would you take down dictation for his chart? I’m sure our gifted physician will want to know we treated him well.”
“Of course, Doctor,” Margaret nods. And does Hawkeye have a pen or a pad of paper with him? Of course not. Fortunately Margaret keeps both in her breast pocket, for situations just like this one.
Half-tab administered to pt. under supervision at approx. 2200
Pt. drank 8oz of room temperature water with assistance.
Pt. A+O x2 and unable or unwilling to open eyes.
Pallid coloration. Trembling composure. Perspiring heavily. Tachycardic.
Hawkeye holds up the lantern beside Charles’ cheek. The flickering light warms him, and makes the insides of his eyelids glow red. Having never been in serious danger, and hearing Hawkeye’s voice mumbling instructions to him, Charles assumes in a daze that his friend must be in grave danger. He tries to sit up in bed but is too weak. His brows are heavy with sweat. Hawkeye lets Charles squeeze his hand but it is not consolation enough. Margaret scoots in closer and pats the side of his head while he wails something about Dr. Pierce’s bleeding body.
2245, pt. calling out for Dr. Pierce, believing him to be in danger.
Experiencing auditory and/or visual hallucinations.
Difficult to console. Hallucinating everything except–
“--Dr. Pierce’s roguish good looks,” Hawkeye recites.
“I’m not writing that,” Margaret says curtly.
He’s planted his palm in the middle of Charles’ chest, which seems to be the only thing that can steady out his breathing. Hawkeye tilts his head to peek at Margaret’s notepad, which she is quick to draw against her chest like an ace in the hole.
“You didn’t mention that you were petting his hair?” Hawkeye pleads. “That was the best part.”
She grumbles something unintelligible and scribbles down something equally so.
Pt. consoled by repetitive combing of hair.
Then she flashes the page at Hawkeye, who smirks and loans out a chuckle. They’re sitting shoulder to shoulder on a crate of gauze dressings in near-darkness, and she can’t help but wonder if this is the way slumber parties were supposed to feel. She might as well be trying out the feel of different men’s last names next to ‘Margaret’ on the paper, with the way she hides it. For one reason or another, she knew Hawkeye was going to laugh at her, but it isn’t in a way that hurts. It’s in a way that tingles a little, in her chest. She leans in tighter against Hawkeye, putting more pressure on his arm, and they lean in together to oversee their dear patient.
Pt. exhausts self and falls asleep approx. 0100.
Next dose, 1 quarter-tab, due by 0200.
Hawkeye and Margaret do the same, a few minutes later. When BJ comes back from Post-Op duty, he finds them slumped together, Margaret’s head on Hawkeye’s shoulder, and Hawkeye’s head on top of Margaret’s. The notepad is still clutched in Margaret’s fist, pages hanging askew over her knee. Charles is still sleeping, with loud snores providing a reliable sign of life. BJ pulls up another crate to sit on, as quietly as he possibly can, but the skidding sound wakes Hawkeye, whose movement in turn wakes Margaret.
“Hey, Beej,” Hawkeye says into a yawn. “Everything okay in Post-OP?”
BJ nods.
“Colonel Potter sent me to check on you guys. He and Kellye have everything under control.” He gives a good-natured smile. “If you wanted to get some sleep in the Swamp… you should have a couple more hours before the sun comes up. I can sit with him; we can take shifts.”
Margaret is infected with the same yawn going around, and covers her mouth with her hand.
“Thanks, Beej,” Hawkeye says. “We started charting…”
Margaret fumbles for the correct page in her notepad, before offering the whole thing over to BJ.
“He thought I was stranded near the frontline, and hurt,” Hawkeye explains, patting Charles’ shoulder as he rises to his feet. “If he calls out for me again… well, you could either come wake me up, or you could do an impression.”
“I’m not a very good juggler,” BJ said.
“And I’m not really bleeding out on the frontline.”
Hawkeye offers his arm down for Margaret to take hold of, bolstering herself to stand after dozing off in such an uncomfortable position. BJ glances back and forth between the two of them and then at Charles on the cot.
“Nice of him to worry about you, though,” BJ says.
“Yeah. I guess if you speed his heart up enough, he can start lending a few spare beats to the less fortunate. He’s a good guy.”
“I’ll tell him, when he wakes up.”
“You’re a good guy, too,” Hawkeye says readily. “Can I bring you back anything?”
“You can have a sweet dream for me.”
Nodding, Hawkeye staggers out of the crowded supply closet, glad for the breath of fresh, early morning air. Margaret follows, keeping a few paces in between them, as if she is stalking Hawkeye like prey. She wouldn’t want to collapse into his bed with him. But he veers away from the Swamp at the last second, and heads toward the Mess Tent, instead. He had gladly given up on eating his dinner to check on Charles, and now reluctantly realizes how hungry he is. Besides, he has a hard time falling asleep when he has the Swamp totally to himself. Margaret has started to feel the same way about her own quarters, lately.
She catches up to Hawkeye at the Mess Tent door, which is unbolted, but the tent itself is also unoccupied. There is nothing left from dinner in the service line, and all of the empty chafing dishes have been stacked up on a table in the far corner. Hawkeye tries the vat of coffee left out near the middle of the room, and drains the last, thick dregs of it into the dirt.
“I could let us into the kitchen,” Margaret says, while Hawkeye stares at the sad puddle he’s made in the dirt.
“It’s not just for me,” Hawkeye explains. “I wanted to bring something back for BJ, and for Charles.”
“Let’s see what we can find.”
Margaret’s cooking experience practically falls into the negatives, while Hawkeye is a known gourmand with a collection of family recipes dating back a century. She opens the cabinets and the ice box to display the available options to Hawkeye, who makes a series of increasingly depressed groans at each one. He settles on bread and a jar of strawberry preserves, having found no butter or other sandwich fixings. Margaret makes a cross-shape out of four slices of bread pressed crust-to-crust on a round plate, and Hawkeye takes each one up in turn to coat it with jam.
“You’re really worried about him, aren’t you?” Hawkeye asks, so he will not need to admit to as much, himself.
“He’s going to be fine,” Margaret weaves away from the personal nature of the question.
“I know he’s gonna be fine, Margaret. But you can still worry about him. You’re a good nurse, and he’s your friend. That’s a perfect recipe for worry.”
Margaret feels teardrops stinging the corners of her eyes. It’s such a relief to hear the word ‘friend’ spoken aloud, to have it bestowed by the camp’s expert on friendship. Margaret was struggling to make sense of her affection for their new doctor - how impressed she was with his work, how desperately she wanted to work beside him in the OR, and how she still wanted to spend time with him even after every surgery was done. ‘Friend’ is a soft word, a perfect word, a word with a wide wingspan, who gives gentle hugs.
“What about you?” Margaret asks, nudging Hawkeye’s arm as he seals the jam jar tight.
“I think he might be my friend, too. You better ask him.”
She laughs aloud with relief, and Hawkeye joins her. They tote the breakfast platter back to the supply room together, giggling and scampering through the dark like schoolchildren. Inside, BJ is sitting up straight and attentive, watching Charles gargle water around his final dose of the tablet. The final quarter is discarded, and Charles will consider himself weaned.
“What do we have here?” BJ asks, turning around and seeing the plate, but not its contents.
“A sweet dream,” Hawkeye says, lowering it into BJ’s line of vision.
Charles clambers up to see the tray, too, and takes a deep breath before deciding what to say. His eyes are open, but bloodshot, and he has taken some effort to wipe the sweat from his skin with his sleeve-cuff.
“We could all use some breakfast,” Margaret dispenses advice not only like a nurse, but like a friend.
BJ rolls his piece of bread up into a tight tube before taking a bite. He remarks that his mother used to make sandwiches for him and his sister that way, sometimes, when they were short on bread.
“See, you only need one piece per sandwich,” he concludes.
Charles tries to tuck his together in the same way, smudging jam all over the crust and subsequently his fingers. He sets it down, displeased, and wipes his fingers clean on the cot as if the entire thing is a napkin.
“How… quaint,” Charles says. “Yes, yes, this reminds me of… childhood. Not of mine, fortunately, but of someone else’s, certainly.”
“Of mine, Charles,” BJ playfully shoves his arm. “I just told you–”
“Now, don’t be silly,” Margaret chides him, taking a seat at the bedside.
She tears his abandoned piece of bread into smaller strips, and feeds them to him carefully, one at a time.
“You need to get your strength back,” she tells him, not leaving enough time between offered bites for him to argue.
“Yeah, Charles,” Hawkeye chimes in. “We need you. None of us could hold a candle to you, isn’t that right?”
Charles blinks heavily, and savors the sugar settling on his tongue. He touches his cheek where the skin is still warm and splotchy red from the steadfast presence of the lantern.
“But I’m forever indebted to you for trying,” he says. "I-- I do hope you aren't going anywhere in a hurry, any of you..."