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The silence was tense and eerie, more foreign than this forest, given his company. Babe glanced over at the figure huddled in the foxhole beside him, but Bill’s gaze was locked firmly on the darkness ahead. Somewhere behind them, Buck continued his rounds, checking in with everyone who was left.
“What, are you saying he’s nuts?” Bill’s words rang in his ears. “Cause Crazy Joe McCloskey was fuckin’ nuts, Babe. That’s why they called him Crazy Joe!”
Bill had shut the conversation down in that way he had of taking control without even having to pull rank.
Babe had no idea how to start it back up again. Or if he even wanted to. Hell, he wasn’t sure what it was he’d really wanted to say. But it wasn’t a criticism of Buck Compton. No… That had been a poor lead-in… The only one he had to attempt to relate his real fears. The longer this battle stretched on, the more Babe started to feel like he was the one going fuckin’ nuts.
Babe wasn’t sure he remembered what it felt like to be warm. He was pretty sure this dull ache in the pit of his stomach would remain with him for the rest of his days, no matter how much he ate. Surely, he’d never slept through a whole night before anyway… Perhaps there was nothing left to this world past Bastogne and these godforsaken woods.
Then Bill coughed shortly beside him, his breath puffing out a little more aggressively into the frigid air. It brought him back to himself a bit, grounded him in the way the bursts of artillery fire had begun to fail to.
As true as it was that he just might be losing his mind, there were also things Babe was beginning to understand with absolute certainty. One was that, if he made it through this (and wasn’t that just the craziest thought of all!) he would never be the same.
The other was that Bill had become synonymous with home. And something would be missing from that sense of belonging even if he did find himself lucky enough to be walking those familiar Philly streets of his past life again one day. He wasn’t sure what this meant for him yet.
But then another barrage of death and destruction came raining down around them, sending them ducking for cover, effectively derailing any existential trains of thought. For now.
…………
And then Bill was gone and Babe was still in these fucking woods, feeling more untethered than ever.
Bill and Joe Toye were on their way home. Muck and Penkala were dead. Buck had been shipped off somewhere, Malarkey was near-comatose, Luz had finally lost his sparkle, and it was just a matter of time before Lipton collapsed, running around doing the job of eight men the way he was. And Babe? Perhaps Babe simply wouldn’t duck for cover the next time the bullets and mortar shells started flying.
“Heffron.” He would never know how that deep, steady drawl managed to be both silky smooth and sharp enough to jolt him back to some sort of awareness. He looked up from his own clenched fists to see a battered tin cup shoved in front of his nose. But his eyes continued to rise... up, up, up until they found Doc’s own. But before he could get properly lost in those dark depths, the medic commanded, “Drink up.”
Obediently, hand moving to take the cup before he was consciously aware of the motion, Babe took a sip of what he suspected was supposed to be coffee. It didn’t taste like anything. And ‘lukewarm’ would have been a generous description.
But he was rewarded with a tiny smile before Gene moved on to the next visage of suffering, and it began to warm him better than the coffee ever could, starting with the odd buzzing in his chest.
What do you know… The rest of the world may have been metaphorically—and sometimes literally—in flames, but Eugene Roe remained steady. Trailing after the remnants of his company… Keeping them all whole however he could.
The days when Babe was the one attempting to catch him when it looked like their medic was about to falter felt like they’d happened a lifetime ago.
He was briefly intrigued by the fluttering that had begun to appear in his core whenever he was around Gene… But he couldn’t find the focus to study it too thoroughly just yet. Gene’s presence was like a mental nudge… Not quite strong enough to un-mire his mind completely from the fugue it had begun to sink into. After all, each day was a lifetime, and human beings weren’t meant to survive more than one of those. Best not to think ahead too much.
And yet… Inexplicably, he did continue to survive, day after day. And they made it out of the woods and back into the sunlight.
And Babe found himself drifting continually closer to Eugene Roe.
The once-so-solitary medic didn’t seem to mind his company so much anymore. At least, he’d begun gracing him more and more with those indulgent, vaguely fond smiles as Babe followed around after him, chattering away about nothing in particular. And he didn’t pull away when Babe would sidle up to him during meals, sitting almost shoulder to shoulder like they still needed to do whatever they could to preserve body heat.
“You know, maybe something good came out of Bastogne after all,” he commented mildly to Spina one day. “Doc seems to have come out of his shell a bit. Spends more downtime with the group.”
The other medic had stopped his counting of supplies, fixing Babe with an unreadable look.
“The group,” he said flatly. “Right…”
Whatever the fuck that meant.
Babe didn’t dwell on it. All he knew was that while Bill’s presence had come to mean home, Gene’s had started to mean safety from the moment he’d first jumped into combat with this company. Later, it had meant warmth in a frozen hellscape. Little bubbles of laughter when they weren’t being shot at. Steadiness when Babe’s sanity was threatening to shake apart. Care against a backdrop of callousness in the face of an untimely death. Butterflies in his stomach when the rest of him had almost been numbed out of existence.
And maybe, at some point along the way, Babe had started to be willfully blind. He wasn’t naïve. Anyone ought to have been able to put all these pieces together and seen the writing on the wall of the bigger picture.
But Babe had had just about all the inner turmoil he could handle. It was not so very difficult to convince himself that he deserved an era of peace… no matter how short-lived it may turn out to be.
…………
“Oh, there you are! We were starting to wonder…”
He couldn’t help but get a little bashful under Frannie’s gaze. There was something almost like relief in her eyes, and nothing about her tone made him doubt that she was genuinely pleased to see him. For a woman who never struggled to keep Bill in line, it amazed him how damn-near saint-like she could be at times. He wouldn’t have blamed her if she was starting to get fed up with his newfound tendency to show up at the happy couple’s new apartment at all hours unannounced.
“Hope you guys weren’t waitin’ on me,” he said, ducking his head at he stepped over the threshold. “It’s not like I ever call ahead…”
But she waved away his concerns as easily as a passing breeze, and Bill’s grin was so wide when he saw him, and their tiny kitchen radiated warmth… Babe felt something within him unclench as he sank into the wooden chair beside his best friend.
“Hey, kid. Where ya been?” Bill greeted.
In the early days after they’d met back up, Babe had moaned and groaned about Bill’s tendency to call him 'kid.' They were no longer the sergeant and the replacement. Just two friends who should be on equal footing… But for some reason, it never felt that way.
“I was here two days ago,” Babe griped back. “Figured I oughta spend at least one night in my own house. My ma’s gonna start taking it personal.”
He wouldn’t blame her if she already was. Through some kind of miracle or divine intervention, all four Heffron boys had made it through the war alive… And Babe could hardly stand to be in the same room with them for the length of time it took to eat dinner and clear the table. Babe had always been fairly close with his brothers. Anyone would think the shared experience of warfare would have bound them together more tightly than ever, the way he felt about he men he’d served with… But that connection he might have expected upon reuniting with them just wasn’t there. Maybe it had to do with how they’d all served in different regiments. Maybe it was because none of them ever spoke about those experiences anyway.
All Babe knew was that when they were all in the same room together, it was like there wasn’t enough air to go around. That sensation of living on borrowed time had never really left him. Like he’d outrun a killer in a dream, and his subconscious did know how to continue on. The next page of the book was blank. There wasn’t supposed to be anything after the horror scene.
Babe had already outlived so many. There were days he thought the guilt was going to finish the job the war had started. He wasn’t sure he’d survive being the one to steal the air from his flesh-and-blood brothers.
And so he ran here.
“Oh, don’t let him give you a hard time. We love having you over.” Frannie breezed into the room after him, stopping to press a kiss to Babe’s cheek for show. The rest of Babe’s face lit up, but Bill just cackled.
Under other circumstances, with any of his other friends, Babe might have felt a little insulted that he was so obviously not a threat here. But this was Bill. It made him sick to his stomach to think of anything coming between the happy couple. Especially with Frannie starting to show… It would be a matter of months before there was a baby joining them at this table, keeping them up at all hours of the night…
Honestly, Babe was pretty sure he was more anxious about the next generation of Guarneres than Bill was. The soon-to-be father was nothing but wide-eyed excitement whenever the topic of the baby came up. He knew Frannie’s parents were a little more apprehensive. They hadn’t even wanted the two to get married at first. A newborn and a newly one-legged husband? He guessed he couldn’t blame them for thinking she was getting in over her head.
But they didn’t know Bill like he and Frannie did. Nothing kept Wild Bill Guarnere down. Losing his leg had barely even slowed him down. He was taking to post-war life with all the energy he’d taken into boot camp, maybe more. He would be just fine.
Babe wished he knew where that left him. Because right now the answer seemed to be hanging off of Bill’s coattails, desperately trying to siphon off some of that zest for life and stability.
Frannie opened the oven, and the kitchen was flooded with the scent of something warm and home-cooked. It should have been comforting. It should have been everything he’d dreamed of for two long years… But instead, the heat began to feel oppressive, his stomach twisting into knots.
He stood abruptly from his chair, (more abruptly than Bill was able to, his mind whispered) announcing, “I gotta use the bathroom first.”
He didn’t hear their responses. His mind was entirely consumed by The Game he began to play any time one of these episodes started. Don’t push the chair back too harshly. Don’t walk too quickly. Don’t slam the door behind you. And for God’s sake, don’t breathe like you’re running a fucking marathon.
Sequestered in the Guarneres’ tiny bathroom, hands braced against the sink in the dimness because he hadn’t bothered to turn on the light, Babe tried to focus on anything but his pounding heart and his own reflection in the mirror. This had happened enough times for him to know that it was simply a waiting game. If he could just focus on each little step, keep himself contained for long enough, eventually the monster that lived in his chest now would tire and go back to sleep.
It was just a waiting game… And Babe hadn’t lost a single round yet.
Eventually, the heat beneath his collar began to recede. The ache in his chest soothed itself. He rested his forehead against the cool glass of the mirror and was aware for the first time of how much his hands were sweating. He let them slide from their grasp on the sink and wiped them on his pants. He finally met his own eyes in his reflection, taking a quick inventory of his appearance. Maybe he’d looked better… but he didn’t spot anything that should raise any red flags.
He took one last deep breath, flushed the toilet for good measure, and walked back out to the kitchen like nothing had happened.
…………
The days continued to pass. Bill continued to jump from one odd job to another as he kept finding things that suited him better. Babe’s own spotty work history had more to do with unreliable attendance, but no one in his life ever called him out on it.
The days continued to pass… And, not nearly as slowly as he would have liked, the season passed with them. Pretty soon, he was showing up at Bill’s place with a jacket… and then a jacket and a scarf… and then as many layers as he could pile on.
Babe would swear that, once upon a time, he’d had fond memories of sledding and snowball fights… Now he watched the skies for the first signs of snow not with hopes of school cancellations but with dread pooling in his stomach. He had a new appreciation for the eerie way a blanket of snow could dampen sound, make you feel like you were the only person left in the whole world…
When, inevitably, the snowy days did come, he did his best to avoid them until the streets were a little more active. But sleeping late had long since lost its charm. Maybe this could be blamed on the weather too, but the nightmares that had haunted him a few times a week ever since he’d come home had become a nightly occurrence. And his pale Irish skin did nothing to camouflage the bags under his eyes.
So he knew he was looking pretty wretched these days whenever he dragged himself through Bill and Frannie’s front door, but neither of them ever commented on it.
On one of these nights, after choking down another dinner that probably would have been wonderful if he’d been able to taste much of anything these days, the atmosphere in the apartment was decidedly different. Babe helped Frannie do the dishes while Bill maneuvered himself onto the couch in the next room. But when Babe walked over to join him, he found that there was just about nowhere left to sit.
“Whoa…” Everywhere he looked… Paperwork. Mostly joking, he turned to Bill with a wry grin and asked, “You finally give up, Bill? Get yourself an office job?”
“Ha ha,” he replied dryly, shoving one stack onto another to make room for his friend.
“Bill’s been working on something big,” Frannie said from behind them, clearly proud.
Babe quickly started moving things aside so she would have a place to sit as well, but she waved him off, her other hand braced against her lower back. She’d reached a stage where her pregnancy was impossible to overlook. “Oh, don’t bother, honey. I’m gonna turn in early tonight.”
She immediately had Bill’s full attention. He twisted to look at her, and it was like the two had a whole conversation with just their eyes. It was undeniably intimate. Babe wanted to look away but found him simultaneously glued to the scene. He reached for her, and she leaned down, that hand on her back going to cup his face instead. They shared a tender kiss, both all smiles when they pulled apart. Frannie made her way back to their bedroom, and Bill’s eyes stayed glued to her back until that door closed behind her.
Babe was quiet for an extra moment, unsure how to break the ice. But he was a South Philly boy through and through. They weren’t exactly known for tact. “You two are real sweet together, you big ball of mush.”
Bill sent a cocky grin Babe’s way, the kind that would have been a little suggestive… implied what a stud he was in a group of guy friends… It was almost funny, seeing it now, knowing just how much he loved and was devoted to his wife.
“So what is all this stuff?” Babe asked, gesturing at the mess around them.
Immediately, Bill beamed, another level of a smile.
“Johnny and I have been talking… We want to set up some kind of get-together this summer. We’ve been reaching out to all the guys from Easy we can reach. More Johnny than me at first. I wasn’t exactly collecting everyone’s contact info around the time I got out. But you know… Lip had info for Popeye and Shifty, and Shifty had McClung’s number and so on… And it kept going and going and now you have all this.”
He gestured around them, and Babe whistled appreciatively right on cue. And it was an impressive endeavor. He’d missed the other guys since he’d been home, but with the promise of a reunion, he suddenly felt it like a lightning strike to the chest. He was excited, for sure. But underneath that, there was a ripple of relief as well. He was secretly glad that Bill was sinking all his extra time and energy into this… rather than plans for Christmas and New Years celebrations.
“Spina even got us in touch with Doc,” Bill went on, and a shiver went down Babe’s spine that had nothing to do with the flurries that had begun to drift down outside.
“Oh yeah?” Babe managed, hoping it sounded more nonchalant to Bill’s ears than it did to his own.
“Yeah… Frannie made me give her the phone for a bit when I called. I think Doc just about passed out from embarrassment on the other end.”
Bill chuckled and Babe grinned back… but a different kind of shiver passed through him. He knew, of course, on a mental level that Gene had saved Bill’s life… but he wasn’t sure he’d ever really felt it until just this moment.
But the rollercoaster continued chugging on, because the next words out of Bill’s mouth were, “He asked about you, ya know.”
Was he imagining the almost coy edge to his tone? And he knew his voice shook a bit this time as he repeated dumbly, “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah… Spina said you two got pretty close too.”
“Y-yeah, well… I just noticed… Gene was always running around looking after everyone else, and it felt like no one was looking after him so… Did he… Did he really ask about me?”
His tone was pathetically hopeful, and he’d begun twisting his hands around themselves… And he saw an understanding settle in Bill’s eyes that made the breath catch in his throat.
Almost to himself, he murmured, “Wow… Ralph had some suspicions but… Huh. Never woulda guessed, kid.”
How was it possible for so many possibilities to race through his mind when it felt like his brain had shut down? He considered faking a medical emergency… Then thought he wasn’t going to have to, because he was pretty sure he was actually about to be sick. The crazy thought crossed his mind that if he made a sudden race for the door… Bill probably wouldn’t be able to catch him. And that thought made a hysterical sob well up beneath the blockage in his throat. Because if he lost the safe place he’d found in this apartment… He honestly wasn’t sure where he’d go from here. That unfathomable reality kept him rooted in his seat.
Bill stayed quiet long enough for Babe to choke down that block and manage, “It wasn’t… We weren’t… I’m not like that.”
Babe had never been a great liar. He wasn’t even a little bit believable. And Bill wasn’t the type to let him get away with it. But of all the things he saw pass through Bill’s expression… the disgust he was anticipating never materialized.
Bill just shrugged, faking nonchalance a lot more successfully than Babe ever could. “Well, hey, if any guy’s gonna turn ya, I guess I can’t knock your choice.”
It was at least another ten minutes before Babe felt like he could breathe freely again, but Bill moved on, just like that. He grabbed a random file from the stack and began catching Babe up on who all they’d managed to reconnect with already.
Slowly… Ever so slowly… Babe let himself sink back into the couch cushions.
By the time they got to the latest updates on Smokey’s medical journey, he was even listening again.
…………
The days continued to pass, the snow continued to fall, and Babe somehow managed to make it through the two holidays he was pretty sure he’d never enjoy again.
He continued to spend as much time at Bill and Frannie’s as ever.
Sleeping over was nothing new. Babe reclaimed the couch as soon as Frannie made Bill find a new place to store his Easy Company files.
Honestly… It was a damn miracle it took as long as it did for one of his bad nights to catch their attention.
Babe didn’t think he was much of a screamer, thankfully. His family tiptoed around him sometimes, but he was sure they would have staged some kind of intervention by now if he was calling out in his sleep every night. But he was usually pretty out of it for a while after he came to, so he couldn’t truly say what kind of ruckus he’d been making exactly.
All he knew was that one second, he was watching Julian bleed out in the snow… and the next, Bill was dropping down beside him on the couch and Babe had his hand over his face, his ragged breathing punctuated by embarrassing little whines. He nearly jumped to his feet when Bill laid a hand on the back of his neck, squeezing reassuringly. “All right, kid, you’re all right…”
After a moment or so, the pressure did succeed in grounding him. Babe squeezed his eyes shut as his breathing began to slow, trying to ward off the moment that would inevitably come next.
But there was a soft clink on the coffee table beside him before he had to face the dreaded let’s talk about it. He opened his eyes to see that Frannie had set down a mug in front of him, little tendrils of steam drifting up from it.
It was a little harder for her to slip out of a room unnoticed these days, but she did her best. Bill reached out and grabbed her hand before she could get too far, the other hand still anchoring Babe to the present. He heard Bill thanking her on his behalf, murmuring promises that he’d rejoin her in bed soon…
But Babe’s eyes settled on the mug before him, captivated. It was hot milk.
Frannie had gotten up in the middle of the night and heated him a cup of milk to help him get back to sleep.
It was hard to describe the way his stomach bottomed out.
Fuck.
Jesus Fucking Christ. What was he doing here? These two were about to have a real baby, and here they were babysitting his sorry ass.
He couldn’t—
He had to—
Babe was out of his seat before his brain figured out how to finish that thought. He didn’t even grab his jacket, just shot out the door… doing his best to block out the sounds of Bill shouting out after him.
…………
He stayed away from that apartment all the next week.
Babe wasn’t sure how he was going to fix himself, exactly, but something needed to fucking change.
There were some extra hurdles now, though. He lived every day in horror of a repeat performance. Except this time it would be his ma rushing to his side instead… He shuddered at the thought.
Or maybe from the cold. His brilliant solution had been that he just wouldn’t sleep until he was about ready to pass out.
Which is how he found himself wandering the streets on a Friday night. It was threatening to snow again, so he didn’t pass too many people… No one who had anywhere else to go, that is. He wondered what that made him, to the outside observer.
It got dark so early this time of year… Babe supposed that kept some people off the streets too, but he’d barely noticed the sun going down. Now it was dark save for the lamps on the street corners and the glow of his cigarette in front of his nose.
He turned onto the next road and found an open store lighting up that patch of sidewalk. Good old Delancey’s… He took one last drag, tossed away the cigarette butt, and pushed through the door.
The woman stocking the sparse grocery shelves barely gave him a passing glance as he wandered over to the even smaller hardware section, passing by the tiny ice cream freezer he used to beeline to as a kid. His eyes passed over the displays, not really seeing anything.
The sound of glass shattering behind him made him whirl around, poised to duck and cover, equally shattered buildings and cobblestoned streets flashing before his eyes. But he forced himself to take a breath, get a fucking grip, and keep his steps measured as he went to investigate the source of the noise.
He reached the aisle and pulled up short for a second at the very real red liquid splashed across the floor… but it was just spaghetti sauce. And the store clerk was on her knees in front of it, cursing softly but vehemently under her breath.
Babe jogged up to the register, grabbed the broom and dustpan he knew they kept behind the counter, and returned to the scene of the crime in record time. “Here, let me help.”
“Thanks.” She looked up with a grateful smile and Babe was struck by a strange wave of familiarity. Those dark eyes wouldn’t let go of him, and he remained frozen long enough for the moment to grow awkward and the clerk to grow impatient. “Alright, give it here then.”
His limbs unstuck and he began hurriedly sweeping up the wreckage. “Sorry. I got it. Just… Do I know you from somewhere?”
He looked up again when she snorted. “Oh God, do boys still use that line? I’m old enough to be your ma, kid.”
He flushed violently. “Not like that! I mean actually. I grew up around here, but I’ve uh… I’ve been away for a while. Just can’t place ya.”
She eyed him for an extra second but seemed to accept this. “My friends call me Nan.”
“Just Nan?” he wheedled in what he hoped was a winningly lighthearted tone.
“Short for Nancy.” She grimaced.
“Nancy ain’t such a bad name,” he assured questioningly.
She huffed a little laugh. “Yeah, but would you like to be Nancy Delancey?” She shrugged. “I knew my fate when I married him, though, so I guess I have no right to complain. Not like Nancy McCloskey had such a nice ring to it either.”
He froze for a second time, eyes finding her dark ones again. Of course… That was it. They had the same eyes. He hadn’t recognized them without the crazed look Babe was used to seeing in them.
Nancy recognized his recognition and nodded grimly. “Yeah, I had a feeling. It’s usually my brother people remember. Used to make my blood boil, the way kids would look at him… Joe wasn’t always like that, you know. He was never the same after the war. It really tore him up, hearing you boys were going back.”
Ah. So she’d clocked him the second he’d come in. Had he started sporting a crazed look of his own without realizing it? She very considerately didn’t ask whether he’d been one of the kids who threw more than funny looks her brother’s way.
She broke the awkward moment with a soft, absolving smile. She took the broom and dustpan back from him. “Thanks. I can take it from here. …What’s your name, hon?”
“It’s… Edward.” He’d paused a moment too long. Funny how such a simple truth could suddenly sound like a lie.
She didn’t call him on it. “Take care, Edward.”
He ducked his head in acknowledgment before heading back out into the night.
Had he known Crazy Joe was an old vet? He was pretty sure he had… But it meant something different now.
His mind flew back to Bill’s living room, the piles of papers on every surface… Babe suddenly felt untethered, not knowing where each of the men in his unit were this night. Picturing them on a cold street corner, scaring neighborhood kids who had no notion of war with the lost look in their eyes…
Babe started to walk a little faster. He’d stayed away long enough.
…………
It was late when he got to Bill’s. All the windows were dark. Babe didn’t pay it much mind. He let himself in, figuring this could all be settled in the morning.
But when he got to the couch, he found someone already perched on the edge of it.
Bill. Looking more ragged than Babe had ever seen him. Pale and sweaty. Hands shaking ever so slightly. Eyes a little wild as they took in the friend standing before him. All the hallmarks of the nightmares Babe knew all too well.
Oh.
Perhaps Frannie was better versed in the art of soothing someone back to sleep than he’d realized.
It tripped him up for a second. All this time, Bill had been the stable one, there to prop him up whenever he faltered. He’d never let on that he might be struggling himself.
He watched Bill take a shuddering, fortifying breath. But Babe crossed the distance between them before he managed to produce a greeting, some semblance of normalcy to this strange, strange night. He dropped down onto the couch and threw his arms around his brother in all but blood, pulling him close. It startled Bill. Enough to keep him silent. For a few extra seconds, at least.
“Crazy kid,” he finally scoffed affectionately, face still tucked into the crook of Babe’s neck.
“You’re only two weeks older than me,” Babe griped back fondly.
For the first time, it felt true.
…………
The weather was starting to change again. Babe had broken out his scarf from where he’d never really put it away. He was under no delusions. He was sure this winter would be rough on him too. But for now, the cool autumn breeze felt nice.
He made his way up the familiar steps, letting himself into the apartment he knew as well as his own. There was talk of Bill and Frannie looking for a bigger place, more babies on the horizon. But for now, they had their hands full.
Lucky for them, they had no shortage of help.
Babe wouldn’t deny that his heart skipped a beat, seeing the dark-haired man sitting on the sofa with the baby on his lap. Babe was a simple guy. Seeing the kindhearted, passionate Army doc who’d already stolen his heart playing nice with a baby? It did things to him.
Unlike his softspoken namesake, baby Eugene was chattering away excitedly with an infant’s understanding of commanding all the attention in the room. The fervor of his babbling picked up speed when he caught sight of his Uncle Babe.
“Oh yeah?” Babe cooed, kneeling down so they were face-to-face. “Ain’t even been on this earth a year yet. How do you have so many stories, huh?”
Eugene burst into full-bellied giggles, and Babe grinned up at Doc Roe, pleased to find him watching him back equally softly.
They’d met back up at Easy Company’s reunion, which had been a roaring success. There was enough talk from the right people about making it an annual thing that Babe was sure it would happen… And he was already looking forward to the next one.
Nothing much had come of their personal reunion. Mostly a lot of awkward mumbling on both their parts. But Bill had been watching over their exchanges as subtly as he ever did anything, and he wasn’t about to let perhaps the final hope for Babe’s love life slip away. And Babe was all too happy to relinquish his spot on the couch when Gene had announced he was coming up for a visit.
“Hi, Gene” he greeted belatedly, hoping the giddiness in his voice wasn’t too evident.
That mouth twisted into a knowing smile. “Hey, Edward.”
The lord and lady of the house made their appearance before Babe had to think up a response. They were all dressed up, ready for their date night.
“Looking good, Frannie,” Babe complimented when she came over to kiss her son goodbye. “Bill… You’ve looked worse.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled, smacking Babe not-so-discreetly on the back of the head. “You two behave tonight, ya hear? No funny business until the kid’s asleep.”
Gene blushed as beautifully red as Babe might have a year or so ago. He was all too comfortable these days to push the happy couple out the door into their child-free night. But his grin was a little too eager as he shut the door behind him.
He’d never been so excited to babysit. There were a lot of extra challenges to his post-war life… But an opportunity to play house with Doc Roe for even one night? Things were looking up.