Archive of Our Own ^beta

It’s not about men, it’s just Sid. He’s your best friend, you’re closer to him than to anyone else and you’re getting mixed up…

It’s not about men, it’s just Captain Haldane. He’s a good man, he’s like a movie hero come to life, of course you’re a little bit starstruck…

It’s not about men, it’s just Snafu. He’s the queer one, he’s the one making you feel this way, it’s okay, it’s not your fault…

It’s not about men at all, it’s just—it’s the war, that’s all, it’s being in the Corps, being out here day in day out with no one but marines and nurses, it’ll be okay once you get back…

There is a small, circular window in the center of the door, bordered by green gingham curtains. Through the blurred glass, Sledge can see Haldane approaching, smiling before he even touches the doorknob. His throat tightens and he grasps desperately for the excuses he’s been clinging to for years, but the door opens and Haldane says “Eugene! It’s so good to see you!” in an earnest voice, and they slip away, every last one, like dogs yanking the leashes from their master’s hands and escaping down the block. Sledge manages a dazed smile as he struggles to return Haldane’s greeting.

This is an inconvenient moment for him to realize, with terrible certainty, that he is queer.

“It’s—I’m glad to see you, too, sir. And back on your feet.”

“I don’t think you have to call me sir anymore, Sledge,” Haldane chuckles. “I’m not in the Marines anymore—and neither are you, I understand?”

It is mid-August. The sun is branding the back of Sledge’s neck and sweat soaks the stiff cotton and wool of his clothes; it’s almost enough to make him want a ragged uniform that lets the wind and cool water reach his skin, but he hasn’t worn one of those for eleven months.

“No, I’m not. But I don’t think that’s the Marines, sir, just good manners.”

“Well, all the same.” He reaches out and shakes Sledge’s hand, and holds it in both of his. His hands are warm and Sledge’s heart jumps. “I think you can call me Andy, don’t you? Or maybe Ack-Ack, for old time’s sake.”

He has green eyes, deep green with a fine icy overlay of blue. Sledge has never been close enough to notice them before and now he thinks he might be staring, so his gaze drops to the muddy mat at his feet.

“All right,” he manages. “I’ll try, at least.”

“Good man!” Haldane pats him on the arm and then darts down to liberate Sledge’s suitcase from his grasp. “Come in, come in.”

Sledge follows him like a sleepwalker—completely unaware of where he is going or why, but not concerned about it in the slightest. This is the kind of confidence Haldane inspires. This is what prompted him, almost a month ago, to pen a letter after a half-year of moping in Mobile. It was meant to be a thank-you letter, and Sledge had spent days trying to craft each sentence. It was difficult to feign cheerfulness while also sounding sincere, and he had sent it off expecting to receive only a perfunctory reply, if anything at all.

He had been surprised by the response—its speed as much as its contents. Barely a week had passed before he received an effusive letter from Haldane that thanked him for writing, refused all compliments, praised Sledge’s soldiering and character in general, and anxiously asked for news of any other K Company vets he knew of. Then, at the end, there had been a scrawled postscript.

Looking back at this, I’ve asked a ridiculous number of questions to be answered in a letter—why don’t you come visit me? I can take a week off of work with no trouble at all, and even after that you can stay as long as you like. There isn’t much extra space, but I’m sure we can fit you in Eddie’s room. He’s living with me at the moment, and the three of us can have our own little reunion. Name your dates!

Sledge had puzzled over that for a minute before remembering that Hillbilly’s Christian name was Eddie. Then he had laughed about it—the two of them had been near-inseparable during the war, had been wounded and sent home within days of each other, even, so it shouldn’t have been a surprise that they were inseparable afterwards, too.

He had set the letter aside, intending to write back a polite refusal, but over the next few days he kept coming back to it. His mother was worrying over him more and more; his father was as patient as ever, but could offer very little in terms of real advice. He had some other veterans who he could turn to—Sid, his brother, Burgin—but all three had begun new lives after the war. They were happy. Haldane’s letter, on the other hand, had an undercurrent of frustration. Only he seemed to be dissatisfied with peacetime and longing for the camaraderie and assurance of the war. And as Sledge thought about it, he had begun to hope that possibly his old C.O. might really understand.

So here he is. He has taken a twenty-hour train ride to get here, and he is only now realizing that he has no idea what to expect from the next five days.

Haldane leads him into the living room. His first impression is that the room is small; then he realizes that this isn’t exactly fair, because he’s used to his parents’ house which is low but sprawling, an entirely different style of structure than Haldane’s narrow, three-story building. Still, there seems to be an incredible amount of furniture everywhere—a loveseat, two couches (only one of which can actually be accessed without climbing over something), three armchairs, two ottomans and a coffee table—and he has to be careful as he squeezes after Haldane towards the main couch.

“I'm sorry it’s so crowded in here,” Haldane apologizes. “The house came furnished but then I had my own furniture from my last place and I couldn’t decide what to keep. We were storing everything in the garage but we just renovated this floor—it used to be a dining room and a sitting room before we took down the wall.” He gestures at a plastered line in the ceiling that indicates where the construction happened. “And of course for that we had to take everything out and put that in the garage, too, and then Eddie thought we might as well put everything back in so I could finally decide what I want to stay in the room and what we should get rid of.”

“Sounds like you’ve kept yourself busy.”

“Yes—and we haven’t even started on the third floor, which was never finished. It’s just sort of a bare attic right now, no insulation or anything. That’s why the three of us are going to have to squeeze a bit.”

“Well, I think if we can fit three men in a hole in the ground we had to dig ourselves, a whole house shouldn’t be that much trouble.”

“I agree,” Haldane says, his eyes sparkling. “Oh, hold on, let me get us something to drink, you’ve been traveling for so long—we have coffee, soda, beer…?”

“Oh, I’m all right, don’t bother,” Sledge tries to say, but the other man is already halfway out the door.

He comes back with two Cokes and sits on the couch beside Sledge.

“How is everything at home? Your family?”

“Everything’s fine,” Sledge lies. He pauses. “My parents are glad to have me home. And my brother Edward, he was back before I was. He got married and got a job right away, so he’s happy as a clam. Don’t know if I’d be that happy if I had to work in a bank.”

Haldane’s lips twitch.

“I believe working in a bank is thought to be a respectable position,” he points out. “At the very least, you’ll have advance notice of any crashes, won’t you?”

“Yes, and with Edward in charge, I’m waiting for that notice any day now,” Sledge jokes, which earns him a proper laugh.

“I’m working at a mill—my father put a word in for me—and I have to go over accounts twice a month. It’s by far the worst part of the job. What about you, have you found anything?”

“No, I haven’t. I’ve enrolled in college courses for the fall,” he says, shrugging. “But between you and me, I have no idea what I’m in it for. I can’t see much past the general education requirements.”

“Well, you’re young,” Haldane says indulgently. He stretches back against the couch with exaggerated stiffness and there’s a touch of a grin on his face that negates the weary-old-man effect of his words. “There’s time to figure that out, isn’t there? My career has gone through quite a few twists and turns since my freshman year of college.”

“Would you mind putting that in a letter to my mother?” Sledge shoots back, and Haldane chuckles again. This is good, he thinks. He hasn’t had the energy to play around like this with anyone but Sid. If they can keep this up for the whole visit, maybe he’ll be okay.

“What’s next in the standard routine of inquiries? I’ve asked about family, career… Oh, that’s right—do you have a girlfriend? Half the marines I know have become engaged in the last six months, it’s incredible.”

Sledge grinds his teeth together but a giggle bubbles up inside of him. Skipper, the only time I’ve thought about romance in the last six months was just now, when you opened that front door.

“No,” he manages in a strangled voice. He clears his throat discreetly and wrestles his mirth. He thinks of when he was a child invited to sit in a corner chair at his mother’s tea parties and church socials, and the way she admonished him when he laughed at Edward’s silent antics. Sit quiet, straight back, and for heaven’s sake don't slurp like that, he snaps at himself. It works marvelously. “There’s too much on my mind right now, I think,” he says in a composed voice. “Getting home and finding things to do and adjusting. Marriage is not my top priority.”

“I can understand that,” Haldane says. His head tilts a hair’s breadth and his eyes are curious. “You didn’t have a steady girl when we were overseas?”

“No, sir.” A shiver of something passes over Haldane’s face—a reaction too quick for Sledge to discern, but it makes his heart stutter. He wonders why it matters, and abruptly says, “Did you?”

Hope squirms in Sledge’s stomach, more like snakes than butterflies.

“Not me, no,” Haldane says in a light voice. He crosses his legs and speaks carefully. “I don’t date much, either. Apparently I never notice when a woman is flirting with me—my greatest character flaw, according to my sister.”

“That seems—drastic.”

“I quite agree with you.” Haldane holds his gaze for a long moment, before Sledge is forced to break away. He looks at the clock instead, heart fluttering like a bird’s wings.

Is this why he is here?

The back of his neck is warm, and he hopes it doesn’t spread to his face, too. He’s always thought—it’s always seemed that Haldane took a special interest in him. Kept an eye out for him, noticed when he was distressed, sought him out. Sledge has always told himself that it was just wishful thinking. (So much easier to quash those feelings when it’s just wishful thinking!) But maybe—maybe it was true. Maybe it was this, Haldane seeing something in him, a kinship that they have.

There is a curious swooping feeling in his gut. If Haldane is asking what Sledge thinks… Could a man like him be queer? Brave, honest, reserved, strong, queer? Part of him thinks he can’t believe it. And the other part has to believe it.

The silence is breathless; it demands one more push.

“Before I forget—thank you again for inviting me, sir,” he says, setting his Coke down on the table. “It means a lot. You always seemed to… well, care more than any of the other officers we had.”

“For the sake of my brother officers, I won’t comment on the state of the Marine Corps in general—but I’m glad you feel that way. It’s hard, you know, to be responsible for so many different types of people in such conditions, and even harder to maintain a strong relationship afterwards. But when there is a certain… additional point of camaraderie…” He trails off, clearly trying to pick out words that would fit, and Sledge stifles a sympathetic grin. They’re straying too far away from subtlety now. After a moment, Haldane just shrugs and reaches over to rest his hand on Sledge’s forearm with an earnest look. “I'd like us to be friends, Eugene.”

Sledge couldn’t quite say what made him do what he did next. He is by no means certain that it was the right thing to do, but he has been living on a razor’s edge for so long that even the hope of certainty sends of a spasm of joy through his body—pure joy, untainted by fear or guilt. He feels safe for the first time in months, and rather than question that feeling, he basks in it. He takes half a breath, gathering up his courage, and kisses the other man on the mouth.

Haldane gives a little gasp of surprise, and automatically his hand reaches up and his fingers touch Sledge’s jaw. Sledge’s lips are immobile, waiting, waiting—he feels the slightest bit of give beneath them and could nearly cry with relief. He tilts his head and parts his lips, asking for something, anything.

Haldane’s hand falls to his shoulder.

Then Sledge’s heart starts to break and fear ripples through him, because he is being pushed away.

“I'm sorry,” he blurts out, throwing himself back against the couch. Adrenaline is racing through him, and Haldane doesn’t look mad but Sledge can’t trust his own senses. What was he thinking? “Christ I’m sorry, sir, I—I didn’t mean—”

“Sledge—” Haldane shakes his head. “Sledge, you don’t need to apologize, it’s okay."

There’s a long pause. Sledge knows he must look like a deer caught in headlights, or possibly a terrified rabbit—he can’t comprehend what okay means just this second. He realizes that Haldane’s hand has moved to his knee.

“Sir?”

“I'm flattered, Eugene,” Haldane says. He squeezes Sledge’s knee, looking a bit bewildered himself. “Really, I’m not angry, but—”

Then the door rattles and Lieutenant Jones enters the room at more or less the worst moment possible. His eyes find Sledge right away and a genuine smile spreads across his face as he says “Hey” to both of them, and then his gaze zeroes in on Haldane's hand. Haldane removes it hastily and Sledge can feel his heart pounding away somewhere in his throat.

Any amount of bravery he had in him is gone; now he can only think of how stupid he’s been. All this time he’s known what he risks by entertaining these feelings. That was why he’d been pushing them away in the first place, and now he has indulged and made a fool of himself, and worse—he’s involved Haldane in it. He feels sick. His eyes flicker to Haldane’s face, hoping against hope that the other man knows what to do.

“You’re late,” the captain says with an easy smile. “But with Eugene just arriving, I forgot to start dinner, anyway.”

“Guess it all evens out, then,” Jones says. His voice is perfectly normal but his eyes are narrow when he looks a Sledge and there’s the faintest hint of a frown line drawn between his eyebrows. “Good to see you, Sledge. How’s the family?”

“They’re good, thank you, sir,” Sledge says. He stands and offers a hand to shake, conscious of the fact that, in his nervousness, he’s slipped right back into the formality Haldane admonished him for not twenty minutes ago. “Good to see you, too.”

“I'm starving,” Jones says to Haldane. “So we better get started quick.”

Haldane agrees. Sledge can’t stand the tension crackling in the room and he says “Could I use your bathroom?” and rushes away in the direction Haldane indicates.

He sits on the toilet and takes deep breaths until his heart rate slows, and then he splashes cool water on his face. For three minutes he just stands there, tapping his fingers anxiously against the sink. He doesn’t know what’s going on. He doesn't know if Haldane is queer and he doesn’t know if Jones has guessed what he walked in on, and he doesn't know what he should do. His brain feels sluggish from all that time spent on the train, and the series of shocks he’s endured since then seem to be coming through a fog.

Should he offer to leave? Not altogether, that would be suspicious, but maybe offer to stay in a hotel, since they’re pressed for space? Yes, that could work. Haldane and Jones live in a little town outside Boston with a Main Street and a park and not much else; there are only three other houses on their street and then woods. It wouldn’t be at all odd for him to prefer staying in the city proper instead. They can meet for dinner or lunch two or three times and then he can skedaddle, and hopefully if he’s distant enough, nothing will cling to Haldane. More than anything else, he doesn’t want to cause a rift between the two men. Their friendship survived the daily stresses and horrors of war—Sledge would feel like the world’s greatest jackass if an ill-timed kiss was the catalyst for a separation.

“You’re an idiot, Eugene Sledge,” he says to his reflection, and his reflection offers no defense.

When he walks into the kitchen, Haldane is gone; Jones is at the counter, slicing tomatoes. He looks just like he did in the war, if a little thinner. His shirt is buttoned and his sleeves folded up as neat as a uniform, and his back is straight.

“Anything I can do to help?” Sledge says, after nervously clearing his throat. Jones looks over his shoulder.

“Sure. Ack-Ack’s grilling hamburgers—it’s the quickest thing we got. If you want to set the table, plates are there and cups over there. And there’s more beer in the fridge.”

Sledge performs his task. Jones finishes with the tomato and leans against the counter, sipping his beer. Sledge waits for him to say something, wondering what kind of conversation to expect.

“There was another marine you were close with, wasn’t there?” Jones says after a minute. “From Alabama?”

“Yes, sir,” Sledge says, surprised that he remembers. “Phillips. Sid Phillips. We grew up together.”

“Hm.” Jones casts a shrewd eye over him. “How’s he doing?”

“Sid’s fine. He’s got a job and everything—he’s getting married next month.”

Jones nods, looking more thoughtful than Sledge thinks is warranted; he wonders what’s going through the man’s head, but keeping silent seems safer. He sets down the last glass and goes to the fridge for a beer. The crack of the can seems unnecessarily  loud. He takes a sip and glances at Jones again from the corner of his eye.

“For God’s sake, Sledge, stop looking at me like I’m going to bite your head off,” Jones says impatiently.

“Sorry. I thought—”

He jerks to a halt, because how the hell is he supposed to finish that sentence? I thought you had realized I kissed your best friend?

Jones’s lips twitch.

“Would it help if I told you why I’m pissed at you?” he suggests. “It’s not ’cuz I caught you kissing a man, that much I can tell you. It’s ’cuz I caught you kissing my man.”

Sledge’s jaw drops. The words buzz around his head uselessly.

“I—what—”

The back door bangs open against the wall as Haldane pushes it with his elbow and enters the room.

“I made a couple extra, in case anyone’s really starving,” he chatters. “And I picked up a blueberry pie on the way home from work for dessert—there might be some ice cream left in the box, but I’m not sure.”

“Thanks, sweetheart.”

Jones walks over and, casual as anything, touches a hand to Haldane’s waist and kisses his cheek before sitting down. Haldane starts, and then understanding flashes across his face and he looks at Sledge with an apologetic half-grin. He sets the tray of hamburgers down.

“I was going to explain.”

“Oh,” Sledge exhales. “I— oh.” He falls into a chair that rattles at the impact and rests his forehead in one hand. “I’m an idiot.”

The answers come simultaneously.

“No.”

“A little bit.”

“No, really, it was a logical mistake to make. I was trying to suss out whether you were gay, but for a slightly different reason.”

Sledge’s cheeks are so hot he almost feels like he has a fever. He wishes he had a fever. If he had a fever, he could hole up in his room alone for a few days, then go home and claim he had died. He wouldn’t have to sit here and justify—apologize for—endlessly bemoan—his decision to walk into a man’s home (a man who had saved his life, a man he respected more than anyone else, a man he hadn’t seen in a year) with the intention of staying for a week, and kissing him within the first twenty-five minutes. He wouldn’t have to do so in front of the man’s…

He looks up. Haldane looks, if possible, almost as embarrassed as Sledge feels. Jones is rather cheerful.

“Still, what a hell of a conclusion to jump to, right?” he says around a mouthful of hamburger. “Even disregarding this —what would’ve you have done if he wasn’t gay, huh?”

“Eddie, darling, I don’t think you’re helping,” Haldane says with a too-wide smile, patting his hand. But in an odd way, it does help; Sledge is sort of relieved that they could can at least acknowledge it instead of dancing around the issue for a week. Get everything over with at once.

“Am I not? Oh well. Eat something, Sledge, come on. We’re not kicking you out.”

Sledge eyes his hamburger and feels his stomach growl. It had been a long train ride. As sick as he has felt for the last few minutes, he can’t deny he has an appetite.

While he eats, he subtly watches the other two men interact. They have decided to give him a few moments to gather his composure, and the question of kissing men has been set aside. Hillbilly is telling a story about work—he’s a carpenter, apparently, which seems to fit—and Haldane is listening attentively. Sledge doesn’t know any of the players, and although they occasionally throw in additional information for his benefit, he is too distracted to really listen.

More than anything, he is amazed by the casual intimacy between the two of them. It is nothing for them to touch each other on the arm, the hand, the knee as they speak. They sit closer than two men usually do, and there is more warmth and responsiveness in their voices. (And yet he senses that they’re restraining themselves, that they’re unused to having an audience—occasionally they will look his way, surprised to find him there, and draw away from each other.)

It’s startling, how easy it is. He has spent some time imagining what a relationship between two men would look like, even as he insisted he had no desire to participate in one, and it has never looked like this. Fed by the fire-and-brimstone rhetoric of public figures and the sneers and innuendo of polite society, even the products of his own imagination are sordid. Darkness, impermanence, furtive movements, lewd conversations, desperation. Not—domesticity. Conversations about dinner, frustrating coworkers, and the gas bill. A sudden overwhelming desire to know more surges within him. Is this what it’s really like? Is this what I’ve been afraid of?

“How long have you…?” he asks suddenly, interrupting Jones’s story—but Jones drops the subject so quickly that he’s certain it was just a way to kill time until he could talk without dying of shame.

“As long as you’ve known us,” he confirms.

“Damn.”

“It’s actually a funny story,” Haldane jumps in. “Eddie doesn’t like to talk about it—he thinks it’s embarrassing.”

“I do not,” Hillbilly objects, although there is a slight reddening along his cheekbones. “When would I have the chance to talk about it, Ack-Ack? Who would I tell?”

“But I think it’s endearing. You weren’t on Guadalcanal, right, Eugene? But you would have read about it?”

“Yes, I followed it in the papers. My friend Sid was there.”

“Then you know how terrible conditions were. Endless weeks just trekking through the jungle, and sudden firefights in pitch blackness. In hindsight it was better than Gloucester—Gloucester was the worst, for me—but Guadalcanal was my first campaign and not a pleasant one. So imagine my relief when, as a fresh lieutenant struggling to keep my captain from decimating his own company, I find that the attached company includes a staff sergeant who is competent, reassuring, good under pressure—”

“And handsome, of course,” Jones butts in. “Can’t forget that.”

“Exactly. You know, a sea-going NCO and a new lieutenant, they can get away with being a bit over-familiar with each other. It’s not the same dynamic. So we ended up spending a lot of time together. Then we were taken off Guadalcanal and had a few months’ leave in Melbourne. One day I’m walking around our billet and a group of marines come lumbering through. Sergeant Jones breaks away and comes over, drunk as a skunk, offers me a three-quarters-empty bottle of scotch, and says ‘Sir, have you been flirtin’ with me or am I just makin’ shit up?’”

“I do not sound like that,” Jones protests as Sledge laughs.

“Close enough. Also not the most cautious approach.”

“Hey, I was basing that on a good six months of evidence, not six minutes…”

“Anyway,” Haldane says loudly. “That’s it. That’s the story. I said ‘yes I have,’ and he sort of hugged me and just wandered off. The next morning he showed up looking extremely embarrassed and offered to buy me dinner.”

“This was between phases on my commission, by the way,” Jones interrupts hastily. “They had nothing to do with each other—Andy had put me in for it the day before, and I didn’t even hear about it for a few days after. The transfer to King wasn’t our decision either.”

“I think that went without saying.”

“I put seven years into that commission, I want it to be said.”

“Of course,” Sledge placates him. “I wouldn’t’ve thought otherwise. So… does anybody else…?”

They look at each other.

“Tommy?” Haldane suggests. “And Carl?”

“Nobody you know, I think,” Jones says slowly. “I also told Perry Redman—he was badly wounded on Gloucester and cycled home—and Don Flores—he served mostly in the Philippines, so I doubt your paths would have crossed. Did you ever meet Tommy Hitchcock?”

“Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“He was in Item Company; they were with us on Peleliu but there wasn’t much overlap, and I think Tommy was transferred out before they went to Okinawa. And Carl…” There is an awkward paused.

“Oh, that was stupid of me,” Haldane sighs. “He was discharged in ’43, wasn’t he?”

“Right.”

“Blue discharge?” Sledge says in a low voice, when they don’t elaborate.

It’s been in the papers recently—a blue discharge isn’t exactly dishonorable, but it’s not honorable , either, reserved mostly for drunks and homosexuals and men with attitude problems who can’t be got rid of any other way. Now those servicemen are returning home to find their bad war record means their prospects for a decent job are shot, never mind a pension or any kind of veteran benefits. Some people think they deserve it—others just shake their head and think that’s too bad and flip the page. Most of the vets that Sledge knows realize that, for one reason or another, that could easily have been them.

“Yeah. He and Tommy are together, have been for years, so at least they’ve got Tommy’s pension.”

“No one was really surprised,” Jones says. He purses his lips and rests his chin in his hand. “Carl was—well, just about the nelliest queen you ever saw.”

“The what?”

“We’re gonna have to make you flash cards. Nelly queen. You know—he shrieks and simpers and flaps his hands and loves to do drag. Great fun, especially when you’re having a few drinks in a private room, but the kind even the most oblivious man is going to recognize as queer. Poor bastard never stood a chance.”

“Huh.” Sledge brings them back to the original question. “So—that’s it? Those four guys and nobody else?”

He looks at Ack-Ack, whose usual calm face now betrays just a hint of vulnerability, and thinks about the desperate desire to talk to someone that Sledge had found in the letter. In the back of his mind he’s been wondering why Haldane would feel like that, if he had Eddie, but now he thinks he might understand. Keeping a secret like this, not just being queer, but being in love and unable to tell anyone…

Haldane smiles.

“Five,” he says, and he raises his glass in a toast.

-

After dinner, they take their blueberry pie and ice cream into the living room; Jones encourages Sledge to spill his food on any of the furniture, to force Haldane to actually make a decision about it. Haldane shushes him and starts to fiddle with the radio. Sledge has been listening to the radio a lot lately, along with reading every trashy book he can get his hands on and wandering aimlessly through the woods, so he recommends The Adventures of Sam Spade and they settle in for an episode. Sledge wants to talk more—he has a thousand questions, some necessary and some impertinent—but the long day of travelling has turned his brain to mush. He has a second serving of pie and listens to the program, and finally, just as the credits are playing, gives in to the urge to yawn.

“You’re tired,” Andy notices. “Of course—you were travelling all day, weren't you? We can show you your bedroom, if you want to rest.”

“I probably should,” Sledge agrees reluctantly.

“Yes. I took the day off work tomorrow, and I was thinking I could show you around Boston. You’ll want to be well-rested for that.”

“Sounds good.”

He is batted away when he tries to help with the dishes, and then Jones gets up to show him to his bedroom.

“You’ll have my room for the week. Don’t worry about it—Andy’s is the bigger one, anyway, so I don’t mind being kicked out,” Jones shrugs when he opens the door.

“Oh,” Sledge says, unable to hide his surprise at the fact that the room, though neat, is obviously lived-in; a drawer of the bureau is cracked, a jacket strewn across the desk chair, and Jones’s beloved guitar sits in an open case across the bed. Jones looks at him questioningly, and Sledge is almost embarrassed to explain. “You really do have separate rooms, then. It’s not just… for show.”

“Right.” Jones looks amused, and then his features mold into a solemn expression. “Listen, Sledge, I know you’re one of those guys who really idolized Andy when we were over there, and I hate to damage your opinion of your hero—but the man snores.” Sledge laughs, and Jones closes the guitar case and swings it over his back, and takes a set of pajamas from the dresser. “’Sides, I was a sea-going Marine for six years before the war—and before that I had a whole mess of brothers to share room with. That makes a man appreciate his personal space. Not that I mind sharing a bed when needs must,” he adds with a grin.

Sledge grins back, but he knows there’s a bit of self-consciousness in his face, too, and this feels strange. Because, if he really thinks about it, he probably knows Hillbilly better than the captain. Sure, Ack-Ack had that wonderful kind, attentive manner, but it wasn’t natural for him to be chummy with the enlisted; when he went out of his way to talk to you one-on-one, you knew he was making a special effort. That was part of the appeal.

Jones had been plenty professional, but after hours he had always roamed through the tents, hauling that guitar around and chatting with everyone he came across. He wasn’t really the type to confide in others, but Sledge has heard stories about his family and his pre-war life in the Marines, knows the jokes in his repertoire and the songs he likes the best. And there has always been a kind of camaraderie between them—the men knew they could trust an officer who had once been an enlisted man. Because of all this, Sledge had been rather pleased to hear that he would get to meet Hillbilly again; he hadn’t anticipated the fact that he might accidentally kiss the man’s boyfriend and generate this odd coolness between them. God, he hopes it melts soon.

“Well, thanks anyway. I really appreciate you guys putting me up.”

“We’re gonna put a limit on the number of times you can say thank you for the same damn thing,” Jones says, shaking his head. “Bathroom’s right next door, on the left. Good night, Sledge.”

“Night.”

Sledge is tired. The train wore on him, and so has the series of highs and lows that have made up this visit so far. He gets ready for bed immediately, turns off the lights, and lies down. The bed is comfortable; it’s firmer than his at home, but the sheets are cool and the red-and-blue quilt on top feels worn in the best kind of way. He quickly overcomes the strange sensation of sleeping on someone else’s pillow—but he can’t quite fall asleep.

Although the house is old and solid, time has warped some of the wood and he fancies that this bedroom division might be new, because the wall is thin enough for him to hear voices in the next room as Hillbilly and Haldane prepare for bed. He knows he shouldn’t eavesdrop but he finds himself straining to hear anyway. He wants to know if, when they’re alone, they talk the way his parents talk, or Edward and Martha, or Sid and Mary—both affectionate and casual, with the everyday intimacy that couples get. Do they call each other pet names, other than “Hillbilly” and “skipper?” Or do they talk the same way they did on Peleliu, friendly and close with little hint of anything more?

But he can’t make out any words. The sounds are too muffled, and he can’t even tell which voice is which as they talk lowly to each other for several minutes. Eventually the voices fade and Sledge rolls over, forcing himself to close his eyes and sleep.

In the silence, he’s more aware of the faint creak of bedsprings, and heat floods his cheeks. It sounds—rhythmic. Are they…? No, definitely not. They’re just settling down, trying to get comfortable. They wouldn’t, not on his first day here, knowing he’s just beyond the wall. But—eventually they might. It’s their house, after all.

Shut up, Sledge groans in his mind. It’s none of your fucking business. He rolls over onto his back and presses the heels of his hand against his eyes. He’s not going to think about sex. Kissing is one thing, holding hands and sharing a bed is one thing. They’re not going to talk about sex.

He ignores the niggling, curious bit of his mind and forcefully counts sheep—one goddamn sheep, two goddamn sheep, three goddamn sheep—until he falls into slumber.

-

“I wish the Sox were in town this week,” Haldane sighs. He directs a longing glance west, through the chartreuse screen of the trees. The summer sun has been waging war against them all day, and they’re taking a moment to rest on a bench in the Boston Commons. It’s a pleasant place to sit for a moment, and Sledge is perfectly content to remain where he is. “We could’ve taken you to a game—they’re on track to take the pennant this year, so odds are it would be a good one.”

“I’m more of a football guy, anyway,” Sledge consoles him.

“So am I, but you don’t just turn down the opportunity to watch Ted Williams play for the Red Sox during a winning season. The man was a marine, same as us—it would be almost unpatriotic.”

“Right, right, semper fi.”

“Well, Fenway is a bit off our course, anyway, so I suppose it’s not that bad.”

Sledge schools his features into polite agreement, although he hasn’t been aware they’ve been following a course. He’s happy to be off his feet for a moment, because every street corner in Boston, it seems, is home to some kind of historical legacy, and Haldane knows them all by heart. They have visited the Old State House and Trinity Church, stood at the site of the Boston Massacre and wandered the Museum of Fine Arts. Sledge knows that he would be just as eager to flaunt the historic sites of Mobile, so he never complained—and really, he found most of it interesting, though not to the same degree as his captain.

After that, they had made a detour to Quincy Market so Haldane could shop for dinner. The rows and rows of farmers’ and fishmongers’ stalls were as unfamiliar to Sledge as anything he had seen in the museum, and he had watched as Haldane picked out vegetables with a keen eye. It was something like magic, the way he always spotted the best one—although perhaps, he thought with some embarrassment, that was something that most people, people whose parents didn’t hire cooks, picked up on.

“My mother is French,” Haldane had explained when Sledge expressed his amazement. “We never cooked anything really fancy at home, but even peasant food has to start with good produce.”

They had loaded down a bag with eggplant, zucchini, summer squash, and several different types of peppers, and arranged for a fishmonger to save them a prized cut of halibut, and then Haldane suggested they take a break and relax for a little while in the park—of course they had had to walk here, too, but Sledge finds that he doesn’t mind so much as he stares out over the lake. The way the sunlight drips on the water’s surface, in peaceful contrast to the riotous pink flowers that crowd the shore, is idyllic. It’s not home, of course, but he can understand why someone would love it just as fiercely as he loves his own woods and streams.

“How long did you live in Boston?” he asks after a moment.

“Oh, I never did,” Haldane says casually.

“Really? But I thought—”

“I know, I know. My parents always preferred small-town living to cities, and on the whole I tend to agree with them. We came to Boston, oh, four or five times a year. Christmas shopping, school vacations, that sort of thing. And as you may have noticed, I’m very fond of history, which is easier to find in Boston than Methuen, my hometown. So I’m attached to the place.”

“You know, I think I picked up on that,” Sledge chuckles. A sudden thought catches him, and he tilts his head curiously. “Stop me if I’m wrong—but I thought I’d heard someone in the unit say once that you were a teacher? Or was that somebody else?”

Haldane’s hands flex against his knees and his leg bounces up and down.

“No,” he says slowly. “That was probably me. I taught ninth and tenth grade, civics and US History. Just for two or three years, between college and the war. I was assistant coach of the football team, too. I… I gave it up when I came home.”

Sledge isn’t stupid; he can tell a sensitive subject when he sees one, and he’s rather proud of himself for how gracefully he deflects.

“That explains it. You haven’t had a chance to lecture in a while, so you took it all out on me this morning.”

“Sorry.”

“I wasn’t complaining. I’m a history buff, too. Oh, is that insulting? A history buff being an amateur and you being a professional?”

“I don’t know,” Haldane laughs. “In any case, I’m not a professional anymore.” He has been tracking the movement of ducks across the lake with his eyes, but now glances up at Sledge, who tries to look as innocent as possible. “You want to ask, don’t you?”

“I don’t want to pry.”

“You know, I think I’d like to tell you.” He sounds puzzled. “I—don’t know why. I haven’t told anybody. When Eddie asks, I change the subject. But… well.” He sighs and looks around them. There is no one close by, but still his voice is soft when he speaks. “I thought it was best, once Eddie moved in, to pursue a change of career. Something that… didn’t put me around young boys. Just in case.”

“Oh.” For a moment, Sledge is caught off guard by the answer—it wasn’t remotely in his mind. Then he thinks about how many times Haldane put his life on the line for the barely-grown men in his unit, and the compassion he showed them, and outrage boils in his blood. “That’s terrible. Even the thought—people are terrible.”

“People will overlook a surprising amount of suspicious behavior, actually,” Haldane shrugs. “As long as you can provide them with a reasonable cover. But when it comes to their children…”

“Still. I’m sorry, Ack-Ack. You and Hillbilly are good people, you shouldn’t have to deal with that bullshit.”

“You don’t need to apologize, Eugene. Just think—someday you’ll find your own fellow and be put in the exact same awful position.”

“God willing,” Sledge says with a huff of laughter, although he still thinks the other man is being too forgiving.

“Let’s put aside the morose and the gay for a little while, shall we?” Haldane says, drumming his fingers on the bench. “Come on—if you’re rested, we have three more stops to make. We have to pick up the fish, and something for dessert from Mike’s in the North End, but before that, I think there’s some place you’d especially like.”

“Where we headed?”

Haldane smiles enigmatically and they leave the park, going north. They’ve been walking for ten minutes when a building looms in front of them—a huge tan brick building with a row of soldier-straight windows and elaborate wrought iron sconces. Sledge admires it for a moment, and elbows the man beside him.

“All right, professor, I know you know—what important stuff happened in that fancy one, there? Was it John Adams’ summer home?”

“That,” Haldane says as he begins to cross the street toward it, “is the Boston Public Library. And I have a card, so feel free to check out anything you think you can read in a week.”

“Are you serious?”

“Completely.”

Sledge gapes like a country bumpkin as they enter the library. It is even more gorgeous on the inside than the outside, all vaulted ceilings and statue nooks and marble inlay. They walk through slowly. Haldane doesn’t say anything, although he does sometimes point to a particularly beautiful detail—a mural of Moses with the commandments, intertwining rivers of black and gold running through the stone, a statue with delicately carved locks of hair spilling over its shoulders.

After several moments of aimless wandering, Haldane guides them up the stairs and towards an immense domed hall filled with rows of tables. Green lamps, gleaming like jewels, sit on each one, and light filters serenely through the arched windows. The room is the busiest they’ve been in so far—every table has at least one occupant—but there is a reverent hush over all of them. Sledge feels uncomfortable standing in the center, and he drifts towards the oak bookshelves that line the walls like sentries.

“As Eddie so often likes to remind me, I have a terrible memory for the details about other people’s lives,” Ack-Ack says in a low voice. “Where they’re from, what they like to be called, that kind of thing. But I remember that you always had a book with you, on Pavuvu or Peleliu. Sometimes a Bible but sometimes others. You were the only man in the company besides me who brought books into a war zone… so I thought you might like to see this.”

“Yes,” Sledge agrees. It comes out only as a whisper, and he swallows past the lump in his throat. “Thank you.” He picks up a book from the shelf, turns it over, and puts it back without taking any of it in, and looks down the long line of shelves. This is only one room. “How long until we have to pick up the fish?” he asks with a little laugh.

“Don’t worry about it. Take as long as you need.”

-

They arrive back at the house just as Hillbilly is getting home from work. Unlike the night before, Andy refuses any help in the kitchen.

“You’re a guest,” he tells Sledge. “And you can’t cook,” he tells Jones.

“I can, too.”

“He can cook enough to keep from starving,” Haldane explains. “But nine years of Marine Corps food ruined his taste buds. No flavor in anything. It’s a beautiful night, go outside and give me an hour.”

They obey. There is a little porch in the back, and again an excess of furniture—a glass table and two metal chairs on the porch, and on the grass two more-comfortable looking chairs, a wicker couch, and a low coffee table. Hillbilly pauses on the doorstep and announces that he’s going to grab his guitar. Sledge settles in one of the wicker chairs, and waits for him to return.

Jones makes sure to open the window before he comes out again, and Sledge smiles to himself. Ack-Ack will be able to hear the music with the window open—it’s a sweet thought.

Jones sits on one of the metal chairs and puts his feet up on the other. He pulls his guitar over his lap, cradling it tenderly, and draws one finger over the strings in a soft hello.

“Any requests?” he asks, though music is already spilling out from the body of the instrument. Sledge shakes his head. “Nothing? We could do a sing along if you like.”

“No, I just want to listen.”

“I’ll do something familiar, anyway.”

He starts with Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree, and Sledge finds himself settling back in his chair. Jones played that song a hundred times on Pavuvu; they’d hummed it in big groups a thousand times on Peleliu. If he closes his eyes, he can feel the sun beat hotter on his face and smell the ocean.

Sledge hardly notices when the song transitions; one minute it’s the Andrews Sisters, the next he realizes he’s hearing This Little Light of Mine. He starts humming and then mumbling along. Hillbilly joins, too, singing in a stronger voice. They fall easily into the gospels. Jones is from Appalachia, so sometimes his tunes are different—certainly the melodies are more complex on his guitar than they ever were on a church piano in Alabama—and  a few songs are unfamiliar, but many of them sound like home. Sledge doesn’t sing along often. He just sits and listens with a lump in his throat.

At first he doesn't know why he’s feeling so emotional. It’s hardly the first time he’s heard Nearer My God to Thee since he’s been back. But as Eddie plays on, and he hears the guitar and the chirping of the evening birds and the sound of pans and silverware clinking in the kitchen, he realizes that he hasn’t been listening to hymns since he got back. Because it’s been harder and harder to flee from the looming realization that he’s queer, and that hymns were not for him.

But Jones is singing them, and he’s queer, too.

Sledge wants desperately to ask him about it. He doesn’t know how—but he waits until Jones finishes I Feel Like Travelling On and opens his mouth.

“Do you… Are you…”

“Yes, I still believe. And as for being gay, I haven’t worried about that in years. The Lord and me, we’ve made our peace.”

“How in the hell did you do that?”

“Look at you blaspheming,” Jones snorts. “Come on, Gene, isn't it obvious? I’ve been playing gospel for near half an hour and you’ve been wanting to ask me something for almost as long.”

Sledge grimaces in acknowledgement. As casual as his words are, Hillbilly looks antsy. His mouth is a thin line and his fingers pull at the strings of his guitar a touch harder than they need to. They don’t talk for another moment, but he doesn’t play anything in particular. He’s just meandering through the music, waiting for the moment when Sledge leans forward in his chair and says in a nervous voice, “You said you’re—good. How did you… get good?

Jones blows out a slow breath, thinking it over.

“That’s hard to say… Especially—I can’t give advice, you know? I can only tell you how I did it, and I don’t even know how well I can do that. First you have to understand my family. You probably do—you probably got folks like us working for your family. We’re poor but respectable. Kids always looking neat in threadbare clothes, my mama trying to keep us in school but we don’t have a high school degree between us. And there’s no such thing as steady work, not if you want it to be honest work, and that’s the only kind we would ever think of taking.”

He stops strumming the guitar and drums on the thin wood instead.

(Sledge knows the family he’s talking about. All of his parents’ full-time servants are black but many are of a similar type—and of course there are his mother’s charitable causes, poor white folk who would be mortified to be thought of as causes but accept two dollars for their children at Christmas with pained looks on their faces.)

“And I was the oldest,” Jones continues. “You know, I took care of everybody, and I had to be a certain way ’cause the whole town knew who I was—acting poorly wasn’t just on me, it was on the whole family. Then, going away to boot camp…” He shakes his head. “ No one knew who I was. I was a private with a serial number and the last name ‘Jones’, for Chrissake, I could’ve been anybody. I was a good marine on duty. Off, I picked up smoking and boozing and cussing, and then I was a sinner already so what did it matter if I was fucking guys?”

Sledge nods, but Jones isn’t looking at him, so after a minute he finds his voice and says, “Yeah, I–I know how that feels.”

Jones looks at him then and sways forward the slightest bit.

“I don’t think like that anymore, Sledge. It only lasts for a little while, when you’re young and don’t know your own mind so much. Did you ever have an affair with somebody within a week of one of you shipping out?”

Sledge shakes his head.

“Well, I have, and I’ll tell you that it’s not so sordid as the doctors and the moralists and everyone makes it out to be. When you’re a nineteen year old kid and you’re homesick and lonely, and there’s a fellow sharing your berth who feels the same and he’s kissing you there in the dark… You can’t feel ugly for it. You can’t . Not unless you’re the kind of person who takes pride in being a sinner, and you and me, Eugene, we just ain’t that kind of people.”

Sledge swallows. They’ve both been caught off guard by the intensity in Jones’s voice, and Sledge doesn’t know what to do with it. He picks at the wicker of his chair just for something to do with his hands.

“I don’t know about that; Sid and I raised a lot of hell in Mobile,” he says, attempting a joke. Hillbilly sits back in his seat and starts strumming at his guitar again, and keeps talking without acknowledging Sledge’s interjection at all.

“That’s why I don’t mind you being here, you know, even with you being sweet on Ack-Ack.”

“I’m not—” Sledge interrupts, his face hot.

“Come on, Sledge. Whether you are or you’re not, honestly I don't mind, because—hell I can’t even say for sure if I was all the way good with God until I fell in love with Andy. You know? I realized that the Good Lord just doesn’t throw a man like that in your path if you’re not meant to fall in love with him, and so I started feeling better about all of it. And if it makes you feel better, too, then I won’t be mad. We all deserve to be right with God, and I truly, honestly think that loving a man like that can help get you there.”

He meets Sledge’s eyes and smiles, his hazel eyes dancing, and Sledge forgets his embarrassment. He laughs and shakes his head.

“Well I guess that’s one way of looking at it,” he sighs. “My mother’s on the church board, and my father’s a doctor, so I don’t know if they would be convinced.”

“Parents… hm.” Hillbilly shrugs.

“Do yours…?” Sledge begins, not sure what he’s asking.

“I told them I was taking an honorable discharge because my injuries were too bad for me to return to active duty for a long while, and that my old C.O. had a line on a good job in Massachusetts.” He smiles thinly. “They like him. He’s talked to my parents and one of my sisters on the phone and they think he sounds very respectable and handsome.”

“Well, they’re not wrong.”

“No, they’re not. Now that I’m back in the States they’ve started asking when I’m going to get married, though.” He pauses, and slowly his head tilts. “Andy’s parents… have stopped.”

Eddie’s fingers start to pick out Leaning On the Everlasting Arms, and they hum together for a few minutes until Ack-Ack calls them in for supper.

-

That night, after dinner, they go back out to the yard. It’s hemmed in nicely with trees on one side and a hedge on the other to give them some privacy. Sledge sits on the same deck chair, and Hillbilly and Haldane share the couch. There is a good assortment of alcohols and cocktail fixings before them, and after some discussion, Haldane mixes mint juleps for himself and Sledge and a Manhattan for Hillbilly. Halfway through the first drink, Haldane casually slips down in his seat, resting his arm against Jones’s thigh and leaning back against his chest. He’s telling a story and he doesn’t miss a beat. Jones doesn’t comment either, although his eyes flicker downwards and he looks like he’s smiling behind the rim of his glass.

Sledge gets a curious feeling in his chest. Something like envy, but more generous. Not I want you but I want that . Last night he could hardly look at the two of them together and today he’s trying not to stare. He crosses his legs and sips from his glass, lets the sweet earthiness of the bourbon settle in the back of his throat and tries to focus on Ack-Ack’s story.

When they’ve finished their drinks, Haldane sits up and pours them another round, and lounges against Jones’s side again. Intimacy grows between the three of them, fed by the alcohol and nurtured by the privacy of the yard; they all become less stiff, and conversation comes easier. Slowly they drift to more personal topics, and (perhaps unsurprisingly) they start talking about when they first realized they were gay. Sledge could probably answer “yesterday, on your doorstep” and have it be half-true, so he’s curious to hear the other men’s responses.

“I knew the minute I got to Basic,” Hillbilly says with a dreamy smile. “All those men about, not a single one related to me, stripping down and showering together and sleeping in close quarters. Lord.”

He flaps his hand like he’s overheating, and Ack-Ack snorts and pats his knee.

“Beat you. My freshman year of college, there was this fellow named Robbie Green, he worked with the Student Athletic Association. He looked like Superman,” he chuckles. “Dark hair and a cleft chin and everything. God, looking back I probably made such a fool of myself trying to get him to notice me. One day… hell. One day at football practice I tried to make a play I had no business making, and I sprained my ankle. I distinctly remember lying on the ground, with everyone bending over me, and thinking ‘Maybe this isn’t so bad—maybe Robbie will offer to help carry me off the pitch.’”

Hillbilly bursts out laughing. Sledge tries to hide it behind a cough.

“But did he?” he presses.

“No! He patted me on the shoulder, though. No, as far as I’m aware, Robbie was straight as an arrow. But I was not the first boy to have a crush on him; eventually a few other guys noticed and expressed their sympathy.”

Sledge is trying to picture Ack-Ack as a scrawny, self-conscious young man crushing on an older guy, and it’s such a ridiculous image that he doesn’t realize it’s his turn to answer until Jones looks at him and says “What about you, Gene? What was your first bona fide homosexual experience?”

“I’m not sure,” Sledge says after a pause.

“Not sure?” Hillbilly echoes. “Damn. It hit me like a speeding truck—how are you not sure?”

“Well, you see, my friend Sid—” he begins, and is interrupted by several knowing “ah”s.

“Told you,” Hillbilly says to the man beside him. “I knew it, as soon as he said Sid was getting married, I knew it.”

“The best friend. Classic.”

“It wasn’t like that,” Sledge protests. His eyes fall and he contemplates his drink, a nostalgic smile playing his lips. “I’ve known Sid since I was about eight years old. We were close, and I always sort of looked up to him, you know—I was a sickly kind of kid, and he was a bit braver and wilder. He teased me a lot, we wrestled and raced around on our bikes and I was always having to trail along after him. I don’t know when it changed. Or if it changed. I think loving someone… There’s a good bit of admiration in it, isn’t there?”

“For you, clearly,” Hillbilly mutters, and Sledge blushes bright red as Haldane elbows the other man in the gut. Sledge clears his throat, unable to keep a sheepish look off his face.

“Anyway. I guess I had a crush on him for a while and didn’t quite know what it was. And if I did, I just told myself—it’s because it’s Sid. I did start getting an inkling when I enlisted, though.”

“It’s not possible for a man to go through Basic without coming out a bit queerer than before.”

“Maybe so.” He cocks his head, trying to sort out the twisted net of thoughts and emotions that had ensnared him back then, and a flush creeps up the back of his neck. “The first time I saw a guy come out of the shower and bat his eyelashes at someone who whistled and catcalled—I almost fell out of my bunk,” he admits. “And then someone noticed and winked at me. I was so upset. I thought well damn, all that work getting into the Marines and they’re gonna kick me out, first week.”

“Aw, poor boot,” Jones coos. Then he tips his glass in Sledge’s direction. “But the real question is—the winker. Did you take him up on it?”

“What?” Ack-Ack says in an amused voice, and then Sledge’s eyes meet Hillbilly’s and there’s a moment of accord between them—a thought that perhaps the experience of an enlisted man is different than that of an officer, someone who has a bit of authority and reserve and a reputation to protect. Hillbilly shoves Ack-Ack playfully.

“Didn’t your gay college buddies teach you anything? A man who holds eye contact a bit too long is a pretty safe bet—a wink is more or less a public declaration of his intent to blow you in the woods before lights out.”

“Eddie!”

He’s both protesting and laughing, and Sledge laughs too, at that and at the insulted look on Eddie’s face.

“It’s true . Andy, this is the third fucking time we’ve had this argument. I have no idea how you got through the war without seeing guys fooling around all over the damn place, I really don’t.”

“I’m not saying it didn’t happen, but most of the guys I knew had it off with a buddy. You know, someone they knew, someone they were close with. Not anyone who winked or held eye contact for five seconds!”

He looks to Sledge for backup and Sledge holds up his hands.

“I don’t know for sure one way or the other,” he says. “I was scared stiff and stuck on Sid. At boot camp I pretty much kept to myself. I didn’t seriously spare a thought towards anyone else until I caught up with Sid on Pavuvu and he told me he’d slept with a woman in Melbourne. Oh, don’t tell anyone I said that, I shouldn’t’ve said. Anyway. I still mooned over him plenty, but I figured if he wasn’t pining over me during my absence, maybe I could let my eye wander, too.”

Haldane snorts, and he brings his glass to his lips. “And hands?” he asks innocently from behind the rim. Sledge chokes on his mint julep and on a fit of giggles.

“Are you drunk?” Jones demands, delight in his voice. Sledge has spilled the remnants of his bourbon, and Andy leans forward to pour another round.

“Oh, shut up.”

“No hotel rooms on Pavuvu or Peleliu,” Sledge reminds them when he can breathe again. “No private train berths, no two-man tents…”

“Plenty of foxholes, though,” Hillbilly says. “And on a dark night, who’s really paying attention—”

Haldane audibly gasps and kicks his lover hard in the shin—and Sledge’s jaw drops, because until that very second he had thought it a hypothetical suggestion.

“ No. You didn’t.”

“Only once,” Haldane says, though his voice is muffled behind the hands covering his face. He’s slumped in his seat and Sledge finds himself gleeful over this entire scenario. He sits back, crosses his legs, and pulls out his pipe.

“Only once,” he repeats, shaking his head. “You know, as an enlisted man in the US Marine Corps—” His voice climbs as Hillbilly begins to shake with barely-controlled laughter. “—trusting in the professionalism and good sense of my commanding officers—”

“Stop,” Andy groans.

“—I don’t know how comfortable I feel knowing that said officers were, even once, diddling in a foxhole—”

“It was just a handjob, come on.”

“ Shut up.”

“—in the middle of an active war zone! What would you’ve done if the Japs showed up, huh?”

“Oh, that’s not even the worst case scenario,” Andy says wearily. “Gunny Haney almost caught us.”

Sledge hoots, while Eddie’s mirth abruptly ceases. He shivers.

“Christ, I almost forgot about that,” he admits. “Scariest moment of my life, and I’ve been shot four times. He just walked up, swung into our hole, and wanted to shoot the shit for ’bout ten minutes. Meanwhile I’m sitting there trying to look normal as possible and thinking up excuses for why I’ve got my hand under your poncho.”

Sledge cackles again, and Hillbilly tosses a pillow at him. Sledges ducks and sticks his tongue out.

He likes this—it’s easy and comfortable, as familiar as he got with the other enlisted men after his baptism by fire on Peleliu. He doesn’t think he’ll have much trouble remembering not to call them “sir” anymore.

“All right, all right, that’s enough. Come on, Sledgehammer, out with it. Give us something to make fun of you for.”

“Hey, I told y’all about Sid already. That’s more or less the best thing I got.”

“We can’t tease you for that,” Andy objects. “A longstanding childhood infatuation is far too sweet. If you have any particularly embarrassing crushes, now, or a really scandalous love affair…”

“Nothing scandalous here,” he says, holding up his hands. They protest—they wheedle. Sledge shakes his head. “Y’all are going to make me say it, aren’t you? Okay. I don’t have a romantic history besides that crush and that wink. No affairs, no flirting. I kissed a girl after homecoming once but I’m guessing that’s not what you’re looking for. Other than that, nothing.”

“Really?” Eddie blurts out.

“Really! And why does everyone give me that look?” he asks, quirking an eyebrow. “Is it that incredible that a man can be both an honorably discharged marine and a virgin?”

“No,” Eddie and Andy say in unison, and then they all burst out laughing because they’ve said it in the same sympathetic tone. Then they purse their lips and tilt their heads one way, then the other, trying to decide what to say. Sledge watches them with amusement.

“How do we say this?” Andy asks Hillbilly.

“Are you asking me because you need someone to be vulgar?”

“No! Eddie…”

“Fine, fine.” Eddie puts his drink down and presses his palms flat together. “It’s like this, Sledge—you’re good-looking. It’s true,” he persists when Sledge scoffs. “You are! And in particular you’re the sort of good-looking that…” He looks at the man beside him for help. “Shit, I don’t know how to put it, either. Certain types of men—”

“Certain types,” Andy stresses.

“Right, certain types, they look at a kid like you and think—”

“Kid?” Sledge yelps. His sides are starting to ache; the other two look embarrassed. “I know what you’re saying, you’re saying you think some lecherous old man would have corrupted me by now!”

They protest and fall over themselves a few minutes trying to think of a better way to word it, but Sledge just chuckles and shakes his head. Eventually Andy tries to get back on track.

“And besides,” he presses. “You made a good impression on people. You’re friendly, you crack jokes, you have that accent—”

“So besides the old men, you should have attracted a couple of marines who watched Gone With the Wind a few too many times,” Eddie finishes with a grin.

“I—” Sledge hesitates, clamping his mouth shut, and they both lean forward eagerly. “Oh, hush, it’s not that big. I think… I might have had a chance. With a guy in our unit. But I never took him up on it,” he adds hastily. “Because I made it a personal policy not to fool around in foxholes—”

“Goody two-shoes.”

“—and then we had our six months, but… I didn’t take him up on it, is all.”

There is an expectant silence.

“And…?” Andy says. Eddie waves his hand in a ‘go on’ gesture.

“What? I told you, nothing happened. Ain’t that much of a story.”

“It’s a terrible story! Who was it? And why do you think he was making a pass at you, and why did you say no?”

Sledge leans back in his chair and rests his foot on the table, careful not to upset the liquor bottles. He shivers a little in the cool night air, and cradles his cup closer. There are thin lines of sticky sugar along the surface of the glass, and he takes another gulp of sweet bourbon and lets the warmth run through him.

“I don’t know if I should say,” he begins slowly. “Because… you know him. And I don’t know for sure that’s what he was doing—or that he’s even gay.”

“Eugene, it’s us ,” Eddie says, waving his hands again. “We’re wise to the whole thing; we’re not going to go ratting him out to his superior officer, for Chrissakes.”

“Unless we are his superior officers, in which case we don’t have much choice,” Andy adds. “Besides, we might know for sure whether he was queer or not. Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Sledge purses his lips as he considers it, and then he shrugs. It’s been itching at him for a while; could be good to get it out there.

“Alright. It was—Snafu.”

“Oh, God,” Andy groans as Eddie lets out a bark of laughter.

“What?”

“Shelton—Shelton was absolutely gay, Gene,” Andy says, shaking his head. “In my entire career in the marines, Snafu was the only man I ever had to reprimand for being queer.”

“You did? Why?”

“Because the man had no subtlety at all and people were getting worked up about it,” Eddie says. “Don’t you remember—it was your first day on Pavuvu, wasn’t it, that he sat around ogling shirtless boots for an hour when he was supposed to be on a work detail? People notice shit like that.”

“Was that ogling? It felt like sadism.”

“With Snafu, probably it was both. Like I said, the man was not subtle.”

“It’s not funny,” Andy said with a frown. “Honest to God, I thought he was going to get himself killed when we were in Melbourne. He was cavorting around all over town with anybody that looked his way—”

“While you were cavorting around with me?” Eddie suggests coyly.

“I knew you. Shelton was cruising parks and bars every day, damn the MPs and no matter whether someone tipped him it was a gay place or no. He got in at least one fight that I know of for trying to pick up someone he shouldn’t’ve. I gave him a few days in the brig for that, and then I said something to him on Pavuvu, too.”

“What did you say?”

Andy shrugs.

“I don’t remember. Something about being careful, and how I thought he was a good man and important to our unit, so I didn’t want to have to discipline him, but that the choice might get taken out of my hands. The usual.”

“Huh.” Eddie’s leg dangles in the air and he cocks his head, looking up at the stars. “Maybe that’s how he knew we were together.”

“He knew?”

“I think so. Once or twice he said something sly to me—I wondered where he was getting it from, if he spotted us somewhere or if he was just making it up. Anyway.” He shakes his head like a dog emerging from water and fixes his gaze on Sledge. “We’re getting away from the point. Gene could’ve slept with Snafu but didn’t. Why not? Now I’m not saying I would sleep with him given the chance, but you two seemed close.”

“We were. It just seemed like a bad idea. It’s hard to explain. Especially with a guy like Snafu, who’s so—so—it’s hard to imagine what he’s like as a civilian. Right? Always kind of on edge and intense about everything. There probably was something there between us when we were out in the middle of it—although, as I said, I like to think I’d refrain from screwing somebody in an active war zone. But when we were doing our six months after V-J day, he invited me back to his hotel room once and it felt—off. There’s something different in knowing that you’re going home for sure, knowing that soon you’ve got to be normal…”

He trails off. There’s more he could say that he thinks these men would understand—more about how the terror and recklessness of combat creates an intimacy that can sometimes be embarrassing afterward. He doesn’t want to talk about that, though, because it treads too close to saying he’s embarrassed about Snafu, and he doesn’t want to say that. The man saved his life a thousand times over. And, damn it, they were friends, and it wouldn’t be fair to push that all aside just because he was too afraid to go for something more.

He could also say something about the times he’s regretted feigning innocence about what Snafu was offering. About the times he’s gotten himself off to the memory of Snafu’s eyes, heavy as a physical touch, and the echo of his slow voice. But he doesn’t want to talk about that either, because that is private.

He shifts in his seat and clears his throat, looking at the two men across the way; he thinks about the comfort between them, the way they exchange affectionate kisses and innocent, barely-there touches. It’s sweet and enviable and not at all the kind of thing he can ever imagine getting from Snafu, and maybe that’s the real reason he doesn’t know how to feel. What had Hillbilly said earlier? It’s not as sordid as everyone thinks… You can’t think like that unless you’re the kind of person who takes pride in feeling like a sinner…

Well, that’s Snafu all right. Sordid and sinning and proud. And when Sledge thinks about that cramped little hotel room and the thick smell of cigarette smoke and booze on Snafu’s breath, he feels shame wrapped up with the desire in his belly, and he’s both relieved that he didn’t put himself through that and uneasy with the thought that refusing it may have meant pushing his friend away altogether.

“I wanted to be friends with him, still,” he insists. “But something happened—I don’t know what. I guess I slept through the Louisiana stop on our train, and he got off without saying goodbye. I’ve sent two letters since then but he hasn’t written back.”

"If you’re waiting on a letter from Shelton, you’re going to be waiting a long time," Eddie says, shaking his head.

“Why?” Andy asks.

“Because it’ll be the shock of my life if that man has above a sixth grade education.” Silence drops like a stone among them, and Sledge’s stomach twists. Whatever response he expected, it wasn’t that. “Oh, don’t look at me like that. I’m not saying he’s stupid—he wouldn’t’ve been a mortarman if he didn’t have a head for numbers, and I’ll bet he’s making a pretty penny as a mechanic right now. But not everyone writes as good as you college boys, and shit like that matters more over here than it did over there.”

Eddie pointedly averts his gaze from their little circle. Sledge is suddenly reminded that Eddie received a battlefield commission, which means he didn’t need to go to high school or college or officer training school. The thought hasn’t occurred to him seriously before now, and he looks at Andy; Andy’s eye is fixed on the back of Eddie’s head

“And hell, Sledge,” Eddie adds impatiently, “you know what Snafu’s like; he wants to be the best at everything, or he wants you to know that he doesn’t give a fuck. You can’t do that in a letter when your grammar is shit and you don’t know how to spell. It might be he doesn’t think he can do it at all when you’re both civilians and he’s not the Asiatic NCO keeping you from getting killed.”

“Maybe,” Sledge agrees reluctantly. He takes a sip of his drink—which has become a neat whiskey with only a fragment of mint leaf lurking in the bottom—and slumps down in his seat with a sigh. “It’s probably pointless to try and prod him. I don’t think anyone’s ever been able to make Snafu do something he didn’t want to do.”

“Yes, Shelton was always a bit contrary…” Andy says thoughtfully. “I didn’t know what to do with him at first—then towards the end I had to make sure all his orders were coming from me one way or the other, because he drove every other officer to distraction.”

“He liked you, though,” Sledge yawns. “Both of you. He got more… Well, more Snafu when you were gone. Probably we all did—even Burgie started getting a little ornery around officers, and he had more patience than all the rest of us put together.”

They’ve strayed too close to the war, and Sledge pauses. He doesn’t know if he should say more, and he is relieved of the choice when Andy speaks in a casual tone.

“I heard Burgin got married.”

“Yeah,” Sledge smiles, shaking himself back. “I got an invite, hauled myself out to Texas for the party. It was a nice wedding. Florence is a great girl.”

“I met her once,” Eddie says, nodding. “Seemed like a good match to me.”

“When did you do that?” Andy asks curiously. He yawns and slides down further in his seat, his head pillowed in Eddie’s lap. Never sit when you can lay down , Sledge thinks. Andy’s hips and legs are bent at an awkward angle to keep him from falling off the couch. It doesn’t look comfortable, but to each his own.

“In Melbourne.”

“Oh, is she Australian?”

“You’re hopeless, skip.”

Eddie runs his fingers through his lover’s light hair and they start to chat about other men they knew from the service. After twenty minutes or so, Sledge finds himself nodding off in his chair, and they unanimously decide it’s time for bed.

That night, Sledge sleeps peacefully.

-

The next night, he doesn’t.

-

“Gene!”

They’re everywhere, everywhere, he fires his gun and they keep coming with blood on their faces and powdered bone clinging to their uniforms—

“Eugene, wake up!”

The foxhole is swarming with maggots and dead bodies, flooded with black oil and mud and gasoline, echoing with the shouts of his fellow marines—

“It’s okay, you’re okay—”

They reach for him with grasping fingers and he wants to give in but they are tearing at his flesh and he doesn’t die he can’t die he doesn’t know how to die—

“Gene!”

Sledge wakes up with a gasp to find Andy’s face hovering above his and hands gripping his shoulders. He looks around wildly, tangled in his bedsheets, but the other man holds him still.

“Gene, it’s all right—”

“Captain?” he manages breathlessly. His entire body is shaking so much he can hardly gulp in air.

“Yes, Sledge, I’m here. You were dreaming.”

“Dreaming…?”

“You had a nightmare, but everything’s all right, you’re back, you’re in my house in Massachusetts and everything is okay. Do you understand?” Sledge blinks furiously. His heart is still pounding hard enough to hurt, but he can feel it slowing down. “Sledge, I need you to nod if you understand.”

Sledge nods, and Andy lets go of his shoulders. He realizes there are tears in his eyes and wipes them away as shame curdles in his gut.

“Shit,” he sniffs. “I—”

“It’s okay,” Andy repeats. His body is humming with tension and he keeps glancing over his shoulder as he speaks. “Listen, I have to leave you alone just for a second, okay? Stay here, I’ll be right back, just—just breathe and hang tight for me. Okay?”

Sledge nods again, and Andy rests a hand against his cheek for a fraction of a second before darting out the door.

The sudden silence, the overwhelming darkness, is like whiplash. Sledge thinks about how loud he must have been screaming to actually wake someone up from a completely different room, and he squeezes his eyes shut and wishes he hadn’t come. The nightmares have been getting better—they don’t happen every night—but he should have known better.

He sits there, panting and feeling ashamed of himself, for a few more minutes until suddenly Andy appears in the doorway.

“Sorry about that,” he says. His hair is rumpled but his eyes are bright. The urgency has melted out of his voice. “Come on, Eugene, let’s go outside for a minute, okay?”

“I’m fine—I’m—”

“Only a minute. Come on, bring your pipe and we’ll sit for a while.”

Sledge obeys. He stands on shaking knees and follows Andy to the back porch. On the way the other man grabs a bottle of brandy and Sledge almost wants to laugh. Brandy for the shock. It’s becoming old-fashioned, but Sledge’s father still recommends it—he would approve.

He’s feeling a little hysterical so he keeps his lips clamped shut as he falls onto the outdoor couch. Andy pours him a fingerful of brandy and sits in the chair opposite. He leans forward, hovering like a mother bird.

“I’m s—” Sledge begins in a small, hoarse voice.

“Eugene, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to shock you awake and then disappear like that. It was callous.”

Sledge doesn’t know what to say. Adrenaline is fighting with the sleepiness in his mind and he knows that he’s missing something , but he can’t name it or form the questions that would help him figure it out. His gaze falls to his pipe and tobacco pouch on the table, and he picks them up. The familiar motion of filling the pipe is almost as good as the liquor.

There is no sound except for the flick of his lighter and the soft rasp of the tobacco catching the flame.

“Does it happen to you?” he asks finally. He knows it’s an ugly, common question but he has to ask it anyway.

Andy is silent for a long time again, which is answer enough.

“No. I… think about it often. The men I lost, and all the other people who died. Especially now, knowing about the a-bomb and Hitler’s camps… I wonder a lot about what was justified and what wasn’t. What mistakes I made, or others made, that could have saved lives. But—mostly I left it over there. It’s harder for Eddie,” he confides. “He tries to hide it—I think his line of reasoning is that since he was a marine for so long before he saw combat, he should be above it all. But he has trouble sleeping, and sometimes you can tell he’s a million miles away.”

His eyes are drifting towards the second story of the house, and he looks weary. Sledge opens his mouth to say something comforting, but then a thought stops him in his tracks.

“Oh, hell.” Andy’s gaze snaps back to Sledge’s face. “That’s it, isn’t it? That boy—the one he hit with the shovel—I woke Eddie up with my screaming and you had to go make sure he was okay because it reminded him. That’s where you went.”

Andy sighed.

“Jesus, Ack-Ack! You weren’t going to tell me, were you?” Sledge gnaws on the end of his pipe. “I’m calling a hotel.”

“Eugene—”

“First thing tomorrow morning—”

“Eugene, don’t, please. We like having you here, and Eddie would feel terrible if you left because of this. Besides, I don’t think you being by yourself is a good idea.”

“I’m fine, skip.”

“You’re still shaking.”

Andy’s voice is quiet and placating, like he’s talking to a frightened animal, and Sledge is aware of the violent tremor still moving through his shoulders. His pajamas are soaked through with sweat.

“It’s cold out here,” he says feebly, even though the summer’s heat still lingers in the night air.

Andy locks gazes with him for a long minute, mouth set in a disapproving line to show that he’s not convinced. But then he stands and walks inside, and comes back with a thick knitted blanket that he drapes around Sledge’s shoulders. He sits beside him and puts his arm behind Sledge’s back. Beneath the faint odor of sweat is a hint of rich aftershave that tickles his nose and makes him shiver for a whole different reason.

Stop it, he thinks firmly. It’s nothing. The thought does little to quell the part of him that wants to curl up against Andy’s chest and fall asleep right there. He wonders if he’s ever going to fully stop being in love with Andy. Or—hell—maybe this is what friendship is for him, being half in love and half overwhelmed with admiration. Sid, Snafu, Ack-Ack, even Hillbilly probably…

“Don’t call a hotel,” Andy says. His voice is thinner than usual, reedy, and Sledge is shocked to realize how upset he really is. “Okay? You’re only here for two more nights, it’s stupid. And… It’s so—it’s strange, living here with my family nearby and old friends and knowing that I can’t be completely honest with them. And they know it too, they can tell, and they’re not completely honest with me in return. It gets lonely… It’s hard to explain. There’s Eddie, of course, and we’re happy, but it gets lonely just the same. It’s even worse for him, just having moved here. That's why we want you to stay, and why I really want to listen to anything you want to tell me. It’s not only for you. Do you understand?”

Sledge nods, pressing his lips together to keep back the watery feeling in his throat. He hesitates for just a moment before placing his head on Andy’s shoulder. It’s not earth-shattering and the other man doesn’t say anything, so with a little sigh of relief he lets his tense muscles relax and drops his weight. Andy squeezes his shoulders tighter.

Before he knows it, Sledge is pouring out everything. Everything. About his father’s veteran patients, and the questions the recruiters asked him, and his fear that being a pansy is what made him more susceptible to this weakness—or that this weakness will make it more obvious to people back home that he's a pansy. He talks about Sid and Edward, how they came back from the war and jumped right back into life, and about his father and the failed dove hunt. He talks, briefly, about Snafu, then about Deacon, and then he even manages to talk for a second about Okinawa, but he starts shaking again and Andy tells him he can stop if he wants.

Throughout the whole thing Andy rubs his back and makes sympathetic noises and admonishes him when he’s being too morose. He repeats a few of the same platitudes he dispensed on Peleliu, but Sledge doesn’t mind. Once he’s done, they sit there without speaking for a few minutes, curled together against the cool night breeze. The night is loud with crickets and the hum of streetlights, and a low, whooping call.

“That’s a barred owl,” Sledge says in a quiet voice.

“Yeah?”

“We have ’em at home, too. I like listening to them… The other types we get around our neighborhood are barn owls and screech owls and they both yell like the devil.”

He yawns and Andy rubs his arm.

“You want to try to get some more sleep?”

“Yeah. Oh, but first—you’ve got to give me something.”

“Hm?”

“Skipper, I just gave you all my burdens. I want one of yours.”

Andy sighs and rests his cheek against the top of Sledge’s head.

“I can’t pick. Can I give you two?” he asks in a voice as weary as Atlas’s.

“Yes.”

“I hate that I left you. K Company. I know, I know it wasn’t my fault or my decision, and a marine with a hole in his head and a shattered leg would be pretty damn useless on Okinawa but… I think of what I could have done to help, and… I abandoned my men when they needed me.”

Sledge thinks about telling him he was the best officer they ever had, and bites it back. Now is not the time.

“What’s the other?” he prompts after a moment.

“Eddie. He was in the Corps for nine years; it was his career, not just something he did during the war. And he grew up in West Virginia and hasn't really been there to stay for at least nine years. Both his parents still live there, and nine brothers and sisters plus the rest of his family… He gave all of it up to come here with me—and I don’t know if I’m worth all that.”

“You are, Andy,” Sledge says immediately. “And he’s an idiot if he doesn’t see it.”

“He’s not, though,” Haldane sighs. “He’d be a good man whether he loved me or not. That’s what makes it hard.”

He kisses the side of Sledge’s head and yawns.

“Bed?” Sledge asks.

“I think so, yes. I’m sure Eddie’s long since asleep, and we could use some rest, too.”

-

Sunlight is wrestling with the gingham curtains when Sledge wakes up. A single ray of white light falls over his face; the rest is a hazy line of gold at the bottom of the curtains, but it’s enough to tell him he’s slept late. It’s Sunday, and he realizes with a sharp breath that he’ll be late for church.

You’re in Massachusetts, his brain reminds him. Not home—and when you’re home you hardly go to church anymore, anyway.

That's not all the way true, of course. Sledge likes going to church still, just like he likes keeping a pocket bible in his suit pocket, except now he prefers to go to the Sunday evening service when the crowd is half its size and mostly made of poorer folk. His parents hardly consider this “going to church” at all, and have been gently, angrily, pleadingly asking him to go to the proper service in the mornings. The ones where he can meet future employers in linen suits and a future wife in a flowery hat. He called them on it once and his father just said, in an earnest voice, that they were worried he might be isolating himself. So he had started taking Sid and Mary to the evening service. They hadn’t known what to say to that.

He reflects on this for a moment with some satisfaction, and then wonders if Andy or Eddie would want to go to church with him later in the day. Eddie is probably a Methodist—he doesn't know if Andy is religious, or what kind of Christian he might be, except that there are a lot of Catholics in Massachusetts. He pictures his mother’s face if he ever told her he went to a Catholic service (even leaving out that his escorts were two men in love with each other) and snorts. Never mind. He’ll skip church this week.

Memories of the night before creep around the room like shadows, but he stands and throws back the curtains, banishing them from his mind. He dresses in slacks and a pressed white shirt—not his Sunday best but not his worst, either—and goes downstairs.

Music drifts up to meet him and he winces. Eddie is singing along to something on the radio, but it’s not at all the type of song that’s good for his voice. His voice is smoky and thin, best in a lower register or a bouncy tune; the starlet on the radio is belting out something at a higher pitch, and Eddie trying his best to match her. Sledge is about to shout a complaint when the familiar smell of bacon wafts through the hallway. The response is Pavlovian—his nose tilts up in the air and his eyes close, and his feet trace the way to the kitchen as confidently as they used to when he was a kid in his own house, barging in on their cook in the middle of making breakfast.

He pushes the door to the kitchen open and the spell is broken as Eddie attempts a particularly daring note. Sledge backs out of the room to the living room, turns off the radio, and falls into a chair at the kitchen table.

“Good morning to you too,” Eddie says.

“How is it I’ve gone this long without realizing you can’t actually sing?” Sledge asks with a yawn.

“Screw you, Sledgehammer. I can’t believe you’re ragging on me after I made you grits.”

Sledge perks up like a dog and looks around, craning for a look inside the pans on the stove.

“You did?”

“Uh-huh. Hominy grits and bacon and blueberry pancakes.”

“God bless you. I thought Andy said you couldn’t cook.”

“That’s his opinion. Maybe I can’t do anything fancy, but I know how to make grits and pancakes, that’s for sure.”

Eddie sets a plate in front of Sledge. There is a small volcano of grits on one side of the plate, rivers of butter flowing down its sides, and a stack of bacon in the center. On the other side are two blue-dotted pancakes that are so large they sag over the edge of the plate. Sledge marvels at the sight and picks up a fork—then he hovers indecisively. Grits first? Pancake first? Bacon while it’s still snapping with oil? He picks up his knife and puts it down again, laboring over the decision, and scoops up a forkful of grits. He moans the minute they hit his tongue.

“Good?” Eddie smiles.

“Does Andy know he doesn't deserve you?” Sledge shoots back, batting his eyelashes. Eddie rolls his eyes and checks him with his hip.

“Don’t you try to flatter me, shug. Want me to fix you a cup of coffee?”

“I’ll get it.”

“Your bacon’ll get cold. Sugar, no cream, right?”

“Please.”

Eddie brings him his coffee and sits down with a cup for himself. He has two pieces of bacon on his saucer, and he reaches out and scoops up some of Sledge’s grits. It’s a messy bite and Sledge pulls a face at him as he calmly licks butter and bacon grease off his fingers. But after that his plate remains empty.

“You’re not hungry?”

“I had a pancake earlier.”

That doesn't seem like enough, given how goddamn delicious this food is, but Sledge doesn’t question him.

He finishes his bacon and Eddie stands, puts another two pieces on, and adds a fresh scoop of grits. When he sits down again he looks distracted and his eyes slowly move up to the ceiling to where Andy’s bedroom is. His teeth worry his lower lip, and when he speaks his voice is so small and hesitant that Sledge knows not to push too much—that Eddie is reluctant to even bring it up.

“How late did you two get to bed last night?” he asks. Sledge dons his poker face and shovels a fork of grits into his mouth.

“Maybe an hour after you saw him,” he says in a high, nonchalant voice. “Forty-five minutes?”

“He usually doesn’t sleep in this late…”

“We’ve been keeping him up the last couple of nights.” Sledge tries to sound perky, but then Eddie snorts and he realizes what he’s said. His face pinks. “Shut up, Hillbilly.”

“I didn't say nothing.”

“Point is—I wouldn’t worry. He’ll be down soon.”

Eddie nods slowly, and Sledge looks down gloomily at his second pancake. He wants to eat it—really he does—he wants to lick his plate clean and ask for thirds, and he’s sure that Hillbilly, doing his best impression of a Southern mama, would oblige. But he’s so full… Then he looks up at Eddie and the remains of his appetite is gone. The other man’s face is drawn and pale, and there are circles under his eyes. He looks—he looks just like Andy said. A million miles away. It’s clear that he didn’t get much sleep last night, either.

“Eddie?” Sledge prompts softly.

Eddie turns his head to look at him, a wide-eyed owl spooked by someone in the night.

“Yeah, Sledge?”

A wordless moment stretches between them, as Sledge thinks up and discards a half-dozen openers. You and me, we both grew up on gospel… we both love him and want him to be happy… we both brought the war back with us… Hey, you know he loves you, don’t you?... You know you’re one of the best and bravest men I know?... I’m sorry for last night…

The longer the silence goes on, the more guarded Eddie’s eyes appear. So in the end, Sledge says nothing. He just slides his hand across the table and covers Eddie’s, the one holding the coffee cup. Eddie’s face softens. He lets his hand fall so Sledge can grip better, and squeezes it back.

After a minute Eddie seems to think he needs to say something—he bites his lip, takes a deep breath, and opens his mouth. Then his chest sinks down and he shakes his head, air seeping through his parted lips. Sledge waits. Finally the other man raises their joined hands to his mouth and kisses the back of Sledge’s, just where the skin pulls tight and pale over indigo veins. He tucks their hands under his chin for a long moment, like a petitioner with a rosary, before returning them to the table again.

“Good morning,” Andy says in a sleepy voice and they both look towards the door. He's standing there still in his pajamas, rubbing at his eyes. “Sorry, I overslept…” He opens his eyes and looks at their hands in the center of the table. For a moment, absurdly, Sledge thinks he’s going to say something angry—but Andy just smiles and his gaze drifts over to the half-empty basket of blueberries on the kitchen counter. “Blueberry pancakes?” he asks happily.

“Yeah,” Eddie says, standing. “But first you’re going to try my grits, and God as my witness, Haldane, if you make that face at me one more time I’m gonna shoot you. Eat—the—damn—grits.”

-

The next two days pass in a dizzying blur. On Sunday, they’re all tired, and they laze around in the kitchen for a few more hours before deciding it would be a shame to stay cooped up all day. They go to the beach, along with three hundred other people.

“It’s not as pretty as the beaches in the Pacific,” Eddie sighs wistfully. “With the palm trees and the white sand and all that bright blue water… no rocks anywhere…”

“Yes, there’s also no one shelling us here,” Ack-Ack points out.

“Still.”

Sledge splashes around with them for a little while, and then retreats to the safe shade of an umbrella. He lounges with a book from the library, and it takes him a good hour to notice there is a small group of young women nearby sending glances his way. He accidentally makes eye contact with one of them and then sinks behind his book, ears turning red—they giggle, and one comes over to perch on his towel and flirt more directly.

You’re a very nice girl, he wants to say, and I don’t mean to waste your time—

It gets worse when Andy and Eddie join them, because that makes a perfectly even group of three men and three women, and Sledge has a hard time hiding his annoyance when the other men graciously agree to escort them over to the snack bar.

“What the hell?” he hisses at Eddie.

“Oh, a little socializing won’t hurt you none.”

“I have to turn down enough girls in Mobile, I’m not trying to get a date here.”

“Well, maybe you ought to practice—if you couldn’t get Merriell Shelton to feel you up, what chance do you have with anyone else? Might as well finesse your approach when you get the chance.”

Sledge glares at him, but he does try his best to be amiable, and when they pile back into Andy’s car, he’s got one girl, Marlene’s, number in his pocket. She had pouted when he told her he was going back to Alabama soon, and demanded a kiss as apology, so now he’s got fresh orangey-red lipstick smeared on his face and he knows he’s never going to live this down.

The following day—Sledge’s last full day in Massachusetts before he has to catch a train—Andy has to go to work. He is extremely apologetic over it, promises he’ll be home early and that they’ll choose a nice restaurant in Boston and make a night of it. Eddie and Sledge chastise him for fussing and shoo him off to work—and then Eddie promptly sets Sledge to work, too.

They clean the gutters and weed the garden, fold the laundry, dust, sweep, and mop. They sing and tell jokes as they work, and on occasion Sledge graciously allows Eddie to take a break and pull out his guitar for an accompaniment. They make sandwiches for lunch and gulp down an entire gallon of lemonade.

“Last thing,” Eddie announces, after an hour-long break in which they just flopped in front of a fan and did absolutely nothing. “We’re getting rid of some of this damn furniture.”

“Oh thank God,” Sledge says. He had dragged himself over the usual couch to drape his body on the back of the never-used second couch. It’s much less comfortable than the first one.

“Every weekend he says he’s going to make a decision, and every weekend we get distracted by the other chores. No more—you and me are going to do it, and this weekend he’s gonna take me out to dinner and a movie and we’re gonna get fresh in the back row.”

“Well, how could I refuse to help in pursuit of such a noble goal?” Sledge says, rolling his eyes, and Eddie blows him a kiss.

They sort through the furniture for half an hour. In almost every case, Andy had better taste than the previous occupant, a grumpy old widower with no eye for color and no sense for when an antique was past saving. They keep an armchair and a roll-top desk that Eddie drags in from a corner of the garage. Everything else they put out on the curb.

Sledge is sweating heavily and suggests the fan again—Eddie proposes the hose, and they go to the backyard to dunk their heads under the cold stream of water. Eddie gets his shirt soaked—accidentally or on purpose, it’s hard to tell—and strips it off.

“I’m surprised you kept up with all that moving,” Eddie teases once they’ve cooled down. “Skinny fella like you.”

“Hey, I made it through bootcamp, same as you.”

“Aw, yeah, but they relax their standards a bit during wartime ’cause they’re desperate. You remember the first time we met? You and Sid were wrestling on the deck and, hand to God, Andy turned to me and said ‘does that look like a real fight to you?’ and I said ‘either way, that little fella might get busted up, so we’d better say something.’”

“All right,” Sledge says. He slaps his thighs and stands. “Come on.”

“What?”

“You insulted my honor, sir. I demand satisfaction.”

“Oh, we gonna fight?” Eddie says in an amused voice. He stands, too, and stretches his long arms over his head. “Have you thought this through, Sledgehammer?”

“Bare fists. You wanna do ten paces?”

“Old school, huh?” Eddie laughs. “Do you want me to give you first dibs, or—?”

His eyes are closed as he stretches and he’s caught off guard when Sledge tackles him to the ground.

“Eugene, you bastard!”

“I warned you,” Sledge growls playfully as Eddie rocks back and forth, hard enough to send them both off balance.

“This is not gentlemanly!”

Sledge lets out a whoop of laughter as Eddie manages to roll him over completely. They wrestle in the grass—occasionally Eddie makes a dig at Sledge’s armpits and he spasms with laughter, which he believes to be monstrously unfair. Still, he manages to hold his own. It feels good to be playful again, good to test his strength. Eddie is taller and stronger and Sledge doesn’t really expect to win, but it feels good all the same.

Inevitably, Eddie manages to get him in a headlock. Sledge thrashes back and forth a couple of times, but when that fails he whines just like he used to do with Sid.

“Aw, c’mon, Hillbilly, let me up—”

“Say uncle!”

“You’re a jackass.”

“Oh shoot, I almost forgot we were queer. Say auntie!”

“I’m gone for one day and you’re ready to kill each other.”

They look up as Andy comes out through the back door, a fond smile on his face. Sledge takes advantage of the moment to push Eddie away and they both lose their balance. Sledge scrambles to his feet, and Eddie lies flat on his back and grins up at Andy.

“Hey, darling. How was work?”

“Not as thrilling as whatever happened here.”

“I won, that’s what happened,” Sledge declares.

“In your dreams.”

Sledge’s t-shirt feels grimy with sweat and streaks of dirt, and he tugs it off and falls back on the grass. It’s dry and scratchy against his skin but at least it feels clean. He breathes in  the heavy summer air and lets the sunlight ease the dull ache of new bruises. Eddie huffs out a laugh and wraps an arm around his shoulders.

“And now I’m being replaced entirely,” Andy says with a dramatic sigh.

“Quit yapping,” Eddie pants. “Geddown here.”

Andy kneels in the grass beside Sledge, and Sledge moves to make space in the middle, but Andy puts a hand on his shoulder and he remains where he is. He wiggles closer to Eddie and bends his head so that the two man can touch, if they so wish, above his head, and then he settles down again and is still.

On one side of him is clean, cool cotton, and on the other hot, flushed skin. Eddie’s arm is stretched over his shoulders and Andy’s above his head—he thinks, though he can't be sure, that Andy might be playing with the other man’s hair. Andy is lying on his side, and his other hand rests casually on Sledge's waist. He is acutely aware of each point of contact, not because it makes him uncomfortable, not because it is arousing, but because it fills a need that has been gnawing at him for longer than he can imagine.

His heart is full to bursting because he is being touched . Touch. Such a simple thing. He wants more of this, forever, and some hazy part of him also wants to be touched with desire and intent—wants to press harder against a man’s warm side and let his hands drift lower and touch lips to lips. But that’s a distant wish, lurking in his heart, not called to the surface at just this moment. This isn’t about lust, and he wouldn’t sacrifice this for sex, not in a hundred years. He wants both. It feels like too much to want, and he wonders desperately if he could ever find words to explain. If Andy and Eddie, who seem to understand him so well, could understand these conflicting congruent desires. His heart is banging against his ribs and he thinks about asking. Then he thinks about letting this beautiful summer silence and the tickle of wind and curtains of sunlight have their due.

His train is leaving tomorrow.

“I don’t want to go home,” he mumbles. He picks at the grass. Andy laughs softly.

“You are in a pretty good spot here,” he says. He nudges his nose against Sledge’s bare shoulder, which six days ago would have been enough to make him swoon. Eddie’s long fingers begin to trace looping figure eights on Sledge’s upper arm.

“I’m going to miss this. I—I won’t be able to tell—to explain—people won’t understand," he finishes weakly.

There is silence. He thinks that both men draw closer to him, their knees knocking against his legs. He stares up at the sky until his eyes sting.

“Someone will,” Eddie mumbles. “Somebody has to.” He pauses. “There was one gay man in Fuckin’ Nowhere, West Virginia. There’s gotta be at least two in Mobile, Alabama.”

“I guess.” He feels bad for bringing it up. It was a beautiful day and now the wind seems colder. “What if he’s not as handsome as the two of you?” he jokes feebly. Eddie snorts to acknowledge the attempt.

“Then you’ll have to come back,” Andy says in a matter-of-fact voice.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. “Bring a beau or two if you got ’em, and if you don’t we’ll try’n rustle up a few from Boston. We’ll wink at every fella in the city if we have to.”

“Doesn’t even have to be a beau,” Andy yawns. “Bring anyone you like. We’ll make it a convention.”

“A queer convention,” Sledge laughs. “My mother will be thrilled.”

“Oh, it’ll be completely respectable. We’ll call it a—book club. Host readings. Proust, the Greeks, Wilde, Whitman…”

Sledge has never read any Proust, and he already knows about Wilde and the Greeks, but the last name catches his ear.

“What about Whitman?”

“Don't let him—”

“Not heat flames up and consumes,” Andy quotes in a dreamy voice. “Not sea-waves hurry in and out. Not the air, delicious and dry, the air of the ripe summer, bears lightly along white down-balls of myriads of seeds, wafted, sailing gracefully, to drop where they may. Not these—O none of these, more than the flames of me, consuming, burning for his love whom I love.”

“See what you let happen. He’ll do that for days if you let him go on.”

“They didn’t teach us that one in English.” Sledge pauses. “Course they didn’t teach us much Whitman at all, just that he was some no-good Yankee that invented free verse.”

Andrew chuckles softly. He stretches his legs and rolls flat on his back, and Sledge pulls away just a little bit. He’s starting to sweat against that side, and the space lets a breath of cool wind kiss his skin. Eddie withdraws his arm and rolls onto his stomach, resting his cheek against his folded arms.

“What if we don’t want to be respectable?” he says in a muffled voice. He wiggles, the sunlight gilding his shoulder blades, and lets out a sweet sigh. “What if we run a drag show or somethin? I did a couple in the Corps; we could probably figure it out. Hell, I’ll call up some of the guys I knew back then, see if we can’t find Gene’s prince charming.”

“You mean some of those guys really were gay?” Sledge asks, skeptical. He had seen a few drag shows on Pavuvu, before they shipped out—one had been an odd mix of the biggest and littlest men in camp, stuffed into repurposed skirts with coconuts tied around their chests, all prancing around the stage cracking jokes. The other had been a more professional gig, with real costumes and makeup and elaborate staged musical numbers. He hadn’t known what to make of either of them. It seemed to him that if they were anywhere near as queer as they seemed, the Corps wouldn’t let them go on, but not one of the straight fellows in his unit had thought anything unusual was happening.

“Oh, yeah. I only did two or three shows, but that gig got me laid a lot more than the Corps probably thought it would.”

“Hey,” Andy says. Eddie thumps his shoulder.

“You don’t get to complain. I was a sergeant back then, and we all knew Lieutenant Haldane wouldn’t get caught fraternizing with no enlisted man.”

“Wouldn’t have gotten caught.”

“Ooh, you hear that, Sledgehammer?” Eddie says with a stronger twang than usual in his voice. “I think that there man is flirtin’ with me. Think I oughta give him a kiss, or should I scold him for gettin’ fresh?”

“Well, I ain’t moving,” Sledge says, burrowing into the grass with his hands behind his head. “So if you're doing anything, better get up.”

“Nah,” Eddie yawns. “I’m good right here. Tell you what I’ll do—I’ll give you a kiss, and then you pass it on.”

“Eddie,” Andy admonishes.

His voice is quiet but suddenly serious, and Sledge can feel Eddie stiffen beside him. Slowly, a blush creeps onto his cheek. They’ve been pretty good with this, so far. Dancing around his crush, or making a joke of it—a careful joke, usually. Hillbilly wasn’t so careful this time. They’re all drunk on sunlight.

Sledge pushes himself up on one elbow and looks down at Eddie. He’s long and lean and tan against the grass and he’s looking at Sledge with guarded eyes. Sledge puts one hand on his shoulder for balance and leans down to kiss Eddie on the cheek. He feels the crease as Eddie smiles, and then he switches to his other side. He hovers for a minute above Andy, thinking of the last time he tried this, a lifetime ago in that crowded living room. Andy’s mouth is in a straight line but there’s a gentleness around his eyes. Sledge thinks it will go better this time, so he bends down and touches lips to cheek.

He doesn’t linger on the kiss, but as he pulls back he pauses for just a minute, an inch of space between them, and Andy smiles. Sledge smiles back, just a flicker of the corner of his mouth, and lies back down.

“Ain’t that sweet,” Eddie says. He yawns and stretches his arms, and puts one around Sledge’s shoulders again.

“Memorial Day,” Andy says suddenly.

“Hm?”

“Next summer. Eugene. Memorial Day weekend, next summer, you can tell everyone you're taking the time to visit with some Marine Corps buddies, and come up for the week.”

“Maybe I will,” Sledge says.

“Do it.” Andy pauses and shifts in the grass. “Or the 4th of July. Or—I don’t know. Whenever you like.” Sledge and Eddie wait. A sigh escapes into the wind. “I don’t want to let this pass by. It’s easy to make vague plans and let them fall away. Other things might seem more important. But this—we’re lucky to be alive, all of us, and we’re lucky to have found each other, not just once, but twice now. I don’t think we ought to let that go to waste.”

“We won’t,” Eddie promises. He doesn’t say anything more, but neither of them expect much. A little from him means a lot from anyone else. After a minute, he nuzzles his head against Sledge’s shoulder. “Right, Eugene?”

There is a lump in his throat. Sledge wants to say something eloquent that will convey the gratitude, the relief, the affection that has been coursing through him all week, but nothing comes to mind. He nods. Andy’s hand slips down to take hold of his, and the three of them lay there in the sunlight, in silence, for a few minutes more.