Work Text:
Ten years. It had been ten years since the war had ended, eleven since Bill had bled out onto the sands of Peleliu while Leckie stared down at him uncomprehendingly, warm palms pressed to his thigh as what felt like all the blood leeched from his body. The look on Leckie’s face haunted Bill’s nightmares like a particularly reticent ghost, those deep blue eyes pleading with him to stay, to survive. And Bill had, hadn’t he? Survived. How could he not, when Bob appeared as though he were mentally praying to a God he didn’t believe in just for him?
Bill didn’t consider himself worth that effort, but he wouldn’t waste such a laborious undertaking executed on his behalf. So, when Hoosier got home from the war, after months in the hospital and rehabilitation, he settled down. Married a swell girl named Lela, got a dead end job that would lead absolutely nowhere, and tried to forget. Not just the horrors of war, the crashes of mortars and the clanging of bullets, but Leckie. Goddamn if Bob Leckie didn’t plague every waking moment of Bill’s life, a perfect image burned into the back of his eyelids, not just the moments before Bill lost consciousness on Peleliu, but other memories. All of them, no matter how hard he’d tried to stuff them down into the hidden crevices inside of his mind, remained at the forefront of his mind.
Which was exactly how an in the process of divorce Bill ‘Hoosier’ Smith wound up standing in front of Robert Leckie’s home in New Jersey, his fists stuffed into the pockets of his jacket, his features hidden under the brim of a cap. It felt like he’d stood on the snow covered sidewalk for hours, though it was only truly ten minutes or so. Clenching his fingers tighter to his hands to inspire warmth within them, Bill breached the distance between the street and Leckie’s doorstep, rapping his knuckles against the door in a measured beat. Bill waited with baited breath for only a moment, the door yanked open with an aggressive force by Leckie.
Leckie, who held the beginnings of wrinkles at the edges of his eyes, with a pen clenched between his lips. A pen that tumbled to the floor after bouncing off of Leckie’s sweater covered chest, his expression morphing into an amusing mimic of a comic book character caught by extreme surprise. “Hoosier?”
“In the flesh, Lucky. Mind lettin’ me inside? It’s colder than the balls on a brass monkey out here.” Bill lifted his hands from his pockets, blowing hot air uselessly on the frozen solid extremities. Leckie stepped aside, ushering Bill into his home before closing the door behind him, shielding them both from the bone piercing chill. Bill made himself at home, tearing off his useless jacket and sitting on the comfortable looking sofa by the fireplace, holding his empty palms to the flames as though that might warm the sudden strike of anxiety that cooled his blood.
“Don’t mind if I ask what the hell you’re doing here in this tone. It’s the only one I have, you know, petulant and cocky at the same time. So, Hoos. Why now?” Leckie sat across from Bill on a rocking chair, the creaking hitting him across the cheek like a nun’s ruler. Stuck in fight or flight mode, panic rushing in, Bill desperately wanted to run, but he knew better than that. It would be a waste of a train ticket, among other things. “We didn’t see you in the hospital, on any boat or train trip back stateside, no letters, no calls, nothing. Why now, why me?”
Something unspoken shimmered in Leckie’s eyes, something deeper than Bill wanted to analyze. Bill opened his mouth, his lips flapping uselessly for a couple of beats before they closed again. He began again, pushing through the fear, eyes watering at the effort, happier than a pig in shit that Leckie dutifully ignored the expression of emotion. “I think you know why you, Lecks, but uh,” Hoosier fiddled with the fabric of his sleeve, his gaze locked onto Leckie’s, unwavering. “My wife is divorcin’ me. Using somethin’ ‘bout me being unable to produce children for her in the suit. Which is fine, I think she knew I couldn’t really feel what she wanted me to, ya know. My fault, ‘nd all. But I figured, well, I…actually, I dunno. I just called the Associated Press, congrats on that, by the way, ‘nd got your address. Think they thought I wanted to send fanmail.” Hoosier swallowed, chuckling darkly in a rumble that was barely a sound at all. “Ya married, Lecks? Maybe I shoulda asked that first before ramblin’.”
Leckie shook his head, leaning on his knees with his elbows. “No, actually, I thought I might. You remember Vera? Those letters?” Bill nodded, his heart hammering at the base of his throat. “Well, I was going to ask her to dinner, open up the path to romance, but it turned out she was already engaged to some Army fellow who had just graduated West Point. Missed the whole war but managed to steal the girl of my dreams.”
“O’course,” Bill huffed, rolling his eyes at the mere fact that some doggy bastard had snatched Leckie’s girl out from under him. As if he wasn’t hoping for that exact or a similar situation. Bill rubbed his palms together even though they were already warm. An awkward silence bloomed between them, the crackling of the fireplace echoing loudly in Bill’s ears. “Listen, Lucky, I didn’t mean to abandon ya ‘nd the fellas at the hospital, but I…there was somethin’ dark in me, somethin’ that lingered. It’s sorta still here, ‘nd I don’t know how to explain it, but life has been very unpalatable for me. I haven’t…it’s hard to think clearly, to focus. Every day passes me by like I’m just some stiff. It’s been like that since Guadualcanal, ya know, ‘nd the only bits I remember…”
“Have to do with me.” Leckie finished, leaning back into the chair, his eyes dark and slightly hollow. He fumbled with his chest pocket for a moment, retrieving two cigarettes and a lighter, one of which he offered to Hoosier with trembling fingers. Leckie sucked on the butt, staring into the fire, shadows of flame licking his sharp features. “I don’t blame you, you know? Even with this gig at AP, I can’t seem to shake those damn islands. They’re all I think about, especially when I’m trying to sleep at night.” Leckie took another drag, his thumb tracing the outline of his lips, which Bill eyed with a bit of guilt. “Runner and Chuckler send me letters every month. They’re both doing swell, by the by, which you wouldn’t know ‘cause we didn’t know how to find you. Disappeared like Rip Van Winkle.”
“Irving,” Bill noted, blowing smoke out of his nostrils. “I went back home to Loogootee. Stayed with my sister, Mary, until I could get my footing, then bought a house not too far from them. With my wife–ex-wife. Nothin’ excitin’ to share, I fear. Livin’ the American Dream, ain’t I?”
Leckie snorted, shaking his head. “You haven’t changed a bit, Hoos. You’re just like I remember you. Still pretty, like the world hasn’t aged you. I suppose that’s because you’ve repressed it all. Coasting through life, wearing your hands down to callouses.”
Bill glanced down at his palms, noting the swarth of callouses hardening the skin. They were the only signs of aging on him, hard labor the only thing he knew how to do. Bill wasn’t like Leckie, he wasn’t witty in a way that was digestible by a general audience of average folk, crass and brutal and sharp like he himself was a weapon. “I wouldn’t call it coastin’, Lecks, but yeah.” Bill gestured to Leckie’s face, a face that he had a hard time admitting he loved. “You have. You’re…different. Relaxed. Sure of yourself. ‘nd ya got those lines, what do the dames call ‘em? Crows feet?”
Leckie’s lips spread in that bright, wide grin that warmed Bill’s entire chest, stunting each breath more than the last. He couldn’t help but return the expression, his smile toothy and shy, blue eyes half lidded in amusement and affection. God, he missed the sound of that laugh. He wished he could record it and play it over and over again when the hollow feeling consumed him. “Alright, asshole. How ‘bout some wine? We’re classy around here, now. Hold your pinky up and everything.”
“Sounds good,” Bill replied, though he didn’t mean it. He hated wine, sour grape taste far too bitter for his tongue. He watched Leckie leave the room with an ease that he had never felt in his life, appreciating just how different Leckie looked like in civilian fatigues. When Leckie returned, he offered Bill a glass of wine, one whiff of which almost floored him. Leckie clanked their glasses together, easing back into the chair with a soft sigh.
“To change,” Leckie raised his glass, a mischievous glint forming in those damned eyes. “And stagnation. Maybe if you’re nice I’ll kiss you like I did that night on Pavuvu.” Bill snorted his swallow of wine onto the carpet, causing Leckie to full bellied laugh like he’d actually said something funny. “After you scrub that shit out of my carpet, of course.”