AN: No idea where this is going, I'm just gonna let it slowly unfold.
Hawkeye was sitting at the bar in the officer's club, swilling what was left of a martini around the inside of its glass. She was gone. Fate had dumped her back into his life and he'd failed to keep her interested. Still too interested in medicine, she'd said, proposed himself into a corner she'd said. That last one was true, but only because he was so scared of her breaking his heart again. The events of the day have left him feeling so bitter that he can almost taste it. Would he have been happier if he'd put her before his residency and she'd stayed? He doubts it. He'd probably have just resented her for it, yet he can't quite bring himself to face the truth: they would never have worked. Surely he couldn't have ever have loved someone unsuitable for him so much, could he? How could such big blue eyes, such blonde curls, such rosy lips tell his heart such a lie? He downs what's left of his drink and gestures for a refill.
"Sorry sir, we're out of gin." Igor gulps as he delivers the news, well aware of Hawkeye's mood.
"Out? How can you be out of gin? This camp runs on gin!" He'd go back to the Swamp, but it's much harder to be "alone" in a tent with BJ and Frank in it than it is here. BJ likes talking, and he doesn't want to talk about it anymore.
"I'm sorry, sir, we ordered more, but supply didn't send it, and…"
"Yeah yeah," Hawkeye waves his hand dismissively, "Just get me something, anything!"
"Will rye do?"
"That's covered by "anything", isn't it? Just pour it in already!"
Igor pours the drink quickly and retreats to another part of the bar, finding himself wishing that the Hawkeye hadn't sat his miserable ass at the middle of it. The door to the officer's club opens and the sound of Frank's voice, simpering is carried inside, before Margaret strides inside, back from yet another trip to Tokyo, with Frank trotting dutifully behind her.
"Speaking of unsuitable…" Hawkeye mutters under his breath, his eyes on the blonde Major. He bets she'd have understood his commitment and dedication to medicine. Though why he's having this thought he doesn't know. She wouldn't have understood his anything else. She's quite something, that Major, but what that something is he's not sure. What he does know is that he has little tolerance for her precious army protocol and she doesn't appreciate his messing around or his sense of humour and thus, whatever something she might be doesn't matter. He watches as the Majors make their way over to a table, Margaret is smiling and laughing at whatever's coming out of Frank's stupid, lip-free mouth. How that moron has managed to find another person to be happy with when he hasn't only intensifies the feelings of bitterness. Hell, that moron had two women. He briefly considers going over there to punch Frank in his stupid face but thinks better of it. Besides, he's not completely sure Margaret wouldn't then put a fist through his own.
Margaret sits at a rickety little table with Frank. "Go get us a drink will you, Frank?"
Frank leaps up and heads over to the bar, "Of course, darling, of course," he simpers. Margaret rolls her eyes. Sometimes he's like an overeager lap dog.
As she watches him head over to the bar Margaret notices Hawkeye. His presence alone isn't unusual, but his demeanour and loneliness is. He's hunched over the bar, quiet and alone, fixated on something behind the bar so strongly that he doesn't even respond when Frank insults him. She sees Igor eye him warily and watches in surprise as a nurse approaches him, flirts, and is fobbed off with a dismissive wave. Margaret frowns. Something must have happened while she was away. Maybe a patient had died? She supposes she'll ask Frank. She's wasting her energy even caring about his problems. That man is nothing but trouble: irritating trouble. But they've been through a lot in the last few months, and she's been starting to see him in a different light since Henry sent them to the front together.. First was that trip to the front, then Henry never made it home, She imagines Trapper couldn't have left at a worse time. She shakes her head in an attempt to clear her thoughts and plasters a convincing smile on her face because here comes Frank. He starts whining before he even sits down. "Margaret, sweetie, I was hoping we could go somewhere a little more private and, y'know, get better re-aquainted with each other."
Margaret rolls her eyes. "Not now, Frank, we're going to have a have a nice, quiet drink."
Frank turns the whine up to eleven, "But sugar-puff, I've got post op duty in an hour! Your presence alone is intoxicating."
Margaret shrugs, "Well that's too bad, Frank. The only thing that's going to intoxicate me tonight is this scotch."
Frank opens his mouth to say something but thinks better of it when she gives him a dark look. He's been wearing thin on her lately, and she'd brought him to the Officer's Club so she could spend time with him in a place where he wouldn't be able to do much touching. Her recent trips to Tokyo, first for R and R and then for the first of two trips to check up on patients had been useful places to look for other options, but so far all she'd found were men looking for string-free good times. Her gaze again falls upon Hawkeye. "What's wrong with him?"
Frank follows her gaze, "Who, Pierce?"
Margaret nods.
Frank's face lights up with glee. Well, he had a thing with one of those new nurses you ordered, y'know, the one who's already transferred out of here, and she was married! Then I heard misery guts over there talking to BJ and it turns out she and Pierce had lived together while he was in med school, and she left him! Serves him right for living with a woman in sin." Frank breaks into maniacal laughter.
So that's it. It's not what she'd been expecting.
Margaret doesn't laugh. She is, after all, having an affair with a married man. She might not be particularly enamoured with him anymore, but if he ever transferred out of her life then she'd have nothing. No friends, no one to love her, nothing. She downs half her drink.
"Margaret, you shouldn't drink that so quickly!"
She puts down her glass and fixes him with a dark look,"Oh buzz off, Frank!"
As if affronted, he stands up quickly and draws himself up to his full height, "Hmph, maybe I will!", and he stomps self righteously out of the club.
Now alone she sighs loudly and downs the rest of her drink. Damn. Now she has to go and get more. She looks over again at Hawkeye in his place at the bar and wonders if his misery wants company, because hers does.
Oh what the hell…
She grabs her empty glass and heads to the bar before settling herself onto the stool next to his.