Title: Postscript
Pairing: Snafu/Sledge
Rating: R
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. This is entirely fictional. This is a portrayal on the HBO series, not the actual men.
A/N: My first Pacific fic. It's kind of short and weird. The rating is for language and some sexuality mostly. If you've seen the series, you probably won't mind at all. :) Well, I'm not entirely happy with this, but I hope you enjoy it.
"You don't wanna do that." Snafu says, lazy with a dangerous edge.
Sledge looks up from the puffy pink and red insides of some nameless man's mouth, because it's easier than seeing vacant eyes.
Why not, he thinks, glaring challengingly at Snafu, and says it through pursed lips.
"You did it." he reminds Snafu tonelessly.
And then he returns his attention to the half-rotted flesh, seeing his fingers moving furiously inside a clammy cheek. He grimaces, despite himself.
He thinks, through his evaporating frustration, This isn't even human anymore. And somehow, it doesn't make it so ugly.
Snafu is rattling on about what Doc said, something about bacteria and infections, and he sounds more and more miserable with each word, so Sledge really doesn't want to look at him.
He thinks Snafu must realize, yes, he did it, and yes, he crossed that line, and yes, he wants to go back. And he just wants to keep Sledge from going there, because maybe he'll feel more, and maybe it will be another layer of these disgusting things, but he won't take it home. He'll fall back into himself when he gets there. Snafu can't. So Snafu lends a shred of somehow-salvageable sanity and gives it away, just like Sledge has tried with him so many times. God only knows why.
He looks up from the dying skin of an already-dead man, and looks at Snafu who, in a moment of clarity and selflessness not doomed by war, looks very much alive. His eyes are open, dull, but not dead. And the clutched hand at his side is letting go of the rocks and hypocrisy as he stares right back at Sledge because, goddamn it, you should know better.
Sledge does. Thanks him maybe later, after he has time to think about this, when Snafu is not looking at him like he's crazy; pleading, and they both are.
Maybe then.
He wants to reach over and take his hand, and talk, question, to make those lips move. Content to just watch Snafu now. It saves him from knowing too much about what he wants.
But he's not sure what to say. He never imagined he'd feel this scattered with the end of the war. Things should be coming together again. What do I need him for now? he wonders. He depended on him for sense, help with the dirty fingers careful enough to keep from getting any blood on the pieces he can help Sledge put together to make a picture. They won't finish it. Their time is running out quickly.
He wants to stay on this train forever. Just keep going and going. Nowhere special. This, here, is somewhere special. Snafu like this, sitting across from him, eyes looking a little drooped and tired, but there is life, so much life, as exhausted as he is.
He turns to the window, to join Snafu in being lost in the scenery blurring by into sick colors and restless streaks messing the window, blinding him. Blankets everything. Covers his thoughts and useless fears, because why should be be afraid now?
The war is over.
There's a sudden soft nudge at the back of his ankle. Gentle enough to keep him from startling, because Snafu knows how to touch him by now. Sledge is grateful to have his attention brought away from the window. Looking at it long enough makes him feel dizzy, and while this does, too, he feels like he'll be caught if he's too tipsy this-way-or-that-way, brain sloshing restlessly inside his skull while Snafu steadies him.
Snafu isn't looking out the window anymore. He does have the decency to look at him when the blunt toe of his boot is rubbing against Sledge's ankle like that, and Sledge thinks maybe there's really nothing deep to look into here, because he's just trying to get my attention; what does he want?
"What?" he breathes. His stomach tenses when he looks at Snafu; blinking slowly, gnawing on his bottom lip and just returning his stare with this 'what?' look right back at him.
He's still for a moment. Though no one can see, and Sledge can feel the toe of Snafu's boot tapping against the back of his ankle in tandem with his furious heart. By now, Snafu has stopped chewing on his bottom lip. He's relaxing against his seat, leg extended as it slips up Sledge's calf as slow and soft as ever, because the dying atmosphere of the train doesn't call for anymore than that. Sledge doesn't need to see it with his eyes; doesn't need to see the confusing and demanding things sparking under the table.
He hasn't moved yet. He wouldn't know what to do, anyway. The tips of his fingers feel numb; tingly, like insects are dancing under his skin. There isn't a breath of air he feels he can take that won't poison his lungs. Somehow, it all seems so toxic when he panics like this. He feels trapped, crushed between the window and the weight of Snafu's gaze.
"Sledge," he whispers, almost sharp and alarmed in tone. He draws his leg back, away, at once. Sledge feels his entire body tense up for a moment, and he grips the worn leather of the seat below him; simply stares at the other man as anxiety leaves and confusion settles in.
Thoughts tick restlessly at his brain, and he tries to think of something to say. He has never been afraid of silence, has never been one of those people that feel the need to fill the quiet with talking for whatever reason, but right now, he needs to say something, because Snafu doesn't look like himself. He looks like he wants to leave. Panicked for a moment, and then a little bitter.
Sledge does want to say something. But his mouth is so dry, and so is his mind, and nothing comes to him.
He thinks maybe that the man across from him can sympathize with that.
Where is he?
First thought that penetrates his sleep.
He's waking, in that awful place between asleep and awake, because it feels like dead and alive, and he's clearly still...alive.
Where is he?
He knows it. Right now, everything feels different. Maybe he's not in his right mind, hasn't been for some time, he knows. But he doesn't need to be in his right mind to know when something so vital to living awake and not asleep is gone, and may as well be nowhere anymore. And without a single word of parting.
You're the only one left.
The night whispers this to him, once the dark finally leaks into the train. Who let it in? It's too quiet. His ears aren't used to being so empty, empty of the lazy calmness of the voice that trickled in his head even when he didn't want it to, because it was so sane coming from such sick insanity, and he didn't want to figure out what that meant. Now, he feels like he does.
But it's gone, Snafu's voice, along with the pair of eyes that gleamed with fear and foretold everything. It's gone. Maybe because there's nothing to foretell anymore.
Still.
He would like to see those eyes again, just to make sure.
After the panic wanes from his shock out of sleep, he begins to relax. It isn't calmness; more just a simple sense of vacancy he has never felt before. It makes the raw aching of his head go unnoticed. Mostly, anyway. There's still a threatening twinge lingering at the base of his skull. Maybe that means he's home. He is home.
Somehow, he feels misplaced here. Lost, but not forgotten. The warm press of his mother's cheek against his neck when he's home, home, and the misty look of insurmountable appreciation in his father's eyes, and he has never felt so cherished. That is what saves him, what keeps his scattered mind securely in place inside his skull-the fact that even though he has let himself forget, no one else has.
He adjusts to life this way. He has not lost it, has not snapped, not once, though he sometimes feels like it. He imagines Snafu telling him to let it out, to just fucking scream or cry or both, and breathe without breathing, with him, because they can figure it out again later. And he imagines sleeping, sleeping deep and perfect like he can't do on his own anymore.
He imagines this, and he does come close to breaking. It's sick to miss Snafu this way. But he doesn't care, not as much as he thought he would. His capacity to care is being occupied by other things, desires and fantasies and questions of when the fuck will I get my goodbye are linked and would make for a perfect story if it weren't for the loss of life and sense.
If only he could write it.
There are no distractions at home. He tries to fix it by drawing, but he always gets that headache, and he knows he's avoiding something.
He tries sleeping in. He tries telling himself he's still asleep even when he wakes up, tries lying himself back into dreaming again. Not the nightmares, no. The dreams. They're good enough to sleep through the nightmares. The dreams are usually short and confusing, and almost always, Snafu's face lingers in his mind after he wakes. Sometimes he's not quite sure what it was about, and he can't remember. But just as often, he does remember.
He keeps his eyes closed now; tries to forget he's awake and forces his mind to pull him back into the dream. He sees Snafu flicking his cigarette ash into a half-full coffee mug. Sledge knows Snafu's coffee has gone cold, but his is still warm as he cradles the mug in his hand and stares daftly across a table he doesn't recognize, in a small kitchen he doesn't remember spending a moment in besides this one, with a man he seems to remember all the time. It all feels very commonplace after that.
Snafu asks him something in a very quiet voice. Not timid, but just too lazy to make himself heard. And Sledge asks him to repeat himself, because he couldn't hear, and Snafu just looks into his mug very blankly and says a bit louder,
"How have you been sleeping?"
And that's when Sledge really wakes up, confused and wondering if Snafu means right now, or if he means back on the train. And then Sledge realizes he doesn't mean anything, because this Snafu isn't real. But that's all he has of him for now.
Sometimes he wonders how real any of it was, if he maybe dreamt of part of it to give himself a reason to cling to someone. But that isn't right. He has the scars to prove it. Has the memories too vivid and sick to be part of anything he created.
He can't blame himself for wishing it weren't real. He wouldn't have to worry for Snafu even though he's the first person that would tell Sledge there's nothing to fucking worry about with him, and he might even act insulted or angry to cover up the fact that he really doesn't know how to act at all. And Sledge wouldn't, either, but he just doesn't have the strength to fake his way through it anymore. He thinks that Snafu might be the only person he knows of that would really understand that, even if he doesn't practice it all the time.
Those are the good ones. The good dreams that wake him up easily, even though they still leave him wishing and wanting and missing, because it doesn't leave him feeling the rush and panic of his body telling him that he's going to die, because look at all these dead men around you; watch them leave. You're going with them, and what will Snafu leave with then?
And he feels that displacement inside his own body all day. Those days, he prays for night to come again, so that he can sleep and do it over and maybe he can dream dreams again instead of the nightmares, because yes-the dreams are worth it; because yes-he did catch up on his sleep.
But the Snafu in his dream never remembers.
He's in his nicest suit, and his nicest shoes, with the nicest tie around his neck, in the prettiest chapel he has ever had the pleasure of being in, watching two people in love get married. And he's never felt so uncomfortable since he spent the night in the muddy earth of Okinawa.
Sid and his bride say their vows, sounding too sincere to ever really be mimicked. Sledge doesn't feel right being here. It just feels too intimate for anyone to see. Maybe he would like this, or something like this someday, but when he thinks about it, his mind just comes up blank.
But he's the best man. He shouldn't be thinking of anyone but Mary and Sidney right now, anyway. Their wedding. Their perfect wedding. So he smiles, not entirely fake but still unsure, and hopes that these two will make it.
He's ashamed that, after it all, when they sit and chat and too many people make small talk with him, he has to keep himself from slipping expletives in regular conversation. He has to keep himself from using the kinds of words he thoughtlessly used around Snafu, and why hasn't that man left his head all day? Shouldn't he be associating him with the suffering and death of the war, since that's the only place some semblance of a relationship ever existed? Is that why Snafu left to a place that felt just as much home as Okinawa did, without a single word forged with half-bitter goodbyes? Because that chapter is over now?
Could Sledge mean anything but war to him anymore?
He wonders about it through a headache, staring blankly through his champagne, hand cradled around perfect glass except for where his fingerprints have marked it. He's starting to think about Snafu's mug half-filled with cold black coffee and the cigarette ash.
He cups his face, hiding the clandestine smile behind his palm; wishes the glass wasn't so clear and swimming with good fortune so that he wouldn't have to worry about dirtying it.
Sledge decides that when he gets home, he'll write a letter.
There are several at the end of the week. He pretends that one day he'll send them all, but in the back of his mind, he knows he won't. He knows the words will stay sunken in his brain and the paper he writes on, and nothing else.
He keeps them scattered in his drawers, underneath his clothes and sometimes clutched against him when he's fallen asleep with the pen in his hand again. He knows he should probably throw it all away if he's not going to send them. Better not keep the memory alive, but the thought scares him more than it ought to.
There's smudged ink on his fingers. Soap just dulls it, and then it's blotted and boldened all over again that night when he writes some more. And his parents; God bless them, but they notice everything.
He sees his father's eyes lingering on his hands as his fingers wrap around a fork to poke at his breakfast with.
"Have you been writing, son?" he asks, lips pursing suspiciously behind his mustache. His mother's hands pause suddenly, dropping the mail (ironically) on the table. They're both looking at him in a way that makes him want to shrink.
"Oh...yes," he starts, fumbling with his words. "A little."
By now, he has let his fork drop.
His mother's face is overcome with a look of dawning hope, and he wants to shrink way from that, too, because he knows what it means. He's found a hobby, something to be passionate about. Oh, thank God.
And his father is smiling at him from across the table, like he's coming back. Our son is coming back, and Sledge is just too wrapped up in the intoxicating illusion that the war really has ended.
But really, he's only clinging to the last piece of the war of his, the one piece that never coincided with the filthy part of it.
What would his parents say?
He'll pretend, for now, while each paper grows weightier in his hands and the ink just bleeds more little by little with each pen stroke. He doesn't write a single word without thinking about what Snafu would think if he ever read it. You wouldn't even know where to send it, he argues with himself. And it's hardly that that keeps his letters hidden away. It's mostly the thought that Snafu probably doesn't want a discarded piece of war finding him again.
But Sledge still writes, because this is the only man he knows that fully relates, understands what the pinnacle of human suffering is; the only man that would know to wake Sledge when he's not dreaming of the good things, because a large part of him really can't survive remembering. Aside from actually living it, that is the worst thing, and he speaks from a waking brain, not the sleeping one that thinks he's awake and sends him signals to run; fight; cry. Sends him metallic tastes and the bitter smell of the lucky dead; the war cries of the unlucky ones.
If anyone could understand this, Snafu could.
Snafu tells him this, in not so many words, in a letter sent, this one; this one...he holds it in his unsure hands a week and forever later, when it's actually just a night;
How have you been sleeping?
And it's signed Merriell Shelton at the bottom like it's been ages since he was Snafu, but Sledge doesn't want to think that way.
The ink is faded and a little smudged, ancient blue, and it looks like it's aged forever. But it is unmistakably Snafu's. Sledge reads it, remembers the distant train ride and his clearer dreams, and knows that in some quiet way, Snafu can ask about it. Some of it, anyway. The parts he knows about.
Sledge feels back into it now. Not so much watching himself in third person anymore, feeling some barrier between his body and his mind. He tries fusing them together in another letter, and he knows this one is the most important, because this one actually goes to someone. He lets go of it. It won't rest in some corner of his room forgotten even by himself as life pushes him through the motions.
He has a return address.
He has a note.
His fingers aren't working well and his penmanship isn't as nice as he'd like it to be, but he has a note, and the sharp angles of his words won't matter to anyone but himself, so he doesn't think about it. He just writes. His brain is connected to his body again, and he still hopes that the words will make more sense to Snafu than they do to himself.
So his pen works, and he thinks, Shit, Sleeping? No, not near as good as on the train, but the ink says, I've been sleeping well. What about you? and a few more words, just to fill the white spaces; Thanks for writing; good to hear from you; how have you been?
But Sledge really does mean it, and he really does want to know all those things, so it's okay even if he has to scribble in the margins to say what he wants to. Snafu should know this about him, anyway.
His fingers are still smudged with the ink of the letters that will still never make it in Snafu's hands, and there are grey fingerprints where he touches what he's saying. He doesn't know whether it's more personal this way, or just messier.
It's neat enough for Snafu, he thinks. Just perfect.
It's really not long until Snafu gives in to whatever has been gnawing at both of them. Says maybe it would be nice to meet again. Sledge tells him where. And nighttime, he thinks, heart thrumming wildly. It'll be nighttime.
He doesn't like being so covert about this. He can't understand why they have to do it this way, like there's something to hide. It comes with an added sense of shame. He knows why he feels it, finally, when he sees Snafu as a shadow standing with tight posture near an idling car, like he doesn't know what he's doing here.
Sledge says his name, quiet and determined, and the shadow turns into a man when Snafu's shoulders loosen. It feels like it's started to rain; Sledge's skin registers it numbly as he ambles toward the figure he longs to be acquainted with again.
He's standing in front of him, just making out the dilated eyes and mouth moving slowly to say a name he almost forgot. It's not carelessness; just an unwillingness to remember.
"Sledge..." he murmurs, sounding almost questioning and a little lost, and it's not like him, so why...
"How long will you stay?" Sledge asks, soft and urgent, like this will be why they go where they go.
Snafu's face is half-illuminated by the dimmed headlights. The part Sledge can see is uncontrolled; maybe a little frustration hidden in there, but not a hint of anger.
"Tonight." he answers. Sounds mechanical. Rehearsed.
Several possibilities play through Sledge's head, scenarios like mini-movies. He could stay; there's plenty of room, plenty of hospitality. But he can't ask Snafu to run away from whatever home he's made for himself, whatever life he's built for himself. So he nods resolutely, like it all makes plenty of sense, and he accepts it like he accepts everything else.
Maybe Snafu sees it, because there's something almost dangerous written on his face that reads, to be continued, and Sledge tries not to worry about it so much anymore.
"Where're we going?" Snafu asks, angling his head toward the inoffensive car. He's still staring at Sledge with expectant, almost weary eyes. He's always looked so tired.
Sledge sees the answer to Snafu's question in his mind almost immediately, where his hands work when he's not writing letters he doesn't even imagine will be read anymore.
They take a wide country road he's never seen anyone travel on, except maybe once, and he gently guides Snafu through territory that feels even a little unfamiliar to himself. Snafu's hands are relaxed around the steering wheel as Sledge tells him to turn there and slow down here. Maybe he doesn't exist only in war for him. Not here, anyway. Maybe the letters will be written faster, and Snafu will actually get to read most of them.
Sledge is really starting to think so.
They share a look that feels longer than it really is when they make it, when the car has stopped humming and bumping over the unpaved road and Snafu has the keys clutched a little too tightly in one hand.
For an anxious moment, Sledge thinks, Why did I bring him here?
But the vague inward questions laced with awkward human connection leave, just for now, when Snafu feels him with his fingertips tracing Sledge's cheekbone, touching in a way he never thought Snafu would be capable of. The inside of the car is getting colder, but Sledge is getting warmer, and Snafu is looking at him in the most thrilled, frightened way, but it doesn't even come close to combat or scared-to-death. And if this feels more natural than that, then it's okay.
He remembers the moment on the train, before he fell asleep. And this is like that. Almost exactly like it, like they're picking up right where they left off. Sledge doesn't really know where that is, but he's following it as best he can in the dark.
Sledge can't see him very well at all. The sky is black. Thick and mottled. Inky. And it's bleeding inside, so he can't really see Snafu. But he can feel him, ghosting words against his collar where he didn't button his shirt up all the way with trembling, hasty fingers. He can't hear it, but it feels like Snafu is mouthing something against him. His skin receives the words like paper, and he thinks of the letters, and he thinks of Snafu almost forcefully to keep his mind away from vertigo and pain and being devoured by it, because Snafu isn't a piece of any of that right now.
Snafu's lips are dry. His mouth isn't only made for swearing and smoking. Sledge is lulled into it, like the false realities of his dreams, and Snafu kisses his way toward Sledge's throat while his one of his fingers brushes behind the shell of his ear.
Sledge shivers and lets his eyes fall shut. He's not using them to see right now, anyway. But his skin is always receptive. He can't turn off feeling. He used to hate that. Used to hate it so much, before he came home. Feels something like a blessing now.
This is the place, the place where he leaves what he has and creates what he doesn't, and maybe this is part of that.
Snafu touches him and Sledge lets him without asking what for or why. His jaw is slack but he can't speak, not yet. Not when Snafu is laying his damaged fingers only perfected at the tips on skin that isn't his.
He only speaks when he can't force daybreak out of his head. Says to forget about where he's taken them and why, and Snafu doesn't look too satisfied with it, but it melts away when Sledge says he isn't going home because he left it for good long before now anyway.
Snafu takes him with.
Daybreak doesn't make it before the car forgets point A forever and lives for point B, but the light chases after them.
He looks at Snafu's softened features and quaking hands working the car; wonders if his parents in Mobile are up yet; noticed he's missing yet.
He thinks before long, he'll send a letter their way.
He's breathing like he did when he was sure he was going to die; and he's breathing like he did when he finally woke up on a quiet and empty train. He's breathing like there's no air left, and he's trying to keep his face on so that Snafu can see him, really see him. Sledge doesn't know when it became something this way...if it was when he started putting his mouth places on Snafu where Snafu had shown him to; if it was when he saw the first sign of life in a deeply disconnected and disturbed man, or if it just started now, and Snafu is showing with his mouth like he tends to do when he's not using his hands. Sledge likes it best when he uses both.
When he's wrapped up against him and Snafu is moving inside, he can't compare it to anything. Not a single memory can ruin it. And it's strange; intrusive, yes, but Snafu knows Sledge and he knows what he's doing, and Sledge arches up against him and tells him faster, harder anyway when it starts feeling so good. He knows he doesn't need to say it because Snafu knows all of what he's feeling, because he's grasping at Eugene's chest with one hand and touching him wherever he can with his other hand. But the words break from him so naturally.
The sheets are rough and damp, and they stick to his skin as he writhes. He can't help any of this, not when Snafu is moving inside like this, not when he's breathing Sledge's name so harshly against his skin sounding so overwhelmed and through with it all except for this.
There is pressure at his insides. Pressing and pulling, and he's suddenly so, so desperate to feel it release because it's feeling so tight, and it's making him feel feverish and dizzy.
There's a rushed string of words mouthed against his skin, between his shoulder-blades, and Snafu sounds almost urgent and torn at from inside. Sledge isn't sure how wonderful this is, or how awful it will be in the morning, but his mind is toasted and fizzing, and he just can't think about it right now.
He has never witnessed Snafu as hysterical and frenzied. If he unhinges during sex like this, Sledge just wants more of it. He cherishes it, and maybe it's slightly possessive. He wouldn't mind it at all if it weren't for the potential losses and inside wars.
He feels Snafu consciously slowing down as they both approach climax. Sledge likes to hold onto the feeling of being right there with Snafu, both aroused out of their minds, holding onto the good-bad frustration and clinging to each other without the shame of men of war.
Snafu has got his arms wedged under Eugene's chest, fingers digging into the skin with just enough pressure to force a cry from his throat while he pushes desperately against Snafu.
Sledge finds the tipping point with reckless pleasure tingling all over as Snafu comes inside him with a sudden breathless groan pressed into the back of his neck. It's almost numbing for a moment, and everything dims a little while he feels the rush of his crippling orgasm and Snafu's, too, who's still moving inside, and Sledge can't make his lungs work through the tight constriction of his lower abdomen. And it's just for a moment, just a moment, before he starts panting with Snafu, snatching the sticky air clouding the room like this is the last of life and weakly built human structure there is.
Sledge is mostly centered again by the time Snafu slides out and wiggles to the other side of the bed. But he doesn't leave. Sledge figures if anyone would, it would be him, because he's the one away from home. Or maybe it's just his turn.
He feels a little sick thinking about it. He looks at Snafu and hopes to think about nothing instead, just be content staring at the sex-slackened features, but his mind only works like that again, like it always does, especially with Snafu.
He doesn't want to sleep. Exhaustion is pulling him in anyway. He'll close his eyes; open them again, see Snafu fighting with the same thing through his own heavy eyes, trying to get a mouth that won't move for anything to say...
What,
Until Snafu is just too troubled to go to sleep and he leaves Sledge to fight through dreams, or maybe none; or until Sledge is just too worried to lose the rest of a night that isn't promising death or pain, just some long overdue peace, and maybe...maybe sleep. This time.
He'll go willingly.
It won't leave. It can't.
Snafu already promised it.
He's tired and he can't sleep; tired-wired. Can't keep staring at Snafu sleeping like this, trying to unlock him, because it may just keep him awake forever and what will he do then?
He shouldn't spend his mornings deranged and beating away the sun like this.
Snafu's closed eyes are twitching, but it's too much of tomorrow right now, so he can't be dreaming. Must be waking up. Sledge hopes the transition is quick, because he hates it when sleep is still wrapped thickly over his mouth and eyes but his brain is working like he's awake.
He raises his heavy head, looks over Snafu's bare shoulder and stares at the mostly expressionless walls spattered with nicks and a single window frosted over with ice and patternless streaks. Hides the world so well.
For a second, he feels completely alone, just like the moment before he stepped off the train. And nearly every moment after.
A light touch on his jaw brings him back. The pad of Snafu's thumb is soothing over his skin like he has since learned to do, how to do it just right. Didn't take long. Just the entirety of lost, awkward fumbling back in Mobile and some grudgingly understood moments later when neither of them could breathe quite right.
Sledge stares at him, feeling almost guilty. He isn't really sure of what yet. Snafu doesn't look alarmed, or even particularly curious about what they've done. But Sledge knows that, around the seriousness in his gaze laced with a bit of something soft, he understands completely. He's never been lost on it, not like Sledge was when he couldn't figure out what the fuck happened on the way back home from hell and why Snafu didn't stick around long enough to help him figure it out. But that was never Snafu's job. And Sledge still pretended like he didn't know why, still felt like a victim. And he wrecked even that for himself when he got lost and remembered in his letters when his hands let the ink work for a mutant part of himself he has started to like being.
He wonders if he'll get to see any of what he dreamt about-if Snafu will let him create a fantasy that mimics happiness so well, it really starts being that.
Maybe, he thinks, feeling Snafu press against him without even making a show of getting the cigarettes on the bedside table, and Sledge wonders if that's for the coffee mug later.
Maybe, Snafu's eyes say back while his mouth works around Sledge's name.
He hears its silence and thinks it is louder than Snafu's shorthand could ever be.