Christmas Nigh; Adeste Fi!

Part 3

The rest of the JAG gang had returned to the Roberts' house after church to retrieve cars and other items.

"You know, AJ," the Admiral addressed his young namesake, "I won't get to see you tomorrow. How about you open the gift from us now?"

The boy looked to his mom for permission.

Harriet agreed with a nod, suggesting, "Why don't you get your present for the Admiral too? You know which one it is?"

Little AJ nodded and scampered off to get it.

When he came back, they traded presents. Little AJ had picked out a puzzle of the solar system for the Admiral, and the Admiral gave the boy a checkerboard.

Little AJ looked at the game curiously.

"It's checkers," the Admiral informed him. "Do you know how to play?"

The boy shook his head. "No, sir," he said. His parents always called this man 'sir,' so he thought it was an appropriate response.

"Well, sir," Meredith emphasized, amused by the boy's manners, but teasing her boyfriend, "I think it's your responsibility to teach him."

"Can we play now?" asked little AJ, hopefully.

Bud interrupted, "I'm sure the Admiral and Ms. Cavanaugh want to head home now, AJ. It's late and the weather's getting bad."

"Nonsense," Meredith said. "We'll have no trouble on the snow with the truck."

The Admiral smiled at little AJ. "I think we have time for one game."

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After Harm had changed into casual clothes and picked up the presents, they headed back to Mac's place. As Harm concentrated on driving through the snow, Mac played with the radio stations, looking for something fun.

Static … "♪♪-enbaum, O Tannenbaum, du kannst mir sehr gefallen! ♪♪" A military drumbeat started up.

"Oh, I like this song." Mac turned the volume up.

"♪♪ The news had come out in the First World War, the Bloody Red Baron was flying once more. The Allied command ignored all of its men and called on Snoopy to do it again. ♪♪ "

"Actually, Mac, …" Harm objected.

"♪♪Twas the night before Christm-♪♪"

Harm turned the radio off, saying, "I really don't want to listen to that one."

"Ohhh-kay," said Mac, wondering about his apparent disdain for the song. "You got something against Snoopy as an ace fighter pilot?"

"No." His answer was very somber. "… It's just that not all pilots have been as lucky as Snoopy was … when flying combat missions on Christmas Eve."

Mac suddenly made the connection between the song and a very tough subject for Harm, … especially tonight. She felt a pang of sympathy, sorry that she had inadvertently been so insensitive.

Harm observed with a trace of sadness, "It seems the Vietnamese didn't have the same Christmas spirit as the Red Baron." Then, trying to smile, he added, "Maybe it would have helped if they celebrated the holiday."

"Oh, Harm. I'm sorry. … I didn't even think about the parallels to your father. I …" Mac trailed off, deciding not to talk about it anymore, since Harm probably didn't need anymore reminders of how his father had been shot down. "… I'm just sorry," she finished.

"It's okay, Mac," Harm assured her. "You wouldn't have known."

"No, I should have," Mac objected. "I've listened to the words; … I just never seriously thought about them."

Harm shrugged. "It's kind of hard to take a song about a cartoon dog seriously," Harm swallowed hard before adding, "… unless it makes you think of something else."

He was silent for a minute, and Mac sensed that she should not interrupt his pondering. Eventually, Harm felt the need to let Mac in on his thoughts and the events that the song made him recall.

"I remember the first time I really listened to the words of that song, … when I first understood the story," he began, almost in a sort of trance. "I was at school, and … the teacher let us have a Christmas party. She had a record player in the classroom and brought in her own holiday music collection.

"She put that song on, and, … I don't know why, … but I listened, …I mean really listened. And suddenly, I was sitting there, … hearing this silly song, and thinking … for just a second that maybe my Dad could have been lucky too, - like Snoopy. … That Dad survived being shot down, and that for some reason, they … just let him go."

With frustrated desperation, Harm explained, "… Because that's the kind of miracle that's supposed to happen at Christmastime."

"But then," he continued after a moment of silence, "I realized that if he'd been let go and sent back to our troops, … he would have made his way home by then. … And that made me sad … and angry. … It was so unfair. My Dad's flight that Christmas Eve wasn't … some cartoon. It didn't have a happy ending. And that stupid song was rubbing my nose in it!"

Mac wasn't sure what she could say, but again, she seemed to know that he wasn't done. So she just waited.

Following a lengthy pause, Harm suddenly admitted, "I started to cry, Mac. Right there at school. … In front of all the kids in class."

This time Mac knew that Harm was looking for a response from her. She had inwardly cringed when he told her he cried at school, because she knew how cruel kids could be about that kind of thing. "What happened then?" she tentatively asked.

"What do you think happened, Mac?" asked Harm rhetorically. "Tommy Brodenmeyer started making fun of me, and pretty soon all the guys were calling me a girly cry-baby."

Mac outwardly winced this time. "I'm guessing that led to an exchange of blows and a trip to the principal's office?" Mac hypothesized.

Harm nodded in affirmation. "In with the principal right after I saw the school nurse for my bloody lip."

"That wasn't too bad, … as injuries go," Mac observed, considering the damage that young boys are capable of inflicting on each other.

"No, not bad. Just my lip, a bad bruise on my face, and sore knuckles. … But Mom wasn't happy with me brawling in the classroom. She made me apologize to the other guy."

"Tommy Brodenmeyer?"

"Yeah." Harm smiled a little, with masculine pride. "He ended up with a shiner, busted glasses, … and a broken nose."

"You hit a boy with glasses?" Mac asked with surprise and an exaggerated 'shame on you' tone of disappointment.

"He was asking for it," Harm insisted, as he stopped the car at a red light. Harm then quietly acknowledged, "I never was very controlled when it came to my Dad."

Mac now gave Harm a soft smile, before sympathetically repeating her apology. "I'm sorry, Harm. I didn't mean to make you remember all that."

"No, it's okay," he told her. "Actually, … it was good to tell that story. I've … never told it to anyone before. … Mom never did find out what that fight was about. … I couldn't bring myself to admit it."

In a comforting gesture, Mac placed her hand on Harm's arm, which was resting atop the middle console. "I'm glad you could tell me."

Harm looked over at her, meeting her eyes. "Me too."

He moved his arm, but as Mac began to withdraw at his motion, he reached out, grasped her palm next to his, and brought their joined hands back to lie between them. For several moments they both sat, transfixed on their connection, until Mac noticed through the corner of her eye that the light had changed.

"Umm, … the light's green," she timidly pointed out. Harm looked up and saw that it was his turn to move in traffic. He gave Mac's hand a quick squeeze before reluctantly letting go of her to reclaim the steering wheel with both hands in order to make his left turn.

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TBC …