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BJ

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It was after my second time in OR that Trapper invited me to the Officer's Club with him. It had gone more smoothly than my first, certainly, but I was still tired, annoyed, and slightly disturbed.

"I'm too tired," I sighed, dropping onto the bench in the scrub room.

"Come on," he urged, bringing his knee up to his chest to tie his shoes. "Drinking'll help you sleep. And hey, you still got a whole camp to meet."

"I've met them," I said irritably. "And I don't think I want to be reintroduced."

"You can't be a hermit while you're here," he said wisely. "You need to make friends. It's the only way you're gonna get by."

I just shook my head and left. "They hate me, Boston."

No one in the camp—beside maybe Frank and Major Houlihan—seemed too pleased that my predecessor was gone. And all of them seemed to think it my fault he had left, like he was some dead puppy and I was the unacceptable replacement. I couldn't blame them, I guess. This Pierce seemed like a fun guy, a good doctor—a hero, really—and much more. Everything, I supposed, that I couldn't even pretend to be under these circumstances.

No one was throwing coffee cups at me in the mess tent, or anything, but no one had gone out of their way to be anything more than polite—except Frank. I was beginning to understand the treatment he was getting from the camp.

He behaved more like a weasel than the one my little sister had attempted to keep as a pet when she was eight. The more I looked at him, he began to resemble one as well—until I realized that the nickname 'Ferret Face' was justified.

He tried to tell me again that he was 'there' if I needed to 'confess' anything 'funny' that 'that roommate' of mine was doing. He said it a lot, actually. When I asked him to explain himself, he usually just snorted, nodded as if I already knew, and turned back to his cup of coffee—or patient, as the case was. He treated them about the same.

The second time McIntyre invited me to the Officer's Club with him, I'd been at the 4077th for a week and it was a very calm, cool evening; silver and pink as the sun procrastinated going down. It was stuck somewhere between night and day, and the full moon had already risen, as if to urge the sun along. I'd been writing my daily letter to Peg—four pages long this time—and was about to sign it when McIntyre snapped me from the sort of trance I'd gone into, with a, "Hey, what are you doin' tonight, California?"

"I'm going to get dressed up nice and pretty and see the Ziegfeld Follies," I said sarcastically, attempting to fit the pages into an envelope.

"Sounds like fun," McIntyre said, insouciant. He was shaving for the first time since I'd met him, looking in a very grimy mirror suspended by the pipe of our wood stove. "But I got a better idea."

"What?"

"Come to the Officer's Club with me. You know Peters? Redhead. Tall," he held his hand high over his head.

"Yeah," I said slowly.

"Word is she's got the hots for you."

"Could've fooled me," I said, somewhat bitterly.

"I know these things," he insisted. "It's a small camp. And anyway, doesn't matter, California—you're driving me crazy. You're driving yourself crazy."

There was a pause as he dragged the razor down his philtrum.

"Nothing a tall drink of water can't fix," he added, chuckling. "You're coming with the Officer's Club with me."

"I'm married," I said.

"I promise I'll be a perfect gentleman."

"I'm serious."

"So am I. Fooling around with Peters isn't gonna hurt nothing."

"It hurts my wife."

"Not mine. She's probably playing back seat bingo with her boss right now," McIntyre dried his face and turned to me and said in a sing-song voice, "She used to be a paper shaker, California. I'm sure she'd be glad to show you a few moves. You could buy her a drink…."

"No," I said flatly.

"Ah, you're no fun," he said with a wave of his hand. He ran a comb through his hair quickly and with that, he was gone. Part of me wished I'd gone with him as I suddenly felt more alone than I was.

By my third week at the MASH, I learned where Trapper went late at night and that his meaningless flirtations in OR weren't so meaningless after all. He drank a lot…usually from the still, but he played poker games in the Officer's Club where his liver had something other than gin destroying it.

I had gotten used to that, and I'd gotten used to Ferret Face and the food (I'm not a picky eater). I'd gotten used to a lot of things, but I refused to admit that I was getting used to the war, I refused to acknowledge that maybe McIntyre was right and I'd eventually get used to all of it.

April was ending, and with it, Korea's short spring. Thus began summer, and it wasn't like California summer—it was rain. All the time. Changwa, the locals called it. Not even sun showers, just rain. The place was depressing enough without being drowned. When I expressed this to McIntyre one wet breakfast, he assured me that toward the end of summer I would be begging for the rain.

Not likely, I thought, shoving my helmet under another leak in the ceiling.

People slowly grew more friendly toward me, including McIntyre, who seemed really reluctant the third time he asked me to join him for a drink.

"This stuff is rotting your insides," he said, motioning at the still. "Or, you wanna go to Rosie's? She—"

"Let's go to the club," I agreed, finishing off my glass and holding my jacket over my head from the ridiculous rain. McIntyre looked surprised that I agreed, but he joined me at the door.

"Ready?" he asked, peering out at the nearly-flooded camp.

"Want to borrow my umbrella?" I asked, nodding up at my jacket.

"One, two….three!"

We dashed across the compound, mud splattering all the way up to my elbows. McIntyre almost fell into a corpsmen shielding a box of sulfa with his body, but other than that we arrived inside the relatively warm Officer's Club unharmed. Except, Trapper and my jacket were soaked. And I was covered with mud, but I'd learned to accept that as a normal part of existence. Mud…came with all the canvas and blood.

It was a quaint little bar, a slot machine and a piano where the priest was playing As Time Goes By as a few people danced. I felt the familiar pang of homesickness, staring at a nurse and one of the chopper pilots wrapped together very snugly. I thought of Peg and the first time we danced—she'd smelled like pound cake and too much trashy perfume, like the good southern girl who was trying to impress the California boys. It was, I suppose, what she w—

"…for California?" McIntyre was asking, sniffling and wiping wet hair off his forehead.

"Bourbon," I said, pulling myself back into reality.

"Out of bourbon," said Klinger, who was tending bar.

"Then I'll have what he's having," I said, waving my hand. "I like your earrings, Klinger."

Burns had made him change into fatigues, but he still wore a nice pair of flowered hoops in his ears anyway. Either he was getting away with them, or Frank hadn't seen. He certainly wasn't around the Officer's Club, and also conveniently missing was Major Houlihan.

"Thank you, sir," Klinger said, sliding a bottle of whiskey toward McIntyre and me as we sat at the bar.

"Maybe I don't want any," McIntyre said, pushing the bottle away.

"What are you, sick?" I asked, jokingly putting my hand on his forehead.

"Yeah," he said, in all seriousness, putting his hand over his forehead. "This rain isn't good for me."

"Well, maybe if you didn't insist on getting soaked every time we go into it," I sighed, raising my own hand to McIntyre's cheek. I used my sleeve to dry it off before putting my palm flat against it. "Wow. Fever."

"Never mind," he said, pulling away from my touch.

"You've got a fever," I insisted. "Look, you're even turning red. Isn't he, Klinger?"

"You do look a little flustered, sir," Klinger agreed.

"Shut up," McIntyre said, getting to his feet. He left, the door banging behind him as he dashed out into the rain again.

"Should I go talk to him?" I asked Klinger.

"Nah," Klinger said with a shrug. "Captain Pierce never did."

I bristled slightly at being compared—again—to Pierce, but I didn't go after McIntyre, either. I sat drinking the warm whiskey alone for a while, chatting idly to various people until Major Burns slid in, looking very wet and agitated.

I wrapped my fingers around the neck of the bottle and began to stand up. "I'll take it to go, Klinger."

But it was too late. Burns sat down right beside me, and slung his arm over my shoulders. I slipped away.

"Oh, I guess I am a little wet," he said laughing, apparently completely clueless. "How are you, BJ?"

I sighed. "Fine, Major."

"How was your day?"

"Fine, Major."

"Good, good. Glad you're getting along good."

"Well."

"Well what?"

"I think you mean 'getting along well'."

Frank giggled. "Oh, yeah. That's what I like about you, BJ. You're always on top of things. So thought you should be the first to know." He nodded.

"First to know what?" I asked, with a small glimmer of hope that he was going to tell me the war was over.

"You and that…and McIntyre," he said almost darkly. But he perked up almost immediately. "Are getting a new roommate."

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Thanks again to Kelly. Love you. Review and get a free baby.