Disclaimer: MASH and its characters... Not mine. Hogan's Heroes and its characters... Not mine. "Who You'd Be Today" by Kenny Chesney... Not mine. William Magnus... Hey, that one is actually mine!
Who You'd Be Today
by J.T. Magnus, "Turbo"
"You know, Ginger," General William Magnus said, again taking a seat by her grave days later, "It's one of those days again. Korea might have been hell, but during the lulls, there was a certain beauty in the land... The sky was bluer than you see it in a lot of places and on a good day, from a good spot, you could see for miles... Well, until a sniper would see you and start taking potshots."
Taking an old photograph out of his pocket, Will looked at it and smiled, "They're rarer here, but sometimes there are days when the sky's so blue I'd almost swear I'm back in Korea and if I turn real quick I'll see you and Baker, Bigalow and Able going after Hawkeye and Trapper or BJ for one of their stunts or Klinger for trying to be 'one of the girls'."
Shaking his head, he laughed, "Poor Max, we always gave him such a hard time. Thing is, he was probably one of the smartest of us all; he was the only one who really tried to get out. He probably would've succeeded if his ideas hadn't been so similar to a lot of what we did back in World War Two. When he found out I was Military Intelligence, he was so sure he would get a Section Eight... Not dressing tips and the address of the clothing store in Hammelburg where we got most of the stuff Peter and Louis used in their disguises..."
"I'm telling the truth, Ginger, some days the sky's so blue, I feel like I can talk to you... You always were the one I felt I could talk to, really..."
At one time, then-Staff Sergeant William Magnus thought he had seen all the possible excuses used - Armistice Day, Chinese New Year, Bastille Day, Independence Day, Oberst Klink's birthday, Colonel Hogan's birthday, Hitler's birthday, The Repeal of Prohibition, even a few days that didn't exist until the Heroes invented them...
Those paled before Hawkeye Pierce and Trapper John McIntyre's latest excuse for a camp-wide party - Annual Sheet Changing Day. From the little sense he could make of it, Will gathered that Hawkeye's idea was for everyone to pull the sheets from their cots, pile them up on a table in the mess tent, drink, party, then grab a random sheet and put it on their cot. For once, the Lieutenant agreed with Majors Houlihan and Burns, he was not switching bed linens with some random person. He had gotten enough of ending up with someone else's ratty sheets and blankets with the switches back at Stalag 13 whenever someone was unlucky enough to have end up with a set in good condition.
"Not going to the party, Lieutenant?"
Turning around, Will smiled at Lieutenant Ginger Bayliss as she walked toward him, "Lieutenant, to a lot of the people in camp, their bedclothes are the worst they'll ever sleep on... After four years of mine being German P.O.W. camp issue, what I've got here might as well be silk."
"What was it like? I mean, if you want to talk about it, after all."
"Hm," Will thought for a moment about how to phrase it without telling too much, "Life in Luftstalag Thirteen can't be described... It had to be experienced."
"That puts me at a loss then, doesn't it, Will?" Ginger smiled back.
"Well, uh... Colonel Hogan was a lot like Hawkeye in a way, always coming up with something - we didn't leave Stalag Thirteen until the war was over, but something was always going. And Louis, he was French from the top of his beret to the soles of his boots, which wasn't that far - he was usually an easy-going sort, but I think he'd want to hurt Igor for calling what he makes 'food.' You see, even though he flew for the Free French during the war, after it Louis returned to his original career, being a chef. That's not even going into the others, Jim, Peter, Andy, Dick - oh, Dick hated the fact that I never called anyone by their real names... Well, except for Peter since he didn't look or act like a Pete... I'm rambling, aren't I?"
"No!" Ginger answered, almost too quickly, "No, not at all. It's just that you don't usually talk so freely about your old friends I was surprised."
Laughing, Will smiled, "Believe me on this, you wouldn't believe me if I told you why. What about you?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, for example, Bigelow's been an Army nurse since the tail end of World War Two, Dish is engaged, Baker's married to a Marine, just to name three of the other nurses, but no one knows anything about you. Where did the name 'Ginger' come from, for example?"
"Genevieve."
"What?" Will asked at Ginger's almost whispered response.
"My full name, William Thomas Magnus," she said, using his own full name to address him with, "is Genevieve Odessa Bayliss..."
"I don't like my name," Ginger said, looking almost like a child who had seen a small animal dying.
"I like it," Will whispered, stepping closer to her so only she could hear, "It's a pretty name for a pretty woman."
"...A very pretty woman," he whispered even softer before letting himself give into the urge to kiss her.
When the two finally pulled apart a moment later, they continued to stare into each other's eyes.
"Will..."
"Ginger..."
"I have Post-Op duty in a few minutes."
"I have no plans for tonight, remember? I don't mind sitting in on an extra Post-Op shift," he answered, with you remaining unspoken.
"Well, well, look who's here, the amateur doctor," Frank Burns sneered as the two Lieutenants walked into the Post-Op ward a few minutes later.
"Burns, if you're a professional," Will countered, "I take that as a compliment."
"Lieutenant, I can have you put on report for disrespect to a superior officer."
Will looked through Frank, "'No,' as they say, 'merely a higher-ranking one.'"
"Oh, Nuts to you!" Frank exclaimed, slapping his clipboard down on the desk and storming out.
"Where were we?"
"Let's see," Will thought for a moment, "Name... birthplace?"
"New York," Ginger answered, "But I thought it was more along the lines of right... about... here."
With each word she had inched her face closer to his and before the echos of the last word had fully died was pressing their lips together once more.
"You'd think that at some point Frank would've stopped complaining because everyone was better than him and start thinking about WHY even a lieutenant with no training who had learned helping the medic in a prison camp was a better doctor than he was..."
A smile slowly found its way across his face, "For being the first time we kissed, we did it good... Genevieve..."