This was wrong.
Wasn't it?
Margaret didn't have time to contemplate the consequences of her upcoming actions as she packed, anger in every grip. It was all flooding back to her; every time Hawkeye had annoyed her, belittled her, or just didn't respect her in the past. She knew, way in the back of her mind, that it was different now, but hormones and raw anger are a nasty combination.
She looked at her gold-rose watch that dangled on her wrist. It was nearly eleven, Hawkeye was in post-op. No, she was not going to say goodbye to him. That's what a silent treatment is, and he needed a full does of it.
"Daddy's being a jerk," she muttered to her unborn infant. She buttoned up her dress uniform, but her hands slowed as if it was the will of the air around her. Her thoughts, consumed by Hawkeye, turned glum.
She missed him.
The thought was small, a rose hidden by a jungle of rough terrain and monstrous trees. However, it was there, and it was true. She missed him, and with every passing hour, she missed him more.
A knock sounded at her door, and she correctly identified the rough, unorderly knock as Corporal Klinger. "Come in," she replied.
Klinger opened the door, in uniform, thank goodness. "Major, your jeep is here. Should I get Captain Pierce to say goodbye to you?"
She shook her head. She could practically feel her unborn baby looking down on her for being so petty and stubborn. "No, thank you, Corporal. We...said our goodbyes earlier."
Not being the dunce she took him for, Klinger knew that was a lie. "Major, can I say something?" He moved to take one of her bags, and she nodded.
"Maybe you should talk to him. The silent treatment only prolongs the fighting, so why drag it out?" The chances of Margaret taking his advice were slim to none, but if Klinger had learned anything, it was that slim chances were pretty good.
Unfortunately, his usual slim chances weren't enough. "Thank you for the advice, Klinger, but I am not speaking to that low-life."
Klinger shrugged his shoulders and took his defeat in good taste. He slung her bag into the trunk, smiling kindly. "Alright, it's your choice. And hey, congratulations on the baby."
It felt good to smile, Margaret realized. "Thank you." She got into the jeep, glad to notice that her driver seemed relatively quiet. She wasn't into the mood to talk to strangers.
"No problem, Major. Have a good time."
She waved him off as the engine sputtered, cackled, coughed, and finally got out of bed and cracked to life. They took off, sending Korean dirt and dust soaring behind them.
Klinger watched as she left, sighing.
Hawkeye walked up behind him. "She said no, huh?"
"She didn't even want to speak to you, Captain. Sorry, I tried."
Hawkeye had guessed as much. He wouldn't change a thing about her, not one trait of tendency, but sometimes, very occasionally, she could drive him up a wall. How was he supposed to win her back when she kept avoiding him?
You're supposed to tell her why you don't want to get married.
Oh, yeah. He forgot about that.
The mood of their little space of Korea shifted, falling down a cavern of melancholy, murky water. "What if she doesn't say goodbye?"
The remark, while tied down to pounds of emotion, confused the Corporal next to him. "Huh? She already left?"
Shaking his head, Hawkeye started walking towards the Swamp, not to mention its gin. "No, I mean when she leaves for the States. She'll say goodbye to me, right? She wouldn't leave me like that." He was longing for some amount of assurance, no matter how small.
As he walked into the Swamp, Klinger nodded. "Don't worry, Captain. Even she wouldn't leave you like that."
Hawkeye took one last glance out towards the Korean dirt. If he closed his eyes, he could imagine her driving back down that road, a smile on her face as she walked over to him.
Shaking the ides of miracles off, Hawkeye motioned the stil. "I hope so."
#
Many terrible, headache-inducing, cramped hours later, Margaret's feet were in Tokyo.
She looked around at the airport. She hadn't walked inside such a massive, giant of a building in months, since her last Tokyo visit. The walls stretched like a rubber band, suspended into the ceiling. She ran her fingers lazily over the brick of the wall, running through and over the cracks and occasional chips.
She walked towards the exit, where she would get a taxi and forget about Hawkeye for the next two days.
"Ma'am?" An MP, a rough, burly man of nearly gigantic stature waved a brick hand in front of her. "Aer, you Major Houlihan?"
Her mind and gut told her not to panic, but something about the man was putting her on edge. "Yes, what's the problem?"
With a click of his mouth, he motioned to another MP, possibly even more massive than the first, to join him. "Major, we have orders that you are, and have been for some time, pregnant. You're going to have to go to the States on the first plane."
Any breath in Margaret's body flew away.
Her vision skipping beats, she tried to find some traction in the smooth ground. "I…Is that necessary? I told my commanding officer, he said the orders weren't do for about a week. Why would I have to go home now?"
The second MP whispered to the first. "Hormones. Why would anyone want to stay in Korea during the war?" The first nodded, and let his companion continue. "Look, Major, you're going on the next plane, handcuffs or not."
Her temper flared at the mention of restraints, and she backed away from the men. "I will not be restrained like some dog!"
"We agree, Major." The first MP said, a sick smirk streaming onto his face. "Everything will be fine, as long as you get onto the next plane for the States, leaves in a couple hours."
Thankfully, her well-groomed common sense saved her from further trouble. "Can I at least make a phone call?"
He shrugged. "Sure, you can do whatever you want, as long as we keep an eye on you until you get onto that plane."
As soon as they sat down, Margaret's throbbing heart took her to the nearest payphone. Her jittery hands dropped the dime three times, but as soon as it was in, she practically bit the operator's head off. "Get me through to M*A*S*H 4077th, yes, it's an emergency, would I be yelling at you like this if it wasn't?" Her tone had the desired effect, and she was talking to Klinger within the next five minutes.
"Major?" She could hear the bags under his eyes as he answered the phone. "Do you have any idea what time it is? I realize that people in Tokyo get more sleep, but for us in Army Cot Central over here–"
"Shut up and get Pierce on the phone!"
That certainly woke him up.
Klinger's spine straightened, he hadn't heard that inflection, that whip-crack in her voice in quite a while. "Uh, yes, Major, one second."
Margaret tried, unsuccessfully, to clutch a few deep breathes as the empty static buzzed like a bee in her ear.
Would he even come to the phone? Most likely. She knew he wanted a reconciliation. Passing over her words and actions to him in the past days, she realized that she had been somewhat harsh, no matter what he had done.
She sighed, leaning her jackhammer of a head against the phone. When she had first found out about her pregnancy, he was there. He had comforted her, held her hand, told her she would be fine, and did whatever she asked, or commanded, him to do. She didn't want to think about how her reaction to his wedding-reluctance may have been over-the-top.
"Margaret? Gee, I thought we hated each other again."
Her glum, regretful mourning snapped into panic. "Pierce, get to Tokyo now. Right now."
The stammering, she had to admit, was a guilty pleasure, even in the crisis of the moment. "Ma-Margaret, I know you've missed me, but right now?" He was being oh-so 'himself', and yesterday, that would've annoyed her, but now, it only stabbed her heart.
"Yes, right now," she persisted. Her eyes darted to the clock above her. "You have to come now. Somehow, they found out I was pregnant, and I'm being sent home today."
"I'll be there, I'll go AWOL for all I care."
She smiled. That angry, determined glint in his voice did wonders for her mood. "There's the man I've been missing. Hawkeye, I have to go, but we'll talk when you get here."
"Alright. I'll get there as soon as I can. When does your flight leave?"
"In three hours."
The cruel reality was that he had very little time; even if he left that instant, catching her would be like finding a rose in a three-mile stretch of thorns. "I'll be there," he promised. "I love you."
Goodness, she had missed those words. "I love you, too. Get here, soon, alright?"
"I will. I love you."
"I love you more."
The operator cut them off, and all her empty, swarming anger punched her in the stomach all over again.
She looked up to the clock once more. "Hawkeye, hurry."