5
Hawkeye just stared at her with disbelief. He had a daughter. A daughter that he could never get know. A daughter that would never know that he was her father. He was deeply hurt and angered, but he couldn't let Margaret know. He just had to cover it up. Maybe even go through the whole "Margaret routine" and pretend that it doesn't bother him.
"Why didn't you ever tell me?" he asked with his voice starting to get shaky.
Margaret could easily see the hurt and pain in his eyes. She grabbed his hand off her shoulder and squeezed it.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"I was scared. I mean you were in the mental hospital and afraid to even go near a child. How could I tell you that you had one?" she asked.
He just stared at her. Shaking his head he looked down.
"I have a daughter and you wait until she's dead to tell me?" he asked more harshly then he had anticipated and completely ignoring her reasoning.
Margaret pulled away a little and looked into his eyes. It's not like she wasn't expecting that, but it hurt. Now the man she loved would never trust her.
Hawkeye looked up and sighed. She was right. But he still felt betrayed. He also knew how vulnerable she was and he could never hurt her. The more that he thought about it, he was beginning to feel guilty. He got her pregnant and then left her on her own making her feel as if she couldn't even call him.
"Could you tell me about her?" he asked.
Margaret nodded. Standing up she kept hold of his hand. He followed her. They ended up walking into her room. He looked around. There was a pile of flowers in the corner which he figured were for the funeral. Another thing that caught his eye was a small teddy bear on her bed. He smiled as he went over and sat down next to it.
"Picking up Radar's habits?" he asked.
Margaret turned to look at him.
"I guess. That was Serena's. I sleep with it now," she said.
As Margaret went into her suitcase on the floor over next to the door, he sat there and held the teddy bear. It was small and had a pink bow. For some reason it made him feel empty. Like something was missing. Of course, he had also just been told that his daughter died.
"Did Serena give it a name?" he asked just staring at it.
"Actually, she named it Hawkeye," Margaret said.
Hawkeye looked up with surprise. Margaret grabbed a book out of the suitcase and then walked over to him and joined him on the bed.
"Angela had The Last of The Mohicans sitting out on her coffee table and Serena asked me to read her a little bit of it, so I did. Of course, she lost interest after I read one page, but she still liked Hawkeye," Margaret said.
Hawkeye smiled up at her. It felt like he was thanking her for something that happened by coincidence. Either way, he liked the idea.
Margaret sighed and looked down at the book. It was a photo album that she had kept. Opening it up, she ran her hand over the first page. The book was in chronological order with the first pictures being with Serena when she was an infant.
"I was over the due date when she was born so I was basically twice as nervous and then when I finally did go into labor I was over with my sister and her daughter who was only five at the time," Margaret said staring down at the page.
"I scared the poor little girl when I had my first contraction," Margaret looked up and smiled a little.
"I had been in labor a little longer then I had been aware of and when I noticed I screamed and Angela grabbed my hand," she said and laughed a little.
"Brenda was down on the ground playing with her dolls and then she looks up at me with these huge eyes just staring at me," she said.
Margaret laughed a little which made Hawkeye feel better.
"And then Angela's hand starts to bleed because my nails went into it," she said.
"And apparently Brenda doesn't handle blood too well," Margaret said.
Hawkeye enjoyed finally getting to see that smile on her face. It hurt him to see her upset like she was downstairs.
"I told you that you needed to cut your nails," he said jokingly.
"Probably gave her nightmares," Margaret said.
She sighed and looked back down at the pictures. There was nothing in those pictures that she would ever forget, yet it felt like she was being reminded of what she did have. Hawkeye looked over. He still couldn't believe that all this time he was a father. Margaret finally turned the page. The picture that caught his eye was one of Serena sitting on the ground playing with a daisy.
"She always loved daisies," Margaret said.
Margaret looked up at Hawkeye and slightly smiled.
"Like the ones that you would give to me sometimes when you would come back from Seoul," she said.
"I remember that," he said still staring at the picture.
The next one that caught his attention was one of her standing on the porch. She looked like she was dressed up for something. Her black hair had berets pulling the hair back behind the ears similar to the way that Margaret would wear hers with bangs loosely framing her face. She was wearing a pink dress that had a bow in the center with white nylons and black buckle shoes. But the thing that really caught him was the necklace she was wearing.
"Is that?" he asked pointing.
"The locket you gave me," she said and then looked up at him.
"I wanted her to have something from you so I gave it to her," she said and then focused her attention back to the pictures.
"I know that it's silly to give jewelry like that to a three year old, but I felt like I had to," she said.
He didn't think it was silly. He was actually glad that she did have something from him. For some odd reason it gave him the feeling of being remembered.
"I still keep it with me," Margaret said with her voice getting shaky as she pulled it out of her pocket.
"I keep with me, like she often did," Margaret said now starting to cry.
She stared down at it in her hand as he grabbed her shoulders.
"I miss her so much," she said.
"I know. I miss her and I didn't even know her," Hawkeye said.
Margaret wiped her eyes and looked over at Hawkeye with bitterness.
"Why did she have to die? She never did anything wrong to anybody," Margaret said crying.
He had no idea how to answer that.
"She would have been four today. She could've had the chance to meet her father. Damn it! She would have been down there celebrating and having a good time with every one!" she cried out.
Margaret looked down and closed the book and securely embraced it in her arms.
"She was all I had, and now she's gone. Gone forever and I'll never see her again," Margaret said softly as she looked up and blankly stared.
"That's not true, you still have me," he said.
"Then why the hell do I feel so damn alone?" she asked.
Hawkeye held onto her as she curled up and laid down on her side. He rubbed her shoulder as she rested her head on his leg. Margaret continued to cry as she held onto the photo album. Hawkeye looked down at her. He knew that he had to be strong for her. On the inside he felt like breaking down, but he couldn't. Instead he sat there as he was and tried to comfort her, knowing that there was no real way to make her feel better at the moment.