Katherine LOVED classical music. So getting a record player of her own for her tent and a copy of Ethel Smyth's The Wreckers was a HUGE boon for her.
She sat on her cot in her tent, with Swordy sitting on her bedside table attached to a belt that Katherine looped over her shoulder whenever she left the tent - Swordy would always be watching her back. She let the music roll over her, thinking how one day, maybe, the abuse she'd suffered at the hands of her family would never happen to anyone else.
She heard a knocking at her door. "Come in!" She called, feeling in good spirits. Margaret Houlihan walked in, looking curious and excited.
"Is that music? Oh that is beautiful!" Margaret clasped her hands. "I thought I heard music!"
"Please, take a seat ma'am." Katherine offered the Major a seat.
"Thank you!" Margaret smiled at the Captain.
They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes, listening to the Overture, which was forever Katherines favourite piece of music.
"I'm not really familiar with classical music, but it does sound so pretty." Margaret admitted.
Katherine looked at the other woman, wondering how much she dared to say. Finally, she figured it wouldn't hurt. "We always went to the opera in Italy and France, the few times we got over there. There were other families we went with, and my friend Charles is the one who first made my family take me with them. I was hooked from the first note."
"You've been to Italy and France?!" Margaret gasped.
Figuring there was nothing left to lose, Katherine continued. "My mother comes from old money, and my stepfather comes from oil money. That's how he became a General, even though he should be in the stockade."
"But…that would make you…" Margaret didn't want to say it.
"Illegitimate. Yes, my mother got around before she got married and I've paid for it." Katherine sighed as the music got stronger and stronger. Margaret wisely said no more, letting the music say it all. She realised how hard it must have been for Katherine, being the illegitimate child of a very wealthy couple.
The music ended. Katherine smiled. The Wreckers always made her feel stronger.
"Thank you for letting me listen with you." Margaret said, getting up. "And you needn't worry, I won't tell anyone what you told me."
Katherine looked up at the older nurse. "Maybe it would be easier if you did." She admitted. She looked at Swordy and picked him up. "Ever since Captain Pierce gave this sword to me…"
"We're not all that bad you know. You should come out sometimes and say hi." Margaret suggested with a smile. Katherine smiled back.
"CHOPPERS! CHOPPERS!" They heard Radar yelling in the compound. Sure enough, the sound of a helicopter followed him.
"Well, looks like I have no choice but to come out now." Katherine joked, strapping Swordy to her back.
"We'll have to do this again sometime." Margaret looked at Katherine, who realised what it would mean if she accepted.
Here goes nothing…
"I have a few Mozart records coming soon, if you'd like to listen to them with me when they get here?" Katherine offered.
"I'd love to, now let's go!" Margaret burst out of the tent with Katherine close behind.
And that was how Katherine made a friend.
–
Katherine had just finished up another patient when Trapper yelled to Hawkeye that he needed help with a belly full of shrapnel.
"I can help you McIntyre." Frank offered.
"I'll wait." Trapper snapped.
"I can help if you show me." Katherine volunteered tentatively.
"Sure!" Trapper responded, surprised that Katherine was offering to help. Katherine pulled on a set of gloves and began to help look for metal that should never have been in that kids body to begin with.
"Why do you keep handing me the wrong instruments?!" Frank then exploded on the nurse who was helping him.
"Because you keep asking for the wrong instruments." Hawkeye sassed back.
"Is this going to be the whole war?" Katherine groaned under her breath to Trapper.
"Only as long as Frank is here." Trapper replied.
"I heard that!" Frank snapped.
"How about you mind your business?" Trapper fired back.
"Oh boy." Katherine pulled a piece of metal carefully out of the boy as Hawkeye threatened Frank with a spleen across the mouth.
"Gentlemen! Remember, you're doctors!" Margaret scolded them.
Katherine tried to block it all out and concentrated on her work, carefully pulling out metal and closing the wounds. She didn't hear Spearchuckers question, or the varied answers, or Frank and Hawkeye snapping at each other. Not with a shell fragment lodged in the boys small intestine.
Ugh.
–
"You did very well today. You're getting better and better at this." Trapper said as he and Katherine walked back to their tents after walking through Post-Op together a few hours after surgery had finished.
"Thank you." Katherine said, trying her best to be friendly as Margaret had suggested.
"Why don't you come over to the Swamp and we'll have a drink and we can talk about how things went?" Trapper offered.
And that was a bridge too far.
"No thank you. Good day!" Katherine immediately scurried to her own tent. Trapper cursed himself for coming on too strong.
"Did you offend Katherine?" Hawkeye asked as Trapper fell into the Swamp, exhausted.
"Offered to have her come over to discuss medicine, I think she took me the wrong way." Trapper explained.
"How else WAS she supposed to take that?" Hawkeye grinned.
"I was being honest! I thought we could go over these medical journals that came in." Trapper pointed out.
"MY journals, thank you!" Hawkeye snatched them back. Just then, Radar came in telling Hawkeye that Colonel Blake wanted to see him.
Meanwhile Katherine was back in her tent listening to The Wreckers again and polishing Swordy. She was feeling a bit shaken by Trappers invitation, wondering if she was doing the right thing by opening up. She looked at Swordy. Did they think that just because they gave her a present that she was going to put out for them? She sheathed the sword and sighed.
It was a good thing she sheathed Swordy when she did because a knock at the door made her jump a mile. "Come in!" She tried not to sound annoyed.
"Mail call! Another letter from the General and another medical journal." Radar said, trying to get in and out as fast as he could without getting his head bitten off.
"Corporal, wait." Katherine stopped him.
Radar stopped, waiting to be told off.
"Is there anything in here worth reading?" She asked him, seeing a way to try and make a new friend.
"I didn't read it! Honest!" Radar cried.
"Radar, we both know you did. Give me the cliff notes." Katherine rolled her eyes.
"He mentioned one of your brothers is now a Lieutenant and the other two have their own platoons and…gee whiz don't make me say it." Radar groaned.
"More notes about how I'm an embarrassment to the family? More hints about how he'd like to keep abusing me?" Katherine asked.
"Pretty much. I'm sorry." Radar slumped.
"Thanks Radar, saves me suffering through it." Katherine sighed. She threw the letter in the firepit without even reading it.
"Your stepfather sounds really awful." Radar ventured.
"He is. Unfortunately because of my family status and my Mom getting pregnant they had to marry her off quickly. No one else wanted to marry my stepfather so his parents were happy to foist him off on us." Katherine lay on her cot. "He's a disgusting pig and his three sons are just as bad."
"Are those your brothers?" Radar asked.
"Half-brothers. Keith Jr is the oldest, then Royston and Harold." Katherine told him. "All of them are younger than me, and whenever they did something wrong I got scolded for it."
"Wow." Radar said. "I had a brother and a sister, but they both died when they were babies."
"That's sad." Katherine said.
"Yeah. My Dad was kinda old though, so I don't really remember him either." Radar sat on the cot. "I was always scared Mom was gonna marry again and that they wouldn't like me."
"My Dad disappeared when he found out Mom was pregnant apparently. I don't think she even knows who he is." Katherine sat up and looked at Radar. "I go by my grandmothers maiden name, Miller. I can't stand anyone else in my family."
"Was your Grandma nice?" Radar asked.
"She tolerated me better than other people did." Katherine sighed. "Anyway, you have mail to hand out, you don't need to hear my life story."
"Oh no I don't mind. It was nice to talk to you, you're usually…well…I mean…" Radar quickly tried to backtrack.
"It's okay Radar. I'm trying to turn over a new leaf after Pierce gave me this sword." Katherine smiled at the scared little Corporal.
"Oh...hey, I was in the office earlier and did you know that Hawkeye is now the Chief Surgeon?" Radar told her.
"How did that happen?" Katherine asked, curious.
"Major Burns made a whole heap of complaints about him, and so he and Hawkeye had to go to the Colonels office and suddenly Hawkeye is Chief Surgeon!"
"That's great!" Katherine smiled.
"Yeah, you should come to the ceremony we're having in the Mess Tent for him tonight. He'd like that!" Radar said.
"I will! Thanks Radar. I wish my little brothers were like you." Katherine got up with Radar to see him out.
"I wish so too. You'd make a swell big sister." Radar left.
Katherine beamed. After Radar left she looked at Swordy and hugged the sword to her chest. "I'm actually making friends! And to think I've been so sullen since I got here. I owe Hawkeye for this."
–
"Did you hear?!" Margaret said about a hour later as the pair sat down for coffee at the Mess.
"About Pierce? I think it's great!" Katherine replied.
"GREAT?! It's a military travesty!" Margaret cried. "A Captain as Chief Surgeon over a Major?"
Katherine froze. She realised that her friend and her benefactor were two people who utterly despised one another.
"I mean don't get me wrong Pierce is a great surgeon but he has no respect! No discipline! No military courtesy!" Margaret continued to rant on. "And poor Frank…"
"I mean, I feel bad for Frank, but can't they work together?" Katherine suggested timidly.
"Work TOGETHER?" Margaret scoffed. "I mean they COULD but do you really see that happening?"
"I guess not." Katherine sighed. "Did you get anything interesting in the mail today?"
"Just a letter from my Mom and one from my Dad. Did you get anything interesting?" Margaret fired back.
"Just a medical journal and a letter from my stepfather. Thankfully Radar pre-read it for me so I didn't have to." Katherine joked.
"That Corporal. Another example of the mismanagement around here." Margaret sighed. "But I'm glad he was able to help you."
Katherine then told Margaret about what had happened in her tent. "I feel so much better now that I'm opening up. You have to admit Pierce did something nice when he bought me Swordy." Katherine reached back and touched the sword that rested on her shoulder.
"He does have his moments." Margaret admitted. "I suppose you'll be going to his little to-do tonight?"
"Yes…I want to try and make more friends." Katherine looked down at her meal.
"Hmm. You should be careful. Your friends can have an influence on your career, for good or for bad." Margaret advised her.
Katherine felt confused. Margaret then saw Frank and the pair quietly left together, leaving Katherine to her thoughts.
–
That evening Katherine and Swordy headed to the Mess tent to see if they could be of any help setting up for Hawkeyes coronation.
"Oh that'd be great, can you help me stir up the punch?" Nurse Kellye asked.
"Absolutely!" Katherine grabbed a bowl of water and some of the powdered drink. "Why is everything so powdered?"
"Honestly some days I feel like I'm powdered." Kellye sighed, stirring up a bowl herself. "Say, it's great to see you come out of your tent, we never expected you to come tonight."
"Well, I've decided to try making friends, and it seems to be going okay." Katherine shrugged.
"Well that's amazing! I'm sure you'll be friends with the whole camp in no time!" Kellye smiled. Katherine smiled back.
Kellye spent the time mixing telling Katherine all about life in Honolulu and Hawaii. She also shared a bit of gossip about the camp, including the rumours about Majors Burns and Houlihan.
"Huh. Makes sense now that I think about it." Katherine stopped stirring for a second. "Well then!"
"I know, right?" Kellye said. "And she gives US such a hard time!"
Katherine couldn't help but agree. Yet she still wanted to be friends with Margaret. There was something about the Major that felt right.
Soon, the ceremony started. Katherine thought it was all rather dull but she did her best to seem interested. She was just about to fall asleep when Hawkeye said something that stuck with her:
"Honestly, when you live in a cruddy situation like this long enough, you get to love a few people…and even hate a few. I guess, outside of our families, we'll never be closer to anybody than we are to each other."
Katherine remembered with a sinking heart that her family hated her for being born outside of marriage. These people were going to be the people who she was going to be closest with for the rest of her life.
"What'd I get on the humble metre?"
Katherine joined in the boos at that one.
–
A few days later, Katherines Mozart records arrived.
She had her table set out with a nice tablecloth and a nice bottle of wine she'd gotten last time she'd had R and R in Seoul. There were saltines and a bit of Army chocolate.
"I'm not too early am I?" Margaret came in with a small knock.
"Not at all! Grab a seat, the show is about to start!" Katherine replied with a smile. So what if Margaret didn't get along with everyone. She was still nice to Katherine, and offered her friendship plainly.
Besides, you need someone to enjoy a good wine and some music with!