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mash_slash2006-12-20 12:47 am
smithy161.livejournal.com) wrote in mash_slash2006-12-20 12:47 am
Entry tags:
(no subject)
Title: Monsters
Pairing: Hawkeye/BJ, sort of
Rating: G
Summary: When he was a little boy, Hawkeye Pierce was afraid of the monster in the shadows in the corner of his bedroom
When he was a little boy, Hawkeye Pierce was afraid of the monster in the shadows in the corner of his bedroom. He never told anybody else about it. If he called for his dad, the monster would get to him first. It was in the same room, after all. It would get him, and his dad would find nothing but an empty bed, so he kept very still and very quiet and pulled the sheets right up over his nose – but never over his eyes. If he was going to have a fighting chance, he had to be able to see it coming. So he sat up all night with his eyes fixed on the shadows in the corner, just beyond the window where the light from the lamp outside couldn’t reach, until he drifted off to sleep.
He never really thought about the monster all that much. He didn’t have to, because it was real. You don’t have to think much about real things. It’s the things that aren’t real you need to think long and hard about, and that’s why being a priest is such a life-consuming commitment, he realises now. He doesn’t know what the monster looked like, because he never saw it. Sometimes he heard it, though, creaking like an old floorboard, or rustling like carelessly hung clothes sliding off hangers. Occasionally it groaned like a water pipe, or hooted like an owl. It could make all kinds of noises, but he knew it was always the monster. The monster that wanted to get him.
The difference with this new monster is that it doesn’t want to get him. Not really. When he was a boy, it was a personal vendetta, a one-on-one stand-off between old enemies. The rules were simple. If he moved or made a sound it would leap out and get him; if he lay perfectly still and silent it would leave him be for another night. This monster could get him any time, no matter how quietly he lay, and while it knew everything about him, he would be swept up by it like a bit of random debris, unnoticed and irrelevant.
It does make noises though, this new monster, and he’s fairly sure he knows what it looks like. At any rate, it’s green. And it howls and screams and whirrs, and there are explosions and shouting. It sounds like a pistol going off, or it sounds like a man falling to the ground, or it sounds like a woman crying, but it’s always the monster. Sometimes, just like when he was a boy, it doesn’t have to make any sound at all, and he doesn’t have to see it. It’s there; he just knows. And it’s going to get him.
Sometimes he lies awake with the covers pulled up over his nose, and he tries to work out how quickly it can get him. He wonders if he calls out to BJ, will the monster get to him first? Certainly BJ is nearer to Hawkeye now than his father was all those years ago, and the monster is further away. But monsters don’t obey human rules, and it could get to Hawkeye in that fractured moment between making the decision and opening his mouth. It bothers him, though. Calling Dad was never really an option, and after considering it, he could safely dismiss it. But now, this time, there might be a chance. Maybe the monster is preoccupied with getting other people, and won’t notice Hawkeye has said anything until BJ is safely in beside him, protecting him.
Once or twice he decides to make the dash across the tent to BJ’s cot, throw himself under the covers, and shut his eyes, but when it comes to the crucial moment he can’t make his body get out of bed. The most primal of childhood instincts keep him pinned to the mattress. He knows, he can feel it – the monster will get him.
There’s no choice, in the end. He lies in his cot with the covers pulled up, eyes fixed on the opposite side of the tent, willing his breathing to stay slow, and shallow, and silent, and he waits for sleep to take him. He tries to remember how he got to sleep as a boy. He never counted sheep, because he wanted to be a doctor, not a farmer, and doctors certainly never counted sheep. Perhaps he studied the patterns on the walls, or sang to himself. He can’t remember now. Funny really, how he can remember what the wallpaper was like in his childhood room, but not how to fall asleep with a monster watching your every move from the dark.
Eventually the sun comes up. That used to mean safety, but not now. He can’t shut his eyes as he shivers in the early morning chill, and when BJ sits on the end of the cot a tingle of fear slithers up his spine. It’s going to get me.
“Couldn’t sleep?” says BJ amicably, pulling green socks on to go with his green pants.
“There was a monster in the tent,” says Hawkeye, regretting every word, because talking about it means it will get you.
“Nah, that’s just Frank.”
He shuts his eyes, and listens to the sounds of BJ getting ready for his shift. He can still feel it, somewhere out there in the sort-of-light, but it’s okay now. It’s like after his father comes in and opens the curtains, and the daytime world is still out there, and the monster is sleeping and invisible until nightfall. It can’t get him now. Not now.
“Catch you later,” says BJ, on his way out. But Hawkeye is finally asleep.
Pairing: Hawkeye/BJ, sort of
Rating: G
Summary: When he was a little boy, Hawkeye Pierce was afraid of the monster in the shadows in the corner of his bedroom
When he was a little boy, Hawkeye Pierce was afraid of the monster in the shadows in the corner of his bedroom. He never told anybody else about it. If he called for his dad, the monster would get to him first. It was in the same room, after all. It would get him, and his dad would find nothing but an empty bed, so he kept very still and very quiet and pulled the sheets right up over his nose – but never over his eyes. If he was going to have a fighting chance, he had to be able to see it coming. So he sat up all night with his eyes fixed on the shadows in the corner, just beyond the window where the light from the lamp outside couldn’t reach, until he drifted off to sleep.
He never really thought about the monster all that much. He didn’t have to, because it was real. You don’t have to think much about real things. It’s the things that aren’t real you need to think long and hard about, and that’s why being a priest is such a life-consuming commitment, he realises now. He doesn’t know what the monster looked like, because he never saw it. Sometimes he heard it, though, creaking like an old floorboard, or rustling like carelessly hung clothes sliding off hangers. Occasionally it groaned like a water pipe, or hooted like an owl. It could make all kinds of noises, but he knew it was always the monster. The monster that wanted to get him.
The difference with this new monster is that it doesn’t want to get him. Not really. When he was a boy, it was a personal vendetta, a one-on-one stand-off between old enemies. The rules were simple. If he moved or made a sound it would leap out and get him; if he lay perfectly still and silent it would leave him be for another night. This monster could get him any time, no matter how quietly he lay, and while it knew everything about him, he would be swept up by it like a bit of random debris, unnoticed and irrelevant.
It does make noises though, this new monster, and he’s fairly sure he knows what it looks like. At any rate, it’s green. And it howls and screams and whirrs, and there are explosions and shouting. It sounds like a pistol going off, or it sounds like a man falling to the ground, or it sounds like a woman crying, but it’s always the monster. Sometimes, just like when he was a boy, it doesn’t have to make any sound at all, and he doesn’t have to see it. It’s there; he just knows. And it’s going to get him.
Sometimes he lies awake with the covers pulled up over his nose, and he tries to work out how quickly it can get him. He wonders if he calls out to BJ, will the monster get to him first? Certainly BJ is nearer to Hawkeye now than his father was all those years ago, and the monster is further away. But monsters don’t obey human rules, and it could get to Hawkeye in that fractured moment between making the decision and opening his mouth. It bothers him, though. Calling Dad was never really an option, and after considering it, he could safely dismiss it. But now, this time, there might be a chance. Maybe the monster is preoccupied with getting other people, and won’t notice Hawkeye has said anything until BJ is safely in beside him, protecting him.
Once or twice he decides to make the dash across the tent to BJ’s cot, throw himself under the covers, and shut his eyes, but when it comes to the crucial moment he can’t make his body get out of bed. The most primal of childhood instincts keep him pinned to the mattress. He knows, he can feel it – the monster will get him.
There’s no choice, in the end. He lies in his cot with the covers pulled up, eyes fixed on the opposite side of the tent, willing his breathing to stay slow, and shallow, and silent, and he waits for sleep to take him. He tries to remember how he got to sleep as a boy. He never counted sheep, because he wanted to be a doctor, not a farmer, and doctors certainly never counted sheep. Perhaps he studied the patterns on the walls, or sang to himself. He can’t remember now. Funny really, how he can remember what the wallpaper was like in his childhood room, but not how to fall asleep with a monster watching your every move from the dark.
Eventually the sun comes up. That used to mean safety, but not now. He can’t shut his eyes as he shivers in the early morning chill, and when BJ sits on the end of the cot a tingle of fear slithers up his spine. It’s going to get me.
“Couldn’t sleep?” says BJ amicably, pulling green socks on to go with his green pants.
“There was a monster in the tent,” says Hawkeye, regretting every word, because talking about it means it will get you.
“Nah, that’s just Frank.”
He shuts his eyes, and listens to the sounds of BJ getting ready for his shift. He can still feel it, somewhere out there in the sort-of-light, but it’s okay now. It’s like after his father comes in and opens the curtains, and the daytime world is still out there, and the monster is sleeping and invisible until nightfall. It can’t get him now. Not now.
“Catch you later,” says BJ, on his way out. But Hawkeye is finally asleep.