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[hawkeyesmartini.livejournal.com]

Something I wrote over the weekend. Hope you like. A thousand pardons for those who see this more than once.

Title : Seeing
Author: hawkeyesmartini
Rating: PG13 should do it.
Fandom: M*A*S*H
Pairing & Genre: B-eye / humour-general
Feedback: Greatly appreciated
Archive: ff.n, hawkeyeisbi, a few other places. Do not take without permission.
Email: hawkeyesmartini@livejournal.com

Warnings: A bit of language
Summary: Hawkeye and Trapper meet in a bar and each sees different things. Sucky summary, I know, but...just work with me, all right?

Disclaimers: Characters not mine, setting is, blah blah, I'm reincarnated Jell-o, you know the drill. Onwards.
A/N : Title sucks, ending I'm not too sure about. Otherwise, enjoy.

Seeing

At eleven-thirty on a Friday night, Dave’s Pub under the 89th Street bridge is full of people. Mostly youngish people, around twenty to thirty-five, dancing or otherwise socializing under soft lighting and loud music. John "Trapper" McIntyre is standing in the doorjamb, humming slightly under his breath as he surveys the scene. A couple of days ago he had found a number, made a call...

Friday, Hawkeye had said. The war had been over for almost two years, and Trapper had one day flipped a page in the newspaper and was greeted by a face he knew, he knew...Hawkeye still had it – of course he did. He had just been awarded something or other, a grant from the government for his achievements...big whoop. But that face brought back some memories. And it had made Trapper smile. He found the number.

He looks around once more and now sees someone seated at a cheap table across the room. The man with shaggy black hair and a smile no one could forget holds up a martini glass, and he grins. That Hawkeye grin. Trapper lifts a hand and begins to walk over.

"Hey hey!" he says.

"Trapper!" Hawkeye exclaims, standing up to grab his hand and then hug him. "I didn’t think you’d really come!"

"Of course I would, you jackass." Trapper grins and sits down. "Took me forever to find this place – rather well hidden, I see."

Hawkeye shrugs nonchalantly, taking a few pretzels from the bowl on the table and brushing the salt off. "They’ll never find me here." He jokes and cracks his knuckles. "Hey, how’s the wife? Kids? Anyone die? Ah, Christ, I sound like a ghoul."

"Nah...hey, Louis is great. Girls are amazing...prettier every day. Except for the boy, he’s not real pretty."

"Yet." Hawkeye smirks.

Trapper snorts and continues. "He’s almost one, now. Matthew. He looks just like me, too." He reaches into his wallet and proudly holds out a snapshot.

Hawkeye leans over to see it, then shakes his head. "Shame." He rolls his eyes. "That poor kid."

"Hey!" Trapper laughs, shaking his finger at Hawkeye. "You watch it. Ahhh...Nothing like comin’ home, you know?"

"I dunno, I thought for awhile hiding and stinking and starving and going insane was the high point of my life."

"Yeah." Trapper nods to his ringless left hand. "Not married."

"Nope."

"Living with anyone?"

"Yes, actually." Hawkeye flashes a smile, glad for the change of subject. "For about two years, now."

"Ahh..." Trapper nods, suddenly averting his eyes as he looks around the room and sips his beer, wondering if all of the women are in the bathroom at once. They seemed to do that, go in groups. "A man or a woman?" he asks then.

Hawkeye suddenly grins – no, smirks – and leans forward on the table with his chin in one hand. "What do you think?" he says sweetly.

"Uhm...Geez, I dunno." The other man shrugs. "I never know with you."

"Well, it just so happens," he says, sitting back up, "that I met someone during the war. You know?"

"Ahhh...I see."

"Do you?" Hawkeye is amused, but continues. "We’ve been sort of an item since before the war ended. Coming back here..." he shrugs now. "Couldn’t be separated. Except there was a teeny little problem."

"Married."

"Bingo."

"Divorced?"

Hawkeye nods, a bit apologetically. "On account of me. I still feel bad, but...they a kid too, but there’s no problem with that, the divorce was actually pretty friendly. More of just a formal thing, really."

"They were over when you stepped into the picture."

"Well," he says lamely. "You’re not exactly Mr. Fidelity yourself."

"Who is?" Trapper shrugs. "You’re just doing everything you can, aren’t you, to not say what type of a person it is you’re with now, huh?"

"What’s what? Type? You mean, alive? Well, I rather hope so."

"No...male or female."

Hawkeye looks for a second longer, then breaks into a grin again. "You really wanna know?" he says. Trapper shrugs, trying to look disinterested, as he always has since first finding out his best friend was AC/DC, but to be honest it fascinated him, although his pride would never allow him to verbalize such.

"I like this place," Hawkeye announces then. "It’s pretty quiet, and the cops never bother anyone here."

"Always good."

"Yeah. I also like it because it’s under the bridge. No one would ever think a bar would be under the bridge and come here accidentally. This isn’t the sort of place you tell all your buddies about at work."

Trapper raises his eyebrow a little. "It’s just a bar. I talk about bars all the time."

"Yes, but not this one."

"What’s so damn special about this one?"

Hawkeye bust out laughing. "Trapper! Look around you!"

Trapper does not necessarily like being laughed at, so he turns and looks. Near the bar there are several men sitting or standing, talking to one another or to the bartender, getting drinks. Out on the small floor there are people dancing, and something seems awry, but everything looks all right...It’s not very well-lit and the music is quite loud, but other than that...He suddenly realizes he is staring at a dancing couple, trying to figure out what is wrong. Then he feels like a jackass for not noticing sooner.

"Where are the women?" he asks, still looking at the two men dancing and holding each other.

Hawkeye shrugs. "They’ve got their own bar."

"I see."

"Do you?" Hawkeye now looks amused.

"I think so. So about this, ah, person you’re living with...is this person in the bar now?" Trapper looks back and reaches for a pretzel.

"Hawk?"

Hawkeye leans back in his chair looking at BJ upside down. "Yesssss?" he says.

BJ smiles. "I’m gonna head back home. Think you can catch a ride?"

"Yep, or I’ll just call a cab. Hey, Beej, Trapper McIntyre." He points across the table. "Trapper, BJ Hunnicutt."

"Ahhhhh...Trapper." BJ holds his hand out. "Good to finally put a face with a name."

"Likewise," Trapper says slowly, shaking his hand and then sitting back, looking at the other man curiously.

"Well, then." BJ says, setting a hand down on Hawkeye’s shoulders. Hawkeye looks back up at him and BJ grins. "Gonna be long?" he asks.

Hawkeye shakes his head. "Nah. You gonna wait up?"

"Was thinkin’ about it. I’ll just see you at home, then."

"Okay." Hawkeye reaches out and intertwines his fingers with BJ’s for just a moment as he leaves, and the two share a look that Trapper is familiar with seeing. He sits quietly for a moment after this "BJ" is gone, not sure what to say, although he knew it was coming.

"So, a man, then." He says, and feels like a jerk.

Hawkeye shrugs. "He was last night. I can check again, if you like."

"I’m sure you will." Trapper sighs. "He the one you, uh, ‘met’, during the war?"

"Yep."

"Mind if I ask how?"

He shrugs again and picks up his glass, but it’s empty, so he signals the waiter for two more. "He lived in the Swamp," he says nonchalantly. "Was hard not to get to know him."

"Surgeon?"

"Yep."

"Ah. My replacement." Trapper gulps down the rest of his drink. "I gotta be goin’, though."

"Why?" Hawkeye’s tone is immediately suspicious, and it’s obvious.

"Just relax, Hawk," Trapper says soothingly. "I just gotta be goin’ is all. Later on this week, why don’t you gimme a call, and we’ll have a drink. Uh...not here, though, all right?"

Hawkeye smirks. "Can’t score in a gay bar, eh?"

"Well," he says a bit sarcastically, looking around, then shrugging. "You never know."

Hawkeye bursts out laughing. "All right, Trap." He says, nodding, in an ‘I’m just humouring him’ tone. "I believe you."

"You don’t think I could?"

He barely holds his laughter. "Uh huh."

"Yeah? Well, we’ll just see," Trapper raises an eyebrow. He waves to his friend and Hawkeye returns it, that wiggling of the fingers thing he always does, and Trapper wonders if that itself has ever given him away. He makes his way out of the bar, aware that there are eyes on him and wondering if any of them belong to Hawkeye. 'We will indeed see', Trapper thinks, and grins.

Fin

Comments greatly appreciated, any feedback welcome.

Adieu,
<:3D~