janecarnall (![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} janecarnall) wrote,@ 2007-04-04 00:26:00 |
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Mirror M*A*S*H: Through the Mirror, Part Ten
This is by way of being a sequel to MirrorM*A*S*H.
(If you find Part Ten confusing, it's probably because you missed part nine. This is Part Ten, and comes after part nine. It's like that.)
Part one, Part two, Part three, Part four, Part five, Part six, part seven, part eight, part nine, part ten, part eleven, part twelve, part thirteen, part fourteen and part fifteen are here.
Part Ten
Packing the damn gun had been stupid. Even if Hawkeye had found the cartridges, he could never have used it.
At least, he thought he probably couldn’t. He couldn’t shoot someone else: could he shoot himself?
The whole damn stunt was stupid. That had occurred to Hawkeye several times already, including during the whole of the nerve-wracking drive back to the 4077th, with himself sitting beside him. Father Mulcahy was supposed to be at the orphanage all day today, maybe not even coming back for the poker game tonight, after the past five days when no one had had a moment to spare to think of anything beyond the next patient...
And then he was going. The Colonel had been processing the transfer as slowly as anyone could, but he couldn’t hold it up forever, and Mulcahy would be gone.
The other Hawkeye stood looking at him after BJ was gone. His cousin. God. The man who’d – no. Not to think about that. Not to throw up again. “I’m stuck in here with you for the next two hours,” Hawkeye said out loud.
The other Hawkeye glanced round the tent – a strange, rapid flicker of his eyes. He pulled a couple of small chapbooks out of his jacket pocket. “Want a dictionary to read?”
He stood with the books in his hands, tall and relaxed and half-smiling: Hawkeye saw, as he had seen in his mind’s eye again and again, Father Mulcahy –
It wasn’t the look on Mulcahy’s face when he had said He told you that kept coming back to him. It was the way he’d looked when Hawkeye visited him in his tent his first night back. The way he’d looked whenever Hawkeye got near him. Even in OR.
He hadn’t believed it. He hadn’t known Mulcahy had reason to be afraid of him.
“Sit down and shut up,” Hawkeye said.
The man opened his mouth.
“Shut up.” The words came out as thick as vomit. Hawkeye turned away and grabbed the chair, pulling it to face the door. He sat down. After a moment, he heard the other Hawkeye sit down on the bed.
After a few minutes, he heard a rustling of pages turning. Then silence. Then a repeated rustling.
Hawkeye turned, trying not to look as if he were looking.
The other Hawkeye had one of the chapbooks open in his hand, and the other on the bed. He was squinting at the one he held: with his left hand he flipped through pages in the book on the bed and glanced down at that.
The last time Hawkeye had tried to read a surgical journal in French, it had looked like that. His French was the kind taught out of a dictionary by a teacher who’d never been nearer Paris than Texas, but he could work his way through a surgical journal with plenty of diagrams.
“What’re you reading?”
The other Hawkeye looked up. “L'evangile selon saint Jean.”
It took Hawkeye a moment to process that. If he ever read the Bible, it was only for the dirty bits. “You’re not going to impress Father Mulcahy,” he said. “You’re not going to get to see Father Mulcahy. I told you.”
“Yeah,” the other Hawkeye said. His long mouth twitched downwards. “I heard you.” After a moment, he added, “Anyway, I knew.”
He hates me. He likes you.
“What are you doing here?”
The other Hawkeye’s head went back and he half-grinned, half-laughed. “You drove me to it.”
Like a blow, all the discomfort Hawkeye had been feeling came back. He’s me. He swung his head away, staring at the tent door, seeing fear. I couldn’t do that. He’d seduced, teased, tricked: he’d pushed some people a bit further than they’d meant to go – but he’d never –
He went on staring at the past, neck muscles rigid. Men who had claimed they’d never before let another man have sex with them: women who had said they never meant to go that far: struggles that he’d thought were playful: resistance that he’d taken for granted could be overcome: I never made anyone do anything they didn’t want to do. Swallowing hurt. Not really. I know I didn’t.
He couldn’t think of Mulcahy: a confused and painful jumble met him whenever he tried. Tricked him, teased him, pushed him... He’d never even thought of kissing him, let alone pinning him down helplessly past resistance, struggles that wouldn’t be playful –
I couldn’t.
He was unsure how much time had passed when another rustle of pages caught his attention: he turned back, disbelieving, to see the other Hawkeye had settled himself back on the cot, propped up against the pillows, gospel in one hand, dictionary in the other. The expression on his face was Dad’s when he was concentrating: focussed as if he were trying to learn something.
The other Hawkeye’s gaze slipped from the book: he lifted his head and met Hawkeye’s eyes. They stared at each other.
After a long moment, the other Hawkeye fixed his attention back on the book. He had to know Hawkeye was still watching him: and something about his expression said he wasn’t focussing on what he was reading any more, but on not looking at Hawkeye.
“I couldn’t,” Hawkeye said out loud.
The other Hawkeye looked up, deliberately slow. Eyebrows up. Were you talking to me?
“We’re supposed to be the same person, right?”
The other Hawkeye shrugged. Hawkeye found himself standing, moving towards the cot. The other Hawkeye didn’t move.
“I couldn’t. Do what you did. To Father Mulcahy. To anyone. I know I couldn’t. How could you?” He was standing over the other Hawkeye, who closed the books he was holding, and lifted his hands, looking at them. He had done this before, when they talked, seeming almost unconscious of the habit, the only mannerism Hawkeye had noticed that he was sure he didn’t have himself.
The other Hawkeye was still looking at his hands when he spoke. “Other things... seemed more important.” He looked up from his hands, meeting Hawkeye’s gaze. “It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I was doing to him. Or at least...” It was very obvious that he was swallowing, having trouble with his words. “I didn’t know you existed. I didn’t know what he meant when he said we were friends. But I knew he didn’t want to. I just didn’t...” he lifted his hands again, spreading his fingers, looking at them. “I just couldn’t feel that it mattered, at the time.”
“Didn’t matter – ” Hawkeye nearly choked. His fists were balling.
“When he told you what I did to him,” the other Hawkeye said, “did he tell you what I did – what I am?”
“What are you?” It was an odd question. Hawkeye stared, momentarily puzzled even past the outrage that filled him. “You’re me.” He turned away, unable to bear it. I can’t tell you apart. BJ had seen the likeness – the more than likeness. BJ had seen the two of them together. BJ knew.
He shouldn’t have done this. He really shouldn’t. Father Mulcahy wouldn’t thank him for it. He sat down again, in the chair facing the door, and rested his head against his fists.
At least he didn’t hear any more page rustling from the other Hawkeye. When Hawkeye glanced over, he was sitting on the bed – only sitting, his hands on the two books, his face empty. He didn’t move or look back at Hawkeye.
It wasn’t dark yet when he heard another jeep pull into the compound.
“Okay,” Hawkeye said. He turned again to look at himself, and still got no reaction. “Okay. Sidney’s here.” It was past six. He knew that look: it was deliberate, stubborn withdrawal. “Come on, wake up.”
The other Hawkeye’s eyes moved, flickering, fastening on him. “I shouldn’t have come here,” he said. His voice was as empty of emotion as his face.
“It’s too late for that – ”
“I shouldn’t have come here,” the other Hawkeye said. He put only the faintest stress on the last word, and leaned forward, his hands pressing down on the books. “Francis should have left me in that temple. Everything would be all right now if he had.” His eyes were fixed on Hawkeye. “We’re not the same person. You’ve never kept anyone alive the way I have. I’m not the same person. I couldn’t have gone home anyway.”
Hawkeye opened his mouth. The other Hawkeye’s hands shot out: not to touch anything. He only held his hands out in front of himself, turning his wrists, stretching his fingers. “We’re really not alike,” he said at last.
The door opened. Hawkeye turned.
Father Mulcahy stood in the doorway, a step ahead of Sidney Freedman. He had been smiling: the smile was dying on his face. He took a wavery step inside the tent, and fell so abruptly that it looked as if he had been tripped: he went down on to his knees and forward on to his face, his arms shot out in front of him like prayer.
Hawkeye could not have reached him before he fell: but his instinctive lunge towards him was stopped by a steel grip on his arms from behind. His own voice said in his ear, “Don’t.”
Sidney was down on his knees beside Mulcahy, checking him. He was the calmest person Hawkeye knew: the strongest emotion Hawkeye had ever seen him express was amusement. But when the other Hawkeye spoke, he looked up, with raised eyebrows and a slight twist in his voice. “He should be all right.”
The other Hawkeye was standing behind him, gripping his arms firmly.
“What happened?” Hawkeye wrenched his arms, but found himself still held.
“Well, in my medical opinion, I would say he fainted,” Sidney said. His eyes flickered, twice, as if taking in both their faces. “Why are you holding him like that?”
The other Hawkeye said, as naturally as if he knew Sidney already, “It’s not going to help if he comes to and sees me standing over him.”
“Oh,” Sidney said. He knelt back on his heels, his hand not leaving Mulcahy’s shoulder. “Who are you?”
“Don’t you know?” Hawkeye tugged himself loose and came over, his steps slowing. He stopped before he reached Mulcahy, a sick twist in his stomach.
Sidney looked, from one to the other of them, and glanced down, away from them both. “I would say I definitely know who one of you is,” he said. “I’m finding this a rather odd experience.”
“You are?”
Sidney looked up at him, down at Mulcahy, and across the tent at the other Hawkeye. He smiled, a tiny flicker of his lips. “Well put.” He looked down at Mulcahy again. “I would rather move him,” he said. “I feel better when my patients are on a couch.”
Mulcahy stirred, letting out something between a sigh and a groan.
to part 11part 11</a>
This is by way of being a sequel to MirrorM*A*S*H.
(If you find Part Ten confusing, it's probably because you missed part nine. This is Part Ten, and comes after part nine. It's like that.)
Part one, Part two, Part three, Part four, Part five, Part six, part seven, part eight, part nine, part ten, part eleven, part twelve, part thirteen, part fourteen and part fifteen are here.
Part Ten
Packing the damn gun had been stupid. Even if Hawkeye had found the cartridges, he could never have used it.
At least, he thought he probably couldn’t. He couldn’t shoot someone else: could he shoot himself?
The whole damn stunt was stupid. That had occurred to Hawkeye several times already, including during the whole of the nerve-wracking drive back to the 4077th, with himself sitting beside him. Father Mulcahy was supposed to be at the orphanage all day today, maybe not even coming back for the poker game tonight, after the past five days when no one had had a moment to spare to think of anything beyond the next patient...
And then he was going. The Colonel had been processing the transfer as slowly as anyone could, but he couldn’t hold it up forever, and Mulcahy would be gone.
The other Hawkeye stood looking at him after BJ was gone. His cousin. God. The man who’d – no. Not to think about that. Not to throw up again. “I’m stuck in here with you for the next two hours,” Hawkeye said out loud.
The other Hawkeye glanced round the tent – a strange, rapid flicker of his eyes. He pulled a couple of small chapbooks out of his jacket pocket. “Want a dictionary to read?”
He stood with the books in his hands, tall and relaxed and half-smiling: Hawkeye saw, as he had seen in his mind’s eye again and again, Father Mulcahy –
It wasn’t the look on Mulcahy’s face when he had said He told you that kept coming back to him. It was the way he’d looked when Hawkeye visited him in his tent his first night back. The way he’d looked whenever Hawkeye got near him. Even in OR.
He hadn’t believed it. He hadn’t known Mulcahy had reason to be afraid of him.
“Sit down and shut up,” Hawkeye said.
The man opened his mouth.
“Shut up.” The words came out as thick as vomit. Hawkeye turned away and grabbed the chair, pulling it to face the door. He sat down. After a moment, he heard the other Hawkeye sit down on the bed.
After a few minutes, he heard a rustling of pages turning. Then silence. Then a repeated rustling.
Hawkeye turned, trying not to look as if he were looking.
The other Hawkeye had one of the chapbooks open in his hand, and the other on the bed. He was squinting at the one he held: with his left hand he flipped through pages in the book on the bed and glanced down at that.
The last time Hawkeye had tried to read a surgical journal in French, it had looked like that. His French was the kind taught out of a dictionary by a teacher who’d never been nearer Paris than Texas, but he could work his way through a surgical journal with plenty of diagrams.
“What’re you reading?”
The other Hawkeye looked up. “L'evangile selon saint Jean.”
It took Hawkeye a moment to process that. If he ever read the Bible, it was only for the dirty bits. “You’re not going to impress Father Mulcahy,” he said. “You’re not going to get to see Father Mulcahy. I told you.”
“Yeah,” the other Hawkeye said. His long mouth twitched downwards. “I heard you.” After a moment, he added, “Anyway, I knew.”
He hates me. He likes you.
“What are you doing here?”
The other Hawkeye’s head went back and he half-grinned, half-laughed. “You drove me to it.”
Like a blow, all the discomfort Hawkeye had been feeling came back. He’s me. He swung his head away, staring at the tent door, seeing fear. I couldn’t do that. He’d seduced, teased, tricked: he’d pushed some people a bit further than they’d meant to go – but he’d never –
He went on staring at the past, neck muscles rigid. Men who had claimed they’d never before let another man have sex with them: women who had said they never meant to go that far: struggles that he’d thought were playful: resistance that he’d taken for granted could be overcome: I never made anyone do anything they didn’t want to do. Swallowing hurt. Not really. I know I didn’t.
He couldn’t think of Mulcahy: a confused and painful jumble met him whenever he tried. Tricked him, teased him, pushed him... He’d never even thought of kissing him, let alone pinning him down helplessly past resistance, struggles that wouldn’t be playful –
I couldn’t.
He was unsure how much time had passed when another rustle of pages caught his attention: he turned back, disbelieving, to see the other Hawkeye had settled himself back on the cot, propped up against the pillows, gospel in one hand, dictionary in the other. The expression on his face was Dad’s when he was concentrating: focussed as if he were trying to learn something.
The other Hawkeye’s gaze slipped from the book: he lifted his head and met Hawkeye’s eyes. They stared at each other.
After a long moment, the other Hawkeye fixed his attention back on the book. He had to know Hawkeye was still watching him: and something about his expression said he wasn’t focussing on what he was reading any more, but on not looking at Hawkeye.
“I couldn’t,” Hawkeye said out loud.
The other Hawkeye looked up, deliberately slow. Eyebrows up. Were you talking to me?
“We’re supposed to be the same person, right?”
The other Hawkeye shrugged. Hawkeye found himself standing, moving towards the cot. The other Hawkeye didn’t move.
“I couldn’t. Do what you did. To Father Mulcahy. To anyone. I know I couldn’t. How could you?” He was standing over the other Hawkeye, who closed the books he was holding, and lifted his hands, looking at them. He had done this before, when they talked, seeming almost unconscious of the habit, the only mannerism Hawkeye had noticed that he was sure he didn’t have himself.
The other Hawkeye was still looking at his hands when he spoke. “Other things... seemed more important.” He looked up from his hands, meeting Hawkeye’s gaze. “It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I was doing to him. Or at least...” It was very obvious that he was swallowing, having trouble with his words. “I didn’t know you existed. I didn’t know what he meant when he said we were friends. But I knew he didn’t want to. I just didn’t...” he lifted his hands again, spreading his fingers, looking at them. “I just couldn’t feel that it mattered, at the time.”
“Didn’t matter – ” Hawkeye nearly choked. His fists were balling.
“When he told you what I did to him,” the other Hawkeye said, “did he tell you what I did – what I am?”
“What are you?” It was an odd question. Hawkeye stared, momentarily puzzled even past the outrage that filled him. “You’re me.” He turned away, unable to bear it. I can’t tell you apart. BJ had seen the likeness – the more than likeness. BJ had seen the two of them together. BJ knew.
He shouldn’t have done this. He really shouldn’t. Father Mulcahy wouldn’t thank him for it. He sat down again, in the chair facing the door, and rested his head against his fists.
At least he didn’t hear any more page rustling from the other Hawkeye. When Hawkeye glanced over, he was sitting on the bed – only sitting, his hands on the two books, his face empty. He didn’t move or look back at Hawkeye.
It wasn’t dark yet when he heard another jeep pull into the compound.
“Okay,” Hawkeye said. He turned again to look at himself, and still got no reaction. “Okay. Sidney’s here.” It was past six. He knew that look: it was deliberate, stubborn withdrawal. “Come on, wake up.”
The other Hawkeye’s eyes moved, flickering, fastening on him. “I shouldn’t have come here,” he said. His voice was as empty of emotion as his face.
“It’s too late for that – ”
“I shouldn’t have come here,” the other Hawkeye said. He put only the faintest stress on the last word, and leaned forward, his hands pressing down on the books. “Francis should have left me in that temple. Everything would be all right now if he had.” His eyes were fixed on Hawkeye. “We’re not the same person. You’ve never kept anyone alive the way I have. I’m not the same person. I couldn’t have gone home anyway.”
Hawkeye opened his mouth. The other Hawkeye’s hands shot out: not to touch anything. He only held his hands out in front of himself, turning his wrists, stretching his fingers. “We’re really not alike,” he said at last.
The door opened. Hawkeye turned.
Father Mulcahy stood in the doorway, a step ahead of Sidney Freedman. He had been smiling: the smile was dying on his face. He took a wavery step inside the tent, and fell so abruptly that it looked as if he had been tripped: he went down on to his knees and forward on to his face, his arms shot out in front of him like prayer.
Hawkeye could not have reached him before he fell: but his instinctive lunge towards him was stopped by a steel grip on his arms from behind. His own voice said in his ear, “Don’t.”
Sidney was down on his knees beside Mulcahy, checking him. He was the calmest person Hawkeye knew: the strongest emotion Hawkeye had ever seen him express was amusement. But when the other Hawkeye spoke, he looked up, with raised eyebrows and a slight twist in his voice. “He should be all right.”
The other Hawkeye was standing behind him, gripping his arms firmly.
“What happened?” Hawkeye wrenched his arms, but found himself still held.
“Well, in my medical opinion, I would say he fainted,” Sidney said. His eyes flickered, twice, as if taking in both their faces. “Why are you holding him like that?”
The other Hawkeye said, as naturally as if he knew Sidney already, “It’s not going to help if he comes to and sees me standing over him.”
“Oh,” Sidney said. He knelt back on his heels, his hand not leaving Mulcahy’s shoulder. “Who are you?”
“Don’t you know?” Hawkeye tugged himself loose and came over, his steps slowing. He stopped before he reached Mulcahy, a sick twist in his stomach.
Sidney looked, from one to the other of them, and glanced down, away from them both. “I would say I definitely know who one of you is,” he said. “I’m finding this a rather odd experience.”
“You are?”
Sidney looked up at him, down at Mulcahy, and across the tent at the other Hawkeye. He smiled, a tiny flicker of his lips. “Well put.” He looked down at Mulcahy again. “I would rather move him,” he said. “I feel better when my patients are on a couch.”
Mulcahy stirred, letting out something between a sigh and a groan.
to part 11part 11</a>