BJ, shaking with nerves, had been graciously overserved at a bar in the San Francisco Airport, and the bourbon, sitting warm in his belly during his initial flight to New York, ultimately led to an embarrassing moment of airsickness in the bathroom.
At LaGuardia, he had no time to eat, let alone buy more drinks; instead, he had to run through the airport to catch his connecting flight, the only flight to Portland each day. He’d sat down in the plane, catching his breath, when the captain announced a mechanical delay that left them sitting at the gate for forty-five minutes.
Sweat pooled in his shoes. The woman next to him lit up one of the complimentary cigarettes. A few seats away, a man and his wife lit theirs. Acrid smoke curled through the tight, metal box. The worst part was knowing it would cling to his clothes, stick to him the rest of the day. Another weight, another discomfort pressed into the strain of his shoulders.
After taking off, the small jetcraft shook through the sky with nauseating turbulence, leaving BJ’s heart pounding in his chest. The tension built inside him, no sense of ease washing over until the aircraft began to descend above the Atlantic Ocean, the water stretching out beneath them. He’d never seen it before.
Upon landing, relief flooded his entire system. A part of him hadn’t expected to make it, sure that some freak accident would happen and he’d be dead, some kind of divine punishment for his arrogance. After all, he’d gotten stuck in Guam, nearly two years ago, sitting in the airport, wondering why he couldn’t catch a break. Wondering why he had to go back.
There was something childish in him that wanted to cling to divinity. Something he hadn’t fully scraped out from years of Sunday school. He’d found it all so grating, being shoved into a room with all the other children, sitting in a circle as Miss Deirdre recounted biblical stories, though he’d been glad not to spend the entire service sitting in the pews, his mother hissing at him to stop fidgeting with his clothes. Except for days he’d faked sickness, desperate for an excuse to not go, BJ went to church every Sunday, frustration building in his chest that he was expected to worship a man who had never once answered his prayers.
He’d dedicated the time he should’ve been praying, the time he should’ve been reflecting on the greatness of God, to memorizing scripture, a party trick that charmed most adults, that occasionally brought a rare smile to his father’s face.
Any lingering attachments he’d had to the concept of God were crushed in the war. For some men, faith was the cure to all their troubles. For BJ, liquor proved to be the better band-aid. He’d admired the chaplain’s best efforts and kept respectful as he’d always been, of course, but Father Mulcahy could never compete with the manic ramblings of Korea’s loudest agnostic. “What kind of God would allow this to happen?”
God or fate or the universe or something, having tossed him around all day, finally let things fall into place. He exited the plane, the hard knot in his stomach — which he’d insist was from the bourbon, the vomiting, or the rough air — shifting around, adapting to the fresh air, to where he’d landed after all this time.
He stepped out onto the tarmac, where a western sun burned his eyes. A large group of folks stood waiting for the arrival of their loved ones, backlit by the sun. Before he could make out any faces, a familiar hunch came into view.
His body moved before his brain could catch up, rushing forward and running across the pavement, charging into his best friend.
With a yelp, Hawkeye Pierce was in BJ’s arms again.
It was delightful the way BJ knocked the wind right out of him, Hawkeye having to grab his arms tight to avoid toppling over. If he’d cared any less about appearances, BJ would hoist him in the air and spin him around, if only for the crazy laugh that would bubble out of Hawk as he did it.
“Christ!” Hawkeye laughed, pressing his hands on either side of BJ’s head. “Aren’t I the luckiest gal in the world?”
His eyes shone bright, his smile wide as ever. He glowed under BJ’s gaze, just as he always had.
BJ instantly forgot about the knot, forgot about anything else but the release of an ache deep in his bones. I’m here, something gasped in relief, flooding him with excitement. He’d finally made it to Maine.
excerpt from my work in progress bj goes to maine/mash reunion fic, i am native to it, but i'm overgrown on ao3. 59.5k and counting...
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