Chapter Text
Special thanks go to Jussen, cabbittracks, minttown1 and Anne Marsh for beta-ing various parts of this story. Their suggestions weren't always taken but always appreciated.
Summary: Trapper watches Frank, and thinks about Hawkeye.
Game 22
by JMA
Trapper was watching Frank. And for the very life of him couldn't figure out why.
He and Hawkeye were sitting in the Mess Tent after... well, to be honest, after nothing. The wounded had slowed to a mere drip, and extreme boredom had settled over the camp like a itchy blanket. More than anything, the lulls tended to make Hawkeye a little crazy, something of negotiable value.
Perhaps it made him a little crazy too. Maybe that was why he was watching Frank.
Not really watching anything in particular, mind you. Just generally, like a nature program. Living Habits of the American Ferret in Korea. Although the way he was over Houlihan, it was more like Mating Habits of the American Ferret.
"What do you think she sees in him?" Hawkeye asked, finally noticing that Trapper was watching Frank and Hot-Lips rather than anything of interest. "I mean, she's not an unattractive woman..."
" I'd do `er" Trapper interjected.
"As would any man. And there are other Majors, even a Colonel." Hawkeye pushed some rehydrated mashed potato around. "But Frank! Why Frank?"
Trapper found himself actually considering it. Frank was married, so she had no hope of that. He wasn't of sufficient rank to advance her career.
"Maybe they like each other. Like minds and all that rot," he said.
"Nobody actually * likes* Frank! And don't tell me that a personality like his does anything to enhance those looks."
"Why Hawk," he chuckled, "You look like you do and you still don't do too bad for yourself."
Hawkeye laughed outright and slapped Trapper hard on the
back. "You're the beauty and I'm the charm of this outfit. If all our good qualities combined in one person we'd be irresistible!"
"Yeah, and if all our bad ones combined together we'd be Frank!"
When they'd stopped laughing, and Hawkeye had moved on to tease Radar about the dangers of eating Mess Tent cuisine, Trapper found himself looking at Frank again.
Over the next few days he began to see... something. The wounded hit, and during a marathon O.R. session Frank tried to reach out to him with some stupid story about his past. Trapper was too tired to put up with it.
Then he saw it. It was quiet, subdued, but all the same there.
Trapper wondered why he'd never seen it before.
Trapper carried Hawkeye from the O.R. to the Swamp despite his own sheer exhaustion. It was worth it to feel Hawkeye's face nuzzle gratefully into his neck. He put the sleeping doctor down as gently as he could, not quite ignoring the messages his body was sending him, telling him that he was getting too old for things like this.
Hawkeye was something else, some unknown quantity he had never encountered before. Sometimes it made Trapper uncomfortable, scared even. Hawkeye was, to Trapper at least, untouchable. Not that Trapper found him... attractive... or anything. He'd been attracted to men before, his eyes slid to Frank on their own accord and that quiet sexuality that was seeping from him, but Hawkeye was something else.
Frank. He almost laughed as he looked at Frank undressing in the corner. Prudely, considering the number of times they had showered together. Ferret-face, no-lips, whose beady eyes now glared at him from the opposite corner of the room.
"What are you looking at you, you pervert!"
Overtired and perhaps a little crazy, Trapper began to laugh
silently, hysterically. When he finally calmed down there were tears in his eyes. Frank huffed.
"Frank," Trapper said softly, even though he didn't think he'd
actually wake Hawkeye.
"Wouldn't you like to know!" Frank snapped back without fire. He carried the same weariness they all did, even the sleeping Hawkeye. Trapper ignored him.
"I think we did some good today."
Frank settled a little at that, looking slightly pleading as he did
back when they were talking in the O.R. He nodded and pulled himself into bed.
"Frank..."
"Yes, McIntyre?"
Trapper sighed and the corner of his mouth twitched. "If ya want someone to talk to. I mean, if I'm not busy or with Hawkeye or anything."
He barely heard the soft "Thank you". It made him smile.
"Just as long as it's not tattling."
Tired, sad, pathetic, and grateful. Trapper wanted him.
Because, just maybe, he could have him.
END