"Hey! Pernelli!"
"Pernelli!" BJ joined in the shouting for fun more than anything, a hand on Hawk's back as they stumbled through the doorway into the kitchen. Of the two of them he was the less loaded, but he'd had more opportunity to eat throughout the day than Hawk on his manic tear to Panmunjom. Not that he'd been able to get much down, nerves and wounded being what they were, but it was Hawk's sudden insistence upon sustenance that had led them to the kitchen to begin with.
BJ flipped the light on and Hawkeye looked around, announcing after a moment, "No Pernelli."
"Unless he's napping under a table somewhere..." BJ glanced beneath a couple before deciding Hawk's assessment had been correct, and shrugged. "That's alright. I'll scrounge something up."
Hawkeye sounded a tiny grunt, minor dizziness making his head swim as he lifted himself backwards onto a corner of the table not covered in pans and massive pots. He could have eaten something at the party, okay, but that would have taken time away from drinking, and that was always more important. "Yeah, but something edible? In here? That's no small feat. Then again, with your shoe size..."
BJ chuckled, shaking his head as he took stock of the visible, handy food stores. Vegetables weren't going to do the trick for Hawk in his current state, so he hunted for bread and anything that could be shoved between slices of it and be reasonably nutritious. "Not a day for small feats," he said cheerily, opening a cabinet and peering inside.
Hunched and swinging his legs a little, Hawkeye watched him with a smile that turned warmer by the moment. "Yeah..." He'd gone to some extreme lengths that day - the whole drive back, his only thought had been I can't believe I actually got away with that - but so had Beej. Sure, neither of them invited or liked what Potter had said about the whole camp following their lead, but it was true all the same. And in his absence, BJ had created a marvelous novelty of an event that perked everyone up, and that it was in his honor, and based on no more extraordinary or vehement a gripe than his usual ones, wasn't lost on Hawkeye at all. "Hey, come here," Hawkeye urged softly.
BJ knew that tone, grinned, and debated whether he should close the door. He had every right to grin, too - he knew he'd outdone himself this time. But Hawk deserved it with what he'd done today. Sure, he'd scared BJ out of his head, worried him about arrest as much as any other tragedy that could befall him off-base, and BJ hadn't even been allowed to track him down to play handler, soother, or to talk delegate-directed MPs out of doing their worst. But the move Hawk had made had been for all of them. For everyone at the 4077th, for every kid on their table or bound to end up there, for everyone else that had no business being stuck in Korea. Of course he deserved the pick-me-up and fanfare.
Still, BJ's grin was a teensy bit smug when he turned and stepped into the space between Hawk's lightly swinging legs. "Yes?"
Hawkeye wondered for a moment why BJ hadn't closed the door, finding it rather limiting to not have privacy no matter how temporary, but reached up from the table's edge to fiddle with Beej's tags, flipping them over and around his long fingers in thought as he smiled upwards. "You know, even with that stupid mustache, you're still pretty great."
"Yeah?"
"Mhmm..."
"Well, so're you, even if that hair color doesn't exactly make you Greer Garson," BJ teased.
Hawkeye rolled his eyes playfully. "Look, none of us make as knock-down, drag-out sexy a redhead as Margaret, and we're all just gonna have to live with that."
BJ raised his eyebrows, tilting his head in consideration; Hawk had a point there.
"I think we should do blue next time," Hawkeye continued dreamily. BJ opened his mouth to ask what they'd be celebrating, but didn't get a word in before it was made clear. "Next time you've got a real tricky patient you pull through with... with those wondrous hands of yours, or... any day. Any reason. How's Wednesday? Check the duty roster and get back to me."
Laughing softly, BJ blushed. Hawk could say so much with so little. It was an art, one specifically designed, it seemed, to fluster BJ whenever he chose. "I don't hate the idea - blue's my favorite."
"Yeah, but it's more than that," Hawkeye murmured in thought, gaze flicking between BJ's stunning smile and his own fingers still fidgeting with the tags. Why shouldn't a whole room have the same color as Beej's robe, one Hawkeye had decided was a powerfully calming shade? So what if the sky already matched his eyes? Why couldn't everything, when Hawkeye was so enamored with them? BJ deserved a party, too, simply for being himself. But rather than say so, and before he'd be asked for further elaboration on his logic, Hawkeye straightened up from his slouch and pulled BJ in by the tags for a slow, grateful kiss.
Definitely should have closed the door, BJ found himself thinking, but despite keeping his ears perked for footsteps, his foremost thoughts were yet again awash with amazement and relief that Hawkeye had survived another madman's folly unscathed; that Hawk was here and safe rather than en route to trial then Leavenworth, and that BJ was fortunate enough to stand where he was standing, kissing who he kissed until footsteps could be heard.
BJ parted from him gently but then swung into action a few feet away, tugging open cupboards again as Sergeant Sal Pernelli, a chef so terrible that Father Mulcahy would do better to pray after the meal rather than before, returned from the latrine.
"Hey, what are you two knuckleheads doing in here?"
"That's Captain Knucklehead to you," BJ said casually, not one to pull or even reference rank except for when it made a fine cover for kisses that probably shouldn't have occurred behind un-closed doors. "Got anything for sandwiches?"
"I gotta eat. Unless you like red wine on your floor, and not from the bottle," Hawkeye added, pulling a queasy look and forcing a small burp for warning effect.
Pernelli sighed, took his time shuffling over to where the bread was kept, and sought leftover meat next. BJ, still thinking of kisses but turned away from their source, thanked the "chef" pleasantly enough once the means to take care of Hawk were in his hands.
Hawkeye watched with a drunkenly dim gaze and found his own secret inner monologue ironic.
You'd think I'm nuts, Beej, sitting here having a pro-Army thought, he directed in his head towards BJ's red-tinted nape. If anyone told me this morning they assumed me capable of a pro-Army thought, I'd have said they were nuts, too. I'd have laughed right in their face and kept on destroying government property.
But as he watched the other put a sandwich together just for him, he justified that it was more pro-he-and-Beej than about the dreadful institution itself, and that made it an okay thought to have.
Guess I can imagine worse things than a peace talk not working out.