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[lovethyneighb_or]

Mulcahy here! Leave a message.

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[lovethyneighb_or]

Oh.

Radar feels so far away. It would have spared him the anguish if he'd never saw anyone from home again. Yet the thought sits wrong in his mind; it's just like any other depressing thought he's had, and still it doesn't fit, like a weed in the garden. The hatred of himself is easy. It's natural, perhaps even deserved. Whenever he shuts his eyes, when he thinks of his self, the image is of broken knuckles and too much blood. Skinny wrists, white robes. A smile that's been polished to utter featurelessness, because there was nothing else to hide behind. A scared animal.

But he just can't help himself; he's too weak to fast, to starve himself of their company until he's figured out how to be someone they could look in the eyes again. He'd hungrily seize every moment he could spend at their sides. He wants Radar to love him like he used to. He can't help it. They were a family. Who is he without them?

It's a long, long night, and he will only get what he wants if he asks.

...

"Forgive me," he murmurs.

[incomingchoppers]

Radar tucks his arms around himself. Slowly, without looking away from Mulcahy, he nods.

"She told me that..." Oh, please don't let his voice break. Let him hold steady. "The person you killed, when it happened. That he was trying to kill you first and he'd been trying for ages."

He doesn't know if that makes it right, but it makes it easier to understand.

"And even with everybody else killing each other all the time, that was the only time you ever hurt someone like that in six years."

[lovethyneighb_or]

He sucks in a breath, looking up. He doesn’t strangle his heart into resolve, but he does give it a squeeze.

“His name was Harry Powell,” he murmurs. “He was… worse than any violent general we had met in the war. He was a baptist priest and yet all he practiced was violence against the weak. He did kill me, several times. But I always told him that if he’d only reconsider, I would forgive him.

“But that day… I had just lost the one person I depended on the most. And Powell was vile. The things he said about him, about me—and then he seized me by the hair, dragging me, and I…”

…

“None of it justifies what I have done. Perhaps it explains it, but there’s nothing to justify it. I’m a priest. How could I? I…” His hands are shaking. He rubs his shoulders, hunching in like he’s cold. “I didn’t mean to. I didn’t even realize I had done it. All I remember is one moment, he’d put his hands around my neck, and then…”

Broken knuckles and too much blood. Sitting on top of something. Out of breath. He barely recognized him.

“… it was over.”

[incomingchoppers]

Like a counterweight, Radar's arms loosen as Mulcahy hugs himself. There's a funny, breathless pressure in his chest, in the back of his throat, like he's about to cry but the tears aren't there.

It's weird, being the youngest of all your friends by at least a decade. Almost three times that in the Father's case. Sometimes (okay, way more than sometimes) it chafes to be treated like a kid all the time, sometimes it's kinda nice knowing there's always someone there to look out for you. But mostly the way Radar looks after them in kind is by keeping the 4077th running smooth.

Not like this. Not someone who could be his dad confessing to him and asking forgiveness. Him, Radar, who still sleeps with a teddy bear and can get drunk on a beer and a half. He doesn't know if he can do this.

Mulcahy's told him exactly what he needs, though. And oh, if he screws this up too just like he screwed up with Hawkeye when they told him about Colonel Blake -- he can't let that happen again. He can't. Otherwise there wasn't any point to all his apologizing and promises to do better. I'd never felt so alone, Hawkeye said to him; maybe the Father hasn't said it, but he sure looks it. He has for ages. It makes Radar's heart hurt every time he sees him.

He steps closer. Whispers: "Father."

That's all, the word half-stuck in the empty space behind his throat, filling the spot where the tears ought to go. He reaches out to touch Father Mulcahy's elbow.

[lovethyneighb_or]

It’s only a little, just barely, but he flinches. Still Radar’s hand settles gently on his elbow.

“I’m sorry,” again, it’s the kind of pleading you do when it isn’t that you expect to avoid getting struck, but perhaps you won’t be struck as hard; not that he’d expect it from Radar, but he’s just so used to doing it. That’s his whole problem. He doesn’t know how to live in peace anymore. “I didn’t mean to. I…”

Mea culpa. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.

[incomingchoppers]

Francis sounded just the same as Radar carried him through the maze. Convinced of pain before it would arrive, too young to be thinking anything like that. The war Mulcahy's been fighting started a long, long time before Radar ever met him.

"I know," he says, and there, finally, his voice cracks.

He can't carry Mulcahy anymore. Still, his arms go around him, gentle as ever.

[lovethyneighb_or]

Mulcahy holds his breath. It's not the first time Radar's touched him since he arrived, but it feels like it is.

Slowly, gently, Mulcahy's arms go around Radar, brushing the back of his jacket.

[incomingchoppers]

He settles into the embrace; tightens it a little, like he'd hold a frightened lamb to keep it from kicking too hard and hurting itself. "It's okay," he says, still in that fractured whisper, more a prayer than a reassurance. Let it be okay.

"I forgive you, sir."

[lovethyneighb_or]

And of course Radar does. He still doesn’t feel like he deserves it, but Radar does. Radar has always been so—so unfailingly decent, and to think Mulcahy only ever knew him in war.

The thing about holding the pieces of yourself in a vice grip to keep it together so that you can still resemble a person, is that at some point, if you want to let go, you have to fall. Have to open the kitchen cabinet with the spilled plates leaning against the door. If you want to catch it, it can’t be you. He doesn’t need a strong hand there. He just needs one at all.

Mulcahy’s hands grip the back of Radar’s shirt, and quietly, he breaks into childish weeping.

[incomingchoppers]

Oh no oh no oh no --

"Hey," and it's a real fight to keep from sounding half as scared as he feels all of a sudden, "hey, no, don't cry, it's okay." He clutches tight to Mulcahy. "It's okay. It's okay."

For a little while, that's all Radar can say. Like a skipping record, or like it'll come true if he just says it enough times, he repeats those two words over and over, so quiet nobody will ever hear it outside the garden.

[lovethyneighb_or]

What panacea, that tenderness, that kindness from someone he loves, wholly and entirely loves. He's helpless against the way it opens up his chest to make him weep harder. Radar must know how much he cares for him.

"I'm sorry--" he says between gasps, but it's not so stricken anymore. There's something missing, like dust swept away. He weeps, weeps, weeps, legs shaking with the effort of keeping him upright when all he wants to do is sink to the ground. But he won't drag Radar with him; but he doesn't want to let go.

But the well dries. He sniffs, scrubs at his eyes. The first moment he can gather himself enough to, he speaks. "I'm sorry for scaring you. It's--it's alright. Really. I... I'm not sure how to explain."

He takes his glasses off to clean them. "After a long time of not being allowed to express myself at all, it feels... well, I felt as though I could with you."

[incomingchoppers]

He's proud of himself for not buckling. The momentary panic has drained away, and honestly, Radar feels a little wobbly himself without the immediate adrenaline propping him up. But he still doesn't fold; he just nods, looking up at Mulcahy.

"Yeah, Vickie told me a little about that, too." Still quiet, but steadier. "If I couldn't do much crying for six years straight I'd wanna cry for weeks once I could again. It's okay, Father, really."

[lovethyneighb_or]

"Yes, well..."

Oh, those are big fat tears dropping out of his eyes again. He sniffs and scrubs uselessly at them, but he gets the feeling that this is going to be on and off for some time. He turns to go sit on the back porch, gesturing for Radar to follow.

When he swallows enough to speak again, "You have no idea how terribly I missed you. Even though the war had already stolen us from our homes, waking up in that place every day was a bitter reminder of how I had been stolen from the 4077th."

He stop, a look of some kind of realization on his face. He scrubs at his eyes.

(It's the first time he's been able to freely say that number since he got here.)

"... at some point, I had given up on ever seeing any of you again. And yet, here you are. As honest and kind and true as I remember you were. I'm sorry for how difficult I've been."

[incomingchoppers]

"You're not being difficult," says Radar, sounding honestly surprised Mulcahy could ever say a thing like that. "I just been worried, that's all. Even before I knew everything I knew something bad'd happened." He sighs. "I shoulda asked sooner what I could do."

He wouldn't've needed to if this was the Mulcahy he knew back home; he just would've known, same as he knows how to handle everything else in camp. But Radar understands by now, really understands, that this isn't the same person, no matter what Vickie told him. Not even because he killed someone, either. You don't live through what Mulcahy went through and come out the same on the other side.

[lovethyneighb_or]

“Have I not been?” he says, just as surprised. “I have been secretive and erratic and—I know that I have not been easy to be friends with.”

With all his paranoias and neuroses and shadows, it’s all he can think about. How every instance of his unhappiness upon another must be at best, an opportunity to feel better about helping someone needy, and at worst, a burden. He’s a mess, broken in his core, and somewhere in his mind he can still hear what 2’s Village has beat into him hundreds of times: a still tongue makes a happy life. How can he be casual company for him?

It must be terrible, for Radar to find that his friend has gone from comforting to exhausting.

[incomingchoppers]

Radar, who once tried to befriend a North Korean soldier who snuck into the chow line and couldn't understand a lick of English, just shrugs.

"I don't think so," is all he says. Simple as that.

[lovethyneighb_or]

How is it that Mulcahy never feels less like himself than with the people who used to know him best? Hawkeye makes him feel haunted--not just even by that old Hawkeye, but by his past. By what Hawkeye wants him to be.

But he's not here. There's a stranger in the house. (Maybe that's how Hawk feels, with everything Mulcahy remembers of someone else and all the things he didn't do. There's a stranger in the house.)

Mulcahy waits for him to spit at him or curse him, to continue his long enlightenment of every way he has erred and continues to err with him. Or at least to refuse. Or at least remain silent. But Hawkeye says, however strained, however reluctant, thank you.

He had been prepared for insults, but not for this. He could tolerate any form of cruelty better than kindness. The ugliness of him had to be given expression, and if there was anyone who sees it, it's Hawkeye. It feels like a lie. It feels incongruous with the look on his face--Mulcahy can't tell if it's disgust or if he's just paranoid, if it's even for him. But it must be. They're the only ones here.

But Hawkeye says thank you, and he's not willing to fight.

"I'm sorry," he says again, "and I'm sorry I was too cowardly to tell you."

[notinflictthem]

"Yeah, well," Hawk starts, but can't really find something to finish the sentence with. Nobody's perfect feels like the understatement of all time, and 'don't worry about it' isn't something he can say in good faith.

An exhale.

"I should get out of your hair, if there's nothing else," give them both some breathing space. This proximity is going to kill them, they need to try again at a nice arm's length.

[lovethyneighb_or]

It's alright. Mulcahy can read the silence perfectly fine.

"Yes. That might be well." He sighs, pulling away. Considers the window. It's probably still early to pull it back much farther than the little corner of visibility he's vigilantly left open.

Sigh.

"Will I see you around, Hawk?"

[notinflictthem]

Another opportunity for a small mercy. Another chance to grant him some small relief. So he does.

"Yeah, you will. I probably owe you coffee for that tray you brought over, so. You know my hours and when to knock."

It's not a grimace but Hawk offers him a closed-mouth smile stuck tight to his teeth.

"Keep well, Father."

[lovethyneighb_or]

He watches Hawkeye go, hands wringing over each other. Not in a nervous fashion necessarily, just... moving.

"I'll do my best." It's the best that he can promise. "And you as well, Hawkeye."

[notinflictthem]

It isn't until Hawk gets out of the apartment that he feels like he can breathe again. They were in love, Trapper is gone, such big defining things feel like they need time before Hawk can accept them. Time to ruminate, time to bargain and deny them until he can't anymore. And Mulcahy...

Is it strange that it's relieving to know there's a reason he feels so far away?

When Hawk gets back up to his apartment, he opens the curtain on his side to about halfway.

[lovethyneighb_or]

It moves the world.

He hunches over, covering his face with his hands entirely, because he knows the expression he's going to make as he sobs openly will be an unpleasant one.

There's nothing else to be but vulnerable with Radar here like this, and for Mulcahy, to be vulnerable is to be devastated, because that's what he is underneath. He wants to bolt, he wants to wail and claw at him and demand how he can stand there and be so forgiving, so uncomplicated with no catch. It means that this is all there is; Radar tells him the truth, and the truth is this and only this: he would have him as his friend. Mulcahy wants to think, "But." But there is nothing else. He has no more excuse to torture himself over his wretchedness if he is not wretched to him after all, but--but--

It's the same feeling he felt with Hawkeye. He could bear any cruelty better than this kindness.

[incomingchoppers]

This time, the flailing panic doesn't latch on. It's just a blip on the screen inside his head, the briefest ping of worry: did I say the wrong thing?

Then he listens through the lingering headache, swallows hard to get the lump out of his throat, and wraps his arm around Mulcahy's shoulders again, leaning close. He sniffles a little bit, just once, but doesn't say anything. The gesture says enough on its own.

I'm here. I'm still here.

[lovethyneighb_or]

Intolerably, blessedly, devastatingly, miraculously, Radar is still here. Impossibly, at the end of the dark valley, he is still here.

He curls into him. Mulcahy's taller than him by a good few inches, but he's never felt so small in his life. He feels like a child. More than that (and this is why he can afford to act this way at all), he feels sheltered. When was the last time he felt like this? Like there was anything at his back? Like he could come in from the cold?

(Angel. Gaeta. Is this what they meant? Do they think about him like this too? Oh, God.)

He's a quiet crier, at least; the only sounds he makes are breathy gasps. Peter jingles quietly as he approaches again, chirping in concern as he touches down on Mulcahy's head.