#and klinger??? KLINGER!!!! hes so fine good lord

[marley-manson]

good things about Bug Out:

- Hawkeye nervous about performing a delicate proceedure he’s never been trained in and snapping at people, always one of my favourite things

- Hawkeye freely and emphatically telling Margaret he’s terrified when she points out he’s not acting scared

- uhhhhh Hawkeye’s parasol

bad things about Bug Out:

- it’s a bad episode bront

- Potter

- “This is the US army, if we want land, we don’t buy it we take it!” with 0 condemnation from the narrative.

- the military march version of the theme complete with asian stereotype riff

- WHY does Margaret stay with Hawkeye, and why does Hawkeye only offer one token protest????????? she is useless here.

- even more emphatic WHY DOES RADAR STAY???? Hawkeye doesn’t even say a word, he’s just like ‘k cool’ when Radar says he’s staying too, wtf lol. He should be picking him up and throwing him into the nearest truck, not buying him a drink at Rosie’s. it’s so arbitrary and stupid, clearly a nonsensical plot contrivance for the sake of like, padding the 2 parter out with the bar scene

- Potter makes Klinger give up all his dresses, no reimbursement or anything, and then it turns out to be pointless in the next scene anyway

- bad attempted dramatic references to wartime rape esp when we got Rainbow Bridge to compare it to. Rainbow Bridge is good because it’s a brief acknowledgement of harsh reality that’s accepted as a risk. Hawkeye makes a quick joke that I’m fine with bc it serves as an ic expression of nervousness, then we move on. In Bug Out Margaret brings it up in a serious enough way suitable for the tone, but Hawkeye dismisses her concern for some reason, telling her “there’s no reason to be afraid,” before the conversation shifts away onto him. Then the more slapstick-y panic at the end (like this scene features Radar trying to hide behind a pole, c’mon) includes Margaret screaming about being ravaged ft a dismissive Hawkeye joke (”tell them you’re with me”), and later exaggerating the danger they were in to Frank. And it also bugs me that Margaret specifies ��female prisoners” when Rainbow Bridge acknowledged male rape. It’s like it’s trying to be a serious moment to draw attention to the danger of the situation, and then falls flat on its face.

- the overall plot doesn’t really make sense? is it just a coincidence that a bug out drill turned into a bug out rumour that was denied and then turned into a real bug out? considering they bug out like twice over the course of the show that seems pretty improbable lol.

- honestly I find the humour in this episode mostly bad. more racist jokes than usual, a few homophobic moments (Potter calling some singer a sissy, BJ’s “I’m staying with you but don’t get me wrong” no homo, everyone calling Frank Alice), and an offputting tone that doesn’t successfully balance its humour and its drama imo (see that paragraph about rape up there for an example)

- oh also why tf does Klinger immediately tell Frank about the bug out thing, without even mentioning the fact that it’s just a drill? I get that Klinger can’t keep a secret, that’s a fairly consistent thing, but why immediately go to Frank and Margaret of all people? Did he intentionally want the camp in an uproar? Why, if so? If it’s a prank we should’ve had a scene where he laughs about it, but nope.

- Hawkeye parking the car to wax poetic about the MASH good lord. serves you right that it stalled out. I don’t necessarily think it’s that ooc since it wasn’t positive, just ‘we spent a lot of time here, lots of ppl died here, hmm’ but i do think it’s dumb as shit and I don’t think Hawkeye lacks that much self-preservation

- no good gay jokes either :/ literally the best we got is Hawkeye saying, “You finally realized I have a beautiful body” after Margaret says she’s staying, which is the mildest of feminizing jokes.

It’s funny honestly, I remembered disliking this episode for Potter and the pro-military flavour and the lack of decent gay jokes, but upon rewatching there are so many more aspects to hate in addition to that

[petewentzssilkpress]

they are so fucking sexy. who said that

[hornyliverpudlianputz]

RULES: Choose any three fandoms (in random order) and answer the questions, then tag 10 people.

I was tagged by @dramaticmusicality​ (Thank you love, I had an absolutely insane start to my week so this is very delayed.)

Three fandoms:

* The Monkees

* Star Trek: The Original Series

* M*A*S*H

[side note, I happened to pick 3 fandoms that all have extra stuff so for simplicity I will only be discussing the respective TV shows for each. That means Monkees show characters only, none of the later TOS movies, and neither the movie nor the book of M*A*S*H.]

The first character you loved:

* Hmmm I think it might actually have been Davy, because I’m a bit of an anglophile (I’m not proud of it). That changed pretty quickly to Mike though.

* I think Spock. The first couple episodes were weird. Either Spock or McCoy.

* Oh gosh. Radar. So much. But the first three seasons are wacky so.

The character you never expected to love so much:

* Peter. I kinda expected to hate him because he was the dumb one, but then he actually had very clever lines that were just dumb because he read the room wrong and he had the smile of an angle so like. Yeah.

* I guess Scotty? He just kinda...snuck in there when I wasn’t paying attention and then it was like omg who is this guy who loves the ship more than people?

* Major Houlihan. Margaret was a top tier bitch early on, especially in the first 3 seasons, but as the show progressed she got a hell of a lot of development and by the end she’s great. I might actually do a rant post about her at some point because seriously, she kicked down some pretty stiff barriers.

The character you relate to the most:

* Personally it’s Mike. But realistically if you were to ask my friends who I was most like, it would be Micky. I’m a massive introvert who doesn’t know how to do things by half so when I’m around people I’m super “on” which means crazy energy, I never shut up, and I sing whatever is in my head. Also my hair. And my fashion sense lol. (I quite like a lot of his season 2 looks. Confidence is key.)

* Spock. Logic is awesome. Also he gives off very strong ace vibes.

* Father Mulcahy. Partially because I read him as ace (are you sensing a theme?) but also because he functions as the “bartender character” that the other characters all take their problems to and that happens to me a lot. (I’m told I’m a good listener.)

The character you’d slap:

* Mr. Babbit. Stop trying to throw the guys out! Also Davy occasionally.

* Chekov. He is adorable but he can be a really creepy horndog sometimes. And he’s a little shit too.

* Early Hawkeye. He’s a real dick. Funny, but a dick. Realistically though it would be Frank Burns, obviously.

Three favorite characters (in order of preference):

* Mike, Peter, Micky/Davy (I can’t leave one guy out! Also these are very slim margins, each of the guys have their own appeal to me.)

* Spock, McCoy, Uhura

* Father Mulcahy, Margaret, Klinger

A character you liked at first, but don’t anymore:

* Argh. Davy I guess. It’s not that I don’t like him anymore it’s just that I like Mike more now.

* Um. Eh? Chekov? Idk? His character kinda changes to suit whatever he needed to be in that episode so, sometimes he’s really obnoxious and sometimes he’s fine.

* Kinda Col. Blake? Just, he’s such an incompetent commander and that really bothers me if I think about it too much. A sweet guy but because of the comedy style of the show in the first three seasons he was a real dope.

Three OTPs:

* Gosh ummm...I don’t really ship any of the guys. They’re children!  Fuck it, Mike and Princess Gwen. They were made for each other.

* Ughhhh I don’t ship these people either argh! There is a lot of subtext between the main trio (Kirk, Spock, McCoy) so I guess OT3? If I had to choose?

* [Spoilers!] Klinger and his eventual wife, Soon-Lee. They were cute. And he stayed in Korea for her! Awww!

I tag @annaofwonderland​, @shorty-blackwell​, @nezclaw​, @ewok-sith-lord​, @faerievampireelf, @little-niggah-sugar, and @monkees-world​ if y’all wanna. (no pressure!) Also if anyone else wants to jump on this train, go for it!

[yndigot]

1 &7 for the salty meme

1. What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?

There's tons of ships in tons of fandoms that I just don't get, but fortunately it's been pretty easy to avoid what I'm not interested in. I'm looking at this more like NOTP territory -- things that would really put me off if they were treated like a real OTP, endgame, wonderful ship we should really be rooting for, even in a fic/from a writer I otherwise enjoy. Also things that I regularly came across while in the fandom. I never understood writing romance or smut about Voldemort, but I also had a fairly easy time avoiding it while in the HP fandom (it didn't just sneak in to the background of fic that was otherwise interesting to me), so it wasn't a major concern, and no one has time to list everything in fandom that's made them go, "nope!"

That said.

MASH: Hawkeye/Trapper. MASHslash had some weird OTPs. Like, for some reason Winchester/Klinger was a big thing for a long time, and Mulcahy became a fandom bicycle just because people liked to corrupt the priest (I guess?), and I was pretty happy just to let that happen and dip in and out depending on how intrigued a particular fic summary left me. BUT. I could never get behind Hawkeye/Trapper as endgame. I'm not bothered by the idea of the two of them getting off. I know they were good friends, and if they were friends with benefits, that's cool. But the relationship with BJ ended up feeling so much deeper and richer, and it was hard for me to ship Hawkeye with Trapper knowing BJ was just around the corner. Anything that treated Hawkeye/Trapper as being as deep/profound as Hawkeye/BJ was going to lose me right away, and I never understood preferring them over other pairings. (I also just ... never cared for Trapper that much. He's fine. I get why Hawkeye would have bonded with him. But Trapper always felt like kind of a skeeze, and Hawkeye's relationship with BJ was ten times deeper and more interesting to me literally from "Welcome to Korea.")

Downton Abbey: Thomas/Jimmy. Even if they're the background ship in something, it 100% puts me off. And there absolutely have been things I've read where they weren't the main ship, but the author keeps implying them in the background or giving them a subplot, and it does make me recoil. I don't care for Jimmy. I don't mind him as a character and a piece of writing, but don't ask me to like him or want good things for him. I'm a pretty happy multishipper with Thomas, but the only Thomas/Jimmy things I've ever read and enjoyed have been modern AUs where it was just ... basically an original story and Jimmy bore no resemblance to Jimmy on the show.

Lord of the Rings: Merry/Pippin. I know they're in a society where marrying your first cousin probably isn't that weird. I was still 0% interested in seeing their relationship as sexual.

-

7. Is there anything you used to like but can’t stand now?

I think there's stuff I'd read when I was new to a fandom or deeply into it, but it's probably not something I'd revisit? I can think of tons of fics I read and even re-read back in the day, and the quality was BAD, but they scratched a very particular itch, and I've since found better content to scratch that itch. I know I read tons of Marriage Law fic when that was a thing, and Canadian Shack fic when that was big. I probably wouldn't circle back around to that, but I'm not put off by it. I just don't have the time to revisit stuff that doesn't feed a specific craving.

I think the best answer for this might be that I'm way less patient these days with very tropey fics where one of the characters is a virgin (or is having their first gay experience) and is being "introduced" to sex by the other. I'm not fundamentally against a fic where someone is having their first sexual encounter or first same-sex sexual encounter, but there is a really solid script that so many fics follow (think also that tightly scripted '1-2-3 fingers then dick' anal sex prep) that's just incredibly tedious and feels very much like someone who knows sex primarily from other fic, and I'm not patient with that anymore. It's not like it was something I really loved before, but it's so repetitive that I'll leave a fic over it unless there's something else really compelling about the rest of that story that's making me stay.

[angryhausfrau-writes]

You Can’t Cross the Same River Twice - Chapter 19

Radar looks out over the fields of new green corn and rich black earth. There's not another soul but him and Ma and Park Sung for miles.

And maybe there's folks who'd find it lonely, being out here in the middle of nowhere. City folk who'd be lost without the tick of a clock bringing mechanical order to their lives. Folks who don't know how to feel a storm coming across the plains, how to feel in their bones when to plant and when to harvest. How to feel the wider rhythm of the year – and the years spread out behind it and the years spreading out ahead of it.

Radar don't get to glimpse that much, not like some folks do – or say they do, anyway. He's mostly in the here and now. So he's learned to take it for what it is and not worry too much about things outta reach.

After all, who is he to raise himself up? Some things are between God and the Lord and he ain't about to blaspheme. Ma'd have his hide.

Still, for all that he can't look too far ahead – he always made his money as a bookie rather than a better – Radar don't think his gift's nothing to sneeze at.

Cuz, see, without the choppers coming over the hill screaming with wounded – and without the constant static from everybody being cold and miserable and scared – the transmission comes in a whole lot clearer. Like how bad storms used to mess up the radio. Now that the clouds are gone, Radar's getting a real clear signal.

He can feel Park Sung coming up behind him with a cup of coffee clear enough to put his hand out right where it's gonna be. He can feel his Ma so clear they can have whole conversations from halfway across the yard without saying a word. He can feel which animals are happy or hungry or hurt.

And he can feel Hawkeye clear from Boston.

Not just Hawkeye – though he tends to be the loudest, feelingest of them – but most of the folks from the 4077. All the folks he'd gotten close with. BJ, Colonel Potter, Klinger, Dr. Winchester. Even Major Houlihan, Sir comes in occasionally, if the weather's right and he's got a good connection to the East Coast.

The only one who's missing is Colonel Blake.

Bloomington's real close to Ottumwa. It oughtta been easy to get him. But Radar ain't close enough with Mrs. Colonel Blake to tune in on her. To see if she might want to meet up with him how he'd planned to with Henry. To see if she don't feel the same gap where he oughtta be.

Like tuning the radio dial and it keeps skipping the station you know is there. And you go back and back over it cuz sometimes you get little ghost whispers you think might be a song but it ain't it's just static and still you can't stop trying to tune in that station.

Sometimes, Radar finds himself missing Korea.

It'd been loud enough, busy enough with criss-crossing signals all trying to drown each other out that you didn't notice the gap. The gap where all the folks who didn't make it oughtta be.

Here in Iowa, the signals are far apart enough – and quiet of the shrieking pain and terror and misery enough – that the gap is obvious. When he stands out at the edge of the fields and slowly tunes through the signals – checking and double checking that there ain't any new gaps – Radar feels it when he passes by where Colonel Blake oughtta be like running your tongue over the gap where a tooth fell out.

He lets the aching emptyness of the sky above him pull down into a narrow point aimed right at the heart of him – lets himself feel the space where Henry oughtta be, lets it fill him up till there ain't no room for nothing else – and then, slowly, lets the feel of the dark, rich earth beneath his feet, the hum of the cicadas and the clucking of the chickens, all that life trickle back into him and he moves to listen to the next signal.

--

Charles is officially the happiest man in the world. Marjory has agreed to marry him and – while they're saving their public engagement announcement for the Winchester summer cotillion – both Grandmama and Marjory's father have approved of the match. Charles will be the one to carry the Winchester name and fortune into the future – and he will be doing it with the most delightful and capable woman in the world at his side. He feels giddy with delight.

Honoria is blatantly laughing at him, but Charles cannot bring himself to mind. He feels rather like laughing himself, he's so full of effervescent joy. And he'd needed to tell someone the good news lest he burst like an overfilled balloon from the pressure of keeping his an engagement a secret. Charles still wants to yell the news from the rooftops – or at the very least, place a tasteful notice in the society pages – but he understands the need for secrecy. The news will be most impactful if shared during the party when all of Boston high society will be congregated in one place and may therefore bear witness to the ascendancy of the Winchester family to another generation of gracious and genteel leadership.

Subdued spectacle is the watchword – the night must be memorable and tasteful. Charles believes the current plan is a “spontaneous” engagement and the presentation of the ring over dessert-

Charles needs to find a ring!

Oh, this is terrible. Calamitous. He hadn't wanted to risk getting his hopes up by even looking at jewelry and now – at the eleventh hour – he must endeavor to find something approaching a worthy adornment for his bride-to-be. Charles can only hope to appeal to Honoria's better nature – via bribery, of course, as is the Winchester way – and pray that she takes pity on him. Her taste is exquisite – as is to be expected of one of her breeding – and Charles cannot do without her help in this delicate and most important matter.

Marriage may not always be forever, but quality jewelry ought to be.

--

BJ knows he's been acting strangely since he got back from visiting Hawkeye.

He's been trying not to distance himself from Peg, lose himself in contemplating the what-ifs and what-did-it-means. But he's maybe overcorrected. Payed her too much attention, made himself conspicuous that way.

It's just that it's easier to not think about Hawkeye when he's losing himself in Peg's embrace.

But whatever the reason, it's obvious that she's cottoned on to the fact that something's wrong – seeing how she's waiting for him in the living room after work with an expression that says he won't be able to weasel his way out of an explanation. BJ'd hoped she'd just let it go. Peg doesn't tend towards directness, has to have her own troubles coaxed out of her. But enough had been enough, apparently. And it looks like she's taking a page out of BJ's book with regards to handling a stubborn spouse.

Peg pats the sofa cushion next to her. “Sit down dear.” It's not a request.

BJ complies. There's not really anything else for him to do.

“Erin's at your parents' for the night so we have the whole evening to catch up with one another.”

BJ tries once more at deflection. “Nothing could make me happier than spending an evening catching up with you, Peggy.” He kisses her hand and up her arm.

And she smiles but she stops him before he gets to her lips.

“I didn't mean catch up like that and you know it, mister. You've been back home for over a week now and you still haven't told me how your little trip to visit Hawkeye went – I always enjoyed hearing about your various wild adventures, I would have thought you'd be full of new stories.”

Ah, hell. There's no way of getting out of answering such a direct question. He'll just have to try and keep his answers short and far away from any of his more tumultuous thoughts.

“Hawkeye's fine, Peg. He's working at a neighborhood clinic, doing more general practice than surgery. But he's happy. Happier than I've ever seen him.”

And hadn't that just smarted.

Intellectually, he knows it's because Hawkeye's home, away from Korea, away from the war. But it sure feels like an indictment of BJ – like he hadn't been enough for Hawkeye. And now that Hawkeye's back with Trapper, everything's just hunky-dory.

“Well, I'm glad he's doing all right. I know he only wrote the two letters, but he seemed like such a nice man – always trying to make you feel better about being away from home. And when I heard about what happened at the end of the war...” Peg trails off.

And maybe that will be the end of it. BJ hopes that's the end of it.

But then Peg says, “And how was meeting the famous Trapper John? Was he as bad as you expected?”

Her tone is teasing. She'd been on the receiving end of several letters – and later, several rants - about the man. About how much BJ detested his cheating, pranking, gin swilling ways.

Peg doesn't mean to do it, doesn't even know the turn his thoughts have taken. But now, BJ's thinking about things he'd rather not – things like how Trapper and Hawkeye had looked at each other like they were the only two people in the room - the whole world. How they'd leaned into each other, moved around one another with a casual intimacy. How well they fit into each others' lives.

“He's a competent surgeon and a pretty good poker player. And he and Hawkeye seem happy living together.” There. That's an innocuous statement that shouldn't warrant any further questions.

“And that just boils your briefs, now doesn't it?”

Yeah. Yeah, it sure does.

--

Hawkeye blinks sleepily and a blurry Trapper comes slowly into focus.

“Sorry for waking you,” Trapper whispers. “You can go back to sleep if you want – it's early still.”

Trapper's coming home off a late shift and it's obvious he's at the point of having stayed up all night where he's keyed up rather than exhausted. So Hawkeye probably won't be getting all that much more sleep regardless.

“You going to make coffee?”

Trapper nods.

“Bring me a cup and I'll forgive you for waking me up.”

Hawkeye cocoons himself back in the blankets. And he doesn't fall back asleep – although he may admit to dozing a little. Or maybe more than a little, because Trapper comes back with coffee and breakfast some indeterminate amount of time later.

Hawkeye wriggles into a more upright position and accepts the plate of pancakes. They're very good. And made even better by being eaten with Trapper snuggled up behind him, laying kisses on his neck and shoulders.

And Trapper's definitely still on the keyed up side of things. His cock is thick and hard and pressing against Hawkeye's back, a delicious counterpoint to his more considerate gestures. So Hawkeye can't bring himself to mind that he's barely finished eating before Trapper sets the plate and silverware aside and pulls him into a syrup sticky kiss.

They make out for a while and it's perfect. Wonderful.

“If you don't wash that plate soon, the syrup's going to turn into a rock and then you'll never get it off.”

“I'd rather think about getting something else off, if you know what I mean.” Trapper waggles his eyebrows in comical lechery.

But Hawkeye won't let himself be swayed. “Trapper, c'mon. The plate.”

“Fuck it.” Trapper grinds a little against Hawkeye's own erection, clearly trying to distract him since seduction didn't work. “We got plenty of other plates – we can just throw it away if it don't wash up.”

Hawkeye gives him a look.

“Fine. I'll go do the goddamn dishes. With a goddamn hard on. Since it's so goddamn important to you.” But Trapper's grinning as he says it. Then he turns to Hawkeye with a striking intensity. “Don't you go anywhere – I wanna pick this back up just as soon as I'm done.”

Hawkeye relaxes further into the mattress. “I'll be right here waiting for you, Trapper, don't you worry.”

“You better.” It comes out as a growl.

And Trapper gives Hawkeye one last bruising kiss before gathering up the dishes and heading downstairs to the kitchen. Hawkeye stretches luxuriously – reveling in the fact that this is how he gets to spend his mornings now. Then he gets up to go brush his teeth in anticipation of Trapper's return.

--

Steve is beginning to understand Hawkeye's desire to fob off all his wannabe paramours on the nearest available target. Ever since he'd moved to Crabapple Cove, Steve had been pursued by a whole slew of young ladies looking for a husband. And he's sure they're all lovely individuals – but as a group, they're overwhelming. Exhausting.

Fortunately, Dr. Pierce – Daniel – has taken pity on Steve and granted him a standing invitation to dinner so he can politely turn down the dinner invitations from literally every single single woman in town. Steve is even beginning to suspect that women from the surrounding towns are in on it – he hadn't recognized a good third of tonight's hopefuls. It's a wonder Steve hadn't been trampled in the crush.

And Daniel had just stood there laughing at Steve's misfortune before escorting him out the door and to the safety of the Pierce house. What exactly Daniel gets out of all this – other than a good laugh, Steve means – he doesn't know. It might be that Daniel is lonely, missing Hawkeye, and that Steve is a convenient substitute for his actual son. There's no denying Daniel has taken an almost paternal interest in Steve.

But it feels like Daniel honestly enjoys Steve's company. And Steve enjoys Daniel's, even if he does gently mock Steve for his string of unwanted admirers.

Not that Steve minds all of the attention. There are a few girls he enjoys going out with – though they tend to be the ones who don't mob him. And if the biggest problem in his life right now is that he's too desirable to women. Well, there are worse fates.

Still, Steve hopes the novelty of his presence wears off soon and things calm down a little. He did move to Crabapple Cove in search of a little peace and quiet after all.

--

“He's an old friend of the family.”

“You sure have a lot of those, Maggie.”

Margaret's not sure what her expression is doing, but now Kat looks sad.

“Oh, honey. I'm not upset with you for having dinner with General Barker. I know what it means to do what you have to in order to get ahead. And I know how important your career is to you – how much getting this promotion he's dangling like a lure would mean to you.”

Kat sighs.

“I just wish you didn't have to do it. I wish you hadn't had to do it so many times in the past. And I wonder.

“I wonder how many “Uncles” sat you on their knee as a little girl, knowing you'd be sitting on their laps for a different reason in a few years?

“How many little jokes did your father make about how pretty you were as a girl? What a beautiful young woman you grew up to be? And the Uncles nodding and drooling and thinking about paying you a personal visit in a few years – just an old family friend catching up on old times – and didn't you just blossom into the prettiest little thing?

“How many of them – how many of them couldn't wait that long?”

Margaret doesn't even realize that she's crying until Kat wipes away the tears.

“I'm sorry, Maggie. This... this is about you and your promotion. I shouldn't have said anything.”

Kat pulls her into a hug and Margaret sobs into her shoulder.

Her mother never said anything about it – just retreated into the kitchen after dinner to drink sherry, leaving Margaret to play hostess for her father and his friends. And her father certainly hadn't said anything about the way his friends looked at her – the way they touched and leered.

And it hadn't hurt her! She'd just learned early on how to make men bend to her whims. How to use them to get ahead in a world that wasn't ready to let a woman lead on her own merits.

So why is she crying?

Kat just stands there and rocks Margaret gently, like she's soothing a child. Holds Margaret firmly to her breast and she's safe here. Here, she doesn't have to be strong. Here, she doesn't have to face the ugly reality of the world – the reality of what exactly she's worth to any man she meets.

But no reprieve lasts forever.

Eventually, Margaret stops crying. Stands tall. Pulls away from Kat's arms.

“I hate them,” Margaret whispers into the space between their bodies. “I hate how they look at me, how they touch me like they own a piece of me. And I hate this world for making me need them.”

Kat hums in gentle understanding and hugs Margaret close once more.

Then Kat helps Margaret do her hair and makeup. Zips her into her dress, helps her into her heels. Gets her ready for her dinner with General Barker.

--

“The American dream, pah!” And then Uncle Abdul spits on the sidewalk outside the laundromat.

It's a familiar refrain. It's how every family gathering gets going. The sign to start complaining about your troubles – how you lost your job, your wife, your money to the craps table. Whatever.

And Max gets it. The world ain't a bed of roses. Being a poor Lebanese immigrant, you have to scrape and scrimp and scam your way into a living.

But Max has always been an optimist. Always on the lookout for a new angle, a new scam, a new way to get by. And now that Soon Li and the kid are in the picture, Max had better double down. Make sure they're provided for. Make sure the kid gets a shot at a better life than either of them had.

So Max had started wheeling and dealing like all their lives depend on it, starting almost a year ago now in Korea.

First to find Soon Li's family, to fulfill that promise. What's left of them had been at a refugee camp almost all the way down in Pusan for whatever reason – trying to pry any useful information outta army intelligence had been a waste of good bribes. But they're all back together again, standing in the shell craters that used to be their village. Looking at the place their family has lived and died for generations – a last glimpse before they gotta leave.

So second had been getting them all settled wherever they wanted to go. With the graft and corruption and black market dealing left over from the war, it's easy enough to get most of the family settled around Seoul – with jobs and a place to live, even. They can't be farmers anymore, the land all gone to shit anywhere close to the demilitarized zone, but they oughtta scrape by. But Soon Li and the kid – some nebulously related cousin they'd run into early on, who even at around two years old don't talk any, not in Korean or English – they both wanna go back to the States with Max.

And that had been third. Getting the kid adopted and a name and papers. Getting them all tickets home. It had taken some finagling, some heavy bribery – all of the Klinger collection gone again to an Army bureaucrat's Korean mistress – but it's worth the price. And it helps they got hitched Christian like when Max was still a soldier – the Buddhist ceremony they'd had after finding Soon Li's folks doesn't count for shit with the US government.

Fourth had been getting settled back home. Finding a place to live that'll take Max and Soon Li and the kid. Max breaks out the Class A's and plays up being a patriotic GI doing right by the gal he knocked up, so they get a pretty nice apartment on the Hunky side of town. Next is getting a job. After a third wedding, this time in Arabic and with a zaffe made up of neighbors and relatives – and with a party that lasts all night, full of food and dancing and family Max ain't seen in years – that problem gets solved, too. Uncle Habib, who got out early enough to go to the wedding on account of good behavior, is looking for people to work the laundromat he just bought – and Uncle Habib is willing to give Max and Soon Li a shot at it. It's a money laundering operation, obviously, but Max thinks they can make a real go of it as a business, doing dry cleaning and alterations and such.

That's the fifth thing. And it's not so much wheeling and dealing as it is careful words to the guys who come in with women's clothes for dry cleaning – women's clothes that are the right size to fit them. Max has developed an eye for this kind of thing, after so many years of sewing and altering and wearing dresses. And an eye for how to make the clothes fit right on bodies they maybe weren't designed for. So it ain't long before Max has a line of customers for discrete alterations, done in the back room while Soon Li oversees the running of the laundromat with an iron fist. And some have started to ask about tailoring.

Maybe someday Max will even have enough customers to set up as a tailor. No money laundering involved. Just honest business and honest skill.

Maybe, maybe, maybe. There Max goes, being an optimist again. And maybe Uncle Abdul is right to spit when Max asks about buying a building. Maybe Uncle Abdul's right to say the American Dream is a crock of shit and that dreaming, planning, scheming for more will just bite Max right in the butt. But Max can't help wondering if maybe.