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Margaret threw her cards down with a groan of disappointment.
“I’m out! Again!” She huffed and crossed her arms in the way that only Hot Lips could. Klinger gave a short laugh and swept all the bills on the table towards him, brushing away a hat feather with the other hand.
“The cards love me, what can I say?” He batted his eyelashes, more of a joke than an insult. “Find a deck that loves you, dear. Or play on a more auspicious night.”
As if on cue, thunder crashed outside the tent, and a gust of wind blew open the shoddy excuse for a Swamp door. Father Mulcahy surged up and blustered over to the door to close it, holding his Loyola hoodie shut tight around his neck as he did so.
“Oh!” grumbled Margaret again. “If there was anything else to do on such a horrid night, I wouldn’t be here losing at poker with you men!”
“You could always try losing at something else if you want.” Hawkeye cocked an eyebrow in her direction, shuffling the cards he had taken back from everyone assembled. “Strip poker, for instance.”
Father Mulcahy’s ears went red in the confines of his hood, but Radar just looked confused.
“Sir, wouldn’t that still be poker?”
Hawkeye dealt again, leaning over the table to reach everyone. “Depends on how much gin is left in that still.”
Decisively, Margaret pushed her small pile of cards away from her with a haughty air. “You know what, Pierce, you may be onto something for the first time in your life!”
Hawkeye grabbed Trapper’s arm, looking at him with mock excitement. “Mark the calendar, Trap!” Trapper raised his eyebrows and scrambled for a pen, raising his other palm to squint and scribble at it while Hawkeye pretended to dictate.
Margaret pursed her lips. “I’m sure the Father here will be grateful for a game that doesn’t involve your constant gambling!” Mulcahy spread his hands in a wordless concession, despite the fact that everyone around the table knew he never kept his winnings. “And I just happen to have a game with me that’s better suited for the intellectuals among us.”
With only a hint of ceremony, Margaret proceeded to pull out a full sized box of Scrabble from her bag beneath the table. It looked well worn and well taken care of, even before the wooden box was opened.
“A bit large for an evening clutch, isn’t that, Major?” Klinger’s eyes widened.
“Don’t be ridiculous, a lady should always be prepared with the essentials!” Margaret set the box smartly on the poker table, while Klinger looked like he was mentally taking notes.
“Oh, I don’t know, I’m not too good with word games.” Radar looked apprehensively at the board that Margaret was unfolding.
“Nonsense! Scrabble is as much a game of strategy as poker is. The only difference is that I’m good at it.” She raised a challenging eyebrow at Hawkeye across the table, and he smiled coyly back.
“I don’t suppose there’s a version called ‘strip Scrabble’, is there?”
“Very funny.”
---
The storm got worse as the night drew on, lashing at the tents with cold rain. Inside, heads were bowed over small wooden tiles.
“T-R-A-P-P-E-R,” the man himself proudly exclaimed, reaching to arrange his tiles.
“Really, sir, your own name?” Klinger asked wryly.
“And no proper nouns, Trap.” Hawk waggled a finger in his best friend’s direction. “It’s a lot harder to cheat in Scrabble, I know, it must be driving you mad.”
Trapper’s face was characteristically smug. “It may displease you to know then, gentlemen, that “trapper” is also an occupation, and therefore valid.”
“Displease us all you want,” Margaret smirked, clearly lumping herself in with ‘gentlemen’, “but you’re no closer to winning.”
“How many points do you have over there, Major?” Father Mulcahy tried to subtly peer over at the few tiles Margaret had left. She expertly shifted her tile stand an inch to the right and the good Father lifted his eyes to the heavens innocently.
“How many!” Hawkeye exclaimed. “Half the board came from Major Thesaurus Houlihan over here!”
“Anyone could have played ‘persnickety’, Pierce, I just happened to get to it first.”
“Yeah, well, the word suits you, have it.”
“I will, thank you very much.”
“And I thought we said no names! Where does ‘Nick’ fall into the rules anyway?”
“I already told you-”
Four heads bounced back and forth between Hawkeye and Margaret before settling somewhere in the middle to all look at each other. Trapper wiggled his eyebrows, and Klinger rolled his eyes.
Understanding a beat too late, Radar began to let out an amused “OH!” but was interrupted by a good natured elbow to the ribs from Father Mulcahy. As a group, they all began to pack up their belongings and take up their raincoats (none too quietly), but the bickering flirts at the table hardly noticed.
“I’m gonna head out for some fresh air, Hawk,” said Trapper, clapping a hand onto Hawkeye’s shoulder.
“Sure thing, Trap.” Hawkeye paid the barest amount of attention to Trapper’s goodbye. “And another thing, Hot Lips, I have half a mind to ask you where that extra blank tile came from! A sleeve seems likely!”
“See you all tomorrow!” Father Mulcahy gave a little wave as he followed everyone else to the door.
“Oh, yes, goodbye Father.” Margaret didn’t even look. “Everybody knows there are three blank tiles per Scrabble set, Pierce!”
“I don’t think everybody does know that! Only those of us that carry Scrabble in their purse!”
“It’s extremely practical to carry around something that might alleviate one’s boredom!”
“There’s plenty of ways to alleviate boredom, Hot Lips.”
“Enlighten me with something that isn’t raw spirits.”
“Oh I’m thinking of a few ways right now.”
They both blinked, and realized three things; that the room was empty, that they were standing, and that sometime in the last few minutes they had gotten extremely close to each other. And perhaps a fourth thing, although it was distant in their minds. The storm had grown much quieter, reduced to only a painless patter of rain on the tent.
After a long moment of indecision, Margaret cleared her throat and took a tiny step back. The air was charged, but neither of them knew if it was the last vestiges of the storm, or something else entirely.
“I think you won,” murmured Hawkeye, all the bite gone from his voice.
Margaret smiled down at the table as she began absently picking up tiles. “Yes, well. There really are only two blank tiles in a Scrabble game.”
Hawkeye smiled, the kind that left his eyes crinkled and rosy. “You sly dog. Don’t worry, I won’t tell. But between us, you could have won easy.”
She finally looked up at him after putting her Scrabble box neatly back in her bag. Her voice was soft as she turned to leave. “I know. Goodnight Hawkeye.”
“Goodnight Margaret.”