I watched 10x14 "The Tooth Will Set You Free" and promptly nominate "B.J, don't forget it's your turn to milk Charles in the morning" for the "dialogue that doesn't sound like it's from an actual episode" files.

(They are so hard to write!! It's like 60% normal conversation, 20% rip-your-heart-out sad, and 20% Completely Unhinged. Or something like that.)


ANYWAY.

I am thoroughly charmed and have not stopped being charmed by the obvious implication in the stinger that they're all hanging out with Charles for moral support while he has dental work done. I mean yeah, there's not much else to do around the 4077 for entertainment, but it's the middle of the night and they could be sleeping or enjoying their down time. But no, they're all (even Margaret, who wasn't around in the Swamp earlier) hanging out with their cranky, definitely-not-good-company-in-this-episode friend to distract him and give him friendly shit and not let him have to do this perfectly ordinary, miserably human thing alone. They know he's scared and they well-meaningly bullied him into it for good reasons, but they're not going to make him do it by himself.

And this made me think about how much I want them all to have this kind of support when they're back in their civilian life after the war. Not just people to be close to; they've all got their families who they love. But I also want them to have coworkers who love and appreciate and take care of them.

I want Hawkeye to have a small country practice with receptionists/nurses who absolute adore him and banter back with his jokes and bring him pastries and coffee when he's staying up all night with a patient, and Margaret to have a team of nurses who see past the scary exterior and have flowers sent to her desk and throw her birthday parties, and Charles to run a thoracic department full of people who are fiercely protective of their terrifying boss for reasons no one outside the department can understand and leave him little treats and cajole him into taking time off when he's working too hard.

I just think they deserve to spend the rest of their lives surrounded by people who love them, and look out for them when they're not looking out for themselves. And I want them to have that. ❤️

The above was all posted on Tumblr here.... then I had additional thoughts.

I didn't really consider, until chatting about the episode with sheron afterwards, that Hawkeye is actually really restrained in how much teasing he directs at Charles in this episode - he hardly jokes about it at all, and it's mostly directed at gently defusing the situation with Charles keeping them awake at night.

(Actually one thing I'm noticing more and more is how much Hawkeye uses humor to defuse tense situations, both in the OR and out of it; it's his first-line go-to when people are getting genuinely angry with each other or when there's a potential fight brewing - to make a joke, deflect attention onto himself and/or undercut the behavior that's causing the problem. If he can make them laugh, that's great; if he can deflect their irritation onto him instead of each other, he's fine with that as long as it helps everyone work together. HAWKEYE. <3)

Anyway though, the usual edge isn't there, and even in the opening scene when Charles is an ass to Margaret about medical stuff, she lets it roll off her with surprisingly little reaction. Colonel Potter finds out about the toothache situation for the first time in the mess scene near the start, but it's clear that Charles's roommates and Margaret have known about this for a while longer. They all know he's in pain and they are cutting him a lot of slack because of it.

(Although this makes Charles telling Margaret not to tell anyone when she confiscates the codeine extra hilarious. Literally everyone she might tell already knows, because you're as inscrutable as clear lake water, Charles!)