M*A*S*H

After Trapper left, Hawkeye was never quite the same.

Radar noticed it first, but that was no surprise, since Radar noticed everything about ten steps before everyone else. What surprised Radar was just how long it took for the rest of the 4077 to see that there was something wrong with Hawkeye. It was glaringly obvious to him that Hawkeye was...different; and it wasn't just that he didn't laugh or smile as much or seem quite so 'devil-may-care' about the fate life had dealt him. He'd been in Korea a while and it was only natural that even Hawk's excessive optimism would eventually dwindle.

The change was more subtle than that.

It was in the way he'd wait half a beat as if listening for a laugh or answer that would never come; it was the way he'd turn, slightly, in Post-Op as if he expected someone to be standing at his side; it was the way he drank, desperately, grimly, as if the homemade hooch was the only lifeline he had.

It was the way he'd stare at the road sign to Boston, as if by staring hard enough he would somehow magically find himself there.

Radar noticed these things and he thought he knew why.