So this is it. The final chapter of HEAIM (as I've taken to calling it) is up! I just want to say thanks to the following for favouriting/following/reviewing/suspending your disbelief over this fic: jeweledweevil, hippiechick2112, T Goerlitz, DaceyRose, Allied Hero, Sherloki'd1, Crazypixies, Paulina'sHM, MASHlover23, and cmee57. I love you all. Also, thanks to adsiderum from the Fangirl fandom for helping me out earlier! And if anyone reading this wants a sequel, there's a poll on my profile.

Disclaimer: I don't own M*A*S*H. Like, at all.

And they all lived happily ever after in Maine. Well, kind of. We have our problems.

Mom isn't speaking to Hawkeye and Cathy isn't speaking to me. It's not for lack of trying on our part. It depresses me sometimes, partly because they're my family and partly because if anyone ever finds out the truth I'll be sent right back to Boston with the knowledge that I'd contributed to the ruin of two people's lives and Cathy will still hate me and quite possibly murder me in my sleep. Fortunately, so far no-one knows, although some people probably suspect. Hey, it's a small town (population 402). I guess most people would just wanna pretend it's not happening. I don't want to know what's gonna happen to the three of us if word gets out.

So yeah, it's kind if a bad situation, but it's a hell of a lot better than it was. One day we'll all be on speaking terms again, and one day people will be more accepting, and then everything will be okay. And whilst I hate just sitting around waiting for tomorrow to be brighter and for that irritating hypothetical glass to fill up, I suppose it's all I can do right now.

Dad and I have only been back twice. Once was a few days after I ran away the second time to pick up clothes and stuff. The other was at Christmas. We spent the day with my maternal grandmother trying to avoid talking about All This. Talk about awkward.

Still, I keep trying to get in touch with my sister in the hope that she'll hear me out. Maybe one day we'll be friends again.

But there are questions to be resolved first. Questions that I may never know the answers to. What am I? Homewrecker or matchmaker? Disease or cure? Or am I neither; just a screwed-up little girl who allowed herself to become a viable vector? I guess I'm all three, really.

Whatever the answer is, maybe I should just let this story die with me, but I figured it should be preserved for posterity. I've written it all down and I'll carry it with me always so no-one will ever find it by accident, and maybe in a few years, or decades, or centuries, someone living in a civilization where this won't be so awful by social standards will read it and be inspired to be themselves around people who hate them, or do something risky but awesome without being afraid of the consequences, or maybe just have the confidence to wake up every morning and have faith in the fact that their life won't suck. I like that idea.

So about that glass: I think I've figured out the answer. People think that if the glass is exactly 50:50 then it really doesn't matter if you say it's half-full or half-empty, but they're wrong. It all depends on whether or not the glass was being filled or drained to get the water to that level in the first place. And I think that's a better metaphor for a person's outlook on life. A true optimist fills their glass, and a real pessimist drains it. It's nothing to do with perspective at all. Not really. Life's what you make it.

Beck Pierce-McIntyre, January 1st, 1959

And now, just for fun...the HEAIM playlist! Most of these are Beck songs, but there's one or two Hawpper songs in there as well. Enjoy!

Breakaway - Kelly Clarkson

It's The End Of The World As We Know It - R.E.M.

Defying Gravity - Kerry Ellis

Get It Right - Glee Cast

Something Better - Softengine

Another Place To Fall - KT Tunstall

Let It Go - Demi Lovato (They kept playing the Idina Menzel version of this on the radio and I thought it was a good Beck song, and the lyrics of this version made more sense in this context, so yeah.)