Fic: The Dharma Years: 1974, part 2a of 2 (Lost; Sawyer/Juliet)
Title: The Dharma Years: 1974 (part 2a of 2)
Pairing: Sawyer/Juliet
Rating: R
Words: 12,950
Summary: Life with the Dharma Initiative. July through December, 1974.
A/N: The official timeline of the show is a little confusing, so I’m just assuming that they were in Dharma from January 1974 until July 1977. My plan is for this to eventually cover all three years, right up until the O6 show up and ruin everyone’s fun. This takes place over the second half of 1974. Part 1 is here.
July
Keeping their relationship a secret is surprisingly easy, for the most part. They only have one really close call, when Jin, of all people, almost catches them in the act.
They’re down in the security office one morning, at the tail-end of Sawyer’s graveyard shift, so early that pretty much everyone else in the barracks is still asleep. Juliet actually stayed with him most of the night, which is a total breach of security protocol, but Sawyer figures what Horace don’t know won’t hurt him. Besides, it’s a hell of a lot easier for Sawyer to stay awake all night when he’s got Juliet around to keep him entertained.
Juliet’s supposed to be at the motor pool in less than an hour, and she still has to go home and shower, so they’re trying to make good use of these last few minutes together. Sawyer’s got her pressed up against the desk, both of them pretty much completely naked, she’s running her tongue along the hollow in his throat and God, he’s so close, when the door rattles, someone trying to turn the locked handle.
They spring apart quick as anything, throwing on their clothes and trying to look like they weren’t just having sex on the desk amid all the time cards and security check paperwork.
When Sawyer unlocks the door, Jin’s there, looking confused and a little worried. The door to the security office is never supposed to be locked, Sawyer knows, but they figured it was probably a smart move considering their plans for the night. Turns out they were right, even though now they’re gonna have to think of an excuse pretty damn quick.
“Hey man,” Sawyer says, realizing he sounds really out of breath. He clears his throat and runs a hand through his hair, trying to get himself under control. “What’s up?”
Jin just looks at Sawyer, then glances into the room behind him, to where Juliet is staring intently at the monitors-the monitors that are pretty much just showing an empty early morning Dharmaville-her face flushed, and a few pieces of hair sticking to her neck with sweat. By the time he looks back to Sawyer, his confusion has transformed to amusement. Sawyer looks at the ground and clears his throat again and, damn, this is embarrassing. Especially since Jin is actually smirking right now. Sawyer didn’t even know Jin could smirk, but apparently he’s really great at it.
“Keys?” Jin says, the corner of his mouth still turned up a little, the smirk almost becoming a full-blown smile.
“Um,” Sawyer says, not knowing what the hell Jin’s talking about. “What?”
“Van,” Jin says, sounding amused. “Grid search?”
Shit. Sawyer can’t believe he forgot about that, the early morning grid searches Miles and Jin are doing this week. He’s just thankful Jin came for the keys instead of Miles. That would have been a disaster.
Or, more of a disaster than it already is, considering he ain't got a clue where those damn keys are and Jin’s standing there looking like the cat that just swallowed the damn canary. He pats the pockets of his jumpsuit, trying to remember where he put them, but he’s not thinking clearly, like the blood ain’t quite made it back up to his brain yet.
“Keys?” Jin says again, looking like he’s enjoying this whole situation way too much. Sawyer narrows his eyes at him and takes a step forward, not really sure what he’s planning to do-it’s not like he’s going to hit Jin, for Christ’s sake-when Juliet walks up next to him, puts her hand lightly on his arm. He feels himself relax a little, the tension draining out of him.
“Here you, go,” she says, holding out a set of keys to Jin. “I had just stopped by to drop them off.” Her voice is completely steady, the lie smooth and easy, and she doesn’t sound out of breath at all, even though her face is still a little flushed.
Jin takes the keys with a quick nod of thanks, that stupid smile still on his face, then turns around and makes his way back up the stairs and outside to start the daily search for Locke and the others.
“Close call,” Sawyer says sheepishly, when the door finally clicks closed. He’s watching Juliet carefully, a little worried about how she’s going to react to Jin practically walking in on them having sex. He expects her to be annoyed, but she mostly just looks embarrassed, maybe even a little amused.
When she catches him watching, she quirks an eyebrow at him. “At least he probably won’t be able to tell anybody,” she says, smiling a little.
Sawyer grins at her and shakes his head, somehow both relieved and annoyed that she can joke around about this whole sneaking around thing. He walks back over to where she is and leans in to kiss her again, but she pulls away before he can and he gets this horrible feeling in his chest, like maybe this is it. But she just nods up at the clock.
"I better get going," she says, smiling a little. He nods and she kisses him gently on the cheek. "I'll see you tonight," she tells him.
When she gets to the top of the stairs, she turns around and gives him a little wave. He waves back and, as he watches the door close behind her, all he can think about is how she's gonna react if Jin decides to tell anyone what he saw.
**
When they show up at Jin and Miles’s house the next night for their weekly poker game, Sawyer braces himself for the teasing he’s sure he and Juliet are gonna get. He doubts Jin would rat them out to anyone else, but he figures for he’s told Miles for sure.
But when they get there and sit around the kitchen table just like always, Miles doesn’t say a word about it or crack any jokes. Hell, there ain’t even a wink or an obscene hand gesture. He guesses means that Jin didn’t say nothing to him, which truth be told, Sawyer thinks is a little strange. It’s like everyone but him gets the need to keep it a big damn mystery.
Even so, he spends most of the game glancing nervously at Jin and Miles, waiting for one of them to say something about it. He’s not paying much attention at all to the game, and he’s already in the hole almost ten bucks. It’s the first time he’s ever really been grateful that they only play for change because otherwise he’d be completely broke by the end of the night.
He glances down at the cards Juliet just handed him and, shit, he’s got nothin’. He rubs his hand across his face, and reaches for his beer. It’s almost empty and he finishes it in one drink, setting it back down on the table with a light clank.
Across the table, Miles groans and drops his cards face down on the table in front of him. “Fuck,” he says, shaking his head. He glares at Juliet, like she’s somehow managing to stack the deck against him.
“What?” Juliet asks, looking way too innocent. Sawyer narrows his eyes at her, wondering if maybe she is cheating. The pile of coins in front of her is suspiciously large.
Miles doesn’t say anything, just shakes his head a little and picks his cards back up, rearranging them with a sigh. They play out the hand, Sawyer folding first. When Juliet wins again, Miles practically throws his cards at her and Sawyer would find this whole thing way more amusing if he weren't sucking so badly himself.
“Hey Juliet,” Miles says, scooping up the new hand of cards she just dealt him and sounding annoyed. “Would you mind taking a break from systematically stealing my weekly pay to grab some more beers out of the fridge?”
Juliet finishes stacking her newly-won coins and smiles sweetly at him. “Not at all,” she says, laughing a little when Miles flips her off. She heads over to the fridge and kneels down to grab another six-pack of beer, her shirt riding up a little in the back to expose a thin line of smooth, pale skin. Sawyer doesn’t even realize he’s staring until he hears Miles start talking beside him. “Damn, Juliet,” he says, nodding at her lower back. “What the hell is that?”
Juliet’s hand flies to her back, to that damn mark, and she stares at Miles over her shoulder. Sawyer just shakes his head and looks down at his cards because he knows this ain’t going nowhere and Miles is most likely about to get told off.
But then Juliet’s shrugging and answering him. “Just a little gift from Ben,” she says lightly, like it’s no big deal.
“A gift from Ben?” Miles says, confused. “What does that mean?”
Juliet stands up and puts the beer on the table, pulling a can off the plastic ring and popping the tab. “I did something he didn't approve of,” she says, taking a drink and sitting back down. “This," she gestures vaguely at her back, "was my punishment.” The whole time she’s talking she’s looking at Miles, at her cards, at some blank space on the wall, anywhere but at Sawyer.
Miles shakes his head, the way he always does when he hears some crazy new thing about being on this island, but he doesn’t say anything else and Sawyer hopes that he'll just drop it. They can change the subject and talk about something else and then Juliet can tell Sawyer about it when they get home, when they’re away from Miles and Jin and it doesn’t feel like she’s trying to hide something from him or avoid having an actual conversation about it.
But of course Miles doesn't drop it, because not dropping things is pretty much the only thing the little bastard is good at. “So what’d you do?” he asks, rearranging the cards in his hand, and signaling for Juliet to give him three new ones.
She takes three cards off the top of the stack and hands them to Miles, face-down. “I killed someone,” she says. Her voice sounds almost casual, but Sawyer knows her well enough by now to hear the edge to it, the way her tone goes kind of flat when she’s really upset.
That seems to get Miles’s attention, since he finally looks up from his cards. “Who’d you kill?” he asks, watching her carefully.
Juliet shrugs and throws a couple of coins into the pot, calling Jin’s raise from before. “A man named Danny.”
And it hits Sawyer then, what she’s talking about, who she killed, why she killed him. And, Jesus, sometimes he hates this fucking island so much he can’t think straight. He rubs his forehead and looks over at Juliet. She glances up and catches him staring at her, and he expects her to do something, somehow acknowledge all the shit that’s running silently between them right now. But she doesn’t do anything, just looks back down at her cards, like she couldn’t care less that she killed someone because of him and Kate and then got fucking branded for it.
Sawyer clenches his teeth, angrier at her than he can ever really remember being. He can feel Jin looking at him out of the corner of his eye and he knows he needs to calm down and act normal, to keep up the stupid fucking charade that he and Juliet are just roommates and friends, that there’s no reason he should be so mad about this. But he can’t seem to force himself to calm down, just keeps getting more and more pissed off as he watches Juliet take another drink of her beer.
“James,” she says, looking directly at him for the first time since this whole conversation started. He just stares back at her, waiting for her to say something, apologize for doing this here, doing this now, apologize for not telling him sooner. But instead she just nods at the cards he’s holding. “It’s your bet.”
And that’s it, Sawyer can’t take it anymore, the way she can just pretend like all the things that have happened between them-hell, all the things that are happening between them-don’t affect her at all. He drops his cards and gets up quick, so abruptly that his chair tips over and clatters to the floor.
“Jesus, Jim,” Miles says, looking at him over his cards like he’s insane. “What the hell?”
Sawyer doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even look at him, just storms outside, the door slamming shut behind him. He can hear Miles still talking behind him, asking Juliet and Jin what Sawyer’s problem is.
By the time he makes it to his and Juliet’s house, he expects her to be right behind him, to have followed him. But when he finally turns around, she’s not there and the barracks are completely deserted.
He stands in the open doorway for a few minutes, getting angrier by the second, thinking of all the things he’s going to say to her when she finally shows up.
When Juliet gets home that night, he’s in already bed, just laying in the dark and starting up at the ceiling. By the time she finally stumbles into their bedroom, he considers just pretending to be asleep, letting this go, pushing it back with everything else they never talk about. Besides, now Sawyer knows the whole story-or some of the story, at least-knows that it was his fault, somehow, something he fucked up even though he didn’t actually do anything wrong. And that’s what really gets him, that for once in his life, he didn’t actually do anything, but apparently that doesn't matter. Him just existing was enough to hurt her. So he thinks about dropping it, since it's clear she ain't too interested in sharing and he figures maybe he's done enough already.
But after just a few minutes, he clicks on the lamp next to the bed and rolls over to face her. Her eyes get wide and he can tell she’s surprised he’s awake, and he figures she probably waited this long to come home so she wouldn’t have to deal with him.
He wants to fight with her, to say something that will make her feel as terrible as she made him feel tonight, to force her to talk about it. But when she looks at him with her sad blue eyes, the anger just kind of evaporates, leaving him feeling deflated and depressed.
“James,” she sighs, rubbing a hand across her forehead. Her breath smells a little like beer, and he realizes that she’s probably drunk. Somehow, that makes him feel even worse. The only two other times he can remember her drinking that much are when the freighter exploded and then when they met Ben at that party. And now tonight when she had to think about all the ways him being in her life has made her even more miserable.
“You should have told me,” he says after a few minutes, furious with himself for sounding so hurt, for letting her see how much this bothers him.
Juliet just looks at him and he’s got no idea what she’s thinking right now. She blinks at him and sighs, sounding as exhausted as he feels. “You never asked.”
And, well, there ain’t much he can say to that, so he just closes his eyes and thinks about all the ways things are falling apart, how he never knows what he’s supposed to do or say to get her to talk to him.
After a few minutes, he moves over so that he's pressed against her back, her body solid and comforting against him. Eventually they fall asleep like that, the light still burning brightly behind them.
**
August
The first week in August, Horace calls Sawyer in to his office for a meeting, looking serious and somber.
When Sawyer gets inside, Horace closes the door behind them and motions for Sawyer to have a seat.
“What’s up, boss?” Sawyer asks nervously, wondering what the hell this is about, what he possibly could have done wrong.
Horace doesn’t say anything at first, just sorts through some papers on his desk and Sawyer’s stomach drops. Finally, after what seems like forever, Horace looks at him and says, “How long have you been here now, Jim?”
“Uh,” Sawyer says, trying to stall a little. “About eight months now, I guess.”
“Eight months,” Horace repeats thoughtfully. “That’s about what I figured.” Horace doesn’t say anything else and Sawyer just waits, still trying to figure out what’s going on.
“Well, Jim,” he says eventually. “Here’s the thing. You know Bill, right? Our Head of Security?”
Sawyer just nods, mustering every ounce of self-control not to roll his eyes. Of course he knows who Bill is--the man’s been his damn boss for eight months.
“Well,” Horace says, “Bill’s planning on leaving us next week and that’s got me in a bit of a bind.”
“Oh,” Sawyer says, even more confused. He had no idea Bill was leaving and he ain’t got a clue what this has to do with him.
“How would you feel about taking his place?” Horace asks and, what? Sawyer just stares at him dumbly for a minute, no idea what to say. Horace must take this as a bad sign, because he gets up from his chair and walks around to where Sawyer’s sitting. He leans on the edge of his desk and puts his hand on Sawyer’s shoulder. “I know it’s a lot to ask,” he says. “But I think you’re the man for the job.”
”Okay,” Sawyer hears himself say. He knows he should probably talk this over with Juliet, maybe think on it some more, but it’s just--Head of Security. He’d be in charge of the whole damn place. It’s too good of an opportunity to pass up.
Horace grins at him and claps him on the shoulder. “Excellent,” he says, reaching out to shake Sawyer’s hand. “Congratulations, Jim. And thank you. I really do appreciate it.”
Sawyer smiles back at him, feeling almost embarrassingly proud of himself, his mind already racing with all the possibilities for expanding his searches of the island, maybe finally finding some more of his people.
**
When he gets home that night, Juliet’s laying on the couch reading Catch-22. She looks up at him and smiles when he walks through the door and he gets that feeling he always does when he sees her these days, like everything in his life is exactly the way it should be.
He kicks off his boots right inside the door and walks over to her. She sets the book down on the floor next to her and moves over so there’s room on the couch for him.
He lays down beside her, the couch still warm from her body. Sawyer moves so they’re face to face and Juliet reaches up and tucks a piece of hair behind his ear. “Hey,” she says, smiling at him, and then kissing him, long and slow. They just lay on the couch like that, making out like teenagers for a while, until he pulls back a little, leaning forward so their foreheads are resting against each other.
“What was that for?” he says. Not that he’s complaining, but it’s not like she normally jumps him the second he walks through the door.
“I heard about your meeting with Horace,” she says, smiling at him. “I’m proud of you, James.”
He looks down, suddenly embarrassed for some reason. She leans forward and kisses him again, reaching out to pull down the zipper on his jumpsuit, pushing the thick fabric down off his shoulders.
He runs his hands under her shirt, running his fingertips over the soft skin on her stomach, on her breasts, on her sides, touching her everywhere he can. When his fingers brush against the mark on her back, she stop kissing him, pulls back far enough so she can look him in the eye.
She doesn’t say anything at first and he wonders if he should move his hand, back to where her skin is smooth and unmarked, back to places that aren’t reminders of where knowing him has gotten her.
“I’m sorry,” she says, eventually, her voice low and serious. He strokes his thumb lightly over the red, raised skin and she bites on her lower lip, looks like she might cry. “I should have told you,” she says. “I just-I didn’t know what to say.”
Sawyer’s not sure how to respond to that, so he just kisses her again, soft and slow, trying to show her that he ain’t mad about it any more. He feels her smile against his mouth, and he figures that she gets it, that things are going to be okay. They shift around so that he’s laying on top of her, and he reaches down to help her push her shirt over her head.
They have sex on the couch, slow and gentle, and he feels closer to her than he ever has before.
**
A couple of days later, Horace asks Sawyer if he’d mind going out with him in a few days to talk to Richard to negotiate some changes to the contract Dharma has with the Hostiles, now that he’s agreed to take on more responsibility and all. Sawyer agrees without even thinking about it, realizing it’ll be one the few chances he’s gonna get to search some of the off-limits parts of the island.
The day they’re supposed to go out and meet the Hostiles, Horace gets sick with the flu. When Sawyer stops by his house that morning, the guy can barely stand and he looks terrible, shaky and green.
It’s supposed to be an easy visit-some minor issue about one of the boundaries that Horace doesn’t think Richard will mind-nothing that should take any more than a few hours, everybody home by dinner time. It’s pretty much the perfect opportunity to do a search of the parts of the island they normally don’t have access to, so Sawyer volunteers to go without him, bringing Jin and Miles as backup.
For the first few hours, everything goes smoothly. But when they’re about a mile into Hostile territory, they’re suddenly surrounded, a circle of men with guns standing all around them.
“We’re here to see Richard,” Sawyer says, holding up his hands in a gesture of surrender. He nods at Miles and Jin, the two of them doing the same.
“Where’s Horace?” one of the guys calls, cocking his rifle and aiming right at Sawyer.
“Horace ain’t feelin’ well today, boys,” Sawyer says confidently, even though, truth be told, he’s a little nervous. He really hopes Alpert shows up soon; these guys don’t look like they’re gonna take too kindly to a change in their routine.
The three of them end up being marched straight into the heart of Hostile-town, hands tied in front of them with rope. Richard is nowhere to be found and by the time it gets dark, Sawyer starts getting nervous. Miles won’t quit runnin’ his mouth and Jin keeps shooting him these worried looks and, for the first time, Sawyer regrets getting that damn promotion.
They spend the night sleeping on the ground. Or, at least, Jin and Miles sleep on the ground. Sawyer just lays there, staring up at the moldy canvas of the tent above him, this horrible feeling in his gut like if anything happens to them, it’s all on him. He never should have accepted that fucking promotion, he knows. He ain’t cut out for leading, this proves that as much as anything.
He tosses and turns for most of the night, figuring he’ll never actually fall asleep with worrying. Plus, he misses Juliet. Like physically misses her. It’s been months since he’s actually slept alone and no matter which way he turns he feels uncomfortable and kind of cold. The last thing he thinks before he finally manages to drift off to sleep, right before dawn, is that he hopes she ain’t too worried about him.
They spend the next two days pretty much exactly like that, tied up and waiting. Practically every minute that passes makes Sawyer feel worse and worse and he can't believe that his first real act as Head of Security was to get him and his friends captured. It's such a fucking disaster.
Richard finally shows up around noon the third day, walking out of the jungle looking as cool and clean as if he just stepped off the cover of GQ.
It takes everything in Sawyer not to charge the guy when he sees him, but seeing as how his hands are still tied and he's got at least three guns pointed at him, he decides attacking the king of the Hostiles probably won't be too smart a move. So instead, he just smirks at Richard once he's close enough to talk to him. "Well hey there, Rick," he says. "Nice of you to finally grace us with your presence."
"Horace sent you out here alone?" Richard asks, apparently not in the mood for banter. His eyes go to the jumpsuit Sawyer's wearing, his new one that says LaFleur, Head of Security. "Well," he says sounding surprised. "It looks like you're fitting in quite nicely with the Dharma Initiave."
Sawyer sighs. "Like I told your friends," he says, "I just need to go over this contract with you and then we can be on our way."
Alpert just stares at him for a few beats before waving for his men to drop their guns. "Okay," he says. "Let's see the contract."
Once they get untied and start going over the contract, the whole thing goes smoothly, and they’re on their way-revised contract in hand-in almost no time. As they trudge back through the jungle, Sawyer swears he’s never going to accept another damn promotion as long as he lives.
When they finally make it back to the barracks, Juliet’s waiting on their porch, sitting next to Amy, chewing on her thumbnail, her eyes a little unfocused. There are dark circles under her eyes and she looks completely exhausted, like she hasn't slept in days. It takes a few seconds before Juliet sees them and, when she does, she practically launches herself off the porch and runs right up to Sawyer, throwing her arms around him and hugging him hard.
She buries her face in his neck and he thinks she might be crying, the way she taking these deep shuddering breaths. “I thought,” she says, sounding kind of frantic. “I thought…” And she doesn’t have to say what she thought, the way she’s holding on to him is enough for him to figure it out. It makes him feel both terrible and wonderful at the same time, realizing how upset she was when she thought something happened to him.
“Hey,” he says, smoothing a hand down her hair and hugging her to him. She’s holding on to him almost desperately, in this way that makes his chest feel kind of tight. Her breath is warm against his neck and feels like she’s shaking, just a little bit. “It’s okay,” he murmurs, holding her as close as he can. He’s waiting for her to realize where they are, who all’s around them, and push him back like there’s nothing at all between them.
But when she pulls back, she doesn’t push him away like he expects her to. Instead, she kisses him, right there in front of Jin and Miles and Amy and everyone else.
She kisses him like she’s not ashamed of him at all, like being with him is all she’s ever wanted. Sawyer kisses her back, and she’s warm and comforting against him, and he almost can’t believe how good it feels, not having to hide this anymore.
**
September
On September 22, both he and Juliet call in sick to work. They spend most of the morning in bed, having the kind of sex that’s desperate and rough, the kind of sex they had right after they started sleeping together and were still sneaking around and Sawyer felt like things could just end between them at any second. It ain’t a bad way to start his day, truth be told, but it still makes him feel kind of tense and off-balance.
By noon, Juliet’s up and showered, acting like a completely different person than she was this morning. By the time Sawyer finally drags himself into the shower and out in to the front of the house, Juliet’s making lunch. And she’s not just making sandwiches or soup, there are vegetables chopped on the counter and something that smells amazing bubbling in a pot on the stove.
“What’s all this?” he asks, grabbing a slice of green pepper from the counter and popping it in his mouth.
“Nothing,” she shrugs, stirring whatever’s on the stove with a wooden spoon. “Just felt like cooking.”
Sawyer walks over and stands next to her, leaning his hip against the counter and watching her cook. She smiles at him when he gets close, but it’s the kind of smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes, and he realizes, not for the first time, that he’s not really sure what he’s supposed to do, what he’s supposed to say in situations like this. So he ends up not saying anything, just stands there next to her, hoping that him being there is enough.
“I’ve been here for four years,” she says, kind of out of the blue. It’s the first time either one of them has actually mentioned what day it is.
Juliet looks over at him, this look on her face like it’s just now hitting her, and he knows he’s gotta say something. It’s hard for him to believe that he’s only been here a year--it seems like a lot longer than that, what with the time travel and all. He can’t even imagine how it must feel for Juliet after four years stuck on this rock. The truth is, just thinking about how long she’s been here makes him nervous, like every new day could be the tipping point, the one that makes her reserve herself a spot on the next sub and just leave forever.
“I know,” he finally says. He reaches out, puts his hand on the back of her neck. She steps away from the stove and puts her arms around him, and they just stand like that for a while, not saying anything else about it.
**
By the time it’s dark, both he and Juliet are feeling a little antsy. They haven’t left the house all day so they finally just decide to take a walk around the barracks together, since it’s almost midnight and there ain’t much else to do.
They somehow end up on the little Dharma playground, sitting next to each other on the swings and staring quietly out into the deserted compound.
“I think about it sometimes,” she says after a while, swaying a little on the swing, scuffing her feet in the dirt. “Leaving, I mean.”
Sawyer looks over at her and his stomach sinks. She just looks so sad and wistful, like getting out of here is the best thing she can possibly imagine. He gets up and walks over to her, kneeling down so that they’re face to face. He reaches up to cup her face with his left hand, brushing his thumb across her cheek.
He’s got no idea what he should say right now. It’s not that he doesn’t want her to be happy, but he just can’t imagine being here without her, what that would feel like. And he’s just…he’s not ready to leave yet, to give up on everything from before, to just throw in the towel on ever getting back to the places they actually belong.
They just sit there like that for a little while, looking at each other sadly, both of them knowing there’s not really any way to fix this, no solution where they’ll live happily ever after.
After a few minutes, Sawyer hears footsteps in the grass behind him and Juliet’s focus shifts to over his shoulder, her eyes getting wide. When Sawyer finally turns around, Ben’s standing there, the glare from the playground lights glinting off of his glasses.
"S-sorry,” he stutters, staring at them, before looking down at the ground.
Sawyer just stares at the kid because he doesn't have the energy to deal with this. But apparently he’s going to have to because Ben takes a couple of steps towards them, like he wants to hang out or something. When he gets closer, Sawyer can see a bruise high up on his cheek, the kind a kid gets when his father belts him a little harder than he means to, and Christ, he just cannot handle this pathetic little kid version of Ben right now.
“I was gonna play on the slide,” he says, kicking a little at the ground. Neither Sawyer or Juliet say anything and Ben licks his lips nervously. “But, um, maybe I should go back home?”
He says it like he wants them to tell him it’s okay, that he can stay. Sawyer’s about to resign himself to that, when he looks quickly at Juliet and she’s got this look on her face like having to spend any time at all with Ben right now will just break her.
So instead, Sawyer just rubs his forehead and sighs. “Go home, kid.”
But Ben doesn’t leave, just stands there, looking pathetic and nervous and hurt and it’s only a minute or two until Sawyer can’t take it any more. He gets up and advances on him, making Ben back up nervously, stumbling a little over his own feet.
“Get the hell out of here, Ben,” Sawyer says, low and serious. And, Jesus Christ, the kid looks like he’s gonna cry, but he goes, walking quickly towards the houses across the courtyard.
Sawyer waits until he’s out of sight, then turns back to Juliet. She’s just staring into the distance, her eyes blank behind the blue and Sawyer wishes like hell he weren’t so helpless to do anything. “Hey,” he says. “You okay?”
Juliet doesn’t respond, just keeps looking out at nothing. “Want me to see if I can get Horace to put Ben and his dad on the next sub?” he asks, only half-joking. Because if he could actually make that happen, that would solve so many problems. Just get Ben away from here early, so he’s not around in thirty years to fuck up their lives. "Or hell," he says. "I got a key to the armory, I can go over to the old Linus homestead tonight, make sure Ben never bothers us again."
That finally gets her attention, and she turns to look at him. She gives him a sad smile and shakes her head. “He’s just a kid, James,” she says, like it doesn’t matter at all that that kid’s going to grow up one day and destroy her entire life or lock him in a cage and torture him.
“Yeah, well,” he says and stops, because he figures there’s just not much more he can say.
He sits on the swing next to her, reaching out so that they're holding hands across the distance between them. They stay out there like that for a little while longer, neither one of them saying anything at all.
**
Part 2b: October through December