Fanfic #3 - Craving (Jate, Kate/Charlie)
Title: Craving
Author: enelya
Pairing: Breaking the old triangle formula, this is Jack/Kate/Charlie.
Rating: I’m sure I won’t shock anyone. Too much, anyways.
Words: As many as I could put together.
Disclaimer: Lost characters are only mine in my imagination.
A/N: I had written a lot of babble, most of it excuses or non-sense. Cutting it short: report of mistakes is appreciated, as I’m sure there are a lot - blame the late hour it was written (muse’s call is usually late at night). And I’m lazy, so I started with something I had already written.
Charlie leaned his back on a tree, standing but still holding his guitar. Touching the chords like caressing silk, the body of his lover, the owner of his heart. Pouring into the melodic stream an infinite passion, words he could’ve never said out loud. She listened but she didn’t understand, why her heart beat faster when the music was so calm, why her steps hurried when she had nowhere to go, why he wasn’t alone, whispering at her ear notes she couldn’t break apart.
But she stood far away, afraid to come too close and break that bubble of illusion where she liked to keep him, safe in her memory. Too frightened that he would be taken away; her feelings read in her eyes, and once her secret exposed, tiny and fragile, would be swept by the cold winds.
+++++++++++
The wind blew cold that day too. The dark grey clouds above their heads promised rain soon, but Jack was determined to continue going, and even after what happened between them last night, she felt no power over him to ask for a stop or to suggest they should look for shelter from the weather. His mind was settled and he wouldn’t have listened to her, even though that time she was probably right.
She walked closer to him, matching his quick pace, to where she could sense the heat coming from his body and feel more protected from those dangerous surroundings. Trailing next to him she could forget about what they were trying to do, communicate with those “others” that had already held her captive once.
Her momentary distraction was broken by a stronger wave of cold air, which left her frozen to her bones. Not from the sudden drop of temperature felt in the environment, but from the voices she heard in the wind, ancient voices that told her of doom, of love and loss, of despair.
++++++++++
The following day, though the music still echoed in the air, the place was deserted. And she was able to lean against the tree, eyes lost in the never ending sea, gazing absently to the point where the blue of the sky met the sparkles of the ocean, daring to think how she got caught in the middle of it.
One of them was like the sea, a force of the nature, a strong embrace taking all of her in it, like drops of water reach to kiss the grains of sand in every beach. They had only been together like man and woman once, and it had been powerful, intense and violently passionate, yet the sweetness and tenderness were forever marked in her skin, an invisible tattoo of love that would last forever.
The other was like a soft breeze that caressed her skin with his music, with the power to let her flow from the earth into another world, where time and place didn’t matter anymore. That could erase the bruises marked on her that fatal day, when the possibility of a different future was stolen in a matter of seconds, and she was powerless to do anything about it.
Most of her days would now be like this, alone with her imaginary music, memories of had happened, thoughts of blue and wishes of a new beginning.
++++++++++
And then she was alone too. She couldn’t perceive where Jack had gone, although she heard him shouting near. She ran towards his voice, only to find she was going the wrong direction, merciless of the currents of air that carried his voice.
Her feet continued to chase trails of sound, until there was nothing left to be heard. Her eyes continued to search, despite no signal of his grey shirt was perceivable among the greens of the jungle and the indefinite colour of the air. Her thoughts never left him, although her life drained from herself. Eventually, exhaustion took over.
++++++++++
She was found unconscious four days later by Sayid, in an unexplored part of the jungle, near to where the tail survivors’ first camp had been. She pretended she couldn’t remember anything… Who would believe her, even on that island? But deep inside, she knew too well, the images from that day were vivid and would still wake her during the night, when she hadn’t any music to scare away the ghosts. He had given himself to her and he had been stolen from her, leaving a loss she couldn’t run away from. But whatever place he was now, he had been returned to her in the form of melody, his spirit lived in the notes Charlie drained from his guitar. And for that she loved him and craved his music, a treason and a homage to the man she gave her heart one true time.