fic, Lost: Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow (Desmond, Sawyer, sort of Charlie), PG
So this prompt had to be for Claire. But I couldn't write it for how much I tried. Then I couldn't do anything for it, then I was skimming the lyrics for the challenge at charliepacefic, the bunny merged with another obsession of mine and there it is. Before someone has doubts/notices it, yes, I've got a kick for keeping Steve alive. He's the only named redshirt that has been around since the beginning and still isn't officially dead, so I keep him alive for the sake of it.
Title: Far from the Twisted Reach of Crazy Sorrow
Characters: Desmond, Sawyer, implied that Charlie is the focus of the fic
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Desmond? Not mine. Sawyer? Not mine. Charlie? Would be alive if he was. Mr Tambourine Man? Bob Dylan's. Strawberry Fields Forever? John Lennon's.
Word count: 2807
Spoilers: Up to Cabin Fever.
Summary: When everyone is gone, when everything is over and when they know they won’t ever be found again because the island is not there anymore, when Claire is still gone and Ben has disappeared into the Orchid, they set up a cross.
A/N: Written for the challenge #3 at charliepacefic with the lyrics from Mr Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan and 'Living is easy with your eyes closed' from Strawberry Fields Forever by the Beatles. I don't know whether it's fine because while Charlie is actually the center of it he really isn't there physically, but it was good to write anyways. And I guess that since I'm using it for philosophy_20 #2, loss, I couldn't make it any other way. And I'm done. I finished it. I finished it. *still can't believe it*
When everyone is gone, when everything is over and when they know they won’t ever be found again because the island is not there anymore, when Claire is still gone and Ben has disappeared into the Orchid, they set up a cross.
They being Desmond, Sawyer and Juliet, the latter one doing it only because of purely unselfish reasons, which should sound pretty strange considering that they’re talking about Juliet. But she had offered to help them even if she probably spoke to Charlie three times when Claire was sick, three times being a fairly optimistic count. It’s not like there’s anyone else that volunteered, anyway.
Well, it’s not like there actually is anyone else apart from Locke (who shows up at the beach once in a while if they’re lucky), Dan, Charlotte and Miles (who mostly stay in their own group, apart from Daniel who quite hangs around Desmond most of the time), Steve and the Others. But the Others are on the other side of the island and no one wants really anything to do with them anyway. Apart from that, everyone else who was still alive after Jack and the others left just disappeared when the island moved and Locke couldn’t or wouldn’t explain what really happened. So it’s really just the three of them and well, if one wanted to be really straightforward, when it come to people who had known Charlie, the choice narrowed at two.
Anyway, Sawyer had chopped the wood, Desmond had found a rope to tie everything together and had written the name on another piece of wood, Juliet had helped them dragging it on the hill and setting it up in the first free spot they find.
Sawyer isn’t really surprised when, having a better look, he sees that they placed it just behind Boone and Shannon.
He says that it’s pretty shit for a funeral and Desmond has to agree; a funeral with nobody but three people on a hill where barely ten desiccated trees stand up is pretty horrible, indeed.
The list in the front pocket of his pants, almost unreadable. Desmond knows because he had a look at it once and then he never touched it again because he also knows that it’s going to fall apart in pieces as soon as someone unfolds it. He hasn’t still lost the hope of giving it to Claire, even if that’s a pretty slim possibility right now, and he can’t help blaming himself and that wave of shame that prevented him from giving it to her when he could have. Sure, maybe if Hurley hadn’t stopped him he would have gone, but he really can’t blame him. He could have followed them and then go back to the beach. Whatever. It’s his fault and he hates himself for it, but there isn’t much he can do about it. Also, now they sodding moved and he doubts that Penny is ever going to find them here. Nothing seems changed, but Locke said they moved and Desmond just knows it’s true. He can feel it. He can see it in the landscape. And he can just hope she does find them, eventually. Even if he doesn’t have an idea of where they are now, himself.
What a fucked up funeral, Vh1, thinks Sawyer shaking his head. The hobbit really didn’t have much luck when the only ones left for it were Juliet, who didn’t know him, Desmond, who can’t even bring himself to speak a few words, and himself, who actually could say something but considering what was his and Charlie’s closest experience, well, it’s better that he doesn’t say anything about it.
Sawyer shouldn’t really care, but he has long given up on pretending he doesn’t. He has given that up a lot of time ago. He cares and it’s really the most fucked up funeral anyone ever had on that piece of rock, and it’s saying something. Fuck, even Nikki and whatshisname had a better one and it’s a pity that they lost the two official funeral speech people.
“This really is the worst fucked up funeral ever.”, he reiterates.
“Guess I can only agree with you, brother.”, Desmond answers with a sigh. Charlie really deserved better than this.
“D’you think there is anything we could.. do?”
“And what, Ivanhoe? Seems like you’re the closest we have to a priest and well, ain’t got anythin’ against you but you’ve done a pretty sorry job up to now.”
“That’s why I’m not one.”
“What do you think he would’ve liked?”
“And why are you askin’ me?”
“Are you serious? Who the fuck else should I ask to? And for your information, I thought you were pretty close. You of everyone should know it.”
It makes sense, except that Desmond doesn’t really know what Charlie would have wanted at his funeral. Sawyer is right, him of everyone should know it, especially because of the reason they actually were friends in the first place, but Desmond doesn’t have an idea. They never talked about it, probably out of trying to avoid bad luck. Maybe Hurley knew. Well, Hurley isn’t here right now.
“I don’t know, brother. Just... well, guess that’s just one thing that doesn’t click.”
“More than everythin’ else? What’s lackin’ here, apart from a body, a regular priest, the deceased’s family and the black clothes?”
“Very funny. There’s no music. That’s the only thing I guess he’d have wanted.”
Sawyer’s expression suddenly turns back to serious and eyes the grave again.
“Yeah, you’ve got a point. Fuck. He really didn’t get any luck. Guess we could sing somethin’, but it sort of feels lame.”
“You can cross the sort.”, Desmond answers. That would be lame. Also ridiculous, but well, it’s not like anyone can laugh at them. But they just stand there for a while, until the sun definitely sets down (they actually did all the job half an hour before sunset). Then they leave and go back to the four or five tents that still stand on the beach, a smaller and sadder version of their former camp; the tents are all close to each other and at night no more than one person keeping watch is around the fire.
--
Sawyer finds Charlie’s guitar in the jungle a week later and it’s in one piece.
Desmond can’t help wondering how the hell is that possible, last time he saw it the neck was completely broken; though the most surprising thing is finding out that Sawyer actually knows how to play it.
He goes up the hill every day and Desmond doesn’t follow him.
He’s already miserable enough and he doesn’t think that he’d do much good. Also, he really doesn’t know what he could do. He can’t carry a tune for long and he can’t play; also, the only music he can think of when he thinks about Charlie is Strawberry Fields Forever and it just hurts to think about it.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
It was on his shoulder and it’s marked in his head, unable to go away; it’s been since he finally was back and couldn’t say he suffered from side effects.
Desmond wonders whether he had misunderstood everything. Whether he misunderstood every single one of his flashes. He knows on a rational level that he really couldn’t have done much better, he had never experienced something like that, he had tried to do the best he could.
But then he thinks they could have told someone, Jack, Sayid, even Locke for that matter. Maybe they’d have had a better answer. Maybe he shouldn’t have tried to do it on his own (sure, Charlie was in there too, but he wasn’t the one with the flashes, right?), maybe he should have talked about it with someone neutral, maybe he would have figured something different.
Maybe he really had been with his eyes closed while seeing those flashes, maybe he had misunderstood them all and the last especially. Thing is, they stopped. He won’t ever get a confirm or a denial. It’s just weight on his shoulders that he can’t seem to shake away and then he remembers another line from that song.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
How beautiful it’d be, if nothing was real indeed. Maybe everything was a cosmic joke and Charlie was going to show up one day and they’d have nothing to get hung about.
Desmond knows it’s pure utopia.
That is, you can’t, you know, tune in, but it’s all right, that is I think it’s not too bad, he finds himself singing softly one afternoon, when Sawyer is gone, Juliet is nowhere to be found and there’s only the ocean to look at in front of him.
You can’t, you know, tune in. That’s just so true. Maybe if he had tuned in at the right point, if he could at least do it now for all that is worth, if, if, if.
There’s nothing good in ifs, not really.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, misunderstanding what you see, he sings softly again, letting the words roll out on his tongue aware that his accent completely ruins the sound of that sentence. He tries not to use it as a metaphor for what happened and then turns and goes to the hill. He thinks he wants to hear Sawyer for once. He’s got this idea that, differently from him, he knows how to tune in.
--
He hears music soon enough and thinks that Sawyer is really not bad; Charlie would have liked the performance quite much. The closest he gets, the more sure he becomes. Sawyer’s pretty good at playing.
Surely Desmond didn’t imagine that of everything he could play in front of a grave to make up for a shitty funeral, he’d play Bob Dylan. When he recognizes the song, Desmond thinks that it isn’t really a good choice.
Mr. Tambourine Man doesn’t really look like a good tribute song, especially for one that kicked a heroin addiction successfully.
“... that evenin's empire has returned into sand, vanished from my hand, left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.. My weariness amazes me, I'm branded on my feet, I’ve got no one to meet and the ancient empty street's too dead for dreamin’...”
Desmond doesn’t walk up on the hill. He stands for some time there, not moving, the sound of Sawyer’s voice (which is low but kind of rich and has definitely a nice sound) and of the music the only one Desmond can hear.
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.
Desmond wonders how much of this is about Charlie, but then he shakes his head. That isn’t the point.
“Hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, I ain’t sleepy and there’s no place I’m goin’ to... hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, in the jingle jangle mornin’, I’ll come followin’ you...”
His mind drifts away.
He remembers when Charlie asked to bring the guitar on that fated trip and that for a second Desmond had thought I could ask him to play something later maybe, he remembers the weariness he felt when he realized what the flashes were about.
He doesn’t really get what Sawyer is singing, just only a few lines scattered here and there.
My senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip.
I'm ready for to fade into my own parade, cast your dancin’ spell my way, I promise to go under it.
If you hear vague traces of skippin' reels of rhyme.
I wouldn't pay it any mind, it's just a shadow you're seein' that he's chasin’.
Play a song for me, I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to.
Sawyer’s voice is low and trembling and almost vibrating and Desmond thinks that maybe it wasn’t such a bad choice.
He remembers when he threw Charlie on the ground the second that arrow flied and the way his hands couldn’t seem to feel a grip there. He remembers listening distractedly to his playing sometimes around camp. He remembers that last flash which ended as he had seen but played in a completely different way.
A shadow you’re seein’ that he’s chasin’.
That was an excellent metaphor, indeed. Now that Charlie has faded into his own parade and there’s pretty much nothing to do, Desmond shivers and realizing that he has a place to go to, he climbs up the hill and goes behind Sawyer, who turns his head a bit, nodding, but doesn’t stop playing. Desmond thinks he’s playing the song a bit slow, but it’s probably because while he’s good, surely he never made a living out of music.
Sawyer’s voice cracks when he has to start the last part and so he just plays another round, starting later. Desmond closes his eyes, sitting down next to him.
“Then take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind, down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves, the haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach, far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow...”
Yeah, brother, that’s exactly where he is now, thinks Desmond. The island is a mess. The trees are either dessicated or about to fall down, there is way less green than it was before, it’s much more hot, there rarely is wind and it just shows all the signs that the moving hasn’t been without trouble.
He wonders whether Charlie is someplace else. Maybe another island like this one was. Because before it really was better than it is now and he would have never thought that one day he would have referenced to the former island in fairly good terms.
Twisted reach of crazy sorrow.
That’s an expression Desmond likes. That’s an expression Desmond really likes.
“Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand wavin’ free..”, Sawyer starts again, and Desmond isn’t aware that he has sort of quietly joined him until his lips are already parted and the following words, already formed, are out of them.
“Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands, with all memory and fate, driven deep beneath the waves, let me forget about today until tomorrow...”, they keep on more or less in unison and for those few seconds, Desmond thinks they do forget.
“Hey, Mr Tambourine man, play a song for me, I’m not sleepy and there ain’t no place I’m goin’ to... hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, in the jingle jangle mornin’, I’ll come followin’ you. ”
Sawyer’s hand falls and he smiles for a second; Desmond does too, even if they don’t look at each other but in front of them, where a sign with Charlie Pace, 1979 - 21/12/2004 is encoded with a shaky hand. Desmond didn’t even know his exact birthday, but what’s gone is gone.
They stay silent for a second; then Desmond turns his head and for a second he thinks he’s seeing Charlie, dressed differently, with shorter hair, waving at the both of them.
Then he disappears as soon as Desmond blinks. He figures it was an hallucination, but at least it wasn’t an angry hallucination. He thought he was smiling. Maybe he imagined it.
“Brother, you’ve seen anythin’ over there?”
“What? No, nothin’. Why?”
“Let it go. I imagined it, probably.”
“Do you think he’d appreciate this?”, Sawyer asks.
Desmond doesn’t have doubts regarding the answer. It’s the only thing he can be sure of and, after all, maybe this time he didn’t misunderstand what he saw.
“Aye. Aye, he would.”
Tomorrow is going to be as miserable as today is, as yesterday was and as every day stranded there will be, Desmond doesn’t have a doubt about it.
Then Sawyer asks him if he knows Strawberry Fields Forever, because y’know, the midget actually had the fuckin’ thing tattooed but I can’t remember the words for the life of me and Desmond answers that he does.
They make probably the worst combination ever for such a task and aye, Charlie really didn’t get much luck on that side. But Desmond now thinks that maybe he figured out that it was always better than anything at all and so when Sawyer starts playing he starts singing quite off key about taking somebody down to a strawberry field which could never exist on this island.
But it’s nothing real and nothing to get hung up about. After all, if he closes his eyes, Desmond can always pretend that it’s not Sawyer near him but Charlie playing in a bad day and that it’s mid-December and not the first week of February.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, indeed.
End.
Title: Far from the Twisted Reach of Crazy Sorrow
Characters: Desmond, Sawyer, implied that Charlie is the focus of the fic
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Desmond? Not mine. Sawyer? Not mine. Charlie? Would be alive if he was. Mr Tambourine Man? Bob Dylan's. Strawberry Fields Forever? John Lennon's.
Word count: 2807
Spoilers: Up to Cabin Fever.
Summary: When everyone is gone, when everything is over and when they know they won’t ever be found again because the island is not there anymore, when Claire is still gone and Ben has disappeared into the Orchid, they set up a cross.
A/N: Written for the challenge #3 at charliepacefic with the lyrics from Mr Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan and 'Living is easy with your eyes closed' from Strawberry Fields Forever by the Beatles. I don't know whether it's fine because while Charlie is actually the center of it he really isn't there physically, but it was good to write anyways. And I guess that since I'm using it for philosophy_20 #2, loss, I couldn't make it any other way. And I'm done. I finished it. I finished it. *still can't believe it*
When everyone is gone, when everything is over and when they know they won’t ever be found again because the island is not there anymore, when Claire is still gone and Ben has disappeared into the Orchid, they set up a cross.
They being Desmond, Sawyer and Juliet, the latter one doing it only because of purely unselfish reasons, which should sound pretty strange considering that they’re talking about Juliet. But she had offered to help them even if she probably spoke to Charlie three times when Claire was sick, three times being a fairly optimistic count. It’s not like there’s anyone else that volunteered, anyway.
Well, it’s not like there actually is anyone else apart from Locke (who shows up at the beach once in a while if they’re lucky), Dan, Charlotte and Miles (who mostly stay in their own group, apart from Daniel who quite hangs around Desmond most of the time), Steve and the Others. But the Others are on the other side of the island and no one wants really anything to do with them anyway. Apart from that, everyone else who was still alive after Jack and the others left just disappeared when the island moved and Locke couldn’t or wouldn’t explain what really happened. So it’s really just the three of them and well, if one wanted to be really straightforward, when it come to people who had known Charlie, the choice narrowed at two.
Anyway, Sawyer had chopped the wood, Desmond had found a rope to tie everything together and had written the name on another piece of wood, Juliet had helped them dragging it on the hill and setting it up in the first free spot they find.
Sawyer isn’t really surprised when, having a better look, he sees that they placed it just behind Boone and Shannon.
He says that it’s pretty shit for a funeral and Desmond has to agree; a funeral with nobody but three people on a hill where barely ten desiccated trees stand up is pretty horrible, indeed.
The list in the front pocket of his pants, almost unreadable. Desmond knows because he had a look at it once and then he never touched it again because he also knows that it’s going to fall apart in pieces as soon as someone unfolds it. He hasn’t still lost the hope of giving it to Claire, even if that’s a pretty slim possibility right now, and he can’t help blaming himself and that wave of shame that prevented him from giving it to her when he could have. Sure, maybe if Hurley hadn’t stopped him he would have gone, but he really can’t blame him. He could have followed them and then go back to the beach. Whatever. It’s his fault and he hates himself for it, but there isn’t much he can do about it. Also, now they sodding moved and he doubts that Penny is ever going to find them here. Nothing seems changed, but Locke said they moved and Desmond just knows it’s true. He can feel it. He can see it in the landscape. And he can just hope she does find them, eventually. Even if he doesn’t have an idea of where they are now, himself.
What a fucked up funeral, Vh1, thinks Sawyer shaking his head. The hobbit really didn’t have much luck when the only ones left for it were Juliet, who didn’t know him, Desmond, who can’t even bring himself to speak a few words, and himself, who actually could say something but considering what was his and Charlie’s closest experience, well, it’s better that he doesn’t say anything about it.
Sawyer shouldn’t really care, but he has long given up on pretending he doesn’t. He has given that up a lot of time ago. He cares and it’s really the most fucked up funeral anyone ever had on that piece of rock, and it’s saying something. Fuck, even Nikki and whatshisname had a better one and it’s a pity that they lost the two official funeral speech people.
“This really is the worst fucked up funeral ever.”, he reiterates.
“Guess I can only agree with you, brother.”, Desmond answers with a sigh. Charlie really deserved better than this.
“D’you think there is anything we could.. do?”
“And what, Ivanhoe? Seems like you’re the closest we have to a priest and well, ain’t got anythin’ against you but you’ve done a pretty sorry job up to now.”
“That’s why I’m not one.”
“What do you think he would’ve liked?”
“And why are you askin’ me?”
“Are you serious? Who the fuck else should I ask to? And for your information, I thought you were pretty close. You of everyone should know it.”
It makes sense, except that Desmond doesn’t really know what Charlie would have wanted at his funeral. Sawyer is right, him of everyone should know it, especially because of the reason they actually were friends in the first place, but Desmond doesn’t have an idea. They never talked about it, probably out of trying to avoid bad luck. Maybe Hurley knew. Well, Hurley isn’t here right now.
“I don’t know, brother. Just... well, guess that’s just one thing that doesn’t click.”
“More than everythin’ else? What’s lackin’ here, apart from a body, a regular priest, the deceased’s family and the black clothes?”
“Very funny. There’s no music. That’s the only thing I guess he’d have wanted.”
Sawyer’s expression suddenly turns back to serious and eyes the grave again.
“Yeah, you’ve got a point. Fuck. He really didn’t get any luck. Guess we could sing somethin’, but it sort of feels lame.”
“You can cross the sort.”, Desmond answers. That would be lame. Also ridiculous, but well, it’s not like anyone can laugh at them. But they just stand there for a while, until the sun definitely sets down (they actually did all the job half an hour before sunset). Then they leave and go back to the four or five tents that still stand on the beach, a smaller and sadder version of their former camp; the tents are all close to each other and at night no more than one person keeping watch is around the fire.
--
Sawyer finds Charlie’s guitar in the jungle a week later and it’s in one piece.
Desmond can’t help wondering how the hell is that possible, last time he saw it the neck was completely broken; though the most surprising thing is finding out that Sawyer actually knows how to play it.
He goes up the hill every day and Desmond doesn’t follow him.
He’s already miserable enough and he doesn’t think that he’d do much good. Also, he really doesn’t know what he could do. He can’t carry a tune for long and he can’t play; also, the only music he can think of when he thinks about Charlie is Strawberry Fields Forever and it just hurts to think about it.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
It was on his shoulder and it’s marked in his head, unable to go away; it’s been since he finally was back and couldn’t say he suffered from side effects.
Desmond wonders whether he had misunderstood everything. Whether he misunderstood every single one of his flashes. He knows on a rational level that he really couldn’t have done much better, he had never experienced something like that, he had tried to do the best he could.
But then he thinks they could have told someone, Jack, Sayid, even Locke for that matter. Maybe they’d have had a better answer. Maybe he shouldn’t have tried to do it on his own (sure, Charlie was in there too, but he wasn’t the one with the flashes, right?), maybe he should have talked about it with someone neutral, maybe he would have figured something different.
Maybe he really had been with his eyes closed while seeing those flashes, maybe he had misunderstood them all and the last especially. Thing is, they stopped. He won’t ever get a confirm or a denial. It’s just weight on his shoulders that he can’t seem to shake away and then he remembers another line from that song.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
How beautiful it’d be, if nothing was real indeed. Maybe everything was a cosmic joke and Charlie was going to show up one day and they’d have nothing to get hung about.
Desmond knows it’s pure utopia.
That is, you can’t, you know, tune in, but it’s all right, that is I think it’s not too bad, he finds himself singing softly one afternoon, when Sawyer is gone, Juliet is nowhere to be found and there’s only the ocean to look at in front of him.
You can’t, you know, tune in. That’s just so true. Maybe if he had tuned in at the right point, if he could at least do it now for all that is worth, if, if, if.
There’s nothing good in ifs, not really.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, misunderstanding what you see, he sings softly again, letting the words roll out on his tongue aware that his accent completely ruins the sound of that sentence. He tries not to use it as a metaphor for what happened and then turns and goes to the hill. He thinks he wants to hear Sawyer for once. He’s got this idea that, differently from him, he knows how to tune in.
--
He hears music soon enough and thinks that Sawyer is really not bad; Charlie would have liked the performance quite much. The closest he gets, the more sure he becomes. Sawyer’s pretty good at playing.
Surely Desmond didn’t imagine that of everything he could play in front of a grave to make up for a shitty funeral, he’d play Bob Dylan. When he recognizes the song, Desmond thinks that it isn’t really a good choice.
Mr. Tambourine Man doesn’t really look like a good tribute song, especially for one that kicked a heroin addiction successfully.
“... that evenin's empire has returned into sand, vanished from my hand, left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.. My weariness amazes me, I'm branded on my feet, I’ve got no one to meet and the ancient empty street's too dead for dreamin’...”
Desmond doesn’t walk up on the hill. He stands for some time there, not moving, the sound of Sawyer’s voice (which is low but kind of rich and has definitely a nice sound) and of the music the only one Desmond can hear.
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.
Desmond wonders how much of this is about Charlie, but then he shakes his head. That isn’t the point.
“Hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, I ain’t sleepy and there’s no place I’m goin’ to... hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, in the jingle jangle mornin’, I’ll come followin’ you...”
His mind drifts away.
He remembers when Charlie asked to bring the guitar on that fated trip and that for a second Desmond had thought I could ask him to play something later maybe, he remembers the weariness he felt when he realized what the flashes were about.
He doesn’t really get what Sawyer is singing, just only a few lines scattered here and there.
My senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip.
I'm ready for to fade into my own parade, cast your dancin’ spell my way, I promise to go under it.
If you hear vague traces of skippin' reels of rhyme.
I wouldn't pay it any mind, it's just a shadow you're seein' that he's chasin’.
Play a song for me, I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to.
Sawyer’s voice is low and trembling and almost vibrating and Desmond thinks that maybe it wasn’t such a bad choice.
He remembers when he threw Charlie on the ground the second that arrow flied and the way his hands couldn’t seem to feel a grip there. He remembers listening distractedly to his playing sometimes around camp. He remembers that last flash which ended as he had seen but played in a completely different way.
A shadow you’re seein’ that he’s chasin’.
That was an excellent metaphor, indeed. Now that Charlie has faded into his own parade and there’s pretty much nothing to do, Desmond shivers and realizing that he has a place to go to, he climbs up the hill and goes behind Sawyer, who turns his head a bit, nodding, but doesn’t stop playing. Desmond thinks he’s playing the song a bit slow, but it’s probably because while he’s good, surely he never made a living out of music.
Sawyer’s voice cracks when he has to start the last part and so he just plays another round, starting later. Desmond closes his eyes, sitting down next to him.
“Then take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind, down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves, the haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach, far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow...”
Yeah, brother, that’s exactly where he is now, thinks Desmond. The island is a mess. The trees are either dessicated or about to fall down, there is way less green than it was before, it’s much more hot, there rarely is wind and it just shows all the signs that the moving hasn’t been without trouble.
He wonders whether Charlie is someplace else. Maybe another island like this one was. Because before it really was better than it is now and he would have never thought that one day he would have referenced to the former island in fairly good terms.
Twisted reach of crazy sorrow.
That’s an expression Desmond likes. That’s an expression Desmond really likes.
“Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand wavin’ free..”, Sawyer starts again, and Desmond isn’t aware that he has sort of quietly joined him until his lips are already parted and the following words, already formed, are out of them.
“Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands, with all memory and fate, driven deep beneath the waves, let me forget about today until tomorrow...”, they keep on more or less in unison and for those few seconds, Desmond thinks they do forget.
“Hey, Mr Tambourine man, play a song for me, I’m not sleepy and there ain’t no place I’m goin’ to... hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me, in the jingle jangle mornin’, I’ll come followin’ you. ”
Sawyer’s hand falls and he smiles for a second; Desmond does too, even if they don’t look at each other but in front of them, where a sign with Charlie Pace, 1979 - 21/12/2004 is encoded with a shaky hand. Desmond didn’t even know his exact birthday, but what’s gone is gone.
They stay silent for a second; then Desmond turns his head and for a second he thinks he’s seeing Charlie, dressed differently, with shorter hair, waving at the both of them.
Then he disappears as soon as Desmond blinks. He figures it was an hallucination, but at least it wasn’t an angry hallucination. He thought he was smiling. Maybe he imagined it.
“Brother, you’ve seen anythin’ over there?”
“What? No, nothin’. Why?”
“Let it go. I imagined it, probably.”
“Do you think he’d appreciate this?”, Sawyer asks.
Desmond doesn’t have doubts regarding the answer. It’s the only thing he can be sure of and, after all, maybe this time he didn’t misunderstand what he saw.
“Aye. Aye, he would.”
Tomorrow is going to be as miserable as today is, as yesterday was and as every day stranded there will be, Desmond doesn’t have a doubt about it.
Then Sawyer asks him if he knows Strawberry Fields Forever, because y’know, the midget actually had the fuckin’ thing tattooed but I can’t remember the words for the life of me and Desmond answers that he does.
They make probably the worst combination ever for such a task and aye, Charlie really didn’t get much luck on that side. But Desmond now thinks that maybe he figured out that it was always better than anything at all and so when Sawyer starts playing he starts singing quite off key about taking somebody down to a strawberry field which could never exist on this island.
But it’s nothing real and nothing to get hung up about. After all, if he closes his eyes, Desmond can always pretend that it’s not Sawyer near him but Charlie playing in a bad day and that it’s mid-December and not the first week of February.
Living is easy with your eyes closed, indeed.
End.