(Untitled)

[little_moons]

We had breakfast, all four of us together, and later, the girls'll go off with Kara and Tom and I'll have the night to ourselves. We need it, we really do, and it also means I don't feel like such a fuckin' asshole for askin' him to give me a few hours to be on my own

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[hightail]

She's sinking.

Kate can't remember exactly how long it has been. Years, she guesses, because after the island, she didn't spend too much time at the beach. There were a few moments here and there, scattered over the years at times when she felt particularly nostalgic or masochistic, staring out at the ocean and wondering if her friends were still alive. If they were looking up at the same horizon, the same setting sun. What they'd think if they could see her. Maybe it would make a difference in opinion that she'd gone back, but this island got in the way, and now she may never know.

The waves wash over her feet, take another layer of sand back out into the sea. She sinks. From the corner of her eye, Kate spots an approaching figure, the surfer she noticed some time ago and promptly forgot. "Hey," she nods, trying to place him, mostly failing. "You're a friend of Sawyer's, right?"

[little_moons]

It takes me a second to hear her, to realize it's me she's talking to. She's familiar, in that vague sort of way that just about everyone around here is. Pretty, but that's normal around here, too.

Huffing out a laugh as I make my way over to her, I say, "Uh, yeah. I guess I am." Never really figured that'd be one of my identifiers, but okay.

[hightail]

"I'm Kate," she volunteers, lifting one hand in a small wave. Briefly, she considers how to describe her relationship to Sawyer, with Sawyer, but finding herself at a loss for the right word - or words - she decides to leave it alone. Instead, she tells him, "He, uh - We're from the same place."

[little_moons]

"Seems like there's a lotta you folks around lately," I say, propping my board up in the sand. "I met Hurley, a couple weeks back."

Bending down to unhook the strap from my ankle, I offer my hand once I straighten back up. "'m Neil."

[hightail]

Kate only nods, shaking the outstretched hand with a bright enough smile. Until this very second, she hasn't considered herself exceptionally lucky, but there is a lot she has taken for granted. Despite the many people she still misses, she has more here than most. Alex, Sawyer, Hurley. Even Juliet, despite their many differences, offers some comfort. We've got a thing for islands, she almost jokes, but that's a fact she thinks they've all been trying to keep quiet (with the possible exception of Hurley). Far be it from her to spill the beans. "So, where you from originally?"

[little_moons]

"Fuckin' Kansas. I grew up in Hutchinson, but I been here goin' on five years. Kinda feels like I'm from here, sometimes," I admit, 'cause regardless of the problems I've had with this place lately, it's still home. Hutchinson... New York... I never felt like I belonged in either of those places.

"What about you? I mean, none of you are actually from that other island, right?"

[hightail]

Only years of experience lying to others keep Kate from batting a lash, however alarmed she truly is. She should have known better, though, once Hurley entered the picture. "Los Angeles," she offers, surprising herself with the answer. It wasn't a conscious lie - in fact, it might not have been a lie at all. L.A. was more of home to her than Iowa by far.

[little_moons]

"You miss it?" I ask, which might be a stupid question, but I know not everybody is as indifferent to the place they came from as I am.

If I remember right, she hasn't even been here long. Months, not years.

[hightail]

The answer doesn't require thought, but it serves as yet another reminder of how much has changed, how much she had an lost. "Yeah," she admits, something which would never hold true for Iowa, or even Florida. She left both behind because she had to keep running; Los Angeles she left because she couldn't keep pretending. "Some things, anyway. The smog I could do without. What about you, you miss Kansas?"

[little_moons]

"Not really, no. I miss some of the people, but that's it," I shrug, finding a dry spot and lowering myself down to sit in the sand.

"I had somebody from home, here, a while ago, but she didn't last." Brian, too, but that story's too fuckin' complicated for a girl who's basically a stranger.