FIC: "Three" (LOST, Jack/Kate/the island)
That's right. Come and get your cracktastic island fic.
Fic: "Three"
Author: daygloparker
Fandom: LOST
Pairing/Rating: Jack/Kate/the island (PG-ish)
Spoilers: AU (but not) from "Do No Harm"
With immense apologies to Bobby Darin and Charles Trenet. I think this may have been the longest thing I've ever written, coming in at twelve pages. Beta by snarkhunter.
Summary: "You will laugh at yourself when you realize that your life now has three distinct periods: Before, Then, and Now."
*
And then one day, you'll wake up and you'll be completely alone.
*
She wakes up and Jack is shouting, calling her name and everyone else's, too. She rolls over, squinting when she opens her eyes at the ill-positioned morning sun. He sounds out of breath. He probably ran all the way from the caves.
He is climbing onto the raft when she pushes aside the flap on her tent. His back is to her, and when Kate calls out to him he turns around. On his face, she sees relief... and surprise and shock and fear. He jumps off the raft and stumbles toward her.
He keeps repeating it, over and over, in between heavy breathing: "Where is everyone?"
"What--" but she stops herself when she sees his face.
A wave breaks quietly on the shore, and she turns to the horizon line. She looks all around her. That's when she realizes that they are completely, utterly alone on the beach. The island is eerily silent.
Kate stares at the tent where Sawyer usually sleeps. She can feel the hairs on the back of neck standing on end, goose bumps prickling her arms. "I don't understand."
He rubs the back of his neck, pulling on the thin piece of yarn around it. "I woke up and they were gone."
"Everyone?" He is too calm, she thinks.
Jack hesitates. "Yeah. Everyone. The caves are empty, too."
In the sand, she sees only two sets of footprints: hers and Jack's, and untouched sand as far as she can see. Like they've always been here, just the two of them.
Her heart beats faster, and her breathing is shallow. "I don't understand," she says again.
Jack's eyes suddenly grow wide, realizing something. He pushes past her and walks frantically down the beach. She calls out to him, but he is determined. He starts to jog. Or maybe he's just ignoring her.
*
At first it won't scare you. You learned the sounds of the jungle a long time ago, after all, so the journey from the beach to the caves won't be that intimidating when it's taken alone. It'll only be longer than before, since there's no one else to carry the extra weight that ten bottles of water rather than five will create in your backpack. You'll have to stop halfway, hunched over and holding your stomach. You will remember when you could (and did) run from the caves to beach and back again, and that thought alone will motivate you to keep moving.
At first you won't mind being alone. It's during the first night of your solitude, when your back aches and your feet hurt, that you will finally succumb to the anxiety and fear. When you'll realize that you aren't really alone.
*
Jack disappears into the tall grass, and when Kate finally moves her legs and runs after him, kicking up sand as she does, she finds him at Boone's grave. He is moving the fresh dirt away with the shovel they used to dig it a week ago.
It takes a couple of seconds for what he’s doing to sink in with her.
"JACK!" she shouts, not able to hide her shock. She is standing at the foot of Boone's grave, but he doesn't acknowledge her and he doesn't stop digging.
"Jack, stop--"
She reaches for his arm to get his attention, and it does - he swats her hand away with tremendous force when her fingers lightly brush his skin. Kate is too started to move again. He glares at her, trying to be angry, but she can see straight through him. She expects his shoulders to fall and his fingers to release the shovel, but he doesn't. His lungs take in deep, quick breaths, which cause his entire upper body to move, but he doesn't let go.
After another minute of staring, he begins to dig again, frantic but silent. She doesn't try to stop him.
He digs and he digs and he digs and he digs, until the hole is deeper than it was before. Even then, he continues to shovel out the dirt. Kate can't bring herself to tell him it's pointless. They don't speak at all.
It takes nearly an hour, and it's an eerie feeling of understanding that washes over her then. Jack is pulling himself out of the hole he has created, and when he throws the shovel at her feet, she gets it. She tells herself: it won't be as bad as the last time; after all, she won't have to touch the marshal this time. So she throws herself into the task, not letting herself believe that she's won't find his body beneath all that dirt.
Later, when she is alone in the clearing, her face and arms covered in dirt and sweat, she falls apart when she realizes that Jack is the only other human being (besides herself) left on the island.
*
You will keep the fire at the beach burning large and bright, because it will be a comfort and a reminder of the others. Of the ones then, before now. And you will laugh at yourself when you realize that your life now has three distinct periods: Before, Then, and Now. Before, you ran from yourself, and then you were running for things unknown. Now, there is only you, and you will come to realize that there is nowhere to run that will adequately protect you from It. The inevitable.
You will sleep at the beach that night because it is what you know, and because the branches of tall trees don't obscure the stars and the sky. You'll know that it's not safe, but you will fall asleep anyway, trying to remember the names of the constellations.
*
Jack is staring out over the cliff where Locke fell a week ago. The sun has begun to set, and Kate brings a torch to light their way home. Home. (She can't remember when that started.) He doesn't move, but she knows that he knows that she is there.
After an awkward silence, she tries to rationalize the day away, both to herself and to Jack: "Maybe they're in the jungle. Hiding."
He turns to her quickly, responding. He is trying to keep his emotions at bay, his panic and his fear; trying, but not succeeding. They are both still running on pure adrenaline. "The bodies, Kate. They're gone!"
She doesn't say anything. His voice echoes a bit between the walls of the valley below. He turns back to the view over the cliff; maybe he's wondering if Locke's body is still down there, too.
Jack laughs derisively at her. "And why would they hide in jungle? The jungle is what's trying to kill us."
She doesn't know why she thinks that. But she won't let him win, won't let him have the last word - she gently tugs on his arm and tells him that it's getting dark.
They sleep in the caves that night, because the caves are closer than the beach and the choice is logical. She doesn't admit to herself that it's because the deserted beach and the half-finished raft make her anxious - more anxious than before, when it was just forty-odd people versus a polar bear and something... else. They had strength in numbers before. Now, they are just two. She reassures herself by logically pointing out in her mind that it doesn't make sense to separate.
*
His name will start to slip your mind after a few days.
At first, you will only misplace it for a moment, its first syllable right there on the tip of your tongue, but not quite... you will know that you know it, and you will stop everything until you do, and then it will come to you, like it was never missing in the first place. (You will never think wiser of still talking to him, even when he is gone. You'll forget that he was ever there to answer you.)
It'll get harder. You'll begin to forget that you ever knew his name to begin with; he will be just a man, a person, someone who was but is no longer. At first, it'll scare you, but then you'll start to forget the fear, too.
Soon, he will be just an impression on your memory. You won't remember his face, the color of his eyes, his hair; the way he smelled. The way he sounded when he was happy, or the sound of panic in his voice when he was scared. He will become a blur, gradually fading into the nothingness of memory. A shadow.
Eventually, you will forget that he ever existed at all.
*
"I killed a man."
Kate looks up at Jack, who is filling water bottles in the stream. They've been alone for three days now, but haven't spoken much. There's nothing to talk about, they've discovered.
She puts down her bag, filled with fruit. "What?" She tries not to sound nervous.
"Locke. I killed Locke."
She stops. "He fell," she counters, despite herself. Her words are deliberate, for him and not herself - she's known it was true from the moment he came stumbling back to the others, covered in dirt. She knows it now, too. Without a hint of irony, she adds: "That wasn't your fault."
He stops filling his bottle, staring down at the ground. He doesn't turn to her. "I pushed him and he stumbled and he fell over that cliff." His voice catches. "I killed him, Kate."
"You didn't--"
"I DID!" he shouts. His back is still to her, as she crouches on the ground. "He's dead and I killed him!" She can feel his anger giving way to frantic confession: "I was just so angry, about... about... " but he doesn't finish.
Kate hesitates to move. She thinks he's going to say something more, or change the subject, or do something, but he just stands there. "About Boone?" she finishes for him, cautiously. Maybe he's looking for the prompt; maybe he needs to tell someone before the guilt is impossible to manage. She's the only one left to tell. But his reply is barely a half-hearted 'yeah,' and when she gets up and walks toward him, she sees that he's staring at the nothingness in front of him. He seems distracted by the movement of the water in the stream, but at the same time completely unaware of it. Lost in his mind.
"Jack?"
Her voice snaps him back to reality. He turns to her, startled. "What?"
"You all right?"
"I just..." He squeezes his eyes shut and runs a hand over his face. Pushing something away. "I'm tired."
It comes out sounding like an excuse, but she feels it, too, pulling at that space right behind her eyes and pushing on her temples. They've slept in the caves these last two nights, and she still hasn't gotten used to laying on padded rock instead of packed sand. Of not being lulled into unconsciousness by the waves breaking on the shore. She knows that Jack barely sleeps at all, but she can't shake that feeling that exhaustion isn't what's on his mind.
In the distance, there is low, rumbling thunder.
Kate hears the familiar sound of rain on the branches above them, and water filters down slowly through the thick foliage at first before giving way to a torrential downpour a few seconds later. Their heads turn quickly to the sky. They've been on the island long enough to know what's next. The loud, terrible shriek from inside the jungle is only slightly surprising.
Their response is still the same; but as they begin scrambling for their things and running for the beach, it occurs to Kate that though the sound seems close, extremely so, she doesn't feel it vibrating through the island. She can't feel it in the ground and up through her legs as she runs. But she runs anyway, and runs and runs, always keeping Jack in her sights and never being more than an arm's length behind him. All she can feel is a dull ache in her muscles.
They are moving away from the sound, and it isn't following them. But even when the threat is gone - when the jungle is silent again and the rain has stopped - they continue to run until they hit the sand. The sun is still high, but they decide right then to stay here for the night.
Jack retreats toward the unfinished raft to survey Michael's progress, and Kate walks in an opposite direction, toward supplies. Inside a backpack in the unofficial medical tent, she finds two unused bottles of Scotch tucked in the front pocket. She rolls them between her fingers, remembering why they're there and tracing their unfamiliar labels with her fingernails, and then slides them into her own bag for safekeeping.
Another day passes, and another night arrives. They decide to sleep at the beach again. (She slept better here last night than she ever did in the caves.)
They built a fire last night, and Kate throws a piece of scrappy kindling into the small blaze just to watch it burn. It crackles because it is dry, despite yesterday's rain, and it throws off a few sparks. Jack is staring into the fire, thinking; meditating. She glances over at him, and he's wearing a familiar expression of blankness.
She pushes his arm softly. "Jack?"
He's not startled like before, turning his head casually instead, like he was always on this plane of reality. He smiles at her way of getting his attention, and she returns the smile, trying to understand.
"I couldn't remember," he says, as if they've been discussing it for the last fifteen minutes.
"What?"
He looks back into the fire. "I couldn't remember his name," Jack replies, still stuck in his own train of thought.
"Who?"
"Boone. Yesterday. Before we ran." She can hear frustration creeping into his voice, maybe at her and maybe at himself. She thinks of before, of the times he has already snapped. She wonders when Jack became the emotionally unstable one. "I was standing there, and... I just couldn't remember."
Kate sighs, saying softly: "You're just tired." She hears herself parroting back his response, and actually buying it for a split second, and she almost can't believe it. The more she processes it, the more she can't shake that look on his face.
He throws a bit of palm leaf into the flames. "Maybe." She can't tell if he doesn't believe it anymore or has given up. She doesn't know which is worse. He looks at her again. "Doesn't this feel... strange?"
She laughs. "Seriously?"
Jack laughs, too, and then the sound fades into the air around them. This is the most conversing they've done since They disappeared, and both look at one another expectantly. Kate smiles nervously, and then reaches into the bag by her side to retrieve the bottles she stashed there yesterday. She passes one to Jack. He takes it, unsure.
Kate smiles, trying to break the tension. "I hate scotch." It always reminded her of her father.
He stares at the label, the one she picked at, and then stares at her. She knows what he's thinking about. "We might need this," he says.
"We do. Now." It’s not what he meant, of course, but she does.
It seems like he might throw the tiny frosted bottle into the fire, the ultimate waste of good alcohol, but instead he twists off its small cap and throws it in. She does the same, and they toast to the air between them and don't think about anything else. Jack drinks his faster than she does; hers burns all the way down her throat, and she tries not to choke when the taste stays in her mouth after the first gulp. She doesn't think about carte blanche.
When his bottle is empty, Jack has it by the neck between two of his fingers and is swinging it back and forth; back and forth, back and forth, until she's done, too. She coughs and he passes her a bottle of water. He says, "I hate scotch, too" (because it reminds him of his father, too), and they laugh again.
In a minute or two, she can feel the blood rushing to her fingers and toes. Her skin is tight around the tips of her fingers and her cheeks are prickling with warmth not from the fire. She sighs, because she used to hold her liquor so much better than this. Used to. It's been a while since she thought like that.
Together, they throw their empty bottles into the dancing flames, and the bits of alcohol still left at their bottoms send small columns of fire shooting up briefly. Jack says again, "It feels strange, right?" and what's stranger is that she's beginning to understand what the hell he's talking it.
It's the small, nagging voice in the back of her head, screaming that everything is not right. That everything is not real. It is running to the beach from something she can hear, but isn't really there.
When he leans over and kisses her, she wants to be startled and surprised and to jerk away, but the truth is... the truth is... the truth-- she forgets how she was going to protest. Her mouth opens, her eyes shut, and she returns his kiss with a small moan, not because this is destined to be, or because they're the last people left on the island, but because she wants to taste the scotch in his mouth and know that he's really there, here, next to her. Now. She doesn't understand why she needs that kind of validation, but she knows that she does. And she can feel him testing her, too.
Jack doesn't kiss her like Sawyer does. Gently, his arm goes around her waist, and he slowly pulls her closer to him. She puts both of her arms around his neck, fingers bumping against the dirty piece of yarn on their way to his hair. He moves suddenly, both of hands clasped tightly around her wrists. She gasps and tries to pull away from him, but his grip is secure, squeezing her tight enough to leave red marks, no doubt. He stares at her with his face inches from his; daring her, testing her. Is that what he thinks she wanted - physical security? Beside them, the fire crackles.
Her chest heaves as she catches her breath, and when she licks her dry lips, she sees his eyes watching her. There is a moment, a minute. She chances it, pressing her lips to his again, and when he opens up to her she proves her trustworthiness by not moving an inch. This is no longer an experiment; hands move quickly down her arms and over her breasts and come to rest on her hips, and then suddenly she's sitting in his lap, kissing him hard, with her arms still clasped around his neck. This isn't about destiny, she thinks; this isn't about need.
Someone/something is whispering in her ear: stop stop stop no not the way it's supposed to be stop, but it only pushes her further: she finds that her hips are moving over his, back and forth, just like how he was swinging that empty bottle between his fingers before. Then. Now. Both his hands are under her shirt and flat against the vertebrae of her back, holding her to him. His mouth finds her collarbone, and there's a low moan coming from her throat. One hand creeps up further - looking for the clasp of her bra, but it was too hot this morning for that layer of clothing - and then his hand snakes around to her breasts, and that is the beginning of the end for them.
It doesn't make sense, but she swears that she hears voices in the distance. They feel familiar.
*
There will be a pile of firewood, but eventually it will run low. You will be too tired to venture into the jungle for more, and would barely be able to bend over to pick it up if you did. Your back will still ache and your feet will never cease to be sore.
So you will turn to the raft at the far end of the beach; by then, you'll have forgotten what it was for.
*
Kate wakes as the sun is rising. Jack's arm is over her stomach, holding her close. She tries to move without waking him, not wanting to disturb the first decent night's sleep he's had since... she tries to remember how long they've been alone, and can't recall for a split second.
Then, she can smell fire. Burning, something burning. An explosion. Smoke. Fire. But there is nothing there past the horizon or into the jungle; only green trees and blue, very blue sky. She can hear that voice inside her again (not right not right see not supposed to be), but when Jack wakes up he explains logically that she's smelling the remains of their fire. She believes him.
Days stretch into one another. She has begun to lose track of time.
The island has been quiet and serene for a long time, but they still only venture into the jungle when they have to: when the water supply is low, when they need medical supplies. She has set up a trap for boar at its edge, and they eat what they have and don't complain. They have forgotten what it was like to have too much food.
She knows that she can't hide her queasy stomach from Jack for much longer, but she doesn't want to think about that now.
The rain comes in intervals, and Kate has begun to recognize that - standard, unwavering, artificial intervals. She can feel the changes in the air, and after several cycles, she can predict it within seconds. Jack never pays attention, and he is always caught off-guard on the raft when the rain comes. He always swears in exactly the same way each time, too, when his clothing is drenched and they are huddled close under the tarp. She has stopped warning him because she knows he won't listen.
Now, she is watching him carve a boar with the precision of a surgeon. This one is smaller than the others before him; the herd is beginning to learn. He slices into its belly, and she has to turn away, squeezing her eyes shut to just barely keep her nausea at bay. It's getting worse.
When she regains her composure and opens her eyes, she sees that he's not working anymore. His knife is pressed against the animal's skin but he isn't moving, only staring blankly at it and not looking at anything at all. She knows that look. She's seen it before.
"Jack?" Hesitantly, she reaches out for his arm. His reaction is calm, but belated.
He looks down at the knife in his hand, and then at her. "This is Locke's."
Kate stares at him. He sounds like a child. "Yes."
"This is Locke's knife. And your shirt--" Jack gestures to it with the knife still in his hand. She holds her breath for a bit. "That's not-- yours is orange. It's Michael's."
"Yes," she says again, slower this time. In the back of her mind, she thinks please don't ask why please don't ask.
He is staring at the corpse of the boar again. "I couldn't remember."
"You're tired," she replies automatically. Why did she just say that?
"No!" He's on his feet now. The knife is still in his hand. "No."
"Jack--"
"Kate." The sound of her name sends shivers down her spine. She pulls her sleeves over her hands and hugs herself. He hasn't said her name since... since... "It's different than that."
"What are you talking about?"
"The others! What happened to the others?"
She shakes her head. He's not making sense. "I don't know."
He crouches down next to her. "You don't know, or you can't remember?"
"I--" but she stops. She genuinely doesn't know which is correct. It scares her. It scares her a lot. Finally, she decides on, "I don't know," but there is that voice inside of her again, feeling vindicated.
"I can't remember," he replies. "I can't remember if I ever knew."
What is she supposed to say? She looks at him, looks at him watching her expectantly. What does he want from her? She doesn't have the answers he needs. Instead, she says, "I'm hungry."
He seems to ignore her. "Sometimes I can't remember before. I know that it existed. Rationally, I know there were other people here, but I can't-- sometimes I can't remember when we weren't the only two people here."
She presses her lips together, saying nothing. He shakes his head, and goes back to carving their dinner. She goes back to watching him.
Three, she wants to scream. They are three people now.
*
There will be a ship, far out in the ocean; tiny from where you'll be standing, but close enough to see your fire if it burned bright enough. But it won't be burning. You'll have forgotten about that, too.
Instead, you will curl an arm around your swollen belly and sing to your child about the ocean and a shepherdess of infinite blue sky. You won't remember when you learned French.
*
The island wants back what they have taken from it.
Kate rolls over on her side, the only comfortable position these days. When she opens her eyes, she is alone in the tent, with the sun just barely out of her sight line. She squints and doesn't breathe for a second or two. It's dread, fear-- and then Jack moves into view, standing at the beach with his pants rolled up to his knees, washing something. She breathes again. This is how they start each day.
Later, she smiles, with one hand over her eyes to shield the sun, when he presents her with a fish. He is humming a song to himself, and the notes sound vaguely familiar, but when she asks him what it is, he contemplates it for a moment and replies that he must have made it up. She knows that's not right; and never again I'll go sailing, she thinks, but it's gone before she can remember more.
He begins to load the empty water bottles into their backpack, and it occurs to her that he might not even remember her name now.
Sometimes there are mornings when she thinks it isn't real. That him standing just along the horizon line is just a mirage, or a dream that almost feels like it's happening, but it's not. But then the baby will kick and she will feel just how tightly pulled her skin is, and it will all come sharply into focus. He will come to wake her up. He won't say her name.
It's dark now. He is staring up at the moon, almost full tonight, but not staring at all. The same vacant expression. Kate reaches out to him, but he doesn't notice; she says his name, and he turns on her, wide-eyed and startled.
"I shouldn't have killed Locke," he says, apropos of nothing.
The name sticks with her. They don't use names anymore. "It was an accident. He fell."
"It shouldn't have happened," he maintains. "It shouldn't've."
She presses her lips together, waiting for her patience to come. He hasn't been in this kind of mood for months, and she's almost forgotten how to cope with it. She feels it testing her limits. "But it did, Jack." He flinches again at the sound of his own name. "It happened and now we're here."
He shakes his head insistently. "No. No, it wasn't supposed to happen."
"But it did!" She stops herself before she yells again, and closes her eyes for a moment to breathe deeply. Sometimes she thinks that if she could find the right combination of words and phrases, she could convince him that she understands. She knows what it's like to feel guilty. To be responsible for another man's death. But she can't, and it weighs on her every time his mood turns into this.
When she opens her eyes again, he's still staring at her, intently, just like a child. "That was the past," she says calmly. "Months ago. Stop punishing yourself, it won't do any good."
She thinks he's going to say something else, challenge her, but his eyes flicker off into the darkness outside. The moon is higher in the sky than it was a moment ago. She wishes she could swear and storm off to another tent, but she can barely stand to keep herself propped up for this long, let alone move.
"The island is punishing us," he says. "Punishing me."
"Thanks," she mumbles.
He turns to her again. "Locke died, and the next morning, they were gone."
"So?"
"So, they're gone. The island took them away."
"How, Jack? How can an island take people?"
The word is on the tip of his mouth, but he bites his tongue. Calmly-- too calm, "This is wrong, all wrong. Everything is… wrong."
"So why am I even here, then?" she replies. It's far more bitter than she intended, and louder, too.
He thinks about it for a moment, genuinely tries to come up with a reason, but he finally buries his face in his hands. "I don't know." Immediately, she feels guilty for raising her voice. "The only thing I know for sure is, this is not what is supposed to be happening."
Gently, she reaches out and runs a hand through his hair. She tells him to get some rest. She lets herself believe that in the morning, this fit of anxiety will be gone. She lets herself believe that it's merely anxiety. She doesn't like to think about the other possibilities. Of the idea that he could wake up and not even remember himself.
When the morning comes, she is alone. This is to be expected, of course, but in the corner of their tent, she notices the backpack. It's still filled with their empty water bottles. Kate wonders why Jack would have left for the caves without it.
*
The sun won't be very high in the sky when a sharp pain from your abdomen awakens you. It will come again and again, and it'll hurt so much that you'll cry. Briefly, everything will come flooding back to you, your pain enough to jar time once again and give you the memories it stole from you: Tomlovedirtairplaneloveguntearsletterslovedeathrunning, TearsemptyplanesandislandJack, JackJackJackJackJackJack--
In that moment, you'll realize that it was never about Jack at all; that it was always about you, you and the things that you carried with you and the burdens you chose to shoulder and the roles you turned away from.
(Two stones: one black, one white. Adam and Eve.)
You will pray that the island won't take this life from you, too. You will accept this challenge, but you will not yield. It will be the first time you have named the island as the source of everything.
And then you will be two again: two, and not alone. His hands and his feet will be perfect, and you will know that you have never loved anything the way that you love him. Even when he cries, you will believe it.
At first, you won't notice the thick black column of smoke on the horizon. And then one day, you'll wake up and you'll be completely alone.
[fin.]
Feedback is love.
Fic: "Three"
Author: daygloparker
Fandom: LOST
Pairing/Rating: Jack/Kate/the island (PG-ish)
Spoilers: AU (but not) from "Do No Harm"
With immense apologies to Bobby Darin and Charles Trenet. I think this may have been the longest thing I've ever written, coming in at twelve pages. Beta by snarkhunter.
Summary: "You will laugh at yourself when you realize that your life now has three distinct periods: Before, Then, and Now."
*
And then one day, you'll wake up and you'll be completely alone.
*
She wakes up and Jack is shouting, calling her name and everyone else's, too. She rolls over, squinting when she opens her eyes at the ill-positioned morning sun. He sounds out of breath. He probably ran all the way from the caves.
He is climbing onto the raft when she pushes aside the flap on her tent. His back is to her, and when Kate calls out to him he turns around. On his face, she sees relief... and surprise and shock and fear. He jumps off the raft and stumbles toward her.
He keeps repeating it, over and over, in between heavy breathing: "Where is everyone?"
"What--" but she stops herself when she sees his face.
A wave breaks quietly on the shore, and she turns to the horizon line. She looks all around her. That's when she realizes that they are completely, utterly alone on the beach. The island is eerily silent.
Kate stares at the tent where Sawyer usually sleeps. She can feel the hairs on the back of neck standing on end, goose bumps prickling her arms. "I don't understand."
He rubs the back of his neck, pulling on the thin piece of yarn around it. "I woke up and they were gone."
"Everyone?" He is too calm, she thinks.
Jack hesitates. "Yeah. Everyone. The caves are empty, too."
In the sand, she sees only two sets of footprints: hers and Jack's, and untouched sand as far as she can see. Like they've always been here, just the two of them.
Her heart beats faster, and her breathing is shallow. "I don't understand," she says again.
Jack's eyes suddenly grow wide, realizing something. He pushes past her and walks frantically down the beach. She calls out to him, but he is determined. He starts to jog. Or maybe he's just ignoring her.
*
At first it won't scare you. You learned the sounds of the jungle a long time ago, after all, so the journey from the beach to the caves won't be that intimidating when it's taken alone. It'll only be longer than before, since there's no one else to carry the extra weight that ten bottles of water rather than five will create in your backpack. You'll have to stop halfway, hunched over and holding your stomach. You will remember when you could (and did) run from the caves to beach and back again, and that thought alone will motivate you to keep moving.
At first you won't mind being alone. It's during the first night of your solitude, when your back aches and your feet hurt, that you will finally succumb to the anxiety and fear. When you'll realize that you aren't really alone.
*
Jack disappears into the tall grass, and when Kate finally moves her legs and runs after him, kicking up sand as she does, she finds him at Boone's grave. He is moving the fresh dirt away with the shovel they used to dig it a week ago.
It takes a couple of seconds for what he’s doing to sink in with her.
"JACK!" she shouts, not able to hide her shock. She is standing at the foot of Boone's grave, but he doesn't acknowledge her and he doesn't stop digging.
"Jack, stop--"
She reaches for his arm to get his attention, and it does - he swats her hand away with tremendous force when her fingers lightly brush his skin. Kate is too started to move again. He glares at her, trying to be angry, but she can see straight through him. She expects his shoulders to fall and his fingers to release the shovel, but he doesn't. His lungs take in deep, quick breaths, which cause his entire upper body to move, but he doesn't let go.
After another minute of staring, he begins to dig again, frantic but silent. She doesn't try to stop him.
He digs and he digs and he digs and he digs, until the hole is deeper than it was before. Even then, he continues to shovel out the dirt. Kate can't bring herself to tell him it's pointless. They don't speak at all.
It takes nearly an hour, and it's an eerie feeling of understanding that washes over her then. Jack is pulling himself out of the hole he has created, and when he throws the shovel at her feet, she gets it. She tells herself: it won't be as bad as the last time; after all, she won't have to touch the marshal this time. So she throws herself into the task, not letting herself believe that she's won't find his body beneath all that dirt.
Later, when she is alone in the clearing, her face and arms covered in dirt and sweat, she falls apart when she realizes that Jack is the only other human being (besides herself) left on the island.
*
You will keep the fire at the beach burning large and bright, because it will be a comfort and a reminder of the others. Of the ones then, before now. And you will laugh at yourself when you realize that your life now has three distinct periods: Before, Then, and Now. Before, you ran from yourself, and then you were running for things unknown. Now, there is only you, and you will come to realize that there is nowhere to run that will adequately protect you from It. The inevitable.
You will sleep at the beach that night because it is what you know, and because the branches of tall trees don't obscure the stars and the sky. You'll know that it's not safe, but you will fall asleep anyway, trying to remember the names of the constellations.
*
Jack is staring out over the cliff where Locke fell a week ago. The sun has begun to set, and Kate brings a torch to light their way home. Home. (She can't remember when that started.) He doesn't move, but she knows that he knows that she is there.
After an awkward silence, she tries to rationalize the day away, both to herself and to Jack: "Maybe they're in the jungle. Hiding."
He turns to her quickly, responding. He is trying to keep his emotions at bay, his panic and his fear; trying, but not succeeding. They are both still running on pure adrenaline. "The bodies, Kate. They're gone!"
She doesn't say anything. His voice echoes a bit between the walls of the valley below. He turns back to the view over the cliff; maybe he's wondering if Locke's body is still down there, too.
Jack laughs derisively at her. "And why would they hide in jungle? The jungle is what's trying to kill us."
She doesn't know why she thinks that. But she won't let him win, won't let him have the last word - she gently tugs on his arm and tells him that it's getting dark.
They sleep in the caves that night, because the caves are closer than the beach and the choice is logical. She doesn't admit to herself that it's because the deserted beach and the half-finished raft make her anxious - more anxious than before, when it was just forty-odd people versus a polar bear and something... else. They had strength in numbers before. Now, they are just two. She reassures herself by logically pointing out in her mind that it doesn't make sense to separate.
*
His name will start to slip your mind after a few days.
At first, you will only misplace it for a moment, its first syllable right there on the tip of your tongue, but not quite... you will know that you know it, and you will stop everything until you do, and then it will come to you, like it was never missing in the first place. (You will never think wiser of still talking to him, even when he is gone. You'll forget that he was ever there to answer you.)
It'll get harder. You'll begin to forget that you ever knew his name to begin with; he will be just a man, a person, someone who was but is no longer. At first, it'll scare you, but then you'll start to forget the fear, too.
Soon, he will be just an impression on your memory. You won't remember his face, the color of his eyes, his hair; the way he smelled. The way he sounded when he was happy, or the sound of panic in his voice when he was scared. He will become a blur, gradually fading into the nothingness of memory. A shadow.
Eventually, you will forget that he ever existed at all.
*
"I killed a man."
Kate looks up at Jack, who is filling water bottles in the stream. They've been alone for three days now, but haven't spoken much. There's nothing to talk about, they've discovered.
She puts down her bag, filled with fruit. "What?" She tries not to sound nervous.
"Locke. I killed Locke."
She stops. "He fell," she counters, despite herself. Her words are deliberate, for him and not herself - she's known it was true from the moment he came stumbling back to the others, covered in dirt. She knows it now, too. Without a hint of irony, she adds: "That wasn't your fault."
He stops filling his bottle, staring down at the ground. He doesn't turn to her. "I pushed him and he stumbled and he fell over that cliff." His voice catches. "I killed him, Kate."
"You didn't--"
"I DID!" he shouts. His back is still to her, as she crouches on the ground. "He's dead and I killed him!" She can feel his anger giving way to frantic confession: "I was just so angry, about... about... " but he doesn't finish.
Kate hesitates to move. She thinks he's going to say something more, or change the subject, or do something, but he just stands there. "About Boone?" she finishes for him, cautiously. Maybe he's looking for the prompt; maybe he needs to tell someone before the guilt is impossible to manage. She's the only one left to tell. But his reply is barely a half-hearted 'yeah,' and when she gets up and walks toward him, she sees that he's staring at the nothingness in front of him. He seems distracted by the movement of the water in the stream, but at the same time completely unaware of it. Lost in his mind.
"Jack?"
Her voice snaps him back to reality. He turns to her, startled. "What?"
"You all right?"
"I just..." He squeezes his eyes shut and runs a hand over his face. Pushing something away. "I'm tired."
It comes out sounding like an excuse, but she feels it, too, pulling at that space right behind her eyes and pushing on her temples. They've slept in the caves these last two nights, and she still hasn't gotten used to laying on padded rock instead of packed sand. Of not being lulled into unconsciousness by the waves breaking on the shore. She knows that Jack barely sleeps at all, but she can't shake that feeling that exhaustion isn't what's on his mind.
In the distance, there is low, rumbling thunder.
Kate hears the familiar sound of rain on the branches above them, and water filters down slowly through the thick foliage at first before giving way to a torrential downpour a few seconds later. Their heads turn quickly to the sky. They've been on the island long enough to know what's next. The loud, terrible shriek from inside the jungle is only slightly surprising.
Their response is still the same; but as they begin scrambling for their things and running for the beach, it occurs to Kate that though the sound seems close, extremely so, she doesn't feel it vibrating through the island. She can't feel it in the ground and up through her legs as she runs. But she runs anyway, and runs and runs, always keeping Jack in her sights and never being more than an arm's length behind him. All she can feel is a dull ache in her muscles.
They are moving away from the sound, and it isn't following them. But even when the threat is gone - when the jungle is silent again and the rain has stopped - they continue to run until they hit the sand. The sun is still high, but they decide right then to stay here for the night.
Jack retreats toward the unfinished raft to survey Michael's progress, and Kate walks in an opposite direction, toward supplies. Inside a backpack in the unofficial medical tent, she finds two unused bottles of Scotch tucked in the front pocket. She rolls them between her fingers, remembering why they're there and tracing their unfamiliar labels with her fingernails, and then slides them into her own bag for safekeeping.
Another day passes, and another night arrives. They decide to sleep at the beach again. (She slept better here last night than she ever did in the caves.)
They built a fire last night, and Kate throws a piece of scrappy kindling into the small blaze just to watch it burn. It crackles because it is dry, despite yesterday's rain, and it throws off a few sparks. Jack is staring into the fire, thinking; meditating. She glances over at him, and he's wearing a familiar expression of blankness.
She pushes his arm softly. "Jack?"
He's not startled like before, turning his head casually instead, like he was always on this plane of reality. He smiles at her way of getting his attention, and she returns the smile, trying to understand.
"I couldn't remember," he says, as if they've been discussing it for the last fifteen minutes.
"What?"
He looks back into the fire. "I couldn't remember his name," Jack replies, still stuck in his own train of thought.
"Who?"
"Boone. Yesterday. Before we ran." She can hear frustration creeping into his voice, maybe at her and maybe at himself. She thinks of before, of the times he has already snapped. She wonders when Jack became the emotionally unstable one. "I was standing there, and... I just couldn't remember."
Kate sighs, saying softly: "You're just tired." She hears herself parroting back his response, and actually buying it for a split second, and she almost can't believe it. The more she processes it, the more she can't shake that look on his face.
He throws a bit of palm leaf into the flames. "Maybe." She can't tell if he doesn't believe it anymore or has given up. She doesn't know which is worse. He looks at her again. "Doesn't this feel... strange?"
She laughs. "Seriously?"
Jack laughs, too, and then the sound fades into the air around them. This is the most conversing they've done since They disappeared, and both look at one another expectantly. Kate smiles nervously, and then reaches into the bag by her side to retrieve the bottles she stashed there yesterday. She passes one to Jack. He takes it, unsure.
Kate smiles, trying to break the tension. "I hate scotch." It always reminded her of her father.
He stares at the label, the one she picked at, and then stares at her. She knows what he's thinking about. "We might need this," he says.
"We do. Now." It’s not what he meant, of course, but she does.
It seems like he might throw the tiny frosted bottle into the fire, the ultimate waste of good alcohol, but instead he twists off its small cap and throws it in. She does the same, and they toast to the air between them and don't think about anything else. Jack drinks his faster than she does; hers burns all the way down her throat, and she tries not to choke when the taste stays in her mouth after the first gulp. She doesn't think about carte blanche.
When his bottle is empty, Jack has it by the neck between two of his fingers and is swinging it back and forth; back and forth, back and forth, until she's done, too. She coughs and he passes her a bottle of water. He says, "I hate scotch, too" (because it reminds him of his father, too), and they laugh again.
In a minute or two, she can feel the blood rushing to her fingers and toes. Her skin is tight around the tips of her fingers and her cheeks are prickling with warmth not from the fire. She sighs, because she used to hold her liquor so much better than this. Used to. It's been a while since she thought like that.
Together, they throw their empty bottles into the dancing flames, and the bits of alcohol still left at their bottoms send small columns of fire shooting up briefly. Jack says again, "It feels strange, right?" and what's stranger is that she's beginning to understand what the hell he's talking it.
It's the small, nagging voice in the back of her head, screaming that everything is not right. That everything is not real. It is running to the beach from something she can hear, but isn't really there.
When he leans over and kisses her, she wants to be startled and surprised and to jerk away, but the truth is... the truth is... the truth-- she forgets how she was going to protest. Her mouth opens, her eyes shut, and she returns his kiss with a small moan, not because this is destined to be, or because they're the last people left on the island, but because she wants to taste the scotch in his mouth and know that he's really there, here, next to her. Now. She doesn't understand why she needs that kind of validation, but she knows that she does. And she can feel him testing her, too.
Jack doesn't kiss her like Sawyer does. Gently, his arm goes around her waist, and he slowly pulls her closer to him. She puts both of her arms around his neck, fingers bumping against the dirty piece of yarn on their way to his hair. He moves suddenly, both of hands clasped tightly around her wrists. She gasps and tries to pull away from him, but his grip is secure, squeezing her tight enough to leave red marks, no doubt. He stares at her with his face inches from his; daring her, testing her. Is that what he thinks she wanted - physical security? Beside them, the fire crackles.
Her chest heaves as she catches her breath, and when she licks her dry lips, she sees his eyes watching her. There is a moment, a minute. She chances it, pressing her lips to his again, and when he opens up to her she proves her trustworthiness by not moving an inch. This is no longer an experiment; hands move quickly down her arms and over her breasts and come to rest on her hips, and then suddenly she's sitting in his lap, kissing him hard, with her arms still clasped around his neck. This isn't about destiny, she thinks; this isn't about need.
Someone/something is whispering in her ear: stop stop stop no not the way it's supposed to be stop, but it only pushes her further: she finds that her hips are moving over his, back and forth, just like how he was swinging that empty bottle between his fingers before. Then. Now. Both his hands are under her shirt and flat against the vertebrae of her back, holding her to him. His mouth finds her collarbone, and there's a low moan coming from her throat. One hand creeps up further - looking for the clasp of her bra, but it was too hot this morning for that layer of clothing - and then his hand snakes around to her breasts, and that is the beginning of the end for them.
It doesn't make sense, but she swears that she hears voices in the distance. They feel familiar.
*
There will be a pile of firewood, but eventually it will run low. You will be too tired to venture into the jungle for more, and would barely be able to bend over to pick it up if you did. Your back will still ache and your feet will never cease to be sore.
So you will turn to the raft at the far end of the beach; by then, you'll have forgotten what it was for.
*
Kate wakes as the sun is rising. Jack's arm is over her stomach, holding her close. She tries to move without waking him, not wanting to disturb the first decent night's sleep he's had since... she tries to remember how long they've been alone, and can't recall for a split second.
Then, she can smell fire. Burning, something burning. An explosion. Smoke. Fire. But there is nothing there past the horizon or into the jungle; only green trees and blue, very blue sky. She can hear that voice inside her again (not right not right see not supposed to be), but when Jack wakes up he explains logically that she's smelling the remains of their fire. She believes him.
Days stretch into one another. She has begun to lose track of time.
The island has been quiet and serene for a long time, but they still only venture into the jungle when they have to: when the water supply is low, when they need medical supplies. She has set up a trap for boar at its edge, and they eat what they have and don't complain. They have forgotten what it was like to have too much food.
She knows that she can't hide her queasy stomach from Jack for much longer, but she doesn't want to think about that now.
The rain comes in intervals, and Kate has begun to recognize that - standard, unwavering, artificial intervals. She can feel the changes in the air, and after several cycles, she can predict it within seconds. Jack never pays attention, and he is always caught off-guard on the raft when the rain comes. He always swears in exactly the same way each time, too, when his clothing is drenched and they are huddled close under the tarp. She has stopped warning him because she knows he won't listen.
Now, she is watching him carve a boar with the precision of a surgeon. This one is smaller than the others before him; the herd is beginning to learn. He slices into its belly, and she has to turn away, squeezing her eyes shut to just barely keep her nausea at bay. It's getting worse.
When she regains her composure and opens her eyes, she sees that he's not working anymore. His knife is pressed against the animal's skin but he isn't moving, only staring blankly at it and not looking at anything at all. She knows that look. She's seen it before.
"Jack?" Hesitantly, she reaches out for his arm. His reaction is calm, but belated.
He looks down at the knife in his hand, and then at her. "This is Locke's."
Kate stares at him. He sounds like a child. "Yes."
"This is Locke's knife. And your shirt--" Jack gestures to it with the knife still in his hand. She holds her breath for a bit. "That's not-- yours is orange. It's Michael's."
"Yes," she says again, slower this time. In the back of her mind, she thinks please don't ask why please don't ask.
He is staring at the corpse of the boar again. "I couldn't remember."
"You're tired," she replies automatically. Why did she just say that?
"No!" He's on his feet now. The knife is still in his hand. "No."
"Jack--"
"Kate." The sound of her name sends shivers down her spine. She pulls her sleeves over her hands and hugs herself. He hasn't said her name since... since... "It's different than that."
"What are you talking about?"
"The others! What happened to the others?"
She shakes her head. He's not making sense. "I don't know."
He crouches down next to her. "You don't know, or you can't remember?"
"I--" but she stops. She genuinely doesn't know which is correct. It scares her. It scares her a lot. Finally, she decides on, "I don't know," but there is that voice inside of her again, feeling vindicated.
"I can't remember," he replies. "I can't remember if I ever knew."
What is she supposed to say? She looks at him, looks at him watching her expectantly. What does he want from her? She doesn't have the answers he needs. Instead, she says, "I'm hungry."
He seems to ignore her. "Sometimes I can't remember before. I know that it existed. Rationally, I know there were other people here, but I can't-- sometimes I can't remember when we weren't the only two people here."
She presses her lips together, saying nothing. He shakes his head, and goes back to carving their dinner. She goes back to watching him.
Three, she wants to scream. They are three people now.
*
There will be a ship, far out in the ocean; tiny from where you'll be standing, but close enough to see your fire if it burned bright enough. But it won't be burning. You'll have forgotten about that, too.
Instead, you will curl an arm around your swollen belly and sing to your child about the ocean and a shepherdess of infinite blue sky. You won't remember when you learned French.
*
The island wants back what they have taken from it.
Kate rolls over on her side, the only comfortable position these days. When she opens her eyes, she is alone in the tent, with the sun just barely out of her sight line. She squints and doesn't breathe for a second or two. It's dread, fear-- and then Jack moves into view, standing at the beach with his pants rolled up to his knees, washing something. She breathes again. This is how they start each day.
Later, she smiles, with one hand over her eyes to shield the sun, when he presents her with a fish. He is humming a song to himself, and the notes sound vaguely familiar, but when she asks him what it is, he contemplates it for a moment and replies that he must have made it up. She knows that's not right; and never again I'll go sailing, she thinks, but it's gone before she can remember more.
He begins to load the empty water bottles into their backpack, and it occurs to her that he might not even remember her name now.
Sometimes there are mornings when she thinks it isn't real. That him standing just along the horizon line is just a mirage, or a dream that almost feels like it's happening, but it's not. But then the baby will kick and she will feel just how tightly pulled her skin is, and it will all come sharply into focus. He will come to wake her up. He won't say her name.
It's dark now. He is staring up at the moon, almost full tonight, but not staring at all. The same vacant expression. Kate reaches out to him, but he doesn't notice; she says his name, and he turns on her, wide-eyed and startled.
"I shouldn't have killed Locke," he says, apropos of nothing.
The name sticks with her. They don't use names anymore. "It was an accident. He fell."
"It shouldn't have happened," he maintains. "It shouldn't've."
She presses her lips together, waiting for her patience to come. He hasn't been in this kind of mood for months, and she's almost forgotten how to cope with it. She feels it testing her limits. "But it did, Jack." He flinches again at the sound of his own name. "It happened and now we're here."
He shakes his head insistently. "No. No, it wasn't supposed to happen."
"But it did!" She stops herself before she yells again, and closes her eyes for a moment to breathe deeply. Sometimes she thinks that if she could find the right combination of words and phrases, she could convince him that she understands. She knows what it's like to feel guilty. To be responsible for another man's death. But she can't, and it weighs on her every time his mood turns into this.
When she opens her eyes again, he's still staring at her, intently, just like a child. "That was the past," she says calmly. "Months ago. Stop punishing yourself, it won't do any good."
She thinks he's going to say something else, challenge her, but his eyes flicker off into the darkness outside. The moon is higher in the sky than it was a moment ago. She wishes she could swear and storm off to another tent, but she can barely stand to keep herself propped up for this long, let alone move.
"The island is punishing us," he says. "Punishing me."
"Thanks," she mumbles.
He turns to her again. "Locke died, and the next morning, they were gone."
"So?"
"So, they're gone. The island took them away."
"How, Jack? How can an island take people?"
The word is on the tip of his mouth, but he bites his tongue. Calmly-- too calm, "This is wrong, all wrong. Everything is… wrong."
"So why am I even here, then?" she replies. It's far more bitter than she intended, and louder, too.
He thinks about it for a moment, genuinely tries to come up with a reason, but he finally buries his face in his hands. "I don't know." Immediately, she feels guilty for raising her voice. "The only thing I know for sure is, this is not what is supposed to be happening."
Gently, she reaches out and runs a hand through his hair. She tells him to get some rest. She lets herself believe that in the morning, this fit of anxiety will be gone. She lets herself believe that it's merely anxiety. She doesn't like to think about the other possibilities. Of the idea that he could wake up and not even remember himself.
When the morning comes, she is alone. This is to be expected, of course, but in the corner of their tent, she notices the backpack. It's still filled with their empty water bottles. Kate wonders why Jack would have left for the caves without it.
*
The sun won't be very high in the sky when a sharp pain from your abdomen awakens you. It will come again and again, and it'll hurt so much that you'll cry. Briefly, everything will come flooding back to you, your pain enough to jar time once again and give you the memories it stole from you: Tomlovedirtairplaneloveguntearsletterslovedeathrunning, TearsemptyplanesandislandJack, JackJackJackJackJackJack--
In that moment, you'll realize that it was never about Jack at all; that it was always about you, you and the things that you carried with you and the burdens you chose to shoulder and the roles you turned away from.
(Two stones: one black, one white. Adam and Eve.)
You will pray that the island won't take this life from you, too. You will accept this challenge, but you will not yield. It will be the first time you have named the island as the source of everything.
And then you will be two again: two, and not alone. His hands and his feet will be perfect, and you will know that you have never loved anything the way that you love him. Even when he cries, you will believe it.
At first, you won't notice the thick black column of smoke on the horizon. And then one day, you'll wake up and you'll be completely alone.
[fin.]
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