Fic: Four Part Harmony
Title: Four Part Harmony
Characters: Charlotte, Miles, Jin, Penny, Desmond, Daniel
Disclaimer: Lost is not mine. Seriously? Seriously.
Rating: PG13
Words: 2500
Spoilers: Up to The Variable
Summary: Ever wonder what Faraday did in Ann Arbor? I blame valhalla37 for putting this idea in my head.
x x x
June 1977
Haste, they said, haste
Don’t you know it’s a race?
Fly, fly up to the moon.
“Oh oh! Turn it up!” Charlotte squeals when the familiar chords greet her. “I love Geronimo Jackson.” Her school books fall to the floor in unison with her sisters’ as they race into the house. In the corner of their living room, her mum and dad hold each other close and sway to the mellow music.
First they mapped them, then conquered them,
Each star at a time,
Forgetting the laws of gravity.
Fly, fly up to the moon.
The girls join in, slowly twirling, waving their arms overhead. Their steps make a spider web pattern on the shag carpet. Charlotte closes her eyes and pretends her fingertips are grazing the constellations, setting them alight. Then she lets her body go limp, and tries to see if it’s possible to resist the pull of gravity. She rocks back and forth, pretending to be weightless. Instead she only feels the magnetic pull even harder. It’s like the earth is calling to her and wants to take her home.
But they’re always reminded of the truth in the end,
What goes up, must come down
Everybody, everybody, ends up in the ground.
At the end of the song, Charlotte lets her body mimic the lyrics and collapses to the floor. The thick carpet cushions the worst of her fall; still, a slow trickle of blood seeps from her nose. Her parents and sisters fuss over her. It takes several minutes for anyone to notice her fall caused the record needle to skip.
Everybody, everybody, ends up on the ground. Everybody, everybody, ends up on the ground. Every-
x x x
November 1976
Every morning is the same. Miles remains in a haze until he gets his coffee. First he drinks a cup black and lets the caffeine wake every nerve. Two spoonfuls of sugar is added to his second cup and after that he feels ready to start the day.
He’s dropping in his second sugar cube when he notices Jin looking at him strangely from across the kitchen table. Sawyer never came home from Juliet’s last night, so it’s just the two of them having breakfast in their residence suite that morning. “What’re you looking at?”
“The doctor is the same. Two cups, both different.”
Miles doesn’t need to ask which doctor. Jin drove his father all around their territory yesterday. Plus he had noticed this habit himself. He notices everything about Chang. “It’s a Chinese thing.”
Jin accepts the explanation and returns his attention to his notepad and copy of the Ann Arbor News. Miles cocks his head. The paper came on last week’s sub and is nine weeks out of date, not that it matters to Jin who only reads it to improve his vocabulary. Not that it matters to any of them - nine weeks, thirty years, it’s all the same.
“So what’s the word on the street?” Miles asks when he sees Jin underline a word.
“Jer-rom-nee-mo.”
“Geronimo? The Indian Chief?”
“I do not think so.” Jin looks between the worn dictionary lying open on the table and the Arts and Life section.
Miles holds out his hand. “Give it here.” Jin passes the paper to Miles who reads aloud, “Geronimo Jackson enchants U of M students with groovy beats.” He looks to Jin. “Just some hippie band. Like the world needs more of them.”
“This man, the piano player…,” Jin taps the grainy picture next to the article, “looks like your friend.”
For a moment Miles hears Jin say, “Looks like your father,” and he frowns, wondering what he’s given away, but then he takes a closer look at the black and white photo. In front of an adoring crowd of co-eds pretending they’re at Woodstock, a man with an afro the size of Texas croons into the microphone on an outdoor stage while strumming an acoustic guitar. Some deadhead plays what looks to be the clarinet while a floozy chick waves a tambourine over her head. And there in the corner, with his back to the photographer, is a man hunched over a piano. The camera only captured his profile, but it’s enough for Miles to recognize that remote yet earnest gaze. He reads the caption, “And newest band member, pianist, songwriter and occasional vocalist… Johnny Appleseed.
“Is that Dan?” Jin asks.
Miles sits stunned. A year ago, the last time he’d seen Dan, he had been a sliver of a man - half mad with grief and full of delusions of grandeur. In the week before he left on the sub, his conversation had been particularly one note. Over and over he had insisted, “I’ll find a way to save us, Miles, all of us. I just need to go away. It’s all too close here.” Horace had promised Sawyer he would find a place for Dan off island with the Dharma research team in Michigan, but Miles could read between the lines. Ever since the Lewises complained, Horace just wanted Dan gone.
“Well, that’s great Dan. Clearly getting the band back together will fix the space time continuum. It’s like a freaking episode of Scooby Doo.”
Jin doesn’t ask for the cultural reference to be explained and ignores Miles’s sour tone. “It’s good. He’s still…,” Jin pats the breast pocket of his coverall, right under the Dharma insignia, “with us.”
Miles exhales and pushes the paper back over to Jin. He slumps in his chair. “I don’t think Dan was ever with us.”
Jin returns to his list of new words and Miles drums his fingers against his mug. Of all of them, Dan seemed the least likely to give up the dream of getting back. It’s strange to imagine him like Sawyer and Juliet, making the best of their situation. But leave it to Dan to do so in the strangest way, by joining some counterculture quartet. Miles pushes his chair away from the table and pours the remainder of his coffee down the drain. It’s not like he could have saved them anyway.
From the sink, Miles looks out their window. It’s a clear day, and from their third floor view, a tiny patch of blue is visible, the ocean, and beyond that, the world - where Dan plays the piano, Jin’s wife isn’t even born, and life goes on. Movement catches his eyes. The school teacher appears on the grass outside the dormitories and claps. A trail of children follow with baskets in their hands. It’s not hard to pick out Charlotte - she’s skipping along, hands attached to two other red headed girls. Lagging behind the group is the miniature Benjamin Linus, no basket, no friends.
“Geronimo…” Jin rolls out his new word. “Maybe they come play here.”
Miles sighs. Maybe he should have gone with Dan. “Stranger things have happened.”
x x x
November 2006
If someone asked Penny where she was at that very moment, the coordinates she would have provided would have been, “at her wit’s end,” and truly no one would dare argue with her. Above deck, Desmond battled rain and wind in an attempt to keep them from capsizing. Below, she fought an equally fierce element. Charlie, adorned in his infant life vest, was swaddled against her chest, leaving her a hand free to grasp the safety rail as the boat lurched this way and that. In her other hand, she gripped a duffel bag full of emergency supplies less they have to escape to the raft. Unable to move his limbs at all, Charlie protested his discomfort by doing an awfully good impersonation of an air raid siren. It meant Penny could barely hear the storm above.
“Shhhh, shhhh, shhhh.” Her lips grazed the wispy hair that looked like it might spring into curls any day now. She laid her cheek against his soggy brow. “We’re going to be alright.”
She doesn’t remember when she started singing, perhaps it was the nearest reflex she had to screaming herself. As she did not want to traumatize her son with a voice once described as nails on a chalkboard, lullabies were always Desmond’s territory. But all of a sudden the words to Teddy Bear’s Picnic were pouring out of her mouth and Charlie had fallen quiet. Since that was about the extent of her children’s song catalogue, Penny repeated the song and managed to keep Charlie’s tears at bay. After round four with the bears and their picnic, Penny decided to sing whatever other songs came to mind, whether they were appropriate or not . Out came Like a Virgin, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, Hey You, Billie Jean, Yellow Submarine and something by a horrendous ‘90s boy band that she was ashamed to know.
Charlie’s eyes were fighting to stay open when she moved on to a song she remembered from her childhood bedtimes.
Seven Days in the Garden of Eden,
How would you spend your time?
I counted the trees while you dug up the bones,
Hey, they weren’t supposed to be here.
If Penny wasn’t mistaken, the storm was fading. The boat seemed to be less at the mercy of the waves. Light was even visible through the portholes. Continuing to sing, she released her grip on the rail and bag, and tested to see if she could stand. The desired stability was still not there, but the rocking was happening in a more predictable motion, and she was able to make her way across the galley. Above she could hear one of the sails going up, which meant the worst was over and Desmond hadn’t done anything foolish like fallen overboard.
We stayed in the shade, dodging the rays,
Coming out to play with the stars.
I cut the grass, and you poured the tea,
Maybe I’m remembering this wrong
The lyrics made her think Des would love a cup of tea when he came down, but it still wasn’t safe to light the stove. So Penny rummaged through the cupboard and came up with a dusty bottle of brandy that had enough left to do the trick. Then she proceeded to unwind the cloth binding Charlie to her. Leaving the life vest on, she lay him in his crib. His arms and legs flailed with joy at being free. Spit bubbles gathered at his mouth as the corners turned up in a sleepy smile. She smiled back her son and finished the song.
When I said ‘I loved you’ it wasn’t a lie,
Only words were far from enough.
I watched you then, and I watched you now
Was it really just for seven days?
As her private concert for Charlie concluded, boots splashed down the galley steps, followed by an equally wet husband. “So that’s what scared the storm away, your singing.”
“You could hear me?”
“Like a banshee,” he grinned, but it took some effort. He was exhausted.
Penny took him in her arms, letting out a sigh of relief. “Thank God that’s over. We need to find a winter port as soon as possible. I’m not going through that again. Ugh, you’re soaking. Go change now.”
“I gotta go up again to check the lines. I just wanted to check on you and Charlie.” Desmond passed by the crib and stroked the slumbering baby’s cheek.
“I’ll go, you stay here and rest.”
“No, it will just take a minute.” He turned and headed back up the steps. “Was that Geronimo Jackson?”
“What?” Penny’s brow furrowed. “Who?”
“The song, Shipwrecked in the Garden of Eden. The record was in the hatch.”
At the mention of the hatch, her husband’s complexion turned an unsightly pallor. Penny swallowed. “I have no idea, I’ve only ever heard my father sing it to me, when I was little, if you can believe that.”
“Well…” Desmond looked lost for a moment, then the past disappeared from his face. “It’s a sweet song, even coming from you.”
Penny pretended to look offended. “Go on, or I’ll start up again. Seven Days in the Garden of Eden, How would you spend your time?”
“I’m going! I’m going!”
x x x
June 1977
Geronimo’s Appleseed Talks Psychedelic Physics, Melody Maker, vol. 6, no. 1
A lab rat navigates a labyrinthine, not in search of an elusive piece of cheese, but the answers to the meaning of life. Sounds like Geronimo Jackson’s hit song Eloise, however it’s also the day job of Johnny Appleseed, the band’s twitchy ivory tickler. While working as a research assistant at the University of Michigan’s Physics Department last year, Appleseed would unwind after a long day under the hood of quantum mechanics by playing piano at the local pub Loose Lucy’s. It was there Appleseed, otherwise known as Dan Smith, met the up and coming Detroit based folk-rock group, Geronimo Jackson. Appleseed was brought on board to give the band a more classic sound and ended up contributing song writing and vocal support on the band’s popular album, Magna Carta.
According to Appleseed, who still moonlights with Einstein wannabes when the band is not on the road, music and mathematics are not all that different. In fact, Appleseed claims musical theory led to a recent breakthrough in his research. “Music is a language, just like English or Latin or Korean. Math is a language too, and I find by applying my knowledge of pitch, tone, melody, and rhythm to numbers, I can translate equations thought to be unknowable.”
For example, Appleseed explained, pushing a stray lock of hair from his serious brow, “You can play the same song over and over by following the notes on the page. But it only takes a slight adjustment in pressure to make a note flat or sharp or more dramatically, strike an entirely new key. Once you’ve done that, you’ve altered what is constant with a variable. Now it’s out there and changed forever. You can’t take it back, and you might not ever play the same variation twice.”
When asked if math is his only inspiration for composing, Appleseed dodged my attempt at getting more personal by stating, “I write what I know.” So sorry ladies, there was no insight into what heartbreak might lurk behind his melancholy ballads and distant eyes.
Although rumours circulate about the band’s eminent break-up, Appleseed wouldn’t confirm anything. He did speak of catching a sub - was that some scientist lingo for taking a break? To conclude our conversation, he offered this cryptic remark about the band’s future, “Here’s hoping thirty years from now, it will be like we never existed.” In the meantime, here’s hoping Appleseed keeps cranking out trippy tunes like Dharma Lady, Shipwrecked in the Garden of Eden, A Man named Dude and Can you hear them Pushing Daisies?
x x x
Characters: Charlotte, Miles, Jin, Penny, Desmond, Daniel
Disclaimer: Lost is not mine. Seriously? Seriously.
Rating: PG13
Words: 2500
Spoilers: Up to The Variable
Summary: Ever wonder what Faraday did in Ann Arbor? I blame valhalla37 for putting this idea in my head.
x x x
June 1977
Haste, they said, haste
Don’t you know it’s a race?
Fly, fly up to the moon.
“Oh oh! Turn it up!” Charlotte squeals when the familiar chords greet her. “I love Geronimo Jackson.” Her school books fall to the floor in unison with her sisters’ as they race into the house. In the corner of their living room, her mum and dad hold each other close and sway to the mellow music.
First they mapped them, then conquered them,
Each star at a time,
Forgetting the laws of gravity.
Fly, fly up to the moon.
The girls join in, slowly twirling, waving their arms overhead. Their steps make a spider web pattern on the shag carpet. Charlotte closes her eyes and pretends her fingertips are grazing the constellations, setting them alight. Then she lets her body go limp, and tries to see if it’s possible to resist the pull of gravity. She rocks back and forth, pretending to be weightless. Instead she only feels the magnetic pull even harder. It’s like the earth is calling to her and wants to take her home.
But they’re always reminded of the truth in the end,
What goes up, must come down
Everybody, everybody, ends up in the ground.
At the end of the song, Charlotte lets her body mimic the lyrics and collapses to the floor. The thick carpet cushions the worst of her fall; still, a slow trickle of blood seeps from her nose. Her parents and sisters fuss over her. It takes several minutes for anyone to notice her fall caused the record needle to skip.
Everybody, everybody, ends up on the ground. Everybody, everybody, ends up on the ground. Every-
x x x
November 1976
Every morning is the same. Miles remains in a haze until he gets his coffee. First he drinks a cup black and lets the caffeine wake every nerve. Two spoonfuls of sugar is added to his second cup and after that he feels ready to start the day.
He’s dropping in his second sugar cube when he notices Jin looking at him strangely from across the kitchen table. Sawyer never came home from Juliet’s last night, so it’s just the two of them having breakfast in their residence suite that morning. “What’re you looking at?”
“The doctor is the same. Two cups, both different.”
Miles doesn’t need to ask which doctor. Jin drove his father all around their territory yesterday. Plus he had noticed this habit himself. He notices everything about Chang. “It’s a Chinese thing.”
Jin accepts the explanation and returns his attention to his notepad and copy of the Ann Arbor News. Miles cocks his head. The paper came on last week’s sub and is nine weeks out of date, not that it matters to Jin who only reads it to improve his vocabulary. Not that it matters to any of them - nine weeks, thirty years, it’s all the same.
“So what’s the word on the street?” Miles asks when he sees Jin underline a word.
“Jer-rom-nee-mo.”
“Geronimo? The Indian Chief?”
“I do not think so.” Jin looks between the worn dictionary lying open on the table and the Arts and Life section.
Miles holds out his hand. “Give it here.” Jin passes the paper to Miles who reads aloud, “Geronimo Jackson enchants U of M students with groovy beats.” He looks to Jin. “Just some hippie band. Like the world needs more of them.”
“This man, the piano player…,” Jin taps the grainy picture next to the article, “looks like your friend.”
For a moment Miles hears Jin say, “Looks like your father,” and he frowns, wondering what he’s given away, but then he takes a closer look at the black and white photo. In front of an adoring crowd of co-eds pretending they’re at Woodstock, a man with an afro the size of Texas croons into the microphone on an outdoor stage while strumming an acoustic guitar. Some deadhead plays what looks to be the clarinet while a floozy chick waves a tambourine over her head. And there in the corner, with his back to the photographer, is a man hunched over a piano. The camera only captured his profile, but it’s enough for Miles to recognize that remote yet earnest gaze. He reads the caption, “And newest band member, pianist, songwriter and occasional vocalist… Johnny Appleseed.
“Is that Dan?” Jin asks.
Miles sits stunned. A year ago, the last time he’d seen Dan, he had been a sliver of a man - half mad with grief and full of delusions of grandeur. In the week before he left on the sub, his conversation had been particularly one note. Over and over he had insisted, “I’ll find a way to save us, Miles, all of us. I just need to go away. It’s all too close here.” Horace had promised Sawyer he would find a place for Dan off island with the Dharma research team in Michigan, but Miles could read between the lines. Ever since the Lewises complained, Horace just wanted Dan gone.
“Well, that’s great Dan. Clearly getting the band back together will fix the space time continuum. It’s like a freaking episode of Scooby Doo.”
Jin doesn’t ask for the cultural reference to be explained and ignores Miles’s sour tone. “It’s good. He’s still…,” Jin pats the breast pocket of his coverall, right under the Dharma insignia, “with us.”
Miles exhales and pushes the paper back over to Jin. He slumps in his chair. “I don’t think Dan was ever with us.”
Jin returns to his list of new words and Miles drums his fingers against his mug. Of all of them, Dan seemed the least likely to give up the dream of getting back. It’s strange to imagine him like Sawyer and Juliet, making the best of their situation. But leave it to Dan to do so in the strangest way, by joining some counterculture quartet. Miles pushes his chair away from the table and pours the remainder of his coffee down the drain. It’s not like he could have saved them anyway.
From the sink, Miles looks out their window. It’s a clear day, and from their third floor view, a tiny patch of blue is visible, the ocean, and beyond that, the world - where Dan plays the piano, Jin’s wife isn’t even born, and life goes on. Movement catches his eyes. The school teacher appears on the grass outside the dormitories and claps. A trail of children follow with baskets in their hands. It’s not hard to pick out Charlotte - she’s skipping along, hands attached to two other red headed girls. Lagging behind the group is the miniature Benjamin Linus, no basket, no friends.
“Geronimo…” Jin rolls out his new word. “Maybe they come play here.”
Miles sighs. Maybe he should have gone with Dan. “Stranger things have happened.”
x x x
November 2006
If someone asked Penny where she was at that very moment, the coordinates she would have provided would have been, “at her wit’s end,” and truly no one would dare argue with her. Above deck, Desmond battled rain and wind in an attempt to keep them from capsizing. Below, she fought an equally fierce element. Charlie, adorned in his infant life vest, was swaddled against her chest, leaving her a hand free to grasp the safety rail as the boat lurched this way and that. In her other hand, she gripped a duffel bag full of emergency supplies less they have to escape to the raft. Unable to move his limbs at all, Charlie protested his discomfort by doing an awfully good impersonation of an air raid siren. It meant Penny could barely hear the storm above.
“Shhhh, shhhh, shhhh.” Her lips grazed the wispy hair that looked like it might spring into curls any day now. She laid her cheek against his soggy brow. “We’re going to be alright.”
She doesn’t remember when she started singing, perhaps it was the nearest reflex she had to screaming herself. As she did not want to traumatize her son with a voice once described as nails on a chalkboard, lullabies were always Desmond’s territory. But all of a sudden the words to Teddy Bear’s Picnic were pouring out of her mouth and Charlie had fallen quiet. Since that was about the extent of her children’s song catalogue, Penny repeated the song and managed to keep Charlie’s tears at bay. After round four with the bears and their picnic, Penny decided to sing whatever other songs came to mind, whether they were appropriate or not . Out came Like a Virgin, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, Hey You, Billie Jean, Yellow Submarine and something by a horrendous ‘90s boy band that she was ashamed to know.
Charlie’s eyes were fighting to stay open when she moved on to a song she remembered from her childhood bedtimes.
Seven Days in the Garden of Eden,
How would you spend your time?
I counted the trees while you dug up the bones,
Hey, they weren’t supposed to be here.
If Penny wasn’t mistaken, the storm was fading. The boat seemed to be less at the mercy of the waves. Light was even visible through the portholes. Continuing to sing, she released her grip on the rail and bag, and tested to see if she could stand. The desired stability was still not there, but the rocking was happening in a more predictable motion, and she was able to make her way across the galley. Above she could hear one of the sails going up, which meant the worst was over and Desmond hadn’t done anything foolish like fallen overboard.
We stayed in the shade, dodging the rays,
Coming out to play with the stars.
I cut the grass, and you poured the tea,
Maybe I’m remembering this wrong
The lyrics made her think Des would love a cup of tea when he came down, but it still wasn’t safe to light the stove. So Penny rummaged through the cupboard and came up with a dusty bottle of brandy that had enough left to do the trick. Then she proceeded to unwind the cloth binding Charlie to her. Leaving the life vest on, she lay him in his crib. His arms and legs flailed with joy at being free. Spit bubbles gathered at his mouth as the corners turned up in a sleepy smile. She smiled back her son and finished the song.
When I said ‘I loved you’ it wasn’t a lie,
Only words were far from enough.
I watched you then, and I watched you now
Was it really just for seven days?
As her private concert for Charlie concluded, boots splashed down the galley steps, followed by an equally wet husband. “So that’s what scared the storm away, your singing.”
“You could hear me?”
“Like a banshee,” he grinned, but it took some effort. He was exhausted.
Penny took him in her arms, letting out a sigh of relief. “Thank God that’s over. We need to find a winter port as soon as possible. I’m not going through that again. Ugh, you’re soaking. Go change now.”
“I gotta go up again to check the lines. I just wanted to check on you and Charlie.” Desmond passed by the crib and stroked the slumbering baby’s cheek.
“I’ll go, you stay here and rest.”
“No, it will just take a minute.” He turned and headed back up the steps. “Was that Geronimo Jackson?”
“What?” Penny’s brow furrowed. “Who?”
“The song, Shipwrecked in the Garden of Eden. The record was in the hatch.”
At the mention of the hatch, her husband’s complexion turned an unsightly pallor. Penny swallowed. “I have no idea, I’ve only ever heard my father sing it to me, when I was little, if you can believe that.”
“Well…” Desmond looked lost for a moment, then the past disappeared from his face. “It’s a sweet song, even coming from you.”
Penny pretended to look offended. “Go on, or I’ll start up again. Seven Days in the Garden of Eden, How would you spend your time?”
“I’m going! I’m going!”
x x x
June 1977
Geronimo’s Appleseed Talks Psychedelic Physics, Melody Maker, vol. 6, no. 1
A lab rat navigates a labyrinthine, not in search of an elusive piece of cheese, but the answers to the meaning of life. Sounds like Geronimo Jackson’s hit song Eloise, however it’s also the day job of Johnny Appleseed, the band’s twitchy ivory tickler. While working as a research assistant at the University of Michigan’s Physics Department last year, Appleseed would unwind after a long day under the hood of quantum mechanics by playing piano at the local pub Loose Lucy’s. It was there Appleseed, otherwise known as Dan Smith, met the up and coming Detroit based folk-rock group, Geronimo Jackson. Appleseed was brought on board to give the band a more classic sound and ended up contributing song writing and vocal support on the band’s popular album, Magna Carta.
According to Appleseed, who still moonlights with Einstein wannabes when the band is not on the road, music and mathematics are not all that different. In fact, Appleseed claims musical theory led to a recent breakthrough in his research. “Music is a language, just like English or Latin or Korean. Math is a language too, and I find by applying my knowledge of pitch, tone, melody, and rhythm to numbers, I can translate equations thought to be unknowable.”
For example, Appleseed explained, pushing a stray lock of hair from his serious brow, “You can play the same song over and over by following the notes on the page. But it only takes a slight adjustment in pressure to make a note flat or sharp or more dramatically, strike an entirely new key. Once you’ve done that, you’ve altered what is constant with a variable. Now it’s out there and changed forever. You can’t take it back, and you might not ever play the same variation twice.”
When asked if math is his only inspiration for composing, Appleseed dodged my attempt at getting more personal by stating, “I write what I know.” So sorry ladies, there was no insight into what heartbreak might lurk behind his melancholy ballads and distant eyes.
Although rumours circulate about the band’s eminent break-up, Appleseed wouldn’t confirm anything. He did speak of catching a sub - was that some scientist lingo for taking a break? To conclude our conversation, he offered this cryptic remark about the band’s future, “Here’s hoping thirty years from now, it will be like we never existed.” In the meantime, here’s hoping Appleseed keeps cranking out trippy tunes like Dharma Lady, Shipwrecked in the Garden of Eden, A Man named Dude and Can you hear them Pushing Daisies?
x x x