TITLE: Promises

AUTHOR: Kristen Kilar chickadeefrom3(at)yahoo(dot)com

RATING: PG-13. Angst. A bit of language.

DISCLAIMER: Sure, they're mine. That's why I waste my time writing fanfic instead of, you know, actually working with the show and telling Dom Monaghan that his contract requires giving me daily full-body massages. Yeah, right. goes off to cry

ARCHIVE: Just ask, I'd love to give permission.

SUMMARY: Charlie thinks about recent events.

SPOILERS: Up through "All The Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues". Mostly for "Cowboys", "Raised by Another", and references to "The Moth".

PAIRINGS: Charlie/Claire. Who else?

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Wow, even when I leave the Andromeda fandom I still write angsty introspections. Plot, someday, I swear, just not today. Not a one-shot! Part two coming soon, and that'll be it.

My first LOST fanfic! Yay! You know, I always said that I would never have an OTP. Nothing against people who have OTPs—you guys are great, I admire you, I just never thought I had the patience to 'ship one couple that devotedly. Then LOST came along and made a liar of me. Charlie and Claire are so destined for each other! Peanut Butter shall rule the world!

Dedicated to Myna, a.k.a. niki blue, a.k.a. rah rah replica, a.k.a. whatever other aliases she's picked up recently, for being my beloved beta and my best friend. Love ya, girl, and I knew Charlie/Claire would get its claws into you… Go read and review her FANTASTIC story, "WhenYou Mentioned Blue".

Also dedicated to the LOST faction on ExIsle, the Charlie/Claire fan club on lost-boards(dot)net, and every other Charlie/Claire shipper in existence. You guys rock hard.

And finally dedicated to the creepiest, scariest TV moment ever. If you've seen "All The Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues", you know what I'm talking about. How many were ready to kill JJ Abrams?

Everything I know about DriveSHAFT I learned from the greatest fansite of its kind, DriveSHAFT: Second Tour of Finland at www(dot)driveshaftband(dot)com .

Please please please review?


He sits there, huddled under a blanket and staring with unseeing eyes into the fire, and thinks.

He left her.

Bloody hell, he left her.

Why does he always have to break his promises?

He's pretty sure he didn't leave her by choice, because he's almost certain that he wouldn't. No, he thinks it's far more likely that he was forced into it. That Ethan separated them.

Or maybe Ethan didn't. Maybe she was right there, staring with horrified blue eyes and sobbing and begging please, no, please, please, oh God, no, as Ethan blindfolded him and tied the vines around his neck and hefted him off the ground and she screamed

He shakes his head to try to rid himself of the image.

He doesn't know for sure what happened.

He doesn't know for sure if she was there.

He feels cold.

All he knows is what Jack and Kate told him.

Jack heard her scream.

Kate didn't.

His own memories are a mess—blurry, out of focus, jumbled, hard to find—and trying to set them in order gives him a headache, but he tries anyway.

She went into labor, only she didn't.

Ethan didn't go get Jack.

Ethan had a knife and told them to go.

Her hand in his, and he promised he wouldn't leave her.

And then nothing makes sense.

There were others, weren't there? Besides Ethan? That's why he'd said they to Jack. Only not. Ethan had to have been alone, because he can't remember any other faces, just Ethan's, and who would've helped Ethan kidnap them anyway?

How far had Ethan made them walk? In silence, because Ethan had flipped out anytime either of them had uttered a syllable. He isn't sure how far they walked, only that it felt like forever and they were both terrified.

He's sure Ethan made them walk in silence, and yet he remembers whispering reassurances in her ear.

There's only one piece of tape, now grimy and torn, left on his hand, the letter E. He remembers dropping the letter L in an attempt to leave a trail. He remembers that Ethan caught him when he dropped A. Then what happened to T? He doesn't remember.

Nothing makes sense, and his dark tangle of memories scares him, and all he knows is he left her, and he's so cold, and his neck and ribs ache, and he can't erase her terrified image from his eyes, and her terrified voice echoes in his ears.

Jack promises him that they'll find her. Kate tells him that Locke and Boone are still out looking, and that they'll send another search party in the morning.

He doesn't answer either of them. He just stares at the fire, and thinks.

In a classically brilliant move, he'd told her about his drug problems while she was having contractions. Genius!

But when she looked at him, there was no judgment in her eyes. No hate, no fear, no disgust, no anger, no pity.

Instead there was pain as another contraction wracked her body. There was begging as she pleaded with him to get Jack. There was trust and need and, he fancies, maybe even love.

That, he remembers with crystal clarity.

She was depending on him. On him!

I won't leave you. I promise.

So much for promises, he thinks, and remembers that he's never had the best of luck with keeping his promises.

He had promised himself he would quit the band in order to stand by his morals. He didn't. He had promised himself he would live a good Catholic life even while he was touring with the band. He didn't. He had promised Liam that he would make them walk away if it ever got to be too much. They didn't. He had promised himself—he had promised everyone—that it was about the music. It wasn't.

He had promised his parents he would get help for his budding drug problem and go back to the Church. He had promised himself that this was his last hit, after this he was going clean. He had promised Liam he would keep in touch. He had promised Pat and Sinjin that he would put the band back together. He had promised God that he would do everything right if he just survived this plane crash.

He'd failed at it all.

And now he's failed her too. He promised to stay by her side and instead…he left her.

His neck hurts from the hanging. His ribs hurt from Jack's resuscitation. He can't keep his thoughts straight. He's so cold, despite the blanket and the fire and the hot water someone gives him.

None of that matters.

All of that will heal.

What matters is that he broke his promise to her.

In the morning, he vows, he will join the search party, no matter what Jack says, but he knows even that won't fix it.

He left her.

Like Thomas did.

Thomas, who he will gladly kill if he ever gets the chance.

Thomas and Ethan, he'll kill them both, to his addled mind they're interchangeable. Thomas, in Australia, who broke her heart and was too blind to see what the bloody git was leaving behind. Ethan, on the island, who took her away and frightened her and killed him so now he can't remember what happened. They might as well be the same person to him.

Everything's all mixed up in his head.

Jack tells Kate (when they think he isn't listening, but he hears everything) that it's probably an aftereffect of the oxygen deprivation.

He doesn't care, and happily imagines various bloody ends for both Thomas and Ethan.

That won't fix this either, though.

Nothing can fix the fact that he broke his promise to her.

Bless me, Father, he says silently, still staring at the fire, for I have sinned.

But he'll find her, he tells himself. He'll find her and she'll be safe, her and her baby both, and he'll keep them safe, and he'll never leave her again.

And that's a promise.

FIN