Jate angst/tragedy. Tissue warning.
She won't let her eyes leave mine. I want to close them more than anything, to block out what is happening. I know they are going to kill her. I heard them talking. I can't fight, I can feel the barrel of the gun in the side of my head. I want to close them so much, and pretend for a while that I'm not here, not watching her last moments. But I can't do that to her. I won't let Kate die alone.
That's ironic. Live together, die alone, that's what I've spent the last months telling everyone. But it's not true. Here I am, with the one woman I care about more than anything in the world, and we're still going to die. We're dying together, but that doesn't make it any better.
Her eyes are filling with tears, but she keeps blinking so that I can't see she is crying. It's like she's trying to punish herself for aomething, but I can't understand what. Surely she can't think that it is her fault we are here. We got ambushed, when I was running after her into the jungle, that's all. She can't blame herself.
I want more than anything to be free of these chains and this gag so I can at least try to comfort her. I want to tell her that it is going to be all right, and that I forgive her. I know Juliet told her that she broke my heart. She did, but that doesn't change anything. I still don't want this. I don't want her to die. I've forgiven her already. I forgave her the moment I heard her voice on the end of the walkie talkie, the fear obvious to everyone.
"We're going to kill your little girlfriend now." One of them is saying. I hope to God she can't hear. I don't want her to know she is dying until she dies. I don't want her to feel pain. She looks me in the eye, and she doesn't waver for one second. I am, in my mind, thrown back to the day when we were captured and I held her gaze in mine forever and I prayed. Then they click the catch off the gun.
They lift the gun from her head, and for one blissful moment I think they've had a change of plan. I wouldn't care if they were killing me instead. But then they place it on her forehead and I know that it is almost over. They rip the gag from her mouth and her eyes fill with tears, which she angrily blinks away. She looks like she is about to say something.
"I lo"
There is a shot. I blink, and it is done. I see the sparkle float out of her eyes. She slumps to the floor, across my lap. I can't breathe... I can't breathe.
When I wake up, I am laid in the jungle. I am alive. I roll over and I see her lifeless form next to me, a tiny hole in her forehead, matching where the gun was placed. My handcuffs are gone, but hers aren't. I lift her in my arms and cling to her, but there is no sign of life. I clasp her to my chest, crying and my heart is breaking. I never knew I could feel so hard.
When I have gathered my own strength, I look down at her face. Her lips are slightly parted, still uttering the words she died saying. 'I lo...' I don't know what she was trying to tell me. And I never will. I put one hand on her cold, pale cheek. The curve of her face fits perfectly in the palm of my hand, though I have never felt that before. Her glassy eyes stare up at me, as if still trying to tell me something. My heart slows and I bend my head and silently kiss her lips, now tinged with blue.
And then I lift her, and I carry her back to camp. My tears have stopped. I don't know why they spared me, but I know that I will have no kind of life ever again. I know that she made my world spin, and the sun rise and set. People rush over to me as I walk in, but recoil in horror as they see Kate. My Kate. I say something to them, trying to explain. They nod, like they understand. How can they ever understand what it is to see the light go out in the eyes of the woman you love?
Sawyer walks towards me. The man she loved, who didn't deserve her. The man she chose. He goes deathly pale when he sees her but he does not cry. He puts his palm over her open eyes and when he removes it her eyes are closed. The beautiful emerald eyes, out of my miserable existence for ever.
I lay her down and cover her with a blanket. Maybe tomorrow I will bury her. Maybe next week I will eat again. Maybe in a while I will begin to forget what her smile looks like, and what she tastes of. Maybe someday I will learn to move on. But not today. Today I will sit with her, because even if she couldn't love me back, she was the woman I loved and I'm not ready to let her go - not just yet.