Boone always accused me of needing something to hold on to. That's why, he snapped once, you go through boyfriends like wildfire.

I mean, if he knew that I'd been scamming him before he said that, then maybe his tune would have changed. But I guess that doesn't matter much anymore, right? To be honest with myself, he wasn't too far off the mark. It's a really great sensation, the feeling of being validated in someone else's eyes. It's a sensation I almost never felt on this shitty little island.

When Walt gave me the dog to hang on to, I kind of took it as an insult at first. Shades of what Boone told me long ago cropped up in my mind. Look, look at Shannon! Too weak to cope by herself. Give her this, help her with that, make sure Shannon can manage. After the initial sting, though, I figured that there wasn't much room for deception or backhandedness in the heart of a ten-year-old boy. He couldn't take his dog with him – simple as that – and just wanted someone to leave it with. I wonder if Vincent realized that he was just a liability too? Yeah, it kind of sucks, dog.

I guess Walt missed the dog, because he came back to visit in the oddest of ways. Dripping wet, mumbling things I couldn't understand. What could he have been saying? "Hey, are you taking good care of Vincent? I trusted you with him. Don't let me down." Of course, when you're being plagued by visions of a drenched boy who left on a boat a week ago, there's not much time to strike up friendly conversation. At the same time, I guess there's a strange sort of irony in that the one person who trusted me would be the same one who led me to my death.

…That's not really a fair thing to say. Sayid trusted me, at least in the end. I don't think I would trust me either what with the things I was saying. (Still, there's a slight indignity in that he really only believed me once he'd seen mysterious ghostly dripping Walt.) And hell – he trusted me enough to be with me. And there was a lot of strain, because it seemed like we rarely agreed on what needed to be done. But something was a little different about him. He wasn't the same person as all of my sleazy ex-boyfriends were. He wasn't someone I needed…he was someone I wanted to be with.

Still, Boone didn't really understand that. Go figure. I could tell how replaced he felt by Sayid; anyone with half a mind to could read Boone like a book. Maybe it's just all the time I've spent with him through the years, but everything he does has a clear intention. In approaching Sayid, it was obviously to protect me from myself. Always protecting me, looking over me…all this watching was a little creepy, in a sense. Almost obsessive. I can't say I really blame him, what with what happened. But that would never have worked. He should have known as much.

Maybe…maybe, just like I "needed something to hold on to", he needed someone to look over. Something to reaffirm himself. Hey, we were a lot more alike than I'd thought.

I guess there will be time to think about that in Heaven, or Hell, or wherever I'm going to be in about thirty seconds.

You know, if you had told me any other day that I was going to be shot to death in the middle of an island jungle by a woman I didn't know chasing after some sort of apparition, I would have laughed in your face. After the plane touched down, though, everything became fair game. I'd like to think that I'm handling this a little more maturely than I would have a month and a half ago. Sure, I kind of wonder why this is happening to me, and why life treated me so crappy, but now it doesn't really seem to make much of a difference.

I'm a little sad that I never got to fulfill any of my dreams, but that's okay. Whenever life gave me something to look forward to, it always seemed to yank it away, cruel and taunting. A happy home, my father's will, the dance internship. Time after time. And it's happening again – but once I'd started to look forward to life, that was yanked away too. Life on this island. Off this island, if I was lucky enough. With Sayid, hopefully.

I hope the dog's okay.

I hope Walt isn't hurt.

I hope Sayid doesn't stay torn up over this for too long. I'll miss him so much. It seems pointless to whine about losing him, because now I can make sure from above that this shitty little island doesn't eat him alive, but I know it's going to hurt.

Now I have something to protect. I understand a little how Boone felt. To protect someone is to love them. That's a gift from the angels.

Nothing really seems to make much sense, right now. That's okay, though. Sayid's here now. I can hold on to him. Boone was more right than I could have guessed.

Thank you for trusting me, but I have to break that now.