Title: Notches
Author: Amanda, otherwise known as Sunshine Antiquity
Spoilers: Entire first season, but only for passing references to different events in the first forty days.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these worlds; I just manipulate them into doing my bidding.
Summary: Jack remembers as the past and present collides; written for a contest on Lost-Forum.
"You fed my daughter bugs!" Jack leaned back against the tree, the knife falling gently from his hand onto the soft mud below. He smiled softly as he heard Kate yell at someone down at the beach. Probably Hurley, he thought. Hurley had a way of trying to help with the brood of young children that always resulted in disaster.
Jack looked over thoughtfully at the few trees surrounding him, three marked with five hundred little notches apiece and the one he was leaning had just added its sixty-fourth notch. Each mark represented a day on the island, the survivor's one piece of civilization that they held onto – a calendar.
They had started the calendar 41 days after being stranded here, just two days after the raft had departed. It had been started at first to show to the swarm of media that would no doubt show up after Michael, Jin, Sawyer and Walt got back to any inhabited land to declare their survival. There was no swarm of media and there had been no more Michael, Jin, Sawyer, or Walt. Now they kept it as their calendar and as a running tribute to their four fellow friends.
The camp hadn't been without their share of deaths as well. Once numbering forty-seven adults and one kid, they had dwindled to twenty-nine adults with seven kids although none were the original kid. The few material objects that had been scattered throughout the camp after the crash were rare. Most clothing, to use the term loosely, consisted of boar skin and leaves, if it was bothered to be worn at all. The water bottles were the only item remaining in any huge quantities, proving all scientists right for the last time that plastic really didn't disintegrate.
A loud crash startled Jack out of his musings, his almost three-year-old daughter Christina stumbled through to where he was, colliding into his body. Her mother, Kate, had followed her closely. Kate stopped short, glad to see her daughter had finally stopped moving, "Spit it out."
Christina shook her head no, her mouth tightly closed as she burrowed her face into Jack's shoulder. Jack tried to prod at her mouth, but she shook her head too violently for him to succeed. He looked quizzically up at Kate, "Was it Hurley?"
"No. Aaron. I swear that boy is becoming a menace to Christina. I turned around for one second and he started taunting her with it. Next thing I know she has a bug in her mouth and running off for dear life."
A grin spread across his face, "He's only four, honey." He turned to his daughter, who had finally stopped squirming in his arms, "If you spit it out right now, you'll get an extra piece of guava for dinner, how's that?"
Christina nodded happily, spitting the bug onto his boarskin shirt with a delighted laugh. It was only a beetle, but it was still half chewed. He grimaced slightly as it was Kate's turn to smile. "Oh Jack," she giggled, "It was just one of those days."