Disclaimer: Don't own Lost, if I did I would have had three hours of Lost last night and started the next season next week.
A/N: GirlClaire, BoyCharlie, BabyTurnip Head. I don't really know what the heck I was trying to do with this, it just sorta happened...
Spoilers: Up to The Greater Good
Imperfections
In another life, it would have been simple.
Boy meets Girl on beach, they become friends, and they fall in love.
In this life, it's a bit more complicated.
More to the tune of: Boy and Girl get on a plane as strangers; survive a crash and the trials of life on a deserted island with all the makings of a nighttime drama since Girl happens to be eight months pregnant and Boy is a has been rock god with a drug problem. Oh, there's polar bears.
In another life, Thomas, the father of Girl's baby, would have come home to the sight of her hanging curtains in their apartment and taken in the sight of her glowing with life, her stomach just beginning to grow, and decided he wanted to spend the rest of his lowly life with her. He would have dropped on one knee and proposed to her then, as impromptu as the artist he was suppose to be.
In this life, he came home and decided he couldn't handle it, decided that having a baby was not going to be the best thing ever and walked out, leaving Girl to deal with everything alone.
In another life Boy would have quit using. He would have realized the errors of his ways and gone to rehab. He would have found himself standing in Lucy's house, staring at that silver trinket and realized it wasn't worth it; she was more than heroin ever could be, and he would have told her. He would have been respectable and clean. He would have taken care of her.
In this life Boy grabs the lighter and gets sick all over himself after a weekend without his 'best friend'. Lucy discovers him for all he really is, for all he wishes he weren't. And she curses him for it.
In another life she never would have gotten pregnant, she would have been smarter than that, insisted that Thomas protect his own arsenal. Then she would have left him, realizing she could do better than a down on his luck painter who simply lacked something.
In this life all it takes are two pink lines to set her fate in motion.
In another life, Boy would have ignored his brother. He would have walked out the minute it got out of control and gone back to his rosaries and drug free habits. He would have known that the whole thing would only lead to heart break, and that in the end Driveshaft would suffer the ultimate blow when it left the music behind.
In this life Boy is not so wise, not so sure of himself. He looks on as his brother walks away, high, drunk and horny, and picks up the little plastic baggy left behind. He forgets about the music. He's a bloody rocker and his guitar is just a means to get more little (or not so little) plastic baggies. In this life it doesn't occur to him that he's stronger than his brother.
In another life they would have met at the airport, Boy sure of himself, Girl still able to trust. They would have met eyes and known that it was meant to be on every level and loved one another quietly. They wouldn't have gotten on the plane.
She would have put curtains up in their flat and he would have thrown her a lopsided grin as she rambled on about how they made her feel. And when the baby finally came, he would have kissed her and told her he'd take care of them and slipped a ring on her finger.
They would have lived happily ever after.
In this life they talk for the first time in the wake of destruction, her back aching, the little bag burning a hole through the sole of his foot. And when Girl collapses Boy sits with her, watching her hands worry over the roundness of her stomach, her blue eyes tired. He tells her that she doesn't frighten him and she doesn't want to trust him.
Then she's better and he comes back, jittery and rambling and he makes her smile almost against her will.
Boy has that power over her and she hates it. But Girl is tired of being lonely and lets him in, if only a little.
And while he's high in the jungle, Boy envisions her, all life and warmth. He envies her and pities her and wants to keep her save from God only knows what. And when he's trapped in the darkness, he wishes he'd at least said good bye to her.
Boy makes the choice to free himself and drops the burden he's carried for far too long. And while cold sweats seize him and he retches and shakes, he thinks of Girl with her tainted innocence and tired eyes. Boy thinks he might love her and it eats him up inside. He's not strong enough to love.
When they get taken Girl latches on to him, wanting to keep him safe, but Boy is taken away and killed and she's alone again. The world burns away inside her head.
Boy is resurrected, reborn, remade, and he thinks of her in the darkness and mourns for the life lost.
She returns, her eyes a little more tired, her innocence a little more tainted. Girl is a little more broken and Boy can't help her this time. Maybe he never could.
Her head is empty and she knows no trust and she hates him just a little bit more. And when he picks up a gun and protects her in the only way he can now, thrusting his own damnation before her own and she knows, somewhere beneath the charred ruins in her mind she isn't meant to lock him out.
And when Baby comes along, Girl is remade. She is Mother now but Boy is still simply Boy, who will rock Baby to sleep while she drifts off nearby, listening to butchered lullabies and nursery rhymes. And she isn't alone.
Boy cradles Baby and knows he is strong enough to love now.
In this life little is right, nothing is perfect, but they really don't mind.