Title: Feel
Original post date: 12th April 2006
Spoilers: up to 2x12, Fire + Water
Summary: When Locke hit him he didn't feel it – he'd already gone numb. Charlie POV during the final scenes in Fire and Water.
Disclaimer: Lost isn't mine. And I can't be bothered writing a cool disclaimer anyways.
Dedication: To Joey/Blackcatinbree - without whom this fic probably wouldn't exist. Thanks so much for sending me your Lost tapes!
'You're hurting me Charlie.'
It felt like I'd been punched in the gut. Like she'd hit me again – only this time her hands had closed in around my heart, squeezed it with cold fingers, leaving me gasping.
And then I began to go numb. I suppose I was…shell-shocked? Is that the word? I was terrified with myself – what I'd done.
What I'd almost done.
She would never forgive me now. How could she? Why would she? I didn't even protest as Locke took Aaron from my arms. I didn't even move – I couldn't move until Claire began to back away, to walk away from me…
Her eyes spoke volumes. Betrayed, betrayed, betrayed… I hadn't just lied to her – I had betrayed her.
My mind began to go around and over and under and around again, frantically searching for something…something…
'Claire…' she kept walking and I panicked. I panicked. 'I'm sorry, Claire…' I tried to dodge around Locke, not thinking. Stupid Charlie – you should have thought it through.
The first blow hurt the most. The second one made me fall. The third one I didn't feel at all. Suddenly I was just another piece of flotsam in the surf. After everyone had gone I somehow managed to pick myself up and I staggered, dripping, down the beach and collapsed onto the sand.
I remember trembling – not shaking but trembling for hours until the sun came up – even though I couldn't feel the cold. The blood on my cheek went sticky and then dried into a hard crust. By the time Jack came, the sun had risen fully. I didn't even say anything, just turned my cheek towards him. I figured he wasn't there to pat me on the shoulder and offer me the usual, empty condolences – he was there to fix me up. It was his duty as a doctor – he wasn't doing it because he really wanted to.
I found myself wincing and groaning a little as Jack stitched my face up, but it wasn't because I could really feel the needle – because I couldn't. I was doing it for Jack's benefit – so that he didn't stay, so that he'd think I was still responding to the world when really…
The day passed slowly and nobody came up to me. The salt in my clothes stiffened them and I became a forlorn beach statue, staring unseeingly out at the ocean. It reminded me of the endless time I wasted after Claire went missing. It was the same blank, buzzing numbness only this time it wasn't the choking burn of rope around my neck that kept bringing me back to reality – it was the sting of the cut on my cheek.
Towards the end of the day Jack came to see me again. I was still sitting in the same place – my face burnt to all hell from sitting in the sun all day.
'You haven't moved all day Charlie,'
'Is that a question Jack?'
He sighed then and went back to the good old stand by – he asked me how I was feeling.
I paused before answering, wondering how he'd take my answer…
'I'm not feeling anything, Jack.'
His eyes widened with concern as I turned my face back to the sea and settled myself down a little bit more comfortably, sighing quietly.
'Not yet anyways.'