Title: Darkness Be My Friend
Original Post Date: 09/08/2007
Word Count: 1507
Summary: Claire knew what drowning felt like.
Disclaimer: The title of this fic is stolen from one of the books in the "Tomorrow When The War Began" series by the incomparable John Marsden and the characters etc. within the fic are stolen from JJ, Damon and the rest of the Lost crew.
Authors Note: written for my 50darkfics claim under the prompt of "darkness"
Cold, cold water
Surrounds me now
And all I've got is your hand
Lord can you hear me now...
Lord can you hear me now...
Lord can you hear me now......
Or am I lost?
"Cold Water" by Damien Rice
Claire knew what drowning felt like. She had nearly drowned once before herself, panicking, flailing in the water as the rip tide dragged her down. And then the most surprising thing had happened – her panic had turned to calm, the blue waters to darkness and she began to float away…
And then Desmond was over her, breathing into her, bringing her back to life again.
It had been her first near death experience and it had shaken her to her very bones. She'd been sick and headachy for the rest of the day and had been secretly relieved when Charlie had disappeared that night. Spending the night alone was terrifying but it allowed her to go over and over the drowning in her mind, reliving the terror of being unable to reach the surface until she thought that she had numbed herself to the fear. When she finally slept however, she dreamt of roiling, turbulent waters and she awoke gasping for air.
She never mentioned it to Charlie directly but when he asked her if she was going to go for a swim several days later, she all but had a full on panic attack and he had to calm her down enough to stop her from hyperventilating. Once she had calmed down enough, in an effort to make her feel better, he told her what he remembered of their ordeal with Ethan, the way it had felt when he had been strung up, when he had been dying…
Claire secretly thought that of the two of them, she'd had the more peaceful near-death experience – but she didn't dare tell him that. The experience had obviously affected him quite badly – he admitted that he couldn't even reach up and put his hands to his neck anymore without being overcome by shivers. The two of them sat together for a long time in a bleak, reflective silence, hand in hand, before either felt the need to move.
When she discovered the way he had died in The Looking Glass, she had been more than a little shocked. He'd told her that he was a good swimmer – how on earth could he have drowned? But of course being a strong swimmer was no indication of whether or not someone would, could die of drowning. Claire still remembered the day, so soon after the crash, when Joanna, a seasoned diver, had drowned just going for an early morning swim. She shivered, remembering her own morning swim that had taken a deadly turn for the worst. By all accounts she also could be, should be dead.
She couldn't bear being near water for a long time. Even the water collector where she filled her drink bottles made tears spring to her eyes. As the air glugged out of the plastic container she would imagine Charlie, not peaceful and calm as Desmond had described but flailing, panicking, trying to get out of the room within which he would forever be entombed…
And even if she managed to avoid bodies of water in her waking hours, her dreams were spasmodically interrupted with the repeated motif of it, seeping into the edges of her subconscious, rushing to knock her off her feet, the ocean's sinuous whispering giving her chills.
One morning, waking from a dream of treading water in a tank that was filling rapidly, Claire clambered out of her tent and all but ran down to the beach. Her freestyle had always been strong and she plunged into the water without even a thought, her long hair fanning out behind her as she pulled strongly with her arms and kicked out with her legs.
Once she got out far enough that she couldn't reach the bottom (which admittedly, wasn't all that far), Clair trod water for a moment, gazing back at the beach camp. She was still half asleep, within her dream and she felt oddly calm as she drew her arms and legs in and sank beneath the waves like a human stone.
Somewhere far above her, the sky was a deep, early morning blue but down here the world was a mixture of grey-green-blue and long tendrils of her own golden hair. She did a slow pirouette, turning her body away from the shore, and let herself float, suspended in the water as the slipstream of the waves gently buffeted her back and forth.
The pressure was already beginning to build on her ears, her face. She let out a small amount of breath to ease the pressure and took in a half-mouthful of water for her troubles. She ignored her instincts, screaming at her to begin kicking for the surface, to save herself. Just a little longer…
And now her body began to truly panic – the lack of oxygen more apparent than ever. Claire let out the final gasp of air she'd been holding and watched, fascinated, as a large silvery air bubble escaped her and headed towards the surface. Almost…
The pressure was unbelievable, her eyes were screwed up in pain, but then finally the edge of her vision began to darken and if she'd had any air left in her lungs, Claire would have breathed a sigh of relief.
The feeling was familiar – the pressure, the pain, the blackness pressing in from all sides as she opened her mouth and let the water in. She choked on it a little as it rushed into her stomach and began to strangle her lungs with its smothering mass.
And then, there it suddenly was – the intense feeling of calm. The sense that everything was going to be okay, that nothing really mattered after all. Not Jack or Desmond or Sun or any of the others, not Charlie or even Aaron… Aaron.
And with that one thought, Claire kicked out, pure instinct, and her head broke the surface. Coughing and gagging on seawater, her eyes streaming with tears, Claire pushed herself towards the shore with weak arms. When she could stand, she pressed her feet into the shifting sands and began to tread heavily out of the water and towards dry land. The waves were still at her hips when Jack came running up, Aaron in his arms, looking terrified.
"Claire!" he called out, running into the water until he was knee deep. Claire met him, shivering wildly as he put an arm around her shoulders and led her back onto solid ground. "What the hell were you doing out there? Why did you leave Aaron?"
"I had to remember how it felt," Claire rasped through the salt in her throat, tears still burning painfully in her eyes as she dripped steadily onto the sand. "I had to know how it felt for Charlie. When he..."
"You could have drowned too!" Jack scolded but Claire knew that he wasn't really angry at her – he was just worried. Everyone seemed to be worried about her nowadays. "Dammit Claire! What would we have done if you'd drowned? What would have happened to Aaron? Did you even think?"
"I had to remember how it felt," she repeated stubbornly, crying in earnest now, her sobs choking her as much as the bile in her throat. "How was I supposed to do that without going in the water?"
Jack stared at her disbelievingly for a moment and then did something Claire hadn't been expecting, and folded her into his arms.
"I'm worried about you," he said forcefully. "Charlie meant a lot to you and its understandable that you'd be upset…but I just…I don't want to lose anyone else okay?"
"Drowning doesn't actually hurt," Claire murmured against Jack's shoulder, completely ignoring what he had just said. "At least not after you let go. Then it's all just soft and calm and you drift off into the darkness…"
Jack pulled back and looked at her worriedly. Claire gazed back at him quite steadily.
"Claire," he said uncertainly. "You're scaring me. I need you to promise me that you won't ever do anything like that ever again okay?"
"I won't." Claire shook her head, shivering suddenly. "Not even to try and understand – to remember him. The darkness is sort of…comforting somehow but it also scares the hell out of me."
There was a long silence and Claire reached out a sodden hand to caress Aaron's face.
"Well…Charlie's end might have been in darkness but wherever he is now I'm certain that he's back in the light again." Jack offered finally, quietly.
"You mean like heaven?" she questioned, taking Aaron carefully into her arms. He stirred slightly as he was transferred from the warmth of Jack's arms to the damp but more familiar angles of Claire's elbows and forearms.
Jack smiled ruefully, his arms awkward at his sides. "I never really believed in heaven but if there is such a place, I'm sure he's there." He touched her lightly on the shoulder and steered her back towards her tent. "Come on," he added quietly. "You'd better get into some dry clothes before you get sick."