Rose Garden
Something in her kitchen has a buildt in radio, and she's not sure what it is yet. All she knows is that it's a quarter past midnight, and somewhere near the fridge, Lynn Anderson is singing to her.
I beg your pardon
I never promised you a rose garden
The vodka burns in her throat. She usually never drinks. Not like this. Not alone in a kitchen after midnight. Lynn Anderson her only company.
Along with the sunshine,
There's gotta be a little rain sometimes
Aparantly, and this is one of those things she just knows, that song, that Lynn Anderson song? Is the most sold song ever to be made. Or was it maybe the most played song ever to be made. It's been listened to a lot, in any case. She stops in her thoughts for a moment, and tries to remember where she has that information from. It's a bit obscure to be her. She was never the kinda girl who kept track of odd facts. She used to need everything she knew. Quickest way out of Newark airport? She knew it. Easiest gun to hide in a purse? She knew it. The most sold song ever to be made? She wouldn't have thought she knew it.
When you take, you gotta give, so live and let live
Or let go
The metal is cold and clammy underneath her bare thighs. Her heals touch the second kitchen drawer. Counted from the bottom. Between her thighs sits the tumbler glass with vodka, she has her left hand around it, twisting it in a half circle. Slowly. No ice. If her son comes in, she can always just claim it's water. It's somewhat ironic to her, that she never really felt like drinking alone in the middle of the night until she, according to all normal standards of decency, really shouldn't. When she was young and free and on the lam, for god's sake, she never felt like drinking alone at night. Now, she's gambling on Aaron not waking up, and if he does, that he'll think it's only water. He is Claire's kid after all. And Claire? No offence to Claire or anything, but she was maybe not the smartest thing they had on that island.
I beg your pardon
I never promised you a rose garden
She cannot for the life of her figure out who turned the radio on. She doesn't know where it is, and she has a sneaky suspicion that Jack doesn't either. It must be the maid. The maid is called Lupe, is fifty-seven and heavy set, and the only time Kate had talked to her, was to get her to quit playing with Aaron. You're here to clean. Not to play.
The glass is starting to warm up from the heat of her hands, and she downs the rest of the vodka before it gets to disgusting to even contemplate. She can feel it in her head, but not in her heart.
I could promise you things like big diamond rings,
But you don't find roses growin' on stalks of clover.
The taste of vodka lingers in her mouth, and makes her feel better, somehow. She's at least not enjoying this. Jack has gone to bed, all strechy. He streches before he gets into bed, and she has no idea why it repulses her. That's not an overstatement. It repulses her. It actually repulses her. And yes, yes, yes, she knows very well that a relationship is giving and taking and making compromises and live and let live, to quote Lynn Anderson, and she should be able to just ignore that little quirk. She doesn't get it. He's not going running, he's going to bed. There can't be a need for excessive streching before you go to bed. And he smells of alcohol. Sometimes in the beginning, and often now, he smells like alcohol when they get into bed. And he turns in his sleep and he makes sleeping noises and he brushes her hip or thigh or elbow with his, and he smells of alcohol, and finally, she'd just bolted up, like Claire that time with the nightmare, on the island, and no, she hadn't watch Claire sleep, but Charlie had, and he had told her about it, she'd bolted up and just realized she could not lay there next to him anymore, and she had gone downstairs to get a drink. At least that had become increasingly easy to find in this house.
So you better think it over
Well, if sweet-talkin' you could make it come true
She's not able to make sense of that last sentence. Maybe that's not what Lynn had sung. It doesn't even sound like a sentence. She pours some more vodka.
I would give you the world right now on a silver platter
But would it matter?
Oh Lynn, that stung a bit. You bitch. If you'd been given the choice, what would you have done, Lynn? It wasn't even a chioce given. Somewhere, somehow, she got a child and a house and a kitchen with an invicible radio, and a very successful doctor-fiancee, and expensive products for her hair, and sitting here now, her vision cleared by vodka, shut up, Lynn, you know it works that way sometimes too, she has no idea how all this came to be. Yes, it's on a silver platter, and no, it doesn't matter, and how did she go from that Australian farmers kitchen to this? Australians. Australians. Everywhere Australians. She drinks again.
So smile for a while and lets be jolly
Love shouldn't be so melancholy
Come along and share the good times while we can
She doesn't know what he would say if he saw her now. Sawyer. She knows what Jack would say. Jack would have looked at her and let her now he was dissapointed in her, and the funny thing? He would have managed to do that while pouring himself a drink. It's almost like a talent, she thinks, the floor keeps moving towards her and away from her. Like a little swing. And in the morning, she'll wake up to an empty bed and an aching head, and she'll hear Lupe playing with Aaron, and he laughs, and didn't I tell you to not do that? And Aaron will look at her with those big, blue eyes, and again, no offence, but those were maybe not Claire's most flattering feature, and he will ask her why Lupe can't play, and in that moment, she will have become someone she's only seen on television before.
I beg your pardon
I never promised you a rose garden
Sometimes, she swears Aaron has a hint of an Australian accent.
Along with the sunshine
There's gotta be a little rain sometimes
It's complete nonsense of course. She knows he can't possibly have one. He barely speaks yet. It's simply impossible.
I could sing you a tune or promise you the moon
But if that's what it takes to hold you
I'd just as soon let you go
Damned Australians. You know who liked Claire? Well, everybody, but more specifically talking? Sawyer. She drinks again. Not liked-liked, not in that way, but still. She wonderes what he'd say if he saw her now. All made up and nowhere to go. She really has nowhere to go. She goes to the park. She goes back from the park. She returns to the park. Damned park. Claire would probably have loved the park. In the beginning, when Aaron cried, she would look at him and think: I don't know what you want. I don't know you at all. Aaron cried a lot in the beginning. He missed his mother, probably. And instead of his mother, instead of his sweet, laughing, Australian little mother, he got stuck with her. And she didn't know what to do with him. I've fed you. I've changed you. Stop crying!
But there's one thing I want you to know
You better look before you leap, still waters run deep
She has tried this before. This whole nice house, nice man nice life thing. She's been there. She's gone down the aisle to marry a police officer. So it goes like this: One. Police officer. Two. Respected doctor. If she ever meets a friendly fireman, she'll run in the other direction. No, you won't, she thinks. You can't run anywhere, can you. She drinks.
And there won't alway be someone there to pull you out,
And you know what I'm talking about
He would have called her freckles. Sawyer. And he would have said something that made her scoff, but she would secretly find it hilarious. Something about Jack, probably. Or maybe about her drinking. He would have asked if he could get some vodka. And she knows how her face would have felt, all smiles. And then they would have gotten a bit drunk, and they wouldn't have bothered finding a bed, and afterwards, he would make a joke about her kitchen.
So smile for a while and let's be jolly
Love shouldn't be so melancholy
Come along and share the good times while we can
She drnks