A/N: This just sorta rolled off my fingers, and I was too lazy to get a beta, so here this is. It's very angsty, and there's character death. Just a warning. Also, I'm open to any suggestions for improvement, I'll re-upload this story as many times as it takes. If you are gonna leave a bad review, MAKE SURE IT CONTAINS A SUGGESTION. If it doesn't, well, screw you. I don't know what else to say…oh yeah! To those of you who have read my now VERY AU story The New Girl, the next chapter is coming…soon. I had it typed up and smoothed over (it's kind of a rough chapter, just in terms of my writing, not the events) and it was saved on my dad's pen drive and he deleted it! So yeah…I'll get to that soon. For now, enjoy this story.
It's not real.
The gunshot wounds in her stomach. The blood stains on her shirts. Her harsh, labored, breathing.
This is his way of punishing himself, punishing himself for not trying to wake up. For not listening to Dave.
"I'm sorry I forgot the blankets," He chokes out. Libby's not really dying and he's not really apologizing. It's not really all his fault.
Her eyelids flutter open, and his heart skips a beat. Maybe he's wrong…
"Michael…" She gasps, her eyes growing wide. Michael? Why would she care about Michael?
"Shhh…Libby, it's okay, Michael made it," Jack soothes her. But the glimmer of hope fades as her harsh breathing slows…and stops. Jack closes her eyes. She's dead.
But not really.
He has to make it stop. The pain. It's not real. But then why does it feel like his heart was torn out? Why is his overweight body shaking with uncontrollable sobs? Each breath he takes, he reminds himself it's not real. He can make this stop any time he wants.
He hears Kate's anguished weeping coming from somewhere else in the hatch. That's not real either. Another figment of his insistent imagination. The part of him that wants to wake up is killing the part of him that's scared. Literally.
It's not real.
Taking a shuddery breath, he raises Libby's hand to his lips. It feels so real. But he knows better. He bites down on his bottom lip, hard, to keep from releasing an anguished wail. Too hard. He tastes the salty tang of blood in his mouth. But it's not really blood. Just like on Libby. Not real. Not, not, not, not, not real. It echoes in his head and he forces himself to believe it. It shaves the tiniest bit off of the edge of the near-unbearable pain.
He doesn't even know how long he sits there, trying to convince himself that time isn't really passing, that Libby's limp hand isn't really growing cold in his. Time doesn't even matter, when he knows that he's still back at Santa Rosa, in a coma, unconscious, dreaming, however Dave wanted to put it.
Eventually, Jack says something about prepping Libby and Ana Lucia for burial, and he is led away. Burial. Libby, buried in the cold, hard grounds of his imagination. He's not sure he even wants to go to the funeral. He wants to just wake up, and leave her buried in his thoughts. Bury the pain, bury the tears, bury the memories. None of this is happening, and he needs to get out of this nightmare before something else convinces him otherwise.
It's not real.
He steps outside the hatch. It's raining. Why is it always raining during pivotal moments?
Oh, yeah. That's how his mind works. Rain equals drama. It's not real rain, it's a mood.
He stands in the rain for a moment, letting the drops slide across his body, washing away the tears and the pain. It's not really rain. It's a sign of freedom coming. Washing away this fantasy life.
He walks slowly at first, unsure of his path, having only traveled to his destination once before. But he picks up speed, now more than ever needing to do this. The jungle is closing in on him, and he has to escape before he loses his mind. He clumsily stumbles over rocks, not caring about the pain when he falls. He weaves his way through trees, ignoring branches snagged on his clothes.
"Every rock, every tree…"
He hears a tree frog in the distance, and the noise makes him feel sick to his stomach. He forces those memories to the side, burying them with Libby.
"…Every tree frog."
He bursts out of the jungle, and stumbles across the waterlogged ground to the edge of the cliff. Winded, he sits down on a nearby rock, staring into the empty sky. Empty like his heart.
He just needed it to be over! The island, the numbers, the curse, the guilt, the pain. All these things he was making up were killing him, slowly and painfully. Just two days ago he had believed all of this was real, as he stood on this very cliff, Libby's arms around himself. Has it only been two days? It feels like a lifetime. Especially considering time wasn't really passing.
It sweeps over him like a tidal wave, the pain, the loss. He practically feels Libby's lips on his, and tears are falling once again. He thought he had cried himself out earlier, but he was wrong, wrong, wrong. This isn't happening. So why does the pain feel so real?
Not real. Not real. Not real.
He gasps the words with each painful sob, each brokenhearted, anguished wail. He forces himself to his feet. Once he's started, he can't stop. Why is he shedding these imaginary tears over something that didn't even happen?
"This isn't happening!" He shouts into the wind and the rain, loud and miserable, enough for the entire camp to hear. But at that moment, the cold feeling of the undeniable sweeps over him.
Who the hell does he think he's kidding?
At that moment, he knows every painful breath he's taking is real. He can't do it, he can't believe Dave's lie, and he can't convince himself that it's his imagination. Every bit of the pain he's feeling is real, too real. Libby is really dead. And he knows it all too well.
Taking a deep breath, he steps forward off the edge of the cliff.