TITLE: Protector
RATING: PG
SUMMARY: Sayid thinks about his role in Shannon's life. Based on a promo Shayid pic from 2.1
DISCLAIMER: I don't own the characters from Lost and am not making a profit. If they were mine, then there would be more Shayid moments, especially in these last few episodes.
Protector. That was the way Sayid had always seen himself. He had protected his family by joining the Guard, which in turn caused him to protect his country during the Gulf War, and then against the insurgents. Then his conscience got the best of him and he had protected an insurgent. Protector was the role other castaways had placed him in the moment he had begun to work on the radios and stand guard at night. This role had caused him to leave after torturing Sawyer, and return when he learned that they were not alone on the island. Now he wished to be more than just a protector.
He watched Shannon's reaction as Jack spoke, could see the pain radiating through her body. She thought no one believed that she saw Walt – or a vision of Walt – in the jungle. Sayid did. He just did not know how to voice that now, not in front of everyone else. Shannon would not lie to him. If she were making up what she had seen, her thin body would not shake as it did now. She would not be drawing her sweater tighter around her body. How he wished he could offer her some sense of comfort. She had turned to him before they returned to the caves, but she had misinterpreted his questions. He wanted to know what the whispers had said to her, had felt the smallest glimmer of hope that he had not been losing his mind that night in the jungle. He had simply wanted all the facts before he told her what he was thinking.
Jack continued to tell them about the hatch. Sayid did not care, still did not understand why Jack and Locke had spent so much time trying to open it. There had to be a reason that it could not be opened from the outside. He watched as Shannon folded her arms against her chest in a self-protecting gesture. Seeing enough, Sayid finally reached out and wrapped one arm around her waist. She looked up briefly before she stepped closer to him.
Sayid wrapped his other arm around her. He cupped the small of her back with entwined fingers. He wondered for a moment what it would feel like to touch her back without the sweater, but pushed the thought away. Now was not the time for him to think of anything but keeping her safe. The protector in him would not go away.
She bent her head forward, her hair falling over her face. The golden strands, which needed desperately to be brushed, tickled his face. He ached to turn and kiss the top of her head, but their relationship was still so strained. He did not know anymore what the boundaries were.
Shannon kept her arms folded as he held her. Inwardly, he sighed, she did not trust him to hold and support her. For now he would continue the role of protector. Maybe one day he would be able to move further with her.
Maybe one day he would be able to be her lover.
The End