Disclaimer: I only own Chris and Mandy. Lost is owned by ABC/Touchstone Television.
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"That looks like it hurt…" was all Chris heard before attempting to bury himself into the sand. He probably tripped on the most stupid thing possible, and he made a complete fool of himself. And now, on top of that, that girl from earlier was around, she was probably listening from the shadows – or maybe she was even at the fire, and he didn't hear her.
"Not as much of a Frisbee, in the head," he said in a fierce whisper, rolling on to his back, and taking a deep breath. Luckily, he hadn't had the wind knocked out of him - he just inhaled a whole bunch of filthy sand particles.
She laughed, at that, but it was true. "Well," she began, through a chuckle, "I'm very sorry about that. Want some help getting up?"
Reluctantly, Chris stuck his hand up, after adjusting his sunglasses back on to his eyes. He felt a cold, small hand grip on to his, and helped him be hoisted up. As he began to dust the sand and dirt from his clothes, he could hear snickering from the group he was with. Grudgingly, he began to walk in the direction he thought was the way to his sleeping quarters.
After a few steps, he heard the clicking of flip-flops, again, and sighed. 'Leave me alone…' He stopped walking, however, and waited for the girl to catch up to him. She stopped, breathlessly, and felt her hand land on his shoulder as she tried to regain her breath.
"Don't worry about it," she said, grinning. "Just tell them it was dark, and you didn't notice the root."
Oh, yeah, that would work. The supposed 'root' he tripped on happened to go from the forest, about halfway along the beach, Chris knew that because he had nearly tripped over it on his first day here - monster Root. "I'd rather not," he told her, and he began to walk again, in a strained voice.
"Okay…" she said slyly and began to follow him along the sand, letting it seep under her toes. "Then you can tell them you're blind."
"I'm not-" he began in an angry tone, but the girl cut in.
"Yeah, you are!"
Chris grunted, and turned inwardly to the forest, unknowingly stepping into the path of the nuisance girl, but he didn't care. She scowled as he did, stopping her in his tracks, but he kept pressing forwards.
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Mandy slumped against a locker, keeping her arms (which enveloped her school books) close to her chest. She just stopped to breath, to look around. She yawned, as she looked along the long, silent, still hallway. She was the only living thing in it – unless you count thrown out cafeteria food 'living'.
She stifled a yawn, and banged her head against the metal of the locker door, which wasn't hard at all. The sound echoed along the hallway, which didn't seem to bother her, she was just waiting for the bell to ring. Her classroom was the room across the hall from where she was standing, she had been sent out because she was supposedly a disturbance – a hindrance, to the learning process of the other students.
It was her last class of the day, English. Which struck her as odd, because the American girl thought she spoke better English than anybody inside the entire country of Australia; their accents were still weird to her, despite living in the country for most of her life, since the divorce of her parents.
She was actually happy to be sent out in to the hall, because this happened to be her last day at the school. It hadn't been the best news to her, at the time, but as the days got closer to the day she would be leaving 'the outback', the more excited she got. She was going to live with her father, in Los Angeles, her home town, before the divorce.
The bell rang, suddenly, slightly startling the teenager, because she happened to be next to the deafening machine. The door to her English class swung open, and she tried to push past the group of students leaving the room, and she tried to get in.
"Ah," the teacher said, furrowing her eyebrows as the presence of the troublemaker entered her room. "Come to disturb me, as well?"
Mandy couldn't help but laugh. "No, I just wanted to tell you, you won't have to put up with me anymore."
Though she didn't show it, the teacher was ecstatic about this. She couldn't think of anything to say in response to this, because it was too good for words. It hadn't even been a month or two with the girl in her class, but she had already been sent out so many times, it was frightening. Instead, she grabbed the small pile of papers she had in her hands, and quickly left the room, to the staff room, leaving Mandy alone in the room.
Checking the clock in the corner of the room, Mandy realized she had enough time to do one more thing 'for' the professor before leaving.
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"Seriously, Chris…" Mandy said in a huff, the name sounded weird to her, when she said it. "It's not a big deal, it's not like I'm going to tell Jack."
Chris stopped, right before he hit the first black of grass, separating the beach from the forest. His ears perked up, at the mention of her not telling Jack. He spun around, still slightly annoyed at the girl, if she didn't like Jack, maybe… "You know what?" he snarled, and walked towards the girl, trying to not walk in to her. "I want to know why you care. Have I shown you anything other than hostility? I've known you for a day!"
She didn't seem to have a response to this, like he anticipated. Maybe now she would leave him alone – maybe.
"I just…" she began slowly. "I need to know. I'm sorry, but it's a big deal around camp. People keep saying how you keep walking in to things, and they want to know if you're okay."
Chris felt a knot tighten in his throat when she had said that. Why did these people have to be so nosy? It just infuriated him to no end that these people were trying to pry in to his life. "I'm okay. Why can't any of you realize that? I don't need your help… I don't need to help seeing; I don't need you people to guide me around the godforsaken island. I've been blind since I was twenty-seven. I think I can manage." His voice had turned grouchier than he expected, then, and his face turned red, from bellowing. He softened slightly, and took a deep breath to regain his composure. "Just stay out of my business."
Mandy wasn't exactly sure how to handle that, he had just told her that he was blind, but she was expecting for it to be a bit nicer, than he said it. She began to feel sorry for the grouchy man. He was stuck on this island and he was alone, judging from his hostility towards others. She was here alone, too, but she felt fortunate enough to be taken in with open arms to a few of the other survivors. They called themselves 'the socks'.
"So… You are blind?" she asked as quietly as possible, but still trying to make it audible.
He sighed in response, resting his head in his hands. "Have you even been listening? You beg me all day to tell you – and when I finally do, you don't hear me!" he stopped, and then began to yell. "I'm blind, okay? Get it through your head! Now get off my case!" He snarled and turned away from her, beginning to make his way to his bed. He was going to sleep for days.
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"Mom, I didn't do anything!" Mandy yelped, after her mother yelled at her – almost instantly after the teenager had stepped in to the house. At the top of the stairs, Mandy could see all of her things packed up, in a few suitcases. Her mother wasn't exactly the type to buy her anything. Another reason she was happy to be out of the country.
"Amanda," she snapped, using the full name technique. "I'm getting so fed up with your lying, and your behavior. Before I take you to the airport, I'm taking you back to the school to apologize."
Mandy's face turned a dark red, and she felt like foaming at the mouth. "I didn't do anything, and you can't expect me to go and apologize to that bi-"
"Language, Amanda! You're only, what, fourteen-"
"I'm sixteen, mom," Mandy snapped back. She wasn't in the mood to argue with her. She was trying to be happy. In less than three hours, she would be on a plane, and going home to her dad - her real home. She kept an aghast expression on her face, and averted her eyes from her mother's. This is what she had to put up with, and she was more than happy to be leaving.
Her mother, however, looked crestfallen. Just the way that Mandy had retorted to her mistake made her feel absolutely horrible. It was a simple mistake. "Am-"
"Mom, I… I'd like a few dollars. I'm taking a taxi to the airport," she began, even though she had enough money on her to take it, she planned on using that on little trinkets at the terminal.
Her mother's mouth began to dry up. What had she just said? She… She couldn't, there was no way she would allow her to. "Amanda…"
Mandy's eyes narrowed, and she could feel a tear began to well up in her eye, she just had to leave. It wasn't her fault that her mother had driven her to the feeling and it wasn't her fault her mother neglected her for the majority of her life. "Mom, just… let's just go. Buy me the tickets, then leave."
Her mother's face hardened and she shook her head. "No, we're not going, yet. I still need to do a few things."
Mandy, who was still standing in the doorway, groaned, and kicked off her shoes, making them hit the wall and scuffing dirt on to the plain white paint. "Whatever," she said angrily, and took the stairs two at a time past her mother.
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"… Was it something I said?" Mandy said quietly, watching Chris walk away angrily. She watched him, as his silhouette disappeared into the bushes, and finally decided to walk back to the group of people around the fire. As she sat down on one of the logs, straddling her legs on either side of the trunk, she let out a sigh, as one of them – a man – began to tell a story.
"You okay, Mandy?" asked Janelle, sitting behind her. Her shoulder was clapped by Janelle's hand, sympathetically.
Nodding slowly, she managed her left leg towards the fire, and turned her head to Janelle. "Yeah, I'm fine," she said quietly, and tried to fake a smile.
Janelle noticed the phony smile, and laughed slightly. "You like him, don't you?" she asked, grinning widely.
Mandy's eyes narrowed when she asked this. It was true, but he was almost twice her age. He was just so nice, he seemed sweet, when you didn't annoy him about his sight problems, and it wasn't that he was bad to look at… But the age difference. She wasn't even legal age! Of course, there was no law enforcement on the island… Still, it would be weird, it would be wrong morally, and she would be ostracized from the entire community because of it.
Maybe in two years.
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Within a few minutes, Mandy could hear the tap to the shower turn on, and the incessant downpour of water on to the basin of the bath. Her mom was thinking about hygiene at a time like this? Mandy was standing alone in her kitchen, hovering over the empty counter, thinking of something she could make herself – she wasn't too fond of airline food.
As she heard the screeching noise of her mother singing, Mandy continually glanced towards her mom's purse at the edge of the counter, next to a bushel of bananas she had picked up from the market. She felt her throat begin to dry up, as she walked towards … the bananas.
Taking one from the bushel, she began to peel it, letting the yellow coating fall to the countertop. She sidestepped about ten centimeters, and was now standing smack-dab in front of the purse.
Looking around nervously, Mandy reached out for it – careful to listen for her mother – and unzipped it. The inside of it was a complete and utter mess. She could see post-it notes running throughout it, (Mandy figured they were of some men she had been seeing), a package of gum, and some lipstick. Tucked away in the corner was a black, leather wallet. Mandy took a deep breath, and reached for it.
She kept a firm, yet sweaty, grip on the leather wallet, fingering the outside of it, as if looking for a secret way in. She didn't know why, but she felt guilty about even considering this. Why should she? Her mother completely neglected her, pretty much forgot about her. Maybe she neglected her credit cards, too.
Somehow, Mandy doubted that.
Opening the wallet, she fidgeted around, she had a few bills in there, but Mandy was looking for a credit card – a Visa, a Master Card, whatever she could find. She had like a flip book, in the wallet, each holding a different piece of identification. She stopped at the first credit card she could find, a Visa. She shifted around, to look at the bathroom door, and took it out of its case, along with a few dollars in cash. Closing the wallet back, she stuffed it in the purse, and zipped it back up.
Taking another deep breath, Mandy dashed out of the kitchen, to the stairway. She had a whole bunch of suitcases she would be taking with her… Now she had to make a choice. Grabbing one of the smaller bags of clothes, along with her carry-on luggage – a backpack, with some CDs, a walkman, and a set of batters - she jumped down the stairs, ignoring the obvious tear she was shedding, and slipped her shoes back on. Luckily, she only lived a few minutes from the downtown, and she would be able to find a taxi, or a bus, from there.
