She didn't invite the boys over for dinner that night and she was making their favorite—spaghetti. She knew it wasn't fair to make Miles and Jin suffer for James' ridiculous behavior, but she didn't know what would happen if she saw him tonight and that scared her. She wasn't afraid of him, she was afraid of herself around him. He made her say things that she'd kept bottled up inside of her, made her think things she hadn't thought in years, made her want to do things—
"Hey."
Juliet gasped and turned, dropping the box of noodles on the counter. "James, I didn't hear you knock."
"I didn't knock," he said, and crossed the distance between them and kissed her. His mouth was hot and he tasted like a spice she didn't know the name of. Slowly, she felt herself drifting backwards until she bumped into the kitchen counter. She let out a sharp gasp into his mouth and moaned when he pulled her tongue towards his with his teeth. James' hand slid slowly down her side and under her shirt to brush across the taut skin of her stomach. He held her hips strongly, possessively, and she wound her hands in his hair, trying to get him as close as possible. James growled low in the back of his throat, and Juliet had to move a hand to the countertop to stabilize herself. She was feeling heady and dizzy and so, so hot—
"Oh my God!" she yelped, springing back from the counter. She'd burned her hand on the stove.
"Goddammit," James swore, realizing what had happened. "You all right?"
"I need ice," Juliet managed through gritted teeth.
James dashed to the fridge and Juliet ran her hand under cold water in the sink, her heart still pounding so loudly in her ears she could barely hear herself think.
"Here, use this." James offered her a bag of frozen Dharma broccoli.
She winced. "Thanks."
"Hell," he sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I don't know what I was thinking, coming in here like that—"
"It wasn't your fault."
"You don't think you should sit down or something?" James asked. "How's it looking?"
Juliet lifted up the broccoli to look and hissed. Her palm glared up at her, angry and red, the pads of her fingers already beginning to blister. "It's fine."
"How about putting your pride on the shelf and going to the infirmary?" James suggested.
She glared at him. "I do have two medical degrees, James. I think I can handle this myself."
"They're right about doctors making the worst patients," he retorted, leaning back against the kitchen table.
"If you want to make yourself useful, you can bring me that dishtowel," she said, pointing. "I don't want freezer burn on top of… this." She gestured lamely to her hand.
James grabbed the dishtowel off the counter and wrapped it around the bag of broccoli, then placed in it her palm. "Better?" he asked. Even after she'd taken the cold bag, he kept her hand in the palm of his. He was warm, emanating heat.
"Yeah," she said, and her voice was shaky and breathy, not how she wanted it to sound.
"Look, Juliet…" James reached up and brushed away a strand of hair that had fallen into her eyes.
Juliet smiled sadly. "I think you should go, James."
"You gonna be okay? Don't lie to me, now." He cracked a smile.
"I'll be fine. Thank you." With her good hand, she squeezed his. "You should go now."
"See you around, Blondie," he said quietly, and left her alone in the kitchen.
X
"What happened to your hand?" Miles asked, his jaw dropping the next morning over breakfast.
"I had a little accident," Juliet said, briefly meeting James' eyes above her Dharma cornflakes.
"You are in pain?" Jin asked, concerned.
"No, no, it's fine. I'm fine," Juliet assured them.
"Not a good idea to work like that," Jin said, looking to Miles and James for support. "You will only hurt yourself more."
"What's it look like under those bandages?" Miles asked. He wrinkled his nose in strange curiosity.
"It looks fine," she said firmly. "And thank you for your concern Jin, but I'm okay to work. I just forgot I left the stove on and… my hand slipped. It'll be good as new in a couple days."
"Yeesh, what happened to your hand?" Amy made a face as she sat down. "Mac working you too hard in the motor pool?"
James snorted and rolled his eyes, but Amy didn't notice. Juliet glared at him and said, "No, I just burned it a little last night. It's okay."
Amy took a bite of her toast. "I don't know, Jules, you might wanna get that checked out. I mean, I'm no doctor, but if it's bad enough that you've got your whole palm wrapped in gauze…"
Juliet sighed, looking across the table to James for help. "Is nobody gonna back me up on this?" She tried one last time. "James?"
He shook his head and wouldn't meet her eyes. "Go to the doctor, Blondie."
X
"There's no excessive swelling, no blistering, no pus of any kind, it's fine," Juliet said firmly to the third nurse who'd tried to help her. "It's only a first-degree burn."
The nurse rolled her eyes and said to another girl dressed in white Dharma scrubs, "They get hurt and think they're all doctors." Juliet bit her tongue and suppressed the words that were fighting to come out of her mouth. "We're going to get you some medication for the pain, okay? A small painkiller. You'll need to take it twice a day for a week, and I'll phone over to the motor pool to let them know you won't be coming into work today."
Juliet threw her hands up in the air. "Fine."
"You can wait over here while we fill the prescription," the other nurse said, and led her to the small waiting area in front of the infirmary building. Juliet hadn't been sitting there two minutes when a young girl came up, supporting a boy about the same age. He was hobbling; he'd twisted his ankle and it looked like his nose was broken.
"Is there a doctor in there?" the girl asked. "He's hurt."
Juliet hurried to her feet and helped them inside. "What happened?" she asked.
"A fight, he got in a fight at school," the girl stammered.
"Annie?" a nurse asked, appearing from around the corner. "What's wrong?"
"It's Ben, he's hurt!" the girl, Annie, said.
And for the first time Juliet looked, really looked at the boy who was leaning limply on his friend's shoulder for support. His face was unfamiliar, rounded out with baby fat that she knew in several years would give way to an austere pair of cheekbones and a menacing brow line. But his eyes… like cloudy seawater. His eyes were the same, and that was what scared her the most. Behind his shattered glasses lenses she saw those eyes, eyes that she knew all too well. Her stomach turned and she ran, barely making it to the bathroom in time.
X
"Jules?" Miles called. "You home?" He walked slowly through the kitchen, the living room, and down the narrow hallway. "Juliet?" A rustling noise came from the bathroom, followed by what was definitely the sound of someone vomiting. "You okay in there?"
"Go away, Miles," she groaned from the other side of the door.
"LaFleur sent me to check on you, are you all right?"
"What does it sound like?"
"Shut up," Miles sighed, and opened the door. Juliet sat slumped on the floor in a t-shirt, her jumpsuit in a pile behind the door. Her eyes were red and puffy like she'd been crying and she hadn't re-bandaged her hand since her visit to the infirmary. The small pink burns on her palm and the pads of her fingers had turned a dark shade of red from gripping the toilet bowl.
"Doin' great," Juliet said with a weak smile.
"I thought you just had a burn, when did you get the flu?" Miles asked, sitting beside her on the tiled bathroom floor.
Juliet sighed and smiled grimly. "Since I saw ten-year-old Ben Linus, that's when."
Miles' eyes grew wide and he let out a big gush of air. "Woah."
"Yeah."
"You sure it was him?" He shrugged when Juliet fixed him with a penetrating stare. "Just asking."
"There was a girl with him, the one who brought him into the infirmary," she continued.
"Sister?"
"Ben didn't have any brothers or sisters."
"What was her name?"
"I don't remember; it doesn't matter."
"Yes, it does, Juliet. If we wanna find out more about Ben we could ask her. She's clearly a friend of some kind, if we can just talk to her—"
"I don't wanna talk to anybody about Ben, Miles," Juliet said sharply. "I'm tired of agonizing over everything he says and does, and every promise he makes and doesn't keep." She sighed. "Ben Linus is here, he is a child, for once it's not my problem and I don't want to have anything to do with him."
"It's not your problem yet," Miles pointed out.
"Don't play the time travel card, Miles, we have no idea how much we're changing by being here right now. Don't tell me that avoiding Ben is going to… to change some event in the future. That's bullshit. This is my life and I'm in control and I'm gonna do what I— excuse me." Her lips turned white and she threw up in the toilet again.
Miles grimaced. "Yeah, you really seem to be in control."
"I'm gonna kill you. Get out of here," she said, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand.
He rose to his feet quickly. "You sure you're gonna be okay?"
"Yeah."
"LaFleur's not gonna be happy when I tell him you're upchucking over here."
"Well I don't care about what makes James happy, Miles."
"He's not gonna be happy about that either."
Juliet rolled her eyes. "Get out of here. Go on. I'll be fine."
Miles shook his head and closed the door behind him. "Crazy…" he muttered, smiling.