Disclaimer: Not mine. They belong to Jason Katims, Melinda Metz, the WB/UPN.
Author's Note: Part Six in the 'Lost' series. Kyle's POV. And, as usual, feedback will keep me going!
I think I've forgotten how to breathe in the past six days.
Six days. 144 hours. 8640 minutes. 518,400 seconds.
A lifetime.
I wonder if I'll always have this countdown in my head. I can't block it out, no matter how hard I try.
Sometimes I think it's a curse, a consequence of remembering. You know what they say. Ignorance is bliss.
But other times, I think it's a blessing. It makes me face reality. It makes me accept that this is real. That the girl I loved like a sister killed my best friend and made me carry his body.
I just have a couple of questions. Questions that keep me up at night. Questions that run through my head during the day like a mantra. Questions that no one left on Earth can answer. My answers are jetting towards the Planet of the Apes right now.
Why didn't she kill me, too? Why did she kill him at all? Why did she do this? Why did she leave me? Why wasn't I enough for her?
Why, why, why? Dammit!
The really sick thing about it all is that I still love her. Even after all she's done. How twisted am I? But she can't be evil, right? She is still the girl that made Christmas dinner and ate the last box of cookies while studying for her French exam and spent hours in the bathroom every morning, right? Because that girl, the girl I know, the girl I love - my sister - isn't the girl that did all of this. She isn't the girl that caused all of this heartache.
The person who did this is a monster. The Tess I know is a funny, misunderstood, kinda kooky girl. Sure, she's so messed up sometimes that her problems have problems, but she's not psychotic. She's just a lost little girl, just like the rest of us.
And maybe I'm the delusional one. I know what she did. Hell, I saw her do it. I heard her admit it. So why can't I accept it?
Dad. He just wanders around the house like a lost little kid. Like he's got nowhere to go and nothing to do. He's aged ten years in the last six days. He looks broken.
I heard him muttering, last night, after he finished off a bottle of scotch. Hate to tell you, Dad, but alcohol doesn't work. It doesn't make you forget. I should know. I already tried it. It doesn't drown out her voice or block out her face or stop the questions from running through my mind.
Nothing can do that.
Anyway, he kept talking. At first, I was confused, but then I realized that he was having this strange conversation with Tess, like she was sitting across the kitchen table from him. That freaked me out, a lot. Dad's supposed to be the adult, the stable one. The one with all the answers.
But Dad doesn't have any more answers than I do. He's just as lost as the rest of us.
Last night, in his drunken haze, he kept saying stuff like, "I was almost your father, too, Tess. You were like the daughter I never knew I wanted. How could you hurt me like this?"
Ouch.
Eventually, he passed out on the couch.
Dad told me this morning, when he woke up, that we're gonna sell the house and find something else. He said it was long past time for a change, but we both know the truth.
Neither of us can stand to live here with her ghost.
We had a funeral for her two days ago. I cried. A lot. I didn't think I would, but I did. Funny thing is, even I don't know why I was crying – or for whom. Tess? Alex? Me?
Maria told me to get over it. That Tess wasn't worth it. I just stared at her. Didn't she know that Tess meant everything to me? That she still does, sometimes?
Then she told me to remember to breathe, to remember to keep moving forward. She said it was what Liz told her to do, right after Alex died.
Good advice. Too bad it won't work.
As far as the rest of the world knows, she died in a car accident. Lost control of her boyfriend's jeep and went careening off a cliff. Yet another motor-vehicle tragedy to hit Roswell in the last few weeks.
I heard some human interest group that wants better roads or something is planning to use Tess and Alex as examples to champion their cause.
It's the kind of irony that'd make Alanis green with envy.
The King of the Pod People dragged the rest of the posse there, except Isabel, of course. They put on a good show, but no one looked as sad as they did at Alex's funeral. Except maybe me and Dad.
Isabel. If I thought I was taking the whole thing hard, I'm having a day at the circus compared to her. I mean, the girl has sat wherever Max has dragged her for the past six days and done nothing. I mean that literally. She hasn't said a word, eaten a mouthful, showered, changed – nothing. She just stares off into space and cries occasionally.
Max and Michael are starting to get seriously worried. Apparently, she won't let them connect to her or something. They thought she was just grieving or dealing or something, but now they're freaked.
Welcome to my world.
Seriously, though, I'm not surprised they're taking hissy fits. She's just a shell. It like she's lost in her own head. She looks the way I think I'd look if I wasn't so damn confused. There's too much going on in my head for me to stay in there like she is. Hell, I'm doing my damnedest to get out of my head.
Isabel wouldn't have even gotten away with it for this long, except her parents had to go out of town on some business trip that couldn't be delayed and the school decided to close for a week out of respect for Tess and Alex. So, as far as the outside world knows, she's just deep in mourning for her boyfriend and her best friend.
Ha.
Time is running out, though, so the king has decreed we've got to do something.
Only problem is, our fearless leader doesn't have clue one about how to lead. His favourite game is what I call 'let's wait and see.' It drives me nuts – it I ran my football team the way he runs us, we'd be lucky if we managed to find the ball, let alone throw it.
Latest instalment of the game is what I've nicknamed, 'watch Isabel vegetate.' Over the last two days, ever since they tried to snap her out of it and couldn't, someone's been with her every minute, watching to see if her head starts spinning around or something, I guess. It's my turn now, and I'm sitting in her desk chair, staring at her. She's sitting on her bed, staring at nothing.
I figured it was a waste of time. She'll come out of it when she's good and ready. Isabel doesn't do anything except on her own terms. I admire that about her. And quite frankly, I secretly think she's better off right now in this waking coma. At least she doesn't have to deal with reality. Because right now, reality bites the big one.
She's not going to snap out of it until she wants to.
She snapped.
Literally.
She started screaming. Out of nowhere. Like a banshee from hell. Max and Michael and the rest of the gang charged in, and I left. She's in good hands. They can do more for her than I can. Hell, I can't even help myself, let alone her.
I sure couldn't help Tess. And Alex? I dragged his body out to the car. I'm real sure that was a big help. Thanks, sis.
I went to Alex's grave. I've found myself here a lot over the last couple of days. I don't know why. I don't even know how I get here. I just walk, and somehow, this is where I end up, every time.
I'm lost right now, and I don't know where to turn. Not to King Max or Guerin - no offence, but they're the last two people I wanna see anytime soon. Not to Liz or Maria - they disliked her from the beginning, they despise her now, and they would be throwing a party celebrating her demise if it wasn't so tasteless. Not to Dad – he's got enough problems of his own. If things were different, I'd go to Alex or Isabel. But Alex can't help me anymore. He can't help anyone anymore. And Isabel's kinda preoccupied right now.
Sick thing is, Tess is the person I'd normally tell all my problems to.
So what do I do when she's the problem?
She was my family. The family I've wanted for years, ever since my mom left me and Dad and never came back. Tess, the girl from outer space, made us a family again. She gave us Christmas, and decorated the tree whose only use before was to dry my socks. She brought food into the house and threw out the delivery menus. She got us addicted to Tabasco sauce and she made us eat with silverware instead of plastic forks and knives. She pranced around the kitchen table and made us get her a chair and hung photographs.
And she killed Alex.
That's what I don't get. How does Tess, my sister for all intents and purposes, go from baking Tabasco-laced brownies to zapping Alex's mind out of his skull? How does she go from professing her eternal love for Max to tricking him into getting her pregnant? How does she go from being the girl who just wanted to be accepted to plotting to deliver them all to their worst enemy?
Buddha's not helping me with this one. I can meditate until the cows come home, and it still won't do me any good. My peace of mind left this solar system the same time I remembered seeing Alex sobbing, begging her to stop hurting him.
I'm afraid to go into my room. Silly, right? I mean, it was my bedroom for sixteen years, and only hers for the last eight months or so. Besides, Dad went in there with some boxes and garbage bags and cleaned out all her stuff. It's like she never even existed. Like she's just a bad dream that'll fade when I wake up.
But I'm not waking up. And I'm still terrified to open that door.
Because I know, if I do, I will lose it, completely.
I remember a time, not too long ago, that I thought my grandpa was off the deep end, just like everyone else who believed in aliens. I remember a time that I laughed at all the alien memorabilia around town with my football buddies. I remember a time when there wasn't an intergalactic crisis every couple of days.
I miss the old days.
But you can't turn back time, I guess, and even after all that's happened, I don't know if I'd really want to, if I was given the chance.
If I turned back time, I wouldn't have known her. Even after all she's done, no matter how much I hate her right now, I'm still happy that I knew her.
I hate strawberries. They remind me of her. That's how she smelled, like strawberries. I used to tease her about that, because she always used strawberry shampoo and bath bubbles. She'd always threaten to steal all of the soap in the house so I'd have to use it, too. I never want to see another strawberry as long as I live.
I'd sell my soul to the devil if it meant I could breathe in her scent again. Strawberries, Tabasco, and Tess.
'Breathe, Kyle,' I remind myself. That's how twisted I am right now. Half the time I want her back, and the rest of the time I'm ready to purge the world of all of its strawberry patches.
That's what I do. My mind keeps turning over things. I hate her one minute and want her back the next.
I threw out all the Tabasco that was in the house this morning. I poured it down the sink and washed it away and smashed the bottles into tiny pieces. Twenty bottles. I gave her a year's supply last Christmas, as a gift, and that's all that was left, five months later.
I want a Tabasco and peanut butter sandwich.
When I found out she was pregnant, I was pissed. Pissed because Max knocked her up. Of course I blamed him. Hell, I still half hate him, sometimes. And I was excited. I thought she'd be a great mom, the kind of mom neither of us had and both of us wanted. I couldn't wait to see her with a baby. She told me I'd be Uncle Kyle.
Then I found out she was leaving. That the baby couldn't live on Earth. That I was losing my almost-sister and my almost-nephew in one shot. I went back to being pissed, but added sadness to the mix.
And that's when the shit hit the proverbial fan.
When Liz and Maria came charging in and told me I'd been mind-warped, I said something stupid, like "I'd remember if I was mind-warped."
What I really meant was, "Tess would never do that to me."
Then I remembered.
Now I wish I could forget.
Maybe the mind-warp was a blessing. Her last gift to me. A chance to be oblivious. A chance to forget the pain.
And maybe she was the cold-hearted bitch that Maria and Liz say she is.
I'm lost without her, and I don't know how to find my way home. I don't know who I am or why I'm still here. I don't know who she is.
I don't know anything anymore. I don't think I wanna know.
All I know is that I have to breathe.