"Maybe you've never noticed, I ain't big on the talking thing. Got nothing to tell."
"Why were you on the plane?" She pressed.
"That," he scowled, "is none of your damn business, baby girl."
"The whole world thinks us dead. I'm a little freaked out by that, a little excited."
"Hell, if I'm dead, this ain't nothin' like I thought it'd be."
"What's it like in your idea?"
"Doesn't matter. We're alive, aren't we? Some people died here, and we didn't. Can't complain."
She had to laugh. "You complain all the time!"
"Yeah, well, that's just me bein' myself. Are you bored or something? No cocos left to pick?"
"You're holding my baby."
"Yah, that's gotta stop, he's growin' to like me. Can't let that happen."
"Just until sundown. Let people get some sleep before he starts wailing again?"
"Seriously, you gotta tame that kid, or soon they'll be a petitioning for our Good Doctor to take its chords out."
Claire smiled. At these hours - the moments between which Charlie and the rest of the group fell asleep - Sawyer felt invisible enough to make himself agreeable company.
"What's with the smilin'?"
"Nothing. I was thinking it wouldn't be so horrible if Aaron grew to like you."
"No way, speak for yourself! I'm not interested. Not playing uncles to this devil child or anybody."
"Hey!" Claire made a face and rolled her eyes at the 'devil child' comment. "Jeez, what's the matter with you?"
"Wh-I'm sorry, I'd be a crappy uncle anyway. Not that I'm ever gonna be one..."
"Why, that's not for you to choose now, is it?"
"Sure ain't, I'm an only child."
"Oh." Claire nodded, and offered mindlessly, "Well, after all this... When it's all over and we all go home, you can still see him if you like."
He snickered at that prospect. "You don't want that. Trust me."
"Maybe... he will. We could be here awhile and it looks like you're his best mate already."
Sawyer shook his head and repressed a smile.
"So why were you on the plane?" Claire tried again, with no expectations.
Resigned, Sawyer breathed in like this was serious. "Justice bought me this ticket to Hell. And irony let me live." He sighed as if in shame.
Claire nodded dubiously, not fully getting his drift.
"I was brought up to believe... It's crazy the stuff they'll have you believe, if they tell you enough when you're small. I thought death was - get this and laugh - this wide open higher space where your dead family welcomed you with open arms, right by God's holy fucking side."
"Wow." Claire had never thought Sawyer to be this... complex.
"Yeah, I'm full of surprises."
She hesitated a moment, reaching for meaning. "Maybe it is. We're alive still, so how do we know? Maybe it just wasn't our time."
"If time's anything to do with it. I say we just lucked out."
"I don't know." She gave as honest a reply as she could.
"Well, you sure did, Drooly McCranky here is reason enough."
Claire looked back at her baby and as motherly pride and strength filled her again, she saw his eyes were tightly closed, while he breathed softly and peacefully.
"You lulled him to sleep!"
"I didn't do nothin'!" Sawyer protested, before he looked down at the evidence resting on his arm, and up again at a grateful Claire. "But that's great, now you can have him back and maybe I can lie down for a couple hours."
As he parted with the bundle to hand it over to his mama, he felt the chill of an evening breeze hit him full-stride on his chest. He couldn't say how long it had been since Claire had come to his tent bringing him the little screamer under the furrowed brows and hard stares of several lostaways. Could have been hours, or mere minutes, for all he knew. And now, he was cold.
Sawyer looked on as Claire gently crouched to the crib, and lay down next to the Brit dimwit. She'd be back tomorrow, same time, and the next day, and the next. He would let her. All of his shirts now reeked of that ominous baby smell anyway.
His eyes wandered onto the horizon line. The twilight of this red retiring sun, damn, that was a sight. The tide was low, and soon the sound of a million waves crashing relentlessly, one after the other, would fade out into silence. This place sure was nothing like paradise, but it didn't much resemble hell either. And now...
Now he was alive.