So here it is, final chapter. As of right now there are no plans for a sequel, but I already miss writting it, so we'll see.

Epilogue

6 months. It had been 6 months since he'd seen Kate standing in that driveway, growing smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror.

Of all the really difficult things he had had to do since meeting her, that may have been the hardest. And after that, it hadn't gotten much better

When he turned himself in, he hadn't gotten much trouble from the police. But it hadn't exactly been a warm reception either. The fact that Kate had beaten his face to a bloody pulp had apparently helped. It turned out that she'd actually broken his nose. That in combination with his near perfect record had worked in his favor. Eventually, they had believed his story. One of the policemen questioning him had even said, "That Alex Dodd sure is a piece of work, isn't he." This only made him wonder what Kate had gone through with him. Yet another piece of her life that he wasn't privy too.

And then they had let him go. He had been expecting much worse.

Seeing his mother though, that had been terrible. There was really no other word for it. The cold, aloof woman from his childhood had looked so old and so tiny in that hospital bed. He had actually felt sorry for her. And she had smiled when she saw him. He couldn't remember one instance from his childhood where he had been the cause of her joy. She had recovered nicely and was actually still living in his home. He tried to maintain a comfortable distance from her, so she wouldn't rely so heavy in him, and he still couldn't fully trust her. He wasn't sure that he ever would. But other than that, it had all seemed a little too easy.

But then, finally unoccupied with personal responsibilities, the agonizing wait had begun. He has taken his job at the hospital back just so he'd have something to keep his mind in check. Something he could focus on other than his ever present worry.

-----------------

It had been 6 months and he had heard nothing. She hadn't made contact with him. He had known it would be difficult for her, but he should have heard something by now, right? He also hadn't heard anything on the news. He supposed this was a good sign. It meant that she wasn't captured or dead.

He googled her everyday. He did it every morning when he woke up and he did it again late in the day (or rather late in his shifts). He did it from his office when he was exhausted from his long shifts and the day's surgeries. When he should have been wrapping up is paper work, packing up to leave, getting home to his empty bed.

About a week ago his search had unearthed an article from a small Iowa paper. At first he had though it may have been an obituary and his heart had stopped. It had turned out to be just a story about her that had no new information. He presumed it must have been a paper from where she had grown up. They probably dug up the story every few years just to sell more papers. Other than that, nothing.

6 months. He had now officially been apart from her longer than he had known her.

Why then was he still so attached to her? Why did he think about her all the fucking time?

Most mornings he woke with a physical ache for her. His body crying out for hers in a way he had ever experienced.

Of course women had shown interest. That had never really been a problem for him. Mostly they were women from the hospital, it was really the only place he was when he wasn't crashed out on his couch in front of bad TV. He attracted a certain type of woman, a woman who liked a challenge. Women who liked fucked up men with sad eyes. He did not return their interest. Didn't even once consider going home with one just to assuage his own base physical need. After Sarah had left, that hadn't been the case. But what was the use of a warm body if it wasn't her warm body.

Sometimes he wondered if she had meant more to him than he had to her. He knew it was possible. And sometimes he believed it. Oh, he knew she cared, but did she care enough? Did she care enough to find her way back to him?

If you didn't count the island, where things had been chaotic beyond all reason, where survival was all he had really focused on. And if you didn't count prison, where they had been monitored constantly and where Kate had been focused on staying sane and getting out, they had really only had two days. Two days where they could be themselves and be comfortable just being with each other. And then his mother had happened.

Was that really enough time? But then he realized that he had known from their first days on the island that their connection, their ties to each other would always be so important to him.

He remembered everything. Images of her and events they had shared would come to him at odd moments of the day. When he threw on his light blue scrubs for surgery, he thought of her in her prison uniform. It was almost the exact same shade of blue.

When he was in the grocery store and saw guava in the produce section, he thought of giving her the seeds that day in the caves. He thought of that smile that had been just for him, and the way she looked in Sun's garden.

In the cereal aisle, when he past the crunch berries he thought of sex with her in Beth's kitchen. How she had breathed when he had his mouth on her and his tongue running over her, lingering on that tiny delicate ball of nerve endings. How she had trembled and gasped. How she had hit her head on the counter when she slid down to him on the floor. How he had been so concerned but she had just laughed at herself.

A few days ago, he had seen a kid in the waiting room clutching a toy airplane. He thought of opening the case with her. He thought of yelling at her, begging for just an ounce of truth, the smallest insight into who she was. It had seemed so important then, to know what she had done. The truth was, he didn't know much more about her now. There were still so many unanswered questions. But it mattered so much less now. The only thing that mattered now was that she was okay.

He remembered everything, everything but one thing. He kept running the conversation over and over in his head, but he could not for the life of him remember what she had said. He remembered being surprised that she knew he had been married, and he remembered that he hadn't been able to come up with an answer at first, so he had asked her. He remembered thinking that he couldn't top her song, it was a great song. And he remembered he'd finally come up with Maybe I'm Amazed – which was a really great fucking song.

But what the hell had her song been? And why was it so important that he remember it. He'd been thinking about it for days now.

It was January 23rd, and he was driving to the hospital through thick, Southern California rain. The kind of rain that made traffic slow to a near stop, not because it was too heavy or dangerous, but simply because people in LA had no idea how to drive in the rain. And he was thinking about it again, he could almost hear the chorus, it was right there, then it slipped away again.

With traffic nearly stopped Jack reached over and fiddled with the programmed buttons on the Land Rover's radio. He flipped through stations the rest of the way to the hospital, not really believing that he would come across the song, but hoping he'd hear something that would trigger his memory.

He pulled into the parking structure and headed to the parking space marked J. Shepard. He parked and unbuckled his seatbelt, but he wasn't willing to face the day yet. He leaned his head back into the seat and exhaled. Then just as he sat up and reached for the keys he heard it.

I can hear her heartbeat from a thousand miles

And the heavens open every time she smiles.

He shook his head in disbelief. "What are the fucking chances?" he said it out loud in his empty car. He sat there still, his hand still touching his keys. He listened to the entire song, didn't even notice the looks he got from the other people who worked at the hospital.

When the song ended, he pulled out the keys and got out of the car. A few minutes later as he was walking down the hospital corridor to his office he thought he may have actually smiled.

At the end of the day, he was sitting in his darkened office, trying to clear his head before heading home in the still pouring rain. He flipped on the dim desk lamp and absently flipped through the mail in his inbox. He had tossed it aside that morning, not wanting to deal with it. There were a few bills, an invitation to a medical seminar that he had no intention of attending, and then he saw it. A small envelope with his address hand written in cramped but neat script. He recognized the penmanship immediately. It was the same as the one from the folded note that he kept tucked away in his nightstand. The return address said Karen Rousseau. How had he missed this?

He examined the envelope for any clues as to where she might be. It was stamped Hartford, Connecticut. He knew she must have moved on from there by now if she had thought it safe enough to send word to him. Still, she was probably still in the Northeast somewhere. It had to be freezing there this time of year. He could not picture her in the snow.

He slid his finger through the gap in the envelope and tore it open. There was nothing of any real substance in the letter, just standard -How are you-I'm fine-Wish you were here- filler. But that didn't make it any less important to him. It was just her letting him know that she was okay. And he finally felt able to breath normally for the first time in 6 months.

He had known she wouldn't be able to give him any specific details and he was grateful just for the knowledge that she was well enough to make contact. As he reached the end of the letter though, he felt a hope growing in his chest that he tried to quell. She had written one single line that he read again and again.

See you soon, Love K

He blinked back hot tears that coated his eyes. His emotions had always run so close to the surface that it didn't surprise him. His parents had hated it, their oversensitive male child in the austere, hard world they had created for themselves. He had merely grown used to it. And the idea that he had received the letter on the very same day that he had heard her song, it was more than bizarre. It was almost too much.

-------------

A few days later, after a long shift at the hospital that had included a 6 hour surgery, he had stumbled up the stairs and crashed on his unmade bed. Within minutes he was dreaming.

He heard a knock at the balcony door. He pulled the shades aside and saw her standing behind the glass. He knew it was a dream because it was dark out and his shift had ended at 9am. He had only just fallen asleep, there was no way it could be dark yet. Jack was logical that way. The fact that she had managed to get up the balcony from the outside and there were snow flurries surrounding her did not faze him in the slightest. He noticed that she was wearing a heavy jacket. How smart of her to think ahead for just such an LA storm, he thought to himself. But then he noticed she wasn't wearing shoes at all.

"Kate," he said through the glass. "Where are you're shoes? Don't you know that over 90 of body heat is lost through the head and feet? You'll catch a cold!"

Kate motioned to her ears and shrugged, indicating that she couldn't hear him through the thick glass. Then she pointed to the door. He tried to open it, but it wouldn't budge.

Suddenly Kate held her fingers up to her ear and mouth like a phone. Jack heard the ringing in his head. He searched frantically for a phone, but couldn't find one. He looked at Kate standing out there in the cold, trying to talk to him and got so sad. He sat down on the floor and despondently crossed his legs.

But then he heard her voice, loud and clear despite the glass. "Pick up the phone, Jack."

He opened his eyes and reached for the phone on his nightstand. "Kate?" He didn't know how he knew, he just knew.

There was a beat. It was just long enough for his heart to become lodged in his throat. Then he heard her speak, "Hey Jack."

The End