Disclaimer: I do not own or have any ties to Bellasario Productions or the characters of JAG.
BETHESDA GARDENS
1200h
Dear Sarah,
You always said it wasn't goodbye, only good luck. I guess the time for a final goodbye has come.
I can never find the right words to tell you how I feel. So in my final words to you, I need to get us on the same page. The minute I saw you, I knew. I knew that you were one of a kind, an angel to save my soul. One smile from you and my heart was whole again. Your eyes held so much sadness, Marine. I wanted to hold you in my arms and take that pain away, but I knew protecting you from the future wouldn't heal the past. I didn't doubt your strength as a marine or as a woman. I knew you could handle whatever life threw at you. I failed you Sarah. I couldn't help you; all the times you cried (which wasn't many) I failed. I couldn't heal your pain. I only added to it. I remember every time I hurt you, but I also remember every time we kissed and I saw your beautiful smile.
I have spent the last eight years trying to coax that smile onto your face. I guess it is something else I have failed at.
When we kissed at the dock, I wasn't kissing Diane. I told you I was, but, God marine I knew what I was doing. I just didn't know if you wanted it as much as I did.
I hope you know that I love you, but as I have failed to tell you I guess you don't. I've always loved you, from the very first time you smiled. It took me along time to understand my love for you. I always knew you were the sexiest goddamn women on the planet, but at the NATO ball I realized just how much I wanted to take you home and make you smile again.
We danced around our feelings, our emotions without ever touching.
Up in the Appalachians I came so close to losing you, so very close. I knew from then on I loved you, yet once again I failed. I failed to save you, failed to tell you I loved you, but most importantly I failed to make you smile. I pulled back from then on. I pulled back until I was worthy of loving you, but even in pulling back I hurt you. I hurt you with Coster, with my comments, but mostly with my return to flying.
Sarah you weren't the only one crying that day. I was dying at the thought of leaving you. I needed to go back; I had to get my dad out of my system so that I could return solely to you. I thought about you everyday up there, every flight. You were my reason for living Sarah and my reason for dying.
I never meant to hurt you, but I just can't seem to stop making you cry. I never was good enough for you. In Australia I wasn't ready, I wasn't good enough. I failed. I said "not yet" I was waiting to be perfect, waiting in the shadows until I could give you every thing you deserved. Mick came along and gave you everything I couldn't. I watched you walk away; I gave up without a fight. He made you smile Mac. I couldn't stop that. He succeeded and I failed.
Yet he left you and you saved me. You didn't just pluck me from the ocean, you saved my soul. I got a second chance to win you back. I tried and I tried Sarah. I tried so very hard. I pushed and you pulled. We were finally working. I loved you with every fiber of my being, and I thought you loved me back. We were so close in Afghanistan, but once again I failed. I failed to hold on and we lost it all, we circled like vultures around our despair. We lost each other.
I didn't kill Singer, how could anyone think I had killed a pregnant woman? It destroyed me Sarah. I waited and waited but no one came. I was all alone in there with just my thoughts for company. Did you all believe I had killed her? Did you just not want to see me? I had no idea what to think. Then it was over. I was exonerated and everyone expected things to go on exactly as before. They couldn't understand what had happened in there. I was treated like a common criminal. To them I was the scum of the earth. I lost control and I couldn't cope. So I pulled away again. I watched you dance away from me again.
Then you went missing in Paraguay. When the Admiral told me you had gone missing I almost died. You were my world Sarah and we thought you were dead. I couldn't lose you. I had to find the truth. I didn't care what the cost. I just knew I had to get you back. I resigned my commission and came to find you. I failed once again, you didn't need my help. You had Webb; he protected you, opened up to you, and did all the things I couldn't. I still put you in danger after I got you out. I'm arsenic Sarah, poison, destroying everyone and everything that I touch. When you were hurt in the crash I didn't know what to say. You had Webb and he had almost died trying to protect you. I crashed a plane with you in it and walked away with a concussion. I had failed to make you smile once again.
So I left, I drifted off, trying to forget your face, your laugh, your smile. I couldn't forget. You haunted my dreams, your pain reminding me of my failure. Webb told me how happy you two were, how much you smiled, how much better he was then me. I believed him because he gave you something I couldn't. He made you smile.
So now I say goodbye Sarah my love. I do not blame you for this. I still and will always love you, but I have failed. I had to watch them kill a child. I lost the small piece of my heart that wasn't yours. I am a broken man Sarah. I have nothing left. You don't need or want me. Harriet, Bud and AJ have never needed me. You were all my family and now you have grown up. There is no place for me in your future.
Go be happy Sarah. Live the life you deserve, but never mourn for me. I don't deserve it. I have failed you, I have failed everyone.
Be happy with Webb, smile everyday. He doesn't deserve you, but he's yours. Let him give you everything you ever wanted.
As I leave you tonight, don't remember me as the failure that gave his soul away. Search and find one good memory of me, if you can. Hold onto that and maybe in the next world I won't fail.
I will love you forever,
My Princess, Jarhead, Ninja-Girl, Marine, Mac…Sarah
"Oh God Harm, what have we done to you?" A sobbing Sarah Mackenzie called out to the world that just wasn't listening