Still, he was fairly sure he could tell that Kate was flirting with him. This was flirting, right? Asking about his tattoos, the gentle teasing, suggesting that he was checking her out. Which he wasn't but he might start, she didn't seem like she'd particularly mind. But Kate was a complex girl and she turned it on and off like a light switch, so Jack was having a bit of a hard time reading her signals.
He tried to flirt with her a little, tried to show some interest, tried to have some interest, but he found that it wasn't really in him. He wasn't in the mood. He wasn't looking for a girlfriend, he was okay with this dry spell. But if they were going to be stuck on this island until the end of time then he was aware that he needed to keep his options open because there were only so many people here and he didn't want to cut them all out because the day might come that he'd rather like some company of that variety. But that sounded cold and manipulative and it made him feel more than a little harsh. Now just wasn't a good time for him to get into anything, especially with someone he wasn't absolutely sure it would work out with. The being stuck together thing worked both ways, he wanted to keep his options open, not blow them and risk his only chance.
This was all so stupid, why was he even thinking about this, none of it really mattered. It was just that he didn't really believe that they were going to be getting off this island anytime soon and if that were true then he had to be careful with the relationships he formed because if he entered into some half-hearted thing now with Kate and then it didn't work out, like it clearly wouldn't with Jack in the mind set he was in, then he'd have an ex-girlfriend on the island and that would just be awkward.
But it seemed like all the worrying was for nothing because Kate's flirting was apparently just that. She wasn't looking for anything more than a bit of banter and some inside jokes. She had issues just like Jack and she didn't want a relationship either. Which worked out well for both of them, Jack guessed. Except that now the option had been taken away, Jack started to wonder if it was such a bad idea.
But Jack moved to the caves and Kate stayed on the beach and they were still talking but there was nothing more to it than that. And once he'd been away a little while he found that he didn't really miss her. Which was both relieving and disappointing at the same time. God, why weren't relationships simple? Jack wasn't cut out for all this matters of the heart crap.
And then there was the cave-in and Jack found himself with more time than he'd like to sit and think. He wondered if he and Kate could have made it work. He didn't really feel a whole lot for her but that had never stopped him in the past. Jack had never really been an overly passionate guy and he didn't remember ever meeting someone and just feeling that thing that people talk about. He'd never looked at someone and just known, he'd never had that clarity. He'd also never taken the lead, it wasn't his style. He guessed being alone didn't bother him as much as it seemed to other people. He was used to being alone, he could handle. He didn't object to being in relationships but he'd never really gone out looking for them either.
He wondered what was going on outside the caves. He could hear muffled voices and he was vaguely aware that people were trying to dig him out. He wondered who'd come. He wondered if Kate had come. But Kate was helping Sayid with finding that French distress call so she was probably otherwise engaged. He tried to work out if he cared.
He wondered what Boone was doing. He was undoubtedly trying to help someone but Jack wondered if it was him or Sayid. He kind of hoped it was him, then when, well, if, he got out he could thank him and maybe he wouldn't think he was quite so worthless. Jack felt bad for Boone, he'd had a pretty hard deal since they'd crashed. If he was honest, he wasn't quite sure how someone could have such a run of bad luck. That's what it had to be, right? Bad luck. No way could someone really be that bad at such an array of activities. It wasn't even possible.
But he had a good heart and that was more than most people. He seemed to put others before himself and that was such a good trait to have. Well, actually, it could be quite a damaging trait, especially if you put others so far before yourself that you don't even look after your own being. Everyone needed to learn to look after themselves before they could help others. Boone didn't really seem like he could look after himself all that well. Or he didn't want to look after himself.
And, anyway, Jack should really learn to take a bit of his own advice. He hadn't been looking after himself all that well since he got here either. Those first few days he didn't eat or drink as much as he should have, not that there was all that much to eat and drink, he didn't exactly get a healthy quota of sleep, but that wasn't really on purpose, and then, with those things under his belt, he went wandering off into the jungle alone. But he found this place so he guessed it worked out okay in the end. Except that now he was stuck in a cave and his oxygen was probably running out and his shoulder was dislocated and he was stuck under a boulder. But, y'know, apart from that...
He wondered what it was about Boone that made him keep popping up in Jack's thoughts. Jack thought that maybe, in another life, he could have been like Boone, or Boone could have been like him. They had similar qualities. They wanted to help, they wanted to look after people, they wanted to problem solve. The only difference was that Boone seemed to have some kind of blockage between what he wanted to do and what he actually managed to achieve. Jack knew that he didn't have a malicious bone in his body and yet he so rarely seemed to succeed. And Jack could kind of see a younger, and way more insecure, version of himself in there. That was probably why he was drawn to Boone. That was why he couldn't get him out of his head. There was no other explanation that he could come up with, nothing else that made any kind of sense. Boone wasn't really the kind of person he'd normally find himself spending time with though. But then, nothing about this situation was normal.