Jack shook his head. "Nothing," he replied, his eyes also on Shannon's back.
Boone looked at him curiously, going over to sit down. "You guys were talking about me, weren't you?"
"No," Jack said, turning to face Boone.
"Yeah you were," he insisted. "What did she say?"
"She's just looking out for you," Jack told him.
"Really?" Boone asked. That didn't sound like Shannon.
"Despite what you might think she's actually quite fond of you," Jack smiled, taking in his reaction.
"I'm not saying she hates me or anything," Boone said. "But that doesn't mean she cares what happens to me either."
"She cares," Jack told him. "So has she told you about yesterday?"
"A little," Boone replied. "Not much. She doesn't want to go into details, started spouting crap about trauma again. Typical Shannon. She just said that they found their base, which was a hatch like this, but they weren't willing to part with Walt easily. Then she said something about hand-to-hand combat, hence all the blood."
Jack nodded. "That's pretty much the story Locke told me," he agreed. "Except that he added fun details about how they weren't working alone and their friends will probably hunt us down and kill us. Other than that..."
"Oh goody, more drama," Boone commented.
"Yep," Jack replied, looking distant.
"You okay?" Boone asked him.
Jack turned to look at him and shook his head a little. "I'm fine."
Boone looked at him. "You don't look fine."
"I'm just... thinking about something," Jack said. "I want to tell you a story."
"A story?" Boone asked. "What kind of story?"
Jack looked like he was about to say something but then turned away instead, sighing. He tapped his foot nervously on the floor, looking deep in thought. Boone wanted to ask him what he was thinking but he was fairly sure he wasn't going to get an answer.
"It's a story about some people called Jack and Sarah," Jack finally said, concentrating on some point far off.
Boone looked at him. This was clearly some kind of transference thing, some way for Jack to distance himself from the situation. But if it meant that Boone was finally going to get some answers then he could go with it.
"Okay," he said. "So what did, erm, Jack and Sarah do?"
"Well, Jack was a doctor. He was a good doctor but he was a bad person. He treated his patients like crap, he was blunt and unsupportive to them. And then one day Sarah comes in. She has multiple crushed vertebrae. Jack lays it out for her and tells her there's every chance that she's never gonna walk again and he doesn't even care about the look on her face when he says it. And then Jack's dad, who's also a doctor and makes a living out of eavesdropping on his son, gives him a talk about hope. He says Jack should try handing some out. So Jack goes to operate on Sarah and she says how she knows she won't dance at her wedding, she doesn't hope for anything else anymore. And it gets to Jack, and that's never really happened before. So he finds himself making her a promise. He tells her that he's going to fix her. And even as he says it he knows that he can't do it, he knows that it would be a miracle. But he's said it and it's out there and now all he can do is try."
Jack stops, the memories clearly getting to him.
"But he does fix her, right?" Boone prompted.
Jack nodded. "He fixed her," he agreed. "He didn't think he had though. He went to tell her that he'd failed, that she was never gonna be able to walk again. But when he tells her she points out that she can wiggle her toes. And then Jack and Sarah start crying like a couple of girls and they look into each others eyes and they just know, they know they're going to be together, they know they have no choice. Something happened without them even noticing it and now everything's changed."
Jack paused again, that far off look in his eyes. Boone couldn't help but notice that he seemed to be stuck somewhere between happy and sad. He obviously loved Sarah so the memories of getting together were obviously happy ones but at the same something bad had clearly happened and it was tainting all the other memories. Boone understood that feeling all too well.
"They got married a little over a year later, which was sadly the longest relationship Jack had ever had. But before they got married they talked about things a lot, they talked about what they wanted. And they both wanted kids. So they decided they were gonna start trying on their wedding night, they wanted to get pregnant straight away." Jack paused again looking uncomfortable. "And they did, pretty much. She got pregnant somewhere in those first two months, and they were both over the moon."
Boone looked at him. "You have a kid?"
Jack shook his head sadly and Boone could guess where this story was going.
"So Sarah was eight and a half months pregnant, she only had six weeks to go, and she was sat at home, enjoying her maternity leave." Jack paused again, looking uncomfortable. "Her feet are all swollen so she kicks off her pumps and sits back, watching TV and trying to get comfortable. Then the doorbell rings and she gets up and trips on the pumps and lands hard on her stomach. And she starts bleeding. And she doesn't stop."
Jack closed his eyes and took a deep breath, clearly trying not to cry. And Boone was actually having a similar problem. Poor Jack. Boone couldn't imagine what that must be like. He knew there was something that Jack was hiding from him, he knew something else happened that caused the break-up of their marriage, but he never imagined this.
Jack opened his eyes again and continued. "After that Jack and Sarah kind of fell apart. Jack turned into a real asshole. He stopped talking, he stopped communicating, he was barely even around anymore, he only went home to sleep after working double shifts at the hospital so that he didn't have to think. And he stopped treating the patients like real people, he stopped treating anyone like they were real people. And then one day he went home and Sarah presented him with divorce papers. And he wasn't surprised, he couldn't even pretend to be surprised, he was actually just wondering what took her so long. They fought over the house, just for the sake of fighting over it really, just because it was the most they'd communicated in months. But Sarah got it so Jack moved out and they've never spoken since."
"I'm sorry," Boone said, for lack of anything better to say.
Jack shook his head. "Don't be sorry. I'm sorry."
Boone looked at him. "Why are you sorry?"
Jack looked at him for the first time since starting the story. "Because, about six or seven months after his divorce, Jack gets in a plane crash and he winds up on this crazy island." Boone smiled at him. "And on this island, he meets a guy. And Jack's never been into guys but he's into this guy. And he starts a relationship with this guy but he does it all wrong. The beginning of the relationship with this guy is like the end of his marriage to Sarah. He doesn't communicate, he doesn't share, he shuts the guy out. Which is really unfair because he loves the guy, he really does, but he's just scared because he feels like some stupid teenager around him and he doesn't know what that means. So he throws himself into his work as island doctor and he makes fifty million excuses not to be intimate with him. And he's sorry. He's sorry he's such a jerk. He's gonna try harder."
Boone smiled at him. "Well the guy loves him too," he told him. "And he doesn't think he's being jerk. And he's more than willing to wait as long as it takes."
Jack smiled back at him. "Thank you."
Boone shrugged. "I'm glad you told me that story," he said. "Answers a lot of questions."
Jack nodded. "Well, I think you were due some answers." He sighed and closed his eyes again, rubbing them with the heels of his hands. He then let his arms drop down and crossed them over his stomach. He glanced at Boone. "I don't have issues with sex," he said. "I like it when I'm having it, it's just not top of my to do list."
Boone nodded. "Okay," he said. "I don't mind, Jack."
"You should."
Boone shook his head. "I don't."
Jack nodded. "Baby steps."
Boone smiled at him and nodded. "Baby steps," he agreed.