Again, my apologies for the time-length in between updates. I've been busy and I am a suffering perfectionist, who proofreads like crazy. Also, Thank you, Lostpedia. LOL.
The warmth of the dish water soothed his hands as he scrubbed the ceramic bowl with his favorite sponge. What was left of dinner was placed in its proper plastic containers and stacked neatly in the refrigerator, and now a pile of dishes were left in its wake, to clean, dry and organize. He always knew that there was a bit of obsessive compulsiveness within his personality when it came to his kitchen, his home in general, and he could never really shake it, and never really wanted to. From the time he was a child, he remembered taking on responsibilities that his father neglected. Cleaning, dusting, everything that maintained the home they lived in here on the Island, what home the Dharma Initiative provided for them. Roger hadn't bothered himself with much, except for a cold beer and the television set whenever he was home, followed by throwing his son around for good measure, for no reason at all.
Ben haphazardly dropped a freshly-cleaned coffee mug into the dish rack, the thoughts he'd let creep in surprising him. He wasn't sure why he was suddenly thinking about his father, after so many years of avoiding the very idea of him. Maybe it was because he was assessing his role as a father more so these days than ever before. Alex was always so quiet, so reserved, and angry. She sat there at the dinner table and neglected to engage in his attempts at conversation, pushing the mash potatoes around her plate, avoiding the meatloaf like the plague, scratching the spokes of her fork repeatedly, creating that shrill racket that she knew he hated. She asked to be excused for the night, and with a broken heart, he let her do so, watching as she quickly disappeared down the hallway to her bedroom. Was it really that hard to just sit with him, to eat the dinner he'd prepared and to just talk to him? Sadly, it must have been. He cleared the table and went about the lonely duties of clean-up, wondering what he could possibly do to get his little girl back, and realizing that she was much like him, determined, stubborn, and persistent in whatever she wanted to do, and if she wanted to hate him, she was going to, no matter what.
Over Ben's shoulder, Alex stood in the door frame of the hallway, watching as he tended to the rest of the dishes, scrubbing, rinsing and then putting them into the dish rack to dry. She hadn't spoken a word to him since coming back from her failed plot of running away. He asked her where she'd been and she lied, telling him that she took up residence at one of her friend's houses nearby, and simply forgot to tell him about the sleepover. The lie came so easily and she felt no guilt, no shame. He lied to her on a regular basis, why would she? She chastised herself for far more than lying to her father. Why hadn't she fought harder to go with Locke? Why had he insisted that she go back? Why had she listened to him? Why didn't he want her? Because he feared that she would get in his way, just like everyone else had. She honestly thought that he would be different, that he would give her the chance to prove herself, but he hadn't, he shipped her away. When were people going to get it? That she could take care of herself and was far more mature than most people her age?
In the weeks since, nothing had changed. She still felt trapped, overly-guarded and protected. She overheard Ben in his office before he called her down for dinner, talking to someone very cryptically, someone he was in business with apparently. He sounded all too pleased with what he heard. He tried to hide it from whomever he was talking to, but she could hear it in his tone. What business did he need to tend to in Los Angeles? She thought to herself as she continued to eavesdrop. Another secret he was keeping from her, another plot that no one knew about, and that nothing good could possibly come from. She was shaken from her thoughts by the sharp clang of a glass falling to the floor. Luckily it hadn't broken into pieces, but it had cracked, rendering it useless.
"Damnit." Ben swore, gripping the handle of his cane so that he could bend for the broken glass at his feet. That sprung Alex into action.
"Here. Let me help you." She startled him, catching him off guard as he balanced himself, his right hand gripping the cane handle tightly. He presented a grateful smile and straightened.
"Thank you." Ben said, using the countertop's edge as leverage as he righted himself. "It must have slipped."
Alex picked up the broken glass, setting it on the counter. "You should sit. I can get the rest."
Ben resisted. "No, that's fine—"
"Dad." She said it sternly, leaving no room for argument. This was the first time she called him that in a long time, since the scene on the docks with Locke. In fact, even then it was a spontaneous outburst, because before then, she'd always called him Ben. He hated it so much when she called him that, how impersonal and detached it felt, the emotional connotation of 'Dad' and the way she said it brought emotions that he hadn't felt in weeks. He couldn't help but smile.
Alex gripped his right forearm, lightly. "You're not supposed to be on your feet for too long. You should sit."
She was obviously worried; she obviously cared more than she led on. His physical therapy sessions had been going well. He was on his feet again, his right leg giving out earlier than his left whenever he tried to walk, but he and his therapist were working on it. He leaned into her as she helped him towards one of the dining room chairs nearby. He wasn't sure where his rebellious, defiant teenager had gone in that moment, but he liked this version of her so much better. He missed her. It reminded him of the days when it was so much easier to understand her, when she would wrap her little arms around his leg and beg him to play with her, her pigtails adorned with little blue ribbons that she demanded he tie in. It reminded him that she was still a compassionate human being, and that he hadn't completely screwed up.
"You overheard my physical therapist." Ben said with a laugh as he slowly lowered himself into the chair. She always made herself scarce during his physical therapy sessions, but she knew that detail, which meant that she'd been eavesdropping; it meant that she cared about his progress. Alex didn't acknowledge his accusation, busying herself with the dishes that were left in the sudsy dish water, providing the perfect excuse for avoiding him again until she was done. She caught him staring at her as she placed a sparkling clean casserole dish into the dish drain.
"What?" She shrugged, annoyed by the gleeful smile on his face.
"Nothing." He was still grinning, wrinkles at the far corners of his eyes. "This just brings back memories. You were around four years old and whenever I was cooking, you wanted to help. You wanted to help with everything. Your favorite toy was this little kitchen set with the little convection oven in it." Daddy's little helper, he would call her, so grateful that she was such an attentive and helpful child, always so eager to please him. He could see it in his mind's eye, the way she looked up at him with those impressionably dark eyes, sparkling with love and adoration for the man that seemed so tall and larger than life.
Not eliciting the response that he thought he would, he continued to ramble. "I walked outside today, into the front yard." He said after a breath. "It was nice. I saw that, that swing you loved so much when you were little. I remember playing with you out there for hours, pushing you and you asking me to push you again and again until you were as high as the sky." He smiled then. "Your laugh was so…pure, and sweet. I would give anything to—"
Alex whirled around angrily, her eyes spitting fire and brimstone, her voice loud and angry. "Why the sudden trip down memory lane, Ben?"
He sat back, startled, his mouth open, his heart cracking in his chest. So, she was back to calling him Ben, he thought sadly, that supportive and worried teenager of minutes past now gone, back to her old vindictive self. He chose his words carefully, said them slowly. "Honestly? Because within the past minute, you've said more to me than you have the past three weeks."He folded his hands and placed them in his lap as he hung his head. "I thought I'd seize the opportunity."
Alex's eyes fell to the floor, shaking her head. "Well, you can stop, because I'm not interested in hearing about my childhood or how good things used to be." She looked back up to him, her face stoic and strained.
Ben studied his daughter, his eyes seeping with his pain. She stood with her arms crossed over her chest, looking away from him with the roll of her eyes, her hair tied into a messy ponytail, a few loose curls framing her face. She was so beautiful, he thought. So smart and strong, everything he imagined her to be. It hurt to see her this way, so spiteful and nasty. It wasn't who she was, but it was who she tried so hard to be.
He said the words slowly. "What have I done to deserve your hatred?" His voice shook, cracked. He shrugged his shoulders, truly confused. "I've raised you, I've clothed you. I've made sure you always had a safe place to call home." And this was how she treated him, as if he had done someone so reprehensible to her. "Why do you hate me so much?"
"Why do you hate John Locke so much?" Alex retorted, avoiding his question.
Now he was mad. Where the hell did Locke fit into this discussion? Ben asked himself. What was she trying to prove? "I'm not talking about John Locke with you." He responded, his tone back to the reserved, clipped register that made her suspect him even more. "Not now and not ever."
Alex jerked forward, almost screaming. "Why not? Because I'm too young to understand, because I can't take it, or because if it wasn't for me, you would have killed him, shot him right there on the dock like a dog?" Before Ben could answer, Alex continued. "Oh no, wait, you wouldn't have done it, you would have had someone else—"
"Because it's none of your business, Alex!" Ben blurted out, furiously, his eyes bulging, giving his daughter a full view of the tears pooling there. He cleared his throat and regained some semblance of composure. "What do you want me to say?" His tone showcased his hurt and agony with the constant tension in their relationship. Above all else, he sounded tired, exhausted with being treated this way. "That I enjoy what I had to do to protect you, to protect our family? That I like disappointing you? That I love the way you look at me now, with no emotion whatsoever besides this…anger that I never knew you would hold onto for this long?"
He was breaking down right in front of her and it felt liberating, and he couldn't stop, obliterating that barrier between them was in his grasp. If only he could reach her again. He was feeble now, listless, but still a stern determination to get his daughter back shone brightly. "Why can't you see that all I've ever tried to do is keep you safe? I did what I had to do on that dock, and you're right, I wouldn't have had Locke killed in front of you, because I care deeply about what you're exposed to, because you're my daughter. So, sue me for not wanting to destroy what innocence you have left."
He could see that she was considering every word he spoke, with the depth and importance with which he delivered them. "Don't you see, Alexandra?" He hadn't called her that in years, and somehow, it brought tears to her eyes, tears she didn't even attempt to hide. "It doesn't matter what I would have done to Locke or anyone else that threatens the safety of those who live in this community, I will protect you, always, but it doesn't change the fact that you weren't supposed to be out there in the first place."
Alex shook her head scoldingly as she wiped at her tears. She was almost there, caught up in what he was trying to spin in his favor. He still didn't get it, that she knew that everything he'd ever done hadn't been all about protecting her or this community, that there were things that he did and would always do because he wanted to inflict pain, because he was a vengeful and petty human being, who would do anything maintain power. The more he tried to dress up his decisions, the more she realized that he would never change.
She scoffed at the gentleness in her father's eyes, in the way that he slouched in his chair for effect. She saw the hope drain from his eyes at the cynical snort. He was no delicate old man who was just severely misunderstood, and for the first time in a long time, she knew she wouldn't waffle on that depiction.
"Like that's justification for what you were gonna do to him if I hadn't been." She stepped away from the kitchen counter, approaching him. "And you wonder why I hate you." With that striking blow, she moved into the dim hallway, the shuffling of her feet was the last thing Ben heard before the click of her door shutting behind her.
Ben's eyes slid close, the tightness of his features helped him to hold back the flood of tears that were ready to blow. Stiffly, he rose from the chair and wobbled over to the kitchen sink, where dishes still lay in the lukewarm water. Pivoting his cane against the lower cabinets, Ben sunk his hands into the water. He felt so cold, numb even, then spiraling rage swept through him, warming him all over. He picked up a plate from the suds, and reached for the sponge to clean it, but instead, in his ire, slammed it over the edge of the counter, shattering it into pieces, before he bowed over, small, imperceptible sobs emanating from him.
He let the pieces that he held in his hands drop to the floor as he allowed the tears in his eyes to let gravity take them as well.
Jack knocked on the door of apartment 15B lightly, not sure if anyone was home. He was sure this was the right apartment complex, but his timing might not have been too great, as he stood at the doorstep, not bothering to call to make sure that she was there. He knocked again, but no one responded. He began to walk away when the door opened. He turned, meeting the dark, deep eyes of a woman, blonde hair tied back into a neat bun, a silky blouse and slacks completed her professional look.
"Hi, uh, I'm sorry. I must have the wrong apartment number." Jack said with a timid smile, looking back at the gold numbers and letter that were nailed to the door. 15B. He was in the right place after all. "I'm looking for Juliet Burke."
The woman smiled back, opening the door a little wider. She couldn't help but notice how attractive he was, the scruff on his face and the tattered, rustic look made him all the more alluring. The leather jacket didn't hurt matters either. She now knew why her sister was so smitten with him. "Then you're in the right place. I'm her sister, Rachel. You must be Jack."
He let out an embarrassed, nervous laugh, extending his hand to her. "Yes, yes, I am. It's very nice to meet you." Rachel took it, shaking it with a flirtatious flare that went right over his head. "Juliet has told me a lot about you." He knew about the cancer, how it ravaged her body, but then the breakthrough, the pregnancy. He was staring at the reason why Juliet wanted off that Island square in the face.
"Ditto." Rachel said, unable to let go of her smile and his hand. He was gorgeous, she thought to herself. Juliet hadn't even begun to explain how much. His features were striking, and his smile was enough to melt her flesh right off her bones. She mentally shook herself out of her trance and invited him inside. "Please come in."
"Thank you." Jack offered, stepping past her and into the apartment.
Rachel closed the door behind her, turning on her heels, watching as he made the room look smaller than it was before. "Juliet is in the back, I'll let her know you're here." She disappeared down a hallway, leaving Jack to scrutinize the apartment.
It was quaint, but modern, comfortable, but stylish all the same. It reminded him of Juliet, a woman of experience and taste, but understated and welcoming. He noticed a picture frame on a nearby end-table. Curious, he picked it up, smiling at the photo. It was a photo of Juliet, Rachel and a young boy. Blonde hair, the same hue as Juliet's, and dark eyes, like his mother. He must be Julian, Jack thought, harkening on the memories of how Juliet described him, her only point of reference to his features was scratchy video feed that Ben allowed her to see.
Rachel walked into the room with a small child in tow, causing Jack to place the frame back in is proper place. The child sat on her left hip, his head buried into the crook of her neck, half asleep. Julian, the miraculous result of Juliet's groundbreaking fertility research, Jack realized. Rachel approached him.
"Jack," she said, staring at her son as he rose from her shoulder, rubbing the back of one small hand over his eyes. She rubbed her hand through his golden locks, kissing his forehead. "This is my son, Julian." The child looked over at him and he could have sworn he felt a lump form in his throat. He was one cute kid; the photo hadn't done him justice. "Can you say hello?"
"Hello." Julian whispered, waving with his other hand.
Jack waved and smiled at the young boy. "Hi." He caught Rachel's proud look at her son, who burrowed into her shoulder again. "He's beautiful."
"Thank you." She said.
Juliet rounded a corner then, wearing tight blue jeans and a modest V-neck t-shirt, the color of violet, her hair up in a ponytail, her bare feet shuffling against the floor. Her sister hadn't told her who was waiting for her in her living room, so when she caught sight of him, her eyes went wild with joy.
"Jack!" She exclaimed, lunging herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck in a tight hug. "It's so good to see you!" He smiled widely at her excitement to see him, wrapping his arms around her waist. She'd called him numerous times, to check up on him, to let him know that she was there if he needed someone to talk to, but he never made the attempt to reach out, until now.
Rachel cleared her throat, garnering Jack and Juliet's attention. She nodded towards the door, fitting Julian more securely atop her hip while pulling the straps of her purse and his backpack over her unoccupied shoulder. "We should get going, Jules." She snickered at hearing Juliet's snort of disapproval, but she knew that she wanted to catch up with her friend. "My feet are killing me and I still have to decide what I'm gonna feed this one for dinner. Thank you for babysitting him while I interviewed."
"Anytime." Juliet walked over to her, cupped her face in her hands and kissed her on the forehead. "I love you. Call me when you can." She said before doing the same to Julian, diving in to kiss his cheek.
"I love you too, and I'll call you as soon as I've got him tucked in bed." She looked over Juliet's shoulder to Jack. "It's nice to meet you."
"You too." Jack said as he waved.
Juliet escorted Rachel and Julian to her door, and they were half-way into the hallway before Rachel leaned in and whispered, "I want every detail." She winked and then walked out, leaving her sister to blush furiously in the doorway. She cleared her throat and closed the door. She turned to Jack, giving him a look that he read all too easily.
He shrugged his broad shoulders. "I know, I know. I disappeared on you. I'm sorry."
"Disappeared is a gross understatement, Jack." Besides the slightly longer hair and the growth on his cheeks and chin, he looked different. She couldn't quite place what was different, but something was. "I've called, left messages…"
"Yeah, I know, I've been busy." Juliet gestured towards the couch, and both she and Jack dropped onto it, their thighs grazing slightly.
"I'm guessing your patient load has gotten worse since coming back, I know mine has. Everyone wants to have a baby it seems." She chuckled, but he suddenly felt uncomfortable. He hadn't told her that he wasn't going back to the hospital, not now at least. How could he break it to her that he was busy trying to find the Island, something that he lied to her face about once already?
"I, um, haven't gone back to work. Yet." He looked back at the photo of Juliet, Rachel and Julian that sat across the room. "They're beautiful, Juliet. Your sister, you nephew, your family. I'm really happy for you."
His sad smile knocked her out of her good mood and trapped her in whatever her friend was going through. She finally realized what it was about him that was different. He didn't look happy. Granted he wasn't completely happy while on the Island, but the anticipation of going home made him extremely happy. Was it not what he expected?
"Jack? What's wrong?" Juliet asked.
He turned to her, his eyes connecting with hers. "I lied to you. On the submarine. You asked me what Kate and I talked about before I left and it wasn't nothing. It wasn't goodbye."
Juliet stood then, her shock and disappointment evident in the way she did so. She turned, her hip cocked, her arms folded over her chest, a stance that reminded him so much of Kate, that for a second, his heart literally jolted. "You're going back for her."
Jack clamped his hands together in front of him, his fingers cradling between each other, readying himself for the opposition. "Yeah." He didn't even attempt to correct her phrasing, because for all intents and purposes, he was going back for Kate, there was no denying that. He couldn't even bring himself to lie about that one, no matter how hard he tried to.
"I can't just leave them on that Island, Juliet. They're gonna—"
"Are you crazy, Jack?" She interrupted him, not giving him a chance to explain, her voice biting and pithy. "Have you literally lost your mind?"
He mentally coached his temper to stay leveled, because he wasn't expecting her to be happy with his decision, but when he spoke, he sounded just as terse, defensive and pent up as she. "No, I haven't lost my mind, Juliet." He looked up at her, his eyes squinting with suspicion. "Were you actually expecting me to just walk away from them, leaving them there to die?"
She shrugged her shoulders, never breaking from her defensive pose. "I don't know what I was expecting, Jack. Maybe I was expecting you to tell me the truth, because that's what friends do for one another." Now, he felt guilty again. They had forged a pretty elaborate bond before leaving the Island, a sacred trust that Jack relied on heavily after Kate's betrayal. He didn't know how he would have gotten through it without her friendship. He was still trying to get through it.
He took a deep breath, looking down at the floor. When he was ready to tell her the reason why he kept it from her, he met her frosty glare, crystallizing behind icy blue eyes. "I couldn't risk you talking me out of it."
"Oh, so, you thought I would talk you out of it, because you know, deep down inside that it's a terrible, dangerous idea." Juliet pushed. Why was Jack still willing to sacrifice everything? The answer was crystal clear. "I knew she'd get to you."
That got his attention like nothing else. "Get to me? What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about Kate, Jack!" She nearly yelled. "You think that the Fugitive hasn't told Ben about this yet? You think that she kept her word for once? I was there, when you made her promise not to come back for you, and what happened? She completely ignored you, her own safety and nearly ruined everything. Now you think that she's keeping your secret over her own life?"
Jack shook his head. How could Juliet have gotten it so wrong? Her hatred of Kate was blinding her. "She never meant to—"
"Never meant to what? Interfere? Because that's exactly what she was doing there." Juliet interrupted. If Kate couldn't have him, no one could, she thought with a derisive chuckle. She stepped closer to him, driving her final point home, hoping that Jack would realize the truth of it, once and for all. "She doesn't care about what it costs you, what risks you took to save her; she completely turned her back on that and did what she wanted to do. She's impulsive, selfish and she'll do anything to—"
"Do not talk about her like you know her!" Jack interrupted her with pointed aggression in his tone, his voice profoundly strained, his eyes black with annoyance and more emotion than she had seen from him in a very long time. He spoke again once he calmed down. "She didn't know that Locke was trying to blow up the submarine and she didn't say anything to Ben. She came back because she thought I was in danger. She—", he swallowed then, still finding it so frustrating that she risked her life for his. He still shook with anger about it. "She did it for me."
"She had no idea what I had planned until I told her that night in the gameroom." He could see her face, the way her hopeful smile slid to the pavement floors when he told her that they were letting him go. There was no pretending her devastation.
"You want to know what I do know?" Juliet pushed, softly, yet firmly.
Jack cocked his head, his eyes squinting. "What's that?"
"She broke your heart, Jack," she punctuated each word of that sentence, and Jack balked away slightly as she finished her thought, "and she doesn't even know it."
She wanted Kate to know just how much she'd hurt this man, she wanted to see her in hell for it and nothing less. The sharpness of her words felt like body blows that made him feel winded, suddenly sucking in air that his lungs failed to grab hold to.
He was still protecting her, Juliet thought, and it literally made her sick to her stomach. Kate was a delicate subject for him; that much she understood, that much she hated, because it was still evident that Jack loved her, and wouldn't stand for anyone speaking of her in the way that Juliet felt necessary for him to hear. It infuriated her how he refused to listen to reason when it came to Kate. She'd seen her file, the list of crimes she'd committed, and why she was in Australia. Jack would do nothing but ruin his life by getting any more involved with her than he already was.
He combed his fingers through his hair, his head hanging low. His fingertips dug into his closed eyelids, and he chuckled a little, amused by her insinuation that he'd forgotten how battered he was over Kate, how destroyed he still was about her. He woke up with it, he went to bed with it, he was living it.
"You think I don't know that?" His voice was humble, emotional, slurred. He stared at her, trying to convince her with some shred of emotionless assurance in his eyes, but he falter, their color bleeding from wounds he thought had healed.
In the darker moments of the past few weeks, when he sat in his apartment late at night, with the lights out, slipping into the abyss with nothing but the desk lap on his dining table illuminating a small corner of his apartment, his eyes would slide close and he saw her. Her wild, dark curls, moody green eyes, the way her freckles seemed to migrate over the curve of her nose and the paleness of her cheeks, so that there was always a new place to discover them. Every minute detail that he thought he'd forget by this time was eerily magnified, cemented in his memory. Every time it happened, every time he saw her, the tone of the vision became all the more gloomy, dangerous, more immediate and pressing. At first, he just recalled memories of stolen moments between them, but the focus was always her, how her dimples dented at the slightest upturn of her lips, how she bit her bottom lip when she was worried. But then he would see things that he never remembered being there for, moments that weren't theirs, but hers. Her moments of solitude crept in, but he felt like he was a part of them somehow, but he couldn't break through. He could never feel or touch, just watch, experience. How was that possible?
During this last haunting, he saw her alone in the jungle, running, her feet beating against the ground rhythmically, her heart pounding erratically, her eyes darting frantically. He felt like he was right next to her, like he was moving with her through the trees, and then she slipped away, she disappeared and in a sense, so had he. In that instant, when he felt her vanish, he opened his eyes with a start, soaking in a cold sweat, realizing with certainty that even she, with all the distance between them, held this power over him that he could never escape, thoughts of her left the line between reality and desire remarkably blurred. He worried for her, too much to think straight. Was what he saw real? If it was, what kind of danger was Kate in? What if he couldn't get to her in time? In order to get his mind off of it, he poured himself into the maps and charts that were scattered throughout his apartment, the results disastrous, fueling him towards a spiraling defeat, one he wasn't sure he had the strength to get up from.
Juliet was just trying to look out for him, he knew that and was grateful for it, but Kate wasn't the enemy. She was the only person he truly trusted, even in spite of the pain she'd caused him. How could she break something she never really knew she had? He thought over and over again. He had no right to be heartbroken, when she was free to sleep with whomever she pleased, but why didn't that make him feel any better? Why hadn't that logical conclusion made their separation, this length of time away from her any easier? She was never his to lose, and still he felt this gaping hole in his life where she used to reside.
"She made her choice, Juliet." His voice was so raw and indelible. He sounded so sure of himself, so resolute with it, even though tears still sat low in his eyes. "She chose. I need to learn how to live with that." He covered his face in his hands, wondering just when he would ever learn.
Juliet walked over to the couch and sat down next to him. She brought a hand to his shoulder, holding there. He lowered his hands. "But I can't think about that right now, not until after I get back. I have to focus on getting to them…and I can't…" He groaned, bringing a hand up to his eyes, rubbing them again.
"Can't what?" Juliet dragged a soothing hand up and down his back.
He looked over at her. Her eyes were so soft, understanding, her heart breaking for him. "Find the Island." He rose to his feet, wordless for minutes on end, pacing the floor in front of her. "I've been looking for weeks, but nothing. It's like it doesn't even exist." He cupped a hand over his forehead, his headache from earlier still pulsating, that small bite of scotch fizzing away. "It doesn't make any sense. Ben wanted me to lie about the Island, but why, if it's not possible to find it?"
"I don't know, Jack. His twisted way of taking precaution, like Brian said." She wished that she could offer answers, to give him some peace of mind, but she couldn't. That explanation wasn't good enough for him. He continued to walk in a circle, in deep, drowning thought.
"So, what is your plan, exactly?" She asked, looking up at him. "Do you expect to land a plane onto the Island, grab everyone off the beach and go completely unnoticed by Ben?"
Jack stopped his movements and contemplating. "Why would he try to stop me? He got what he wanted from me, and now he's done."
Juliet shook her head. "He's never done, Jack. Do you honestly not remember how diabolical he is?" Jack turned from her then, pacing like a caged animal, rubbing the back of his head impatiently. He didn't need this. There were so many obstacles in his way already; he didn't need her adding to it because she still wasn't sold on the idea. She noticed the stubbornness of his stride and stood up, reaching for him, making him turn to look at her, stepping into him until he couldn't avoid what she was telling him.
"He always has some hidden agenda, Jack. Always. He planted himself near your camp, because he wanted you to find him, he needed you to help him and he kept me on that Island under false pretenses and he had no intention of letting me go, not until it suited him." Juliet pointed out.
"He has a gift of making you believe that his idea is actually yours and that you came to it all on your own." Like performing the surgery, Juliet thought. Ben knew just how to destroy Jack, by stripping him of the person he loved, predicting that he would agree to the surgery to find a way out, but he underestimated just how much Jack loved and what he was willing to do for those he cared about.
"Ben is the least of my problems." Jack admitted under his breath, his hands resting on his hips.
"What does that mean?" Juliet asked, worriedly.
Jack hesitated, deliberating in his head just how to say this, what words to use, what tone to express. He walked to one side of the room and then retraced his steps. "Something is happening to me. Something I can't explain." He finally confessed, speaking to her without actually looking at her. "All this time I've been trying to find the Island, to get there for my friends, to do what I promised them, but I feel like it's not as cut and dry as that anymore, and I can't make it stop." He could hear Locke in his head again, goading.
'When you get off this Island, when you see your world without it, you'll do anything to get back here again.'
Jack grabbed at his forehead again, rubbing it with his fingertips. "Locke said that once I leave the Island, I would do anything to find it again." He turned his back to her, staring at the ceiling with vacant eyes. He whirled back around, the concern for him in Juliet's eyes palpable. "I think he knows something that I don't. That I don't understand, or that I don't want to understand, but either way, I don't think he's as crazy as I want him to be. I don't think he ever was."
"Locke is crazy, Jack." If Juliet knew one thing, it was that. The man was a ticking time bomb and if Jack hadn't left the Island when he had, Locke would have gotten him killed. "He was running for the submarine with a bag of explosives. I would be surprised if Ben hasn't had him killed already." Juliet tried to make this okay for him, but her assurance wasn't reaching him.
"But what if he was right?" Jack asked. "What if …what I'm feeling is because of the Island itself? Because I wasn't supposed to leave?"
Juliet was exasperated with what was running through Jack's head. It was becoming impossible to keep up with him. "You're talking about the Island as if it has some hold over you."
"Maybe it does." He retorted curtly.
Juliet shook her head emphatically, bringing her hands up in front of her, waving them, signaling got him to stop. "Jack, this is ridiculous. You're just anxious to get back to your friends. You've been working yourself into an early grave, because you're worried about them, nothing more. You—"
"That's not it, not all of it." Jack interrupted. "I know exhaustion, I know anxiety. I'm a surgeon, I've lived with it for years, I know how to control it, but this…this is something I've never experienced before. I don't have a frame of reference for anything I'm feeling right now." She recognized just how scared he was right then, the fear of what was happening to him was eating him alive. Everything that was certain suddenly wasn't.
A tear escaped down his cheek. "I don't know what's happening to me, but getting back to this Island, it's… all I have left."
"Jack…" She said his name with such sadness and despair. He was deteriorating right in front of her and there was nothing she could do. Getting back to the Island was becoming his existence, his everything. He had so much more to live for, to go on for. He was a brilliant doctor, a wonderful man who had so many years ahead of him. Her love for him grew with what heart she knew him to have. He was sweet and gentle, a loving, caring person. He deserved it all, and the fact that he felt he had nothing left, it was devastating.
"You have Rachel and Julian, you have a family." He argued before she could state her case for him staying put, because he knew that she would try. "You got your life back, Juliet, and you worked hard to get it back. You left the Island in your rearview where it should be, but I can't." She could never understand what was going on with him, he realized. He was speaking in tongues to her, saying things that the Jack she knew just weeks ago would never have uttered.
"Fact of the matter is, I don't want my old life back, not until I find what I'm looking for, and even after that, who knows?" He shrugged his shoulders, a meek smile on his face. "Maybe I've changed too much, maybe I've finally realized that I can never go back to the way things were."
He didn't know what the future held for him, everything was so convoluted. He didn't feel what he thought he would feel about anything. The Island was it. It was the only thing that made sense. Juliet looked stricken just then, her eyes darting back and forth as she looked in the distance. Jack saw that she was no longer listening to him, lost in her own thoughts immediately.
"Juliet? What's wrong?" He asked, watching as she leaned down onto a nearby bookcase, crossing her arms over her chest. He reached out to her; his hands caressed her elbows lightly. She closed her eyes for a few seconds, hurt by the tenderness of his touch, the way he was so ready to comfort her when she didn't deserve it.
She bit at her bottom lip. "There was something that I've wanted to tell you for a very long time, but…"
She stopped there, and Jack pushed for more. "What? What is it?"
She opened her eyes to find his pleading face, the face she could never deny. "You have a sister and a nephew too, Jack."
His eyebrows scrunched inward, an uncompromising, quizzical crease fell between them. His head leaned to the side, and he dropped his hands from her, moving from her a touch. "Wh—What?"
She was looking down at his feet at this point, unable to look him in the eyes. "Ben gave me the assignment of picking apart your life, to read and know everything about you—"
"Yeah, Ben used you to try to manipulate me into agreeing to help him, I was there. You told me about that already." His voice was searching, waiting anxiously for the news that had her on pins and needles all of a sudden.
"Well, there's more." She crossed her arms more tightly, and finally connected to his eyes, which were glazed with ignorance. "There were things in your file about your father that I never told you, that I couldn't tell you. About his travels, details and records that he kept from you and your mother." She swallowed, and then continued. "He spent quite a bit of time in Australia over the years. It wasn't some random spot he chose to go to when he left."
God, this was so hard. "He, uh, he had an affair with someone he met there, twenty-four years ago and she became pregnant. It was on-going, lasted for some time, until they decided to part ways, because your father wasn't willing to divorce your mother." Jack stepped back, her words knocking him away a few steps, but she continued.
"She gave birth to a baby girl. He went down there to try to connect with her, but she didn't want anything to do with him." Jack turned away from her, his hand over his mouth. Juliet was starting to break down, her voice shaky and nervy. "That was a week before he died."
He had a sister? This wasn't possible. He didn't want to believe it. He looked back over at Juliet. He could tell she hadn't told him everything. She was still holding something back. "There's more, isn't there?"
"Jack, I—" She hesitated, knowing full well that she was about to break him further than he always was.
Jack stepped into her, his voice demanding and abrupt. "Tell me."
Juliet gave a short nod, her voice squeaking through her tight throat. "Your sister was on Flight 815, too, Jack," she looked up at him, shock bellowing over his anger for a moment, "and she was eight months pregnant."
He looked at her with steaming eyes, his mouth poised to say more, but then it dawned on him. His eyes grew wild with bewilderment. "Claire?" His broken, strangled voice spoke. Juliet brought her hand over her mouth, tears already falling down her face as she nodded once, then twice. He gripped his hair between his fists, his own tears falling down his face. He was trembling, his glistening, wide eyes darted to and fro. "Oh my God." He breathed, choking on a gasp.
The betrayal she found in his eyes was deadly, lethal. He retreated with legs that wobbled under his weight, his face fixed in a state of complete bafflement. She reached out to him, her fingers curled around his forearm. "I'm so sorry, Jack. There were so many times that I wanted to—"
"Wanted to what?" He yelled, yanking his arm from her grasp. "Finally tell me, after all the time we spent together that you knew that Claire was my sister?" He was yelling now, loudly, so angry, it radiated off of him in waves.
She spoke timidly through her sobs, her voice growing louder to explain. "I was sworn to secrecy. If I'd told you, Ben wouldn't have let me leave; he wouldn't have let me go." She cried into her hands, her face covered with them, her heart crushed for having crushed his, for having broken his trust.
"I'm so sorry, Jack." She said as she wiped at her tears. "I had to do it. I had to get back to my family." She found no excuse adequate enough to express, to make his pain go away, to justify the choice she made. She had acted selfishly and now she would lose him, she knew it. Jack stared off into the distance at his left, his stomach churning, and his mouth suddenly dry. He finally turned to her again with eyes full of hatred and disgust.
"By keeping me from mine." She let out another anguished sob, so disgusted with herself, more than enough for the both of them, but Jack would throw the final punch.
"So much for friends telling each other the truth." He sounded so heartbroken, devastated; she could hear the tears in his voice, ones she was sure he would shed once he was out of sight, the man in front of her too angry to cry now, too ready to punish her to let her see him that way. He moved for the door, his hand wrapped around the doorknob. He needed to get away from her; he needed to get away from everything.
Frantic to stop him, Juliet sprung towards him, her hand wrapped around his forearm again, physically pleading him to wait before she spoke it. "No! Jack, please! Wait!"
"Don't—" He whipped around, her hand falling away from him on impact. "Don't you dare touch me." There was such disdain in his voice, such heartache. From that one sentence, she could tell that he was done. With her. With this.
He hurled the door open and was gone in a flash, leaving Juliet in a pool of her own tears.
Her door remained open after him, the image of her body-wracking cries left for the world to see.
A dimly lit, large cavernous room supported by several large columns several feet in diameter, ornated with solid, crumbling stone walls, was calm, the sound of night had fallen over it. Moonlight filtered in from the splintered ceiling, the stars sinking downward, so big and round to the naked eye. Small torches sat within tiny holes along all four walls, clay water jugs stood in a far corner.
In another corner of the massive cavity, a spinning wheel spun coarse threads. The spindle of the wheel was fed assiduously by two large, calloused hands, as a sandal-clad foot pumped the pedal, continuously stepping down onto it to propel the wheel to spin a few thousand revolutions per second. The rhythmic clicking sound from the petal set its own tempo within the quiet space. The foot belonged to a man sitting in front of the spinning wheel, the machine's conductor. He was of moderate build, short, blond hair, his face indiscernible in the faint lighting. He wore dark pants and a dingy white collared shirt and sat alone in the firelight, working ardently to create the last bit of threads he needed for his final project, one very near to his heart.
Fire crackled in a large round pit at the center of the room. The far wall was decorated with a faded painting of a winged goddess of some kind, Egyptian in origin, with a small ravine of water underneath it, the source of the water coming from someplace within the wall. The man rose from his wheel, gathering the homemade thread and walked over to a long tapestry that hung from high up, and touched the ground. A primitive loom that held the warp thread under a definite tension strain held it together, so that he could weave the weft threads through it, creating an intricate weaving. Once the course threads were put in place, he used a long-bladed knife to carefully ram the threads together. His tapestry depicted a pair of wings outstretched from an encircled eye figure, and what appeared to be seventeen long arms emanating like rays out from this eye, falling onto figures of people, ancient Egyptians through the length of the drapery, sprinkled with hieroglyphs. Across the top was an emblazoned Greek-lettered motto, translated as:
'May the gods grant thee all that thy heart desires.'
As he worked, he thought about the betrayal of his trust and his willingness to teach and share the duties of protecting this Island, this place that held so much of humanity's salvation and destruction. He had been deceived, in ways that he couldn't have possibly imagined. It didn't make him angry; it made him feel nothing, for the Island always found its way. Once he was done, the nameless, faceless man stepped back, admiring his creation. It was finished. Finally. Years of hard work, centuries of spinning course threads into something useful, lifetimes of defending and protecting, it was all over. He could finally rest in peace.
He breathlessly dropped to his knees, keeled over and wept at the base of the cloth, the curve of his back hiccupping with every tear he shed. In his heart, he was grateful, happy. He was free. He welcomed the end of his life now, the end of this journey, this pain, this ultimate sacrifice that he hadn't known he was making some two-thousand years ago. Death was a welcomed visitor. Still arched towards the floor, his arms stretched in front of him, his palms flat, he prayed, silently chanted in Latin, his voice growing louder and more emotional with every word of the dead language he spoke forwards and backwards. When he was done, he looked up at the completed tapestry. It was time.
He knew that he would come after him. He'd done what he did for this. Mercy was never his strong suit, but he would gladly stand at the waft of his blade and perish, if for the Island's purpose, its placement in the right hands. He knew that he had done all that he could, but he wasn't done yet. It was never that easy, and it certainly wasn't going to start now.
He would never be done, not until the Island landed in the fateful hands of the one who was never supposed to leave.