A/N: Hello! Sorry for the lack of update last week, I'm still here. I really wanted to sort out the next few chapters before I posted this one, just for quality purposes, so I decided not to post last week to give me some more time to work on these chapters. I was really hoping to make it a full year of updating every week, but I still made it pretty far, about 45 weeks if I did my math right!

She's alive, she's alive, she's alive.

Chapter Eleven: Separation Anxiety

When Jack woke the next morning, Rowan was still asleep, her hand still in his as it had been when they decided to get some sleep the previous night.

He had thought that seeing her when he first woke up would be a comfort, particularly after the previous day.

But without warning, he immediately became fixated on the night she had died, the image of her lying lifeless in the snow in the forefront of his mind.

He tried pushing the image away, his heart sinking in the same way it had that night.

Though he could see her breathing, he reached for her wrist with his free hand anyway, feeling around for a pulse. For a few moments he lay there counting the beats.

There wasn't a magic number. Jack wasn't sure what his goal with his mental counting was, except perhaps an acknowledgement that her pulse was present at all.

Once he had counted to two-hundred he urged himself to stop, his shaking hand now reaching to push her hair back, desperate for her to swat at his hand like she always did.

He stopped short. Rowan had made it clear that holding his hand was as far as her comfort with touch went at the moment.

Jack pulled his hand back. He didn't need the gesture to prove she was alive. She was obviously alive. Her chest was rising and falling with each breath. Her hand, despite holding his all night, was warm. He had been counting the beats of her pulse.

She was alive.

Still, his mind kept replaying that moment. That moment when he dropped to his knees beside her and checked hopelessly for signs of life that just weren't there.

Jack squeezed her hand, eyes still fixed to her as she slept.

She's alive, she's alive, she's alive, she's alive.

His free hand was at her wrist again.

One… two… three…

He had counted to nearly five hundred this time when she stirred and rubbed at her eyes with her free hand.

Movement! She was moving, that meant that she was still alive!

But he knew that!

He knew she was alive, he had spent the last two days with her, he had fallen asleep holding her hand, he knew she was alive.

I'm just not used to it, he assured himself as she opened her eyes. That had to be it.

"Morning, Sawyer," Jack said, hoping he didn't sound as anxious as he had been.

"Morning, Frost," she replied. She squeezed his hand, a small gesture, a welcome confirmation that she was still alive.

But I already knew that!

Jack tried shaking the thought away.

"Mmph. Shopping today," she said, frowning slightly.

"You don't have to go," Jack said at once. In any other circumstance, another day of not leaving the cabin would sound like torture, but he was already clinging to the possibility.

If they stayed in the cabin, she was safe. If she was safe, she would stay alive.

Rowan released his hand so that she might properly sit upright, stretching slightly as she went. "No," she said. "I'm going. It's been weeks of 'stay here for your own good,' and—well, I mean for me it's been weeks of it."

"Right," Jack said, finally sitting upright as well, having to remind himself that Rowan's perception of time was that she had just spent over two weeks cooped up at the North Pole, barely able to even walk around and leave the room for most of that time.

"I can't just sit here and do nothing," Rowan said, taking the hairbrush that had been sent along in the care package for her from the bedside table.

Part of the previous day had consisted of Rowan putting these items away. The clothes that Euterpe had brought along were combined with the few pieces of Rowan's clothing that had been left behind at the pole, and now resided in the storage chest at the end of the bed with Jack's other clothes.

"I keep getting this anxious feeling that I need to be doing something, anything," Rowan said, brushing her hair. "At least this is something—Ugh!"

She set the hairbrush down on the bedside table, a bit more forcefully than expected. Setting her hands to her hair, she started combing her fingers through the strands, teeth clenched.

"You okay?" Jack asked, brow furrowed.

"Even brushing my hair feels wrong," she said, her fingers getting caught in a tangle. She tugged forcefully, pain clear in her expression.

"Uh, Rowan—" Jack started. She managed to yank her hand away, strands of dark brown hair twisted around her fingers, pulled from her scalp. She winced in pain, eying the strands.

It was with little hesitation that she was back at it, pulling her fingers through her hair, tugging at it in frustration, straining at the feeling. More and more strands clung to her fingers and still she would not slow down.

"Maybe you can circle back to your hair," Jack said. "If you keep pulling it out, you'll have nothing to dye."

Rowan's eyes darted from him to the strands of hair twisted around her fingers and back before shaking her head.

She grabbed for the hairbrush again, pulling it through the strands. Jack winced at that very specific sound of a hairbrush being forcefully pulled through a knot, an unsettling, crackling shrrrrrrrk.

"No, I'm going to get through this," she said, her voice trembling slightly. "I'm going to brush my goddamn hair like I'm a normal goddamn person."

Jack set his hand to hers, pausing her pursuits, eying her carefully. "Normal goddamn people don't hurt themselves doing this, Rowan."

Rowan's eyes were watering, tears of frustration, as she let him take the brush from her grasp.

"Circle back to this," Jack said. She nodded, pulling herself out of bed without another word, approaching the storage chest and pulling open the lid, obscuring his view of her. He glanced at the strands of hair caught in the pins of the brush, frowning.

Confiscating a hairbrush was not something he had expected he would ever need to do. He was already wondering if he was over-reacting.

But there had been something so unsettling about her movements.

After a moment, Rowan closed the storage chest, revealing that she had changed into a pair of jeans and a camisole. She pulled the hoodie of his that she had been wearing back on, sighing heavily as she pulled her hair from the collar.

She sat back on the bed and for a moment they simply sat in silence, awkward.

"Maybe you could give it a shot?" Rowan said, wincing slightly to make this request and pointing at the brush in his hand.

"You sure?" Jack said. He had held himself back from touching her hair earlier, after all.

"Worth a shot. You won't get so angry with it you start pulling it out," Rowan frowned, turning so that her back was facing him.

"Okay, let me know if you change your mind."

"Okay."

Jack kneeled behind her, carefully setting his fingers to her hair, pausing to see if she would react badly. Rowan was staying quite still, and he could not see her expression from here. Taking a section of hair, he gently ran the brush over it.

She moved and he paused again, but she was only pulling her necklace from beneath the hoodie's collar, soon enough fidgeting with the charm.

Her hair truthfully did not have a lot of knots in it. She seemed to have just gotten frustrated by the odd feeling and taken it out on some of the tangles she had happened to encounter.

Jack was careful with the hairbrush anyway, remembering his younger sister crying out in protest when their mother would pull just a bit too hard on the comb. Mary would sometimes beg Jack to comb her hair before their mother could get her hands on it.

["Jack, please? It doesn't hurt when you comb it!"]

Their father had not been pleased when he found out about this arrangement, making more comments about Jack insisting on doing "women's work," instead of learning something useful.

John Overland, with his hands calloused from working extensively with lumber, would likely still not think this was very useful.

Jack recalled the first night he obtained the cabin, a thought that mimicked his father's tone precisely sneering at him for not being man enough to build it himself. His father had helped build nearly every cabin in town and now here Jack was having not done anything to contribute to the structure that now sheltered him.

Perhaps that was part of why it had taken Jack a few weeks to properly spend a night sleeping at the cabin.

Jack shoved the thoughts of his father away, as he was prone to do. Mary had never flinched in pain when he tended to her hair, and now at least Rowan made no indication that she was in pain either.

It wasn't long before Jack was leaning over to set the brush back on the bedside table. "There, I think I got it," he said.

Rowan carefully touched her hair, running her fingers through the strands. They passed through easily, nothing to snag on along the way.

She turned to properly face him again, her cheeks wet with silent tears. He frowned at the sight.

"Thanks," she said, wiping away the tears. "Hopefully… hopefully after today my hair will at least feel like mine."

"Hopefully," Jack said. He offered his hand and she took it. He gave her hand a squeeze, once more wishing he could pull her close or kiss her, hoping that the squeeze would communicate something similar.

"Do you, uh, want coffee or something? We don't have to leave right away, and North got me a coffee maker," Jack said after a beat.

"Is that what that thing on the counter is?" Rowan asked, seeming relieved for a new topic.

"Yeah, it's a syphon maker," Jack said. "It looks like a mad scientist should be messing with it, doesn't it?"

"It absolutely does," she said. "But, yes, coffee with you always sounds nice."

Jack managed a smile at this remark, and she did too. He released her hand so that they might vacate the loft and enter the small kitchen.

It was mid-afternoon in Greece, which meant that it should be morning back in Pennsylvania. Euterpe had not actually established a time that Jack should bring Rowan by the mountain, but figured it would be some time sooner rather than later.

The other Muses had been making themselves scarce. Calliope was not in the mountain at all, off visiting a novelist that she had been working with.

With Calliope absent, Clio was present, as they had now implemented their rule that at least one of the two eldest Muses would be present at the base at all times. Clio was in her room currently, sleeping after a rather long visit to the past, having told the others to wake her if something important or interesting happened.

Erato did not spend much time at the base in general, so she was likely back at the North Pole or out spreading inspiration. Cupid had mumbled something about physical therapy for his wing before departing via portal.

Polyhymnia was in her room, working on a very tedious bit of embroidery, deciding to focus her anxieties there instead of with baking for the day.

Melpomene was in her room, practicing her harpsichord. Thalia was headed for Canada, saying that she was going to see if there were any good films being made whose sets she could lurk about to find someone to inspire.

Urania was among the stars.

This left Euterpe and Terpsichore, the only Muses that Rowan had agreed to meet with, in the kitchen, fiddling with the computer that North had given them to pass the time. They were already dressed in the clothes that Arachne had made them to better pass as mortal.

"Why is the computer so good at chess?" Terpsichore grumbled as she lost another game.

Euterpe was organizing a stack of bills that Clio had given her earlier for the trip. "Because it's a computer. And because you're not very good at chess."

"You give it a try then," Terpsichore said, turning the computer so that it would better face the other Muse.

"I'm also not very good at chess," Euterpe said, shaking her head. "I bet Urania could beat it."

"Yeah, probably," Terpsichore sighed.

The twirling light that suddenly appeared in the corner of the room drew their eye and left Euterpe's heart racing as she tucked the bills into the inner pocket in her jacket.

Upon her return to the mountain the previous night, she had insisted that everything had gone as well as could be expected. Most of the questions had been about Rowan and how she was doing. Most of the discussions had been about her distrust of the Muses overall and logistics behind where everyone would be in order to stay out of the way when she dropped by today.

Terpsichore had asked how it had been to see Jack and Rowan together after all this time, and Euterpe had insisted that it was not strange at all. And for the most part, it wasn't.

But now Rowan stepped through the portal with Jack, grabbing for his arm to steady herself and Euterpe couldn't help the slight sigh that she hoped no one noticed.

Jack examined Rowan for a second, making sure that the girl wasn't actually about to fall over. She planted her feet and seemed fine, offering him a small smile.

Rowan, it seemed, had made use of some of the clothes that Euterpe had dropped off, namely the jeans and boots. But she was still wearing one of Jack's hoodies, as she had been when Euterpe had dropped by the previous day.

It didn't mean much, that Jack's girlfriend was wearing one of his jackets. It was pretty boring as far as things to notice went.

But there was something cozy about it. Intimate.

Euterpe had given Jack some clothes before and it had felt very platonic. Just a friend doing another friend a favor.

But that was good, wasn't it? That Euterpe's interactions with Jack felt platonic? If they didn't, they wouldn't feel safe.

As Rowan adjusted the hem of the jacket, Euterpe thought, it might be nice if intimacy felt safe.

"You'll get better with the portals," Terpsichore said, closing the laptop and standing as soon as Jack and Rowan appeared.

"What do you know, Cori? You stick every landing," Euterpe said, hoping to get out of her own head with the bit of teasing.

Terpsichore grinned. "Fine, based on what I've observed from the rest of you, she'll get better with the portals."

"So, I'm not the only one almost falling through them each time, good," Rowan sighed.

"It's definitely easier to fly through them," Jack nodded. "Because then you don't feel that weird jerking thing the floor does."

"I'll get right on learning to fly then," Rowan said dryly as she glanced around the room.

Euterpe hadn't told Jack to stop by the kitchen specifically when he came by, she and Terpsichore only deciding to wait there a few hours earlier. But it seemed like a good place to start, for it was one of the least overwhelming rooms in the base. Perhaps Jack had similar thoughts.

It wasn't a small kitchen by any means, particularly with only the four of them present. But it was still a kitchen.

"So, we can show you around and then go pick stuff up, or we can pick stuff up first, whatever you're up for," Terpsichore said.

"I mean, I guess we're already here," Rowan said. Her arms had been crossed before her chest ever since she had steadied herself from the portal. She glanced back at Jack. "I don't know how long all of this is going to take."

"Right, I um, I'll check back in a couple hours," Jack said.

"I mean, you can come with us," Euterpe said to Jack, whose face seemed to fall briefly at the acknowledgement that he would be leaving. "Take part in the hair dye and piercings."

"I think I'm good," Jack said, shaking his head. "Besides, I can't control who sees me or not."

"Ah, yeah, might accidentally cause another ghost spectacle," Terpsichore said. "Which, I want to be invited the next time you guys haunt something on purpose, it sounded fun."

"Noted," Jack said with a slight smile.

"You really should check in with the others and spread winter around a bit, I don't want to be the reason you're not doing that," Rowan said, her voice soft.

"Don't worry about it, Sawyer," Jack said. It seemed that this was a discussion they may have had before.

"Are you heading to the pole?" Euterpe asked.

"Probably," Jack said.

"Great, Clio added that to the arch already," Terpsichore said. "You know how you touch the chrysanthemums to leave the mountain?"

"Yes," Jack said. Rowan's brow furrowed and she eyed the others curiously.

"Well, it's a slow process, but Clio's working on making all the other carvings go other places," Terpsichore said. "So, there's some holly on the left side of the arch, if you touch that it will send you just outside North's Workshop."

"So far, we have that one and the starfish that will take you to Sandy's island," Euterpe said.

"With all the portals, it doesn't seem like you'd need that arch to go so many places," Jack said.

"Calliope and Clio wanted a back-up, in case something happens and we can't use the portals for whatever reason," Terpsichore said. "Besides, the arch only gets you out of the mountain, not back in."

"Right," Jack said. He glanced back Rowan's way. "I guess I'll head out."

"Okay, see you soon," Rowan said.

They each eyed each other with something that seemed like regret, that only confused Euterpe as long as it took for Jack to offer Rowan his hand.

Rowan took his hand, squeezed it, and gave him a gentle smile that he returned.

Of course, they wouldn't be able to just fall back to where they had been before her death, familiar gestures and stealing kisses. The new body would have thrown a wrench in that.

They each exchanged a soft "I love you," before releasing each other's hand. Jack glanced at Terpsichore and Euterpe and offered them a wave. "See you later, be careful."

"We'll keep an eye on each other," Terpsichore assured him. "See you soon."

"See you," Euterpe said.

Jack cast Rowan one last glance before heading out of the kitchen.

"Well, this is the kitchen, obviously," Terpsichore said, not long after Jack had vanished from sight. "I don't know if this came up, but you probably noticed you haven't been hungry since you've been back."

"Yeah, it's weird," Rowan said, tearing her eyes away from where Jack had been. "I figured I was just… too thrown off, emotionally, to be hungry."

"And that might be part of it. But, eating isn't going to be as important for your health anymore. Your main source of energy and sustenance is going to be people creating based on the inspiration you gave them," Terpsichore explained. "If it's been a while since you last inspired someone, you might start feeling lightheaded, kind of sick, and you might start getting hungry again because your body needs some other source of energy."

"Inspiring people, right," Rowan frowned, her gaze grave.

"All that being said, we still eat quite a bit, thus: the kitchen," Terpsichore said, seeming not to notice Rowan's change in expression, or choosing to ignore it if she had.

"You eat even when you don't need to?" Rowan clarified.

"Food is a comfort. It's a way for a lot of us to feel connected to where we came from," Euterpe explained. "So, we make old family recipes, regional dishes, new things we find and like. Poly's been a bit on-edge lately so she's been baking a lot."

"Right, yeah, she sent along cookies in the care package," Rowan said. "I haven't had any yet."

"We have loads of ingredients and utensils and everything, if you ever feel compelled to cook," Terpsichore said.

As Terpsichore began showing off where everything in the kitchen was, Euterpe cast careful glances Rowan's way. The girl seemed to be listening to Terpsichore, but had crossed her arms again, her faint frown still fixed. Her fingers kept brushing against the fabric of the jacket every few moments.

Euterpe frowned, feeling vaguely guilty as she realized that the hoodie Rowan wore and the intimacy that it implied might be the only thing she had at the moment that really felt safe and comfortable.

Jack had hardly taken a few steps beyond the kitchen before his heart began to race, his hands beginning to tremble.

The image of Rowan's lifeless body flashed in his mind again and he stopped in his tracks, spinning around at once.

He flew silently back toward the kitchen and landed in the archway. Rowan's back was to him, Terpsichore and Euterpe's too as Terpsichore opened a cabinet to show the inner contents. None of them noticed his presence.

She's alive, she's alive, she's alive.

Jack quickly shook his head, starting down the hall again before they could notice that he had turned back and could question it.

What was he supposed to say, that he had barely made it down the hall before worrying that she had somehow dropped dead in the brief moment they were apart?

But that's what had happened.

That was exactly what had happened, and it was happening again the further Jack made his way toward the meticulously carved arch at the far end of the hall.

The way he had moved her hair from her forehead only to not be met by her had swatting at his absentmindedly. The way he had felt around for a pulse that wasn't there. The way he held her hand and realized that she was even colder than he was. It all crashed into the forefront of his mind in great detail.

She's alive. I just saw her. She's alive.

The urge to stop walking, to turn around and rush back to check again was still there. Something in him was so unsure, so terrified that maybe he had been mistaken. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe something had happened.

Still, he urged himself forward, his unsteady hand finding the holly carved into the wall and touching it. The stone gave off a dim glow as usual before North's workshop came into view. Jack cast a glance behind him.

He could still go back, he could still make sure she was all right.

She's alive! I just saw her!

Jack took a deep breath and turned back to the arch. He stepped through.

This did not help.

He was too far now, much too far to help if something happened. The arch he had walked through only went the one way, he would have to get another portal or fly all the way back to Greece.

A portal would be faster but he had emptied his pocket of the ones that Clio had given him when Rowan had been putting her care package items away. He had casually dumped them all into the bottom drawer of the chest of drawers for safe keeping.

Jack hadn't thought to grab more than the one they had taken to get to Mount Parnassus in the first place, something he realized only after they had arrived. When he had still been in the kitchen he had considered that he would just ask North to borrow one to get Rowan home and try to get into a habit of having at least two portals on-hand when he could.

It had been such a casual notion before, but now he was desperate. He was just outside the front door to the workshop and if he was anyone else, he would ring the bell and wait to be let in and escorted by one of the security yetis.

But Jack didn't have that kind of time, and he wasn't really one to use the front door even in the best of circumstances.

Darting into the air, Jack soon found the opening in the ceiling over the globe that he usually used to enter the pole. He landed on the main platform clumsily, barely registering that this was not the best place to look for North, who was likely in his office.

In fact, Jack barely registered anything. He was dizzy and now leaning heavily against a pillar, his staff having fallen from his hand to the ground without his notice.

He was breathing much too quickly, his hand still shaking as he slid to the floor, his chest tightening as he went.

"She's alive, she's alive, I just saw her," Jack whispered to himself between gasping breath. His vision was blurred by tears. His mind was actively working against him, the image of her body the night she died flashing before him again.

He closed his eyes, knowing it wouldn't help.

There was a sudden clicking of heels, a concerned hand to the shoulder.

"Jack, what's wrong?"

Jack opened his eyes and a very concerned Erato was kneeling before him. He didn't answer her question, still breathing rapidly, trembling.

"Okay, Jack, where are you?" Erato asked, trying something else.

"The North Pole," he managed to say.

"What is that?" Erato said, pointing to the large, ever-turning globe.

"The globe," Jack said. Part of him was screaming that this didn't matter, that all that mattered was that he was currently at the North Pole and needed to get back to Greece.

Another part of him knew that didn't make any sense.

Still, his pulse raced.

"Tell me about the globe, anything about it, tell me what it looks like, what it does," Erato said.

"It—it's a massive globe. It's made—made of square and rectangular panels," Jack said, eying the globe and trying to focus on it. "It keeps track of the believers. Each light—all the lights represent a child that believes in the Guardians. All the labels—I have no idea what language they're in. I think it's the yeti's language, but I never asked. I know it's not Russian, I can read some Russian. The water is mostly blue, some of the panels are more purple-leaning. The land masses are mostly green, some of them are yellow and brown. There are symbols. I don't know what most of them mean."

Jack hadn't realized that there had been any yetis around when he landed, but one was returning with North now. Focusing on the globe for a time seemed to have brought him back to reality just enough that his breathing had at least calmed somewhat.

He felt suddenly exhausted as North kneeled down beside Erato.

"Is everything all right?" North said.

"I—I think so?" Jack said, wincing as the words came with such a doubtful tone.

"Did something happen?" Erato asked.

"I—I took Rowan to Mount Parnassus and—and as soon as I left the room I—I was just overcome with dread and I couldn't stop thinking about the night she died," Jack said, knowing that all of this didn't make any sense but that he wouldn't be able to get away with no explanation. "And I kept wanting to turn back and check on her but I had just seen her, so I made myself leave and—and the last time—the last time I left her alone—"

Jack stopped short, staring hard at the floor in front of him rather than at North and Erato.

"She died," Erato finished for him, gently.

Jack hesitated, then nodded, eyes still welling up.

"That doesn't mean it'll happen this time," Erato said.

"You don't know that," Jack said before he could stop himself.

"Neither do you," North said softly. "Rowan is very safe with Terpsichore and Euterpe."

"I've put her in other situations that she was supposed to be safe in, and then I left. I left and the shadow people attacked her. I left and she showed up in Burgess and turned up dead," Jack said. A handful of frozen tears sat awkwardly on his face and he hastily wiped them away.

"There were also weeks' worth of days when you left her for a time and came back to find her perfectly safe," Erato reminded him.

"She is a Muse now, much harder to bring harm to," North said. "I know you want to protect her, but you cannot be around all the time."

"What am I supposed to do if—if this is how I react to walking away from her? I woke up yesterday and she was just in a different part of the cabin and I thought I had dreamt the whole thing and she was gone," Jack said, shaking his head. "I kept counting her pulse this morning because I kept needing proof she was alive."

"This is all going to be an adjustment," Erato said. "And her death was clearly traumatic for you. But I think the only way you can feel like she'll be okay if you leave her alone is to actually leave her alone sometimes."

"I hate this, I know it's all irrational and I can't stop," Jack said, shaking his head. How humiliating, to crash land at the pole and fall to pieces because he had left Rowan for minutes at this point.

"It is very strange situation you are in," North said, patting him on the shoulder before standing upright, offering Erato a hand as she stood as well. "How about we go to my office and try to get your bearings there? Can you walk?"

"Yeah, yeah I should be able to," Jack said, grabbing for his staff and rising to his feet.

"I'll let you take over," Erato said to North. She cast Jack a gentle smile before gently squeezing his shoulder.

"Thank you," Jack said softly before she had a chance to walk off. "Sorry about all of that."

"Any time, Jack," Erato said.