Disclaimer: I do not own Lost or its characters. I only own the story in my head.

Summary: They changed everything. Flight 815 never crashed, the island is underwater, and the same people are living different lives. So they think, because fate as other plans.

Sideways Stories from the Castaways

Charlotte

Charlotte Lewis notices that the woman next to him shifted and moved her hands further under the jacket on her lap. She saw the glint of metal and smiles.

"You know James here, arrested me for smuggling…a coffee pot" She tells the woman, who smiles back. "He smashed it to pieces right there in the airport"

"You can't be too careful people will smuggle things in anything nowadays." He says defending himself.

"I don't doubt that." Charlotte replies with a grin. "But I'm still confused as to why you thought I was a smuggler."

"You're birth certificate." He replies.

"What?" She asks confused. "My birth certificate, what does that have to do with anything?"

"It says you were born in Essex, England in 1971." She raises her eyebrows at him. "The problem is the ink used to write it didn't exist until 1977. Meaning your birth certificate didn't exist until you were six years old."

She purses her lips and looks at him. "My parents were scientists, James. I was born on a remote island where the last thing they were worrying about was paper. My birth certificate wasn't written until we returned to England." She tells him.

He nods. "In my line of business people only fake documents when they were hiding something " he tells her "You've made eight trips to Tanzania…before our little incident. What's so special about Tanzania?"

"It's Africa." She says like he's an idiot. "It's been there since the beginning of time. Do you know how many tribes still live like the world never progressed? Do you how many artifacts have yet to be discovered?"

He forces himself to smile. "I got that, but Africa is huge and you spend all your time with one tribe and more specifically one place."

Charlotte smiles "See here, it's easy to gain people's trust because we will gladly make new friends, but in Africa it takes years to gain the trust of a tribe that rarely if ever lets in outsiders. Fake documents and lying won't work. You have to eat like them, hunt like them you have to become one of them that is not something done overnight." She tells him. "That tribe trusts me and to keep that trust I have to keep going back to help them."

James nods his head, he still knew she was hiding something but she wasn't a smuggler. "What are you looking for in Tanzania Dr. Lewis?" he asks.

"The past" she answers. My past she thinks to herself. Her parents were part of an organization called the Dharma Initiative when she was born. She was searching for the island that Dharma discovered; she spent so much time in Tanzania because that is where artifacts from with Dharma logos have shown up. She needed to find to find out where she was born, she had these memories of a paradise and her parents refused to tell her about it. So that only made her more curious, what happened on that island?

"Well it's been nice chatting with you again, James but I have to get back to going." She gives him one last smile and walks away. It was strange bumping into him again especially here; she'd have to tell Juliet about it. She walks quickly through the hallway not really paying attention to anything until she slams into him.

"I'm so sorry. I wasn't looking where I was going." She says helping the man up. He had longish brown hair and had on a collared shirt and tie.

"No…no it was my…fault I wasn't…I wasn't paying attention. " He says nervously.

"No, it was my fault I had a lot going on in my head and I didn't see you." She says noticing that they were in front of the nursery. "Did your wife have a baby?"

He looks at the window then back at her. "My sister…half sister…she had the baby" he tells her.

"Oh, well then, I guess congratulations on becoming a half Uncle." She says smiling at him.

"Half Uncle, right." He laughs

"Charlotte" she says extending her hand to him.

He shakes her hand then realizes he hadn't told her his name. "Daniel, I'm…Daniel"

"Nice to meet you Daniel" she says.

"So, uh what brings you to…the hospital?" He asks. "You don't look like you had a baby…but if um if you might've so you uh you look good then if that's the case…unless you're a doctor?...And I'm rambling aren't I?"

Charlotte can't hold in her smile. "You are, but that's alright" she tells him. He was nervous and kind of twitchy but she found herself smiling at that and she didn't know why, he was not the usual type of guy she'd go for. "No I haven't had a baby. I'm here helping out a friend of mine; she's the doctor, a fertility specialist." She says. "The couple she's helping only speaks Korean."

His brows furrow "And…you speak Korean?" He asks.

"Yes" she says. "I spent some time in Korea finding artifacts from the Joseon Dynasty." He was looking at her confused. "Right, sorry I'm an Archeologist; I should've said that first."

"That's alright." He says. "I'm a Physicist and you're an Archeologist…not that there is…any correlation between the two." He says shyly.

"Well, what kind of physicist are you?" she asks.

"Astrophysicist" he replies.

"Well I study the past and you study the future so there's a little connection there." She replies.

"I suppose" he says with a smile.

She smiles back and feels her phone vibrating against her hip. She takes it out and sees its Juliet. She holds up her hand to him "Excuse me" she tells him and takes the call and tells Juliet she's on her way. "I'm terribly sorry, I have to go" she says to him not really wanting to end their conversation.

"That's ok, you're working. I understand" he says.

"Goodbye" she says and turns to walk away.

"Do you want to get dinner…later I mean…with me?" he blurts out to her retreating back.

She smiles and turns around. "I'd love to get dinner with you...later." she replies.

She walks into Juliet's office with a smile on her face.

"What's with you?" Juliet asks.

"I ran into two good looking men" She answers. "And I have a date"

"Only you could get a date while being in hospital for five minutes" Juliet replies with a smirk.

"You could get a date too if you left your office once awhile" She replies back. Charlotte wanted to help her friend after her divorce, she made a medical breakthrough that she used as an excuse to not date anyone. "Well, the other man I ran into was the detective that arrested on me on my last trip to Tanzania, maybe you could go out with him"

"You want to set me up with the police officer that arrested you?" Juliet replies looking up at her from her desk.

"Why not, you both could use a little fun in your lives and I think you can bring that out in each other." She tells her, having no idea way she said that. She didn't know him that well but for some reason she knew he was lonely.

"His name is James Ford" She tells her.