a/n: First of all I have to say thank you to all of your wonderful reviews—I didn't anticipate the reception and I'm very grateful for it. Hopefully this next chapter doesn't seem too bad in comparison :p


Chapter 2: Defense Mechanisms

Although this may go without saying, James had never really considered himself a 'people person'. He knew how to read them—how to anger them, how to trick them, how to—all of the above. Despite evidence supporting the contrary, he never really asked to be who he was—neither a killer nor a conman—even if the denial was better than dealing, even if both of the facades, at some point, ended up becoming his reality.

In all honesty, he didn't really know how to let himself be anything else. It was safer this way; there was a haven in being hated, a comfort in being kept at a distance, a sense of security in being 'Sawyer'. And if he truly thought about it, he knew a fragment of his eight-year-old self still clung to his mindset; he needed to be despised—at least that way nobody would ever think to get near him—to witness him waver, to scratch past the surface. That way he would never again have to experience the sheer, heartbreaking burden of losing something, because nothing would ever come close enough to touch him.

And if only for a moment, he was invincible.

This island had tested him beyond reason, beyond everything, but nothing seemed to pierce him deeper than his own damn feelings. Like many of his fellow castaways (dead or alive, here or home), he never predicted how much he'd evolve—or rather, just how much of those aforementioned feelings would spill into broad daylight.

He let himself care, and no matter how much he'd deny it or how many countless times he'd chide himself for that first mistake, for that pure human weakness—he truly let these people matter to him, and watched as they all seemed to slip from his fingers.

Although in the past he may have wished Juliet gone (a tentative time in between taser-induced seizures and baby-napping schemes), they now dealt with whatever this temperamental island dished at them together. He counted on her presence. After that night on the docks, he never considered he'd really have to deal with the actuality of her leaving. He had had a hopeful inkling that maybe she'd be the one to stay. And now that the prospect of truly never seeing her again was rapidly becoming a reality, he never anticipated this feeling. This raw pain. Was it just blind hope after all?

God, he wished he could just turn numb already.

The sun was just setting on the horizon, it's blinding red beams descending into the ocean by the time the beginning of the docks came into his view. As his heavy footfalls made their way towards the island's edge, he felt the breeze blow back his unkempt locks. And as he neared the pier, he cursed himself, cursed this place, and cursed his goddamn feelings.

He let himself grow too accustomed to seeing her daily. He let himself count on that sole expectation, that unforeseen comfort in her presence—seeing her when he woke up, seeing her before he fell asleep.

When the soft sound of his feet hitting the blades of grass morphed into the reverberations of boots against wooden planks, his pace unbelievably quickened. When he reached the end of the docks, hearing the dull creak below him and seeing nothing but the clear ocean in front of him, his stomach churned anxiously.

The sub was scheduled to have left merely minutes ago.

Did he really miss his chance to try to convince her to stay (again)? Or even miss the opportunity to merely say goodbye?

His breath hitched in his throat. His head ached. His vision blurred. And as much as he hated to admit it, felt everything all over again: His parents were dead. The Kahana was up in smoke. Kate was leaving. Claire was missing. Anthony Cooper was a dick.

And just as he was about to build his tired old walls back up again, just as he thought the world had finally gone spinning off its wretched axis, he heard a hiccup to his left. Registering the noise, his head whipped in that direction.

If it had been any other day, under any other circumstances, he would've been amused at what his eyes found there—instead of an awful combination of relief, apprehension, and familiarity.

There was Juliet.

And there was yet another form of alcoholic beverage in her reaches.

He took a moment to release the breath he didn't remember holding before he approached her. She didn't seem to be registering his presence anyway. His mask back up (aside from his eyebrows knitted in wary confusion), he strolled in her direction as if there were no questions burning behind his gaze.

"What, no note?" he quipped, simply standing beside her and staring down at her curious form, masking his utter relief that she was in fact still there as he did so.

"I didn't take you as the sentimental type, James," she replies before tilting her head backwards as she brought the bottle to her lips for another swig, cringing slightly at the taste of the alcohol as it trickled into her mouth, but swallowing it nonetheless.

"This a new habit of yers?" He nods towards the red wine she had clutched in her hands. She ignores the question as she eyes the bottle.

"Courtesy of the Galaga crew," she announces in a proud, slight slur, an octave higher than her normal tone, lifting the glass bottle in the air and extending it towards the waves of the ocean.

"You know, I watched that same sub being blown up 30 years in the future—by a John Locke," she starts, speaking in an airy voice that wasn't exactly hers. "The same John who claims he's going to save us all. Funny, huh?"

He shakes his head and sighs in response.

"This seat taken?" he questions her as the shadows of the set sun begin to surround them.

"Since when do you ask first?" She barely managed to roll her eyes as she gestures for him to take a seat.

"Since yer a few sips away from a hangover," he retorts as he sits, resting his elbows on his bended knees.

"Oh, do you want some?" she asks, as if she just remembered the bottle in her hands. "It's not Merlot, but it'll do the trick…"

She smirks as he shakes his head, declining the offer from her outstretched hand.

"That's a first," she muses in a quiet breath as she raises and tips the bottle once more, but before her lips can even touch the rim, he grabs the bottom, holding it firmly still.

"I think you've had enougha that, Boozy," he chided, his Southern drawl thick. She raises an eyebrow and quickly snatches the wine out of his reaches in defiance, but refrains from taking another sip.

He let a quiet moment go by."Now, wanna tell me what yer doin' out here?

"Didn't think sitting here warranted an explanation—" Her voice was rough in amusement as she dangled her legs, which were clad in shorts, off the wooden pier. She refused to look in his direction.

"I mean why ya almost left."

"Why I almost left, or why I didn't?" She turns now, daring a look.

"Either is fair game, Blondie."

When their wary glances finally made contact, she was all blue eyes and soft frowns, all hidden insecurities. Like he was. As his attention fully turned back from the nearby grass to her nearby gaze, he realized her smirk was gone now and the lazy, snarky amusement in her eyes was replaced by the most poignant sadness. Tears just beyond the brim, his breath hitched yet again; he had never seen her, the queen of pretenses, cry before.

"I don't know," she admitted, her voice raw with emotion. She could feel the fight in her trickling away, dissolving under the stars they now sat beneath. "I don't even know where to begin."

"I'm all ears."

"I mean look at me, I'm a mess," she gestured with one hand, the other absentmindedly still clutching that bottle.

"Yeah, well, I don't have the greatest track record either, Blondie."

About to give in, she felt something urging her fight him back. It was as if something snapped, something was hurling its last defenses forward in protection.

Was it the vulnerability or the alcohol?

She bit her lip in frustration before speaking.

"Why are you even out here, James? You have no obligation. No ties. And up until a month or so ago you didn't even like me." She felt her eyes narrow themselves.

"Juliet—"

"Why does me being here even matter to you?" His mouth opened in response as she continued. "Are you that afraid of being alone?"

At that, he paused. He felt the anger surface at her stubborn seclusion. Did she really have no idea what it was like not even ten minutes ago, with him hurdling himself down this very dock looking for her?

If she wanted to push him away, didn't want to explain herself, then neither did he.

"Well I just can't seem to help myself, can I? Guess I have a thing for troubled women," he heard himself hiss. "But I must say, it's damn near refreshin' to see some emotion from you every once in awhile. As pleasant as it is."

He inwardly grimaced as soon as he let his default aggression slip in word-form, guilt seeping in as her face drop unbelievably further.

For a second she contemplated furthering the conversation, retorting with something else, but there was this feeling in the pit of her stomach, this flicker of fight left in her that hated how meek she sounded mere seconds ago—this feeling that despised nosebleeds and dynamite and death, that loathed ex-husbands and unrequited feelings— hated every last vulnerable thing about her.

"Well I guess we can't all keep it held together as bravely as you, James," came her quiet, cold reply. "Really glad I stayed for this, by the way," she added quickly, huffing a little in anger.

The seconds passed, and without thinking she wobbled to her feet and had began to trudge back towards their Dharma house, leaving Sawyer scrambling to his own two feet in her wake.

"Now wait a second, I didn't mean it like tha—"

His plea cut short as his vision worked against him. Sawyer squinted at the space in front of him, barely making out her outline in the darkness as she staggered further away from where he was standing anxiously under the dim moonlight. His movements halted as he heard a sudden crashing noise a few yards away—a mixture of shattering glass and a strained yelp.

Without hesitation, his feet picked up the pace.

Frantically searching the darkness ahead of him, his heartbeat hastening like his boots, he ran until he felt himself nearly stumble over her lying form.

When he reached her, he squinted and saw the shards of the wine bottle beneath her on the concrete walkway; saw the green glass glitter in the moonlight; saw as she noticed his presence in anger; saw as she still stubbornly tried to prop herself up to add the distance back between them, even as she cried out in pain, even as blood trickled from the soles of her feet and the sides of left leg, staining the ground beneath them both.

"Just leave me alone, James," she hissed almost inaudibly as he reached out to her on instinct.

He stood there for a moment, frustrated by her stubbornness. A split second later he moved again.

"Like hell I will," he replied through gritted teeth, firmly scooping her up into his arms before she could protest.

By the time he reached their house, she had passed out (from pain or sadness or a pure drunken stupor he could not determine). When he burst through the front door without so much as a warning knock, their roommates were all situated on the couch seemingly discussing him and the blonde now currently limp in his arms.

"Hey, La Fleur—" Miles' words swiftly dissolved into silence as he registered the scene in front of him.

All three of them rushed to their feet without hesitation as droplets of Juliet's blood began decorating the tiles of the kitchen floor.

TBC

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