"Alex, does your mom know you're here?"
"No."
"Then I'm afraid you can't stay."
"Dr. Linus, you said I should make my own choice."
"I did say that, but you can't make it in exclusion of your mother, who has devoted her whole life to you. Once I did not honor motherhood, Alex. Now I must. You need your mother more than you need a surrogate father."
"Thank you for saying that, Benjamin."
They both whirled in their chairs and saw Alex's mom standing at the screen door, looking in. Dr. Linus scrambled up to open it. "Rousseau—"
"Would you please stop calling me that? We're not on the Island anymore, Benjamin. My name is Danielle." She came in and sat down next to Alex. "I was just talking to your father outside, Benjamin. He told me what he did to you, and what Richard Alpert did to you, and what Jacob and the other man did to you. And then he told me what you did to him. He said it doesn't make what you did right, but it does explain it a little. He said you both forgave each other."
"Yes, we did. John Locke forgave me too. And now I can only hope you will be able to."
"He says he's leaving, and now you have no one left."
"Yes," he said quietly.
"Why didn't you leave?"
"Because I wasn't ready. I needed to have a chance to try to do what was right, to ask for your forgiveness, to try to do and be what I never could before."
Her mom reached forward and touched his arm. "I have seen that you are right. The time has come for me to forgive. That is what we have been given this time for. Especially now that I see that you have changed. I see you want what is best for my daughter."
"This time, Danielle, I would die for her, if I could."
She nodded. "I know that now. I forgive you, Benjamin, for her sake—and for mine, and maybe for yours, too."
Tears were in Dr. Linus' eyes again. "Thank you, Danielle."
It was all getting very weird, and Alex wondered if there was going to be kissing as well as crying. "So, can we all go home and have dinner now?"
"No," Dr. Linus said. "Today I'm making you dinner. Something simple, because I'm just learning. Do you like lasagna?"
Alex got up from her chair and went around the table, put her arms around Dr. Linus, and hugged him the way she'd wanted to from the beginning. She couldn't call him "Dad" yet, but she was certain that would change soon. After a moment, she felt him hug her back, and for some reason she wanted to cry and had a feeling that he did too. "Dr. Linus, I love lasagna. So does Mom."