A/N: UPDATE! (Dies) I wish I could give you a giant, juicy chapter, but unfortunately, all I have is a very short and angsty piece. Hopefully, though, you'll like it anyway. ^^

7: A Leopard Doesn't Change Its Spots

"If you really love me, then go."

"I only said that so he'd stop hitting you."

Kate dreams of these words that night. Even in her sleep, she hears how stupid they sound.

Why would she get that guy to stop hitting Sawyer, if years later, instead of getting beat up by other people, they're hitting each other?

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There's no use drinking.

There's no use going to bed. So Sawyer has lied on the couch the whole night.

There's no use. He has a spaghetti sauce stain on his jeans.

Sawyer feels the complete blackness spreading over his soul. But that's not as important as that spaghetti sauce stain on his jeans.

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The tears are just pouring down and they don't want to stop. As Kate is sitting in the kitchen, clutching to a glass of water as if that's what keeping her in existence, which perhaps it is, she tries to keep her sobs down, but what's the point. Sawyer probably doesn't hear her, he's gone back to his apathetic staring into nothing. And even if he heard, he wouldn't care.

Kate's not Juliet, and because of this, she's basically nothing.

Kate covers her eyes with her hands as a new wave of agony wells up. Her arms sting when she moves them, the wounds from Sawyer's hands haven't healed.

She knows she has to leave. She can't stay here.

She loves Sawyer. And for his sake, she has to leave. If she stays, it's just going to happen again. Even if he will eventually get over Juliet, he's going to go into grieving periods once in a while, and even if he doesn't necessarily start mistaking Kate for her, she's going to make it so much harder. Just by being here. Just by loving him.

Why does it have to be so goddamn hard?

If her mom was here, she'd start talking about how you don't learn anything if it's not hard. How anything that doesn't kill you makes you stronger, how she can't expect anything to just be handed to her without complications.

But her mom isn't here. So all Kate can do is to go into the bedroom that used to be hers and Sawyer's, start gathering up her things, and sob out loud, because she knows Sawyer doesn't care, anyway.

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Sawyer has weak memories of loving her. Vague, fleeting memories. Sort of like these single glimpses that you remember of your childhood, but you don't remember in what context they happened. Your mother's smile. Cereals in a bowl. The taste of dirt on the playground.

That's how he remembers his love for her. Her face faded over the years she was gone, and now all he has is glimpses. Sweat gathering up in her eyebrow when they made love. Her hand in the sand on the beach. A stripe of sweat running down the back of her top.

How could that ever be enough to love her? How could these brief glimpses ever replace what Juliet was?

Kate has to understand this. Sawyer doesn't really get how she can be so sad about it. He really wishes she could stop sobbing so helplessly in the kitchen over something that he can't control any more than she can.

She probably thinks he doesn't hear her. She always covers her mouth with her hand when she's crying, thinks that keeps anyone from hearing her, but he does. Maybe not anyone does, but Sawyer does, and even if he didn't, he knows the look she gets in her eyes after she's cried. Like she'd punch anyone in the face if they asked her what's the matter.

Sawyer's not going to ask. He knows why she's crying. He just doesn't care. He can't do anything about it, because he can't love her.

It's not his fault that the true love of his life has died, and he'd prefer it if Kate were her. Kate has to get that, too.

Kate is second best, but compared to Juliet, that's not much.

If she doesn't get that, what's he supposed to do about it?

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After a while, Kate gives up trying to fit enough clothes for a one-week hike into her knapsack. Instead, she just packs the stuff she brought here. She knows that Jack and the others have probably moved and are now damn near impossible to find, but she doesn't care. She'll find them sooner or later, and anything is better than here.

She puts the knapsack over her shoulder, looks around the bedroom she has everything she needs before she walks into the living room. Sawyer's still lying there, staring at the ceiling. Probably trying to pretend like he doesn't notice her.

"I'm leaving now," Kate says.

Sawyer doesn't answer. Doesn't even look at her.

"I love you, Sawyer," she goes on. "That's why I played along. I wanted you to think I was Juliet because if that's what it took for you to love me again, I had no problem with it."

Sawyer fidgets with his fingernails. Still without looking at her.

"And you loved me once, too," Kate says, and damn, those goddamn tears are clogging up her voice again. "I know you did."

Right now, she hates him as much as she loves him.

"Sawyer, if you don't say anything, if you don't start talking to me, I'm going to leave."

Sawyer looks at her. Not lovingly. Not even angrily, like when they had sex earlier.

Just blank. That hurts even more.

"I don't anymore."

It's barely above a mumble. And it still manages to stick so deep inside her being that it probably wouldn't matter if he right now stood up and covered her with kisses and chocolate-covered roses. It'd still hurt.

Kate doesn't answer him. Not much to say, anyway, she's a bit too shocked to even think of something hurtful that'd make him feel at least a fragment of the pain she's feeling right now. There probably isn't anything, anyway. He doesn't feel anything for her. No love. Not even hate.

Kate straightens her backpack. Then she turns around and walks outside. She'd almost forgotten what fresh air felt like, she's been trapped in her own little world with Sawyer for so long. But as she starts walking away from the house she loves just for sharing that time with him, away from the man she can't bring herself to hate even though every fiber of her being wants to, she starts crying again. With no effort at all to keep it quiet this time.

She hates him. Hates it all.

Hates Sawyer, hates Juliet, hates this entire fucking island.