They didn't even manage to come back to the caves the night before. They just fell asleep cradled in the blanket, seeking warmth within each other.
Alice woke up happy. She wasn't even disoriented. She knew exactly where she was. She knew that the arms she fitted so perfectly in and the second heartbeat she felt against her back belonged to Jack.
Only then she actually tensed up, realizing that they didn't know how long they'd actually been asleep. They couldn't possibly risk anyone from either camp walking in on them like this. If somebody hadn't already… but no, they couldn't, could they?
"We really should get back before someone stumbles here," she said and entangled herself from Jack's limbs with a heavy sigh. He groaned with disappointment when he lost the hold on her body, but eventually awoke enough to understand what she was getting at.
"I wish we didn't have to sneak around like some teenagers," he said when sitting up and rubbing his eyes. Then he watched as she quickly put her clothes back on, making her feel a little self-conscious.
"Should we talk about it?" he asked when she finished.
"There's nothing to talk about, Jack. It's done," she said casually.
"Wait…" he stopped her right there. "I thought… I thought we had something real."
She stilled and blinked a few times when looking at him. "Jack, I am not breaking up with you," she explained. "I just know that you're going to worry about consequences and I say we shouldn't talk or worry about it before… something happens… and it may not even happen," she finished awkwardly. Yeah, it definitely was a very mature and adult way of talking about a possible pregnancy, she thought sarcastically.
"Maybe you're right," he admitted. "Maybe we should just focus on finding Claire."
"Definitely," she agreed.
He finally stood up and picked up his pants. Then he caught her staring as well.
"What? It's not like you weren't looking," she told him with a wink. "And I guess this is currently mine," she pointed his body.
"Oh, really?" he teased her when the pants were finally on place. "So, is this mine?" He reached for her, pulled her in and kissed sweetly for good morning.
"Oh, yeah," she said in between the kisses.
"Ok, we do actually have something important to do," Jack reluctantly pointed out when pulling away. "And we're getting all worked up again."
"Yeah, we do," she admitted when biting her lip. She wondered whether they would go as far as having sex again on the island, but then she just felt guilty that she was enjoying herself while Claire was with the people who'd hung Charlie on a tree. Alice was also scared for the baby in the woman's belly.
"We should really be getting back," she sighed.
As it turned out, they couldn't do much for Claire. Locke was still trying to find a new track and decide which way she'd been taken, but the chances were low. They didn't know what to do and where to look and they didn't have enough manpower to search the island, especially with possibly a lot of other people out there and a mysterious monster. Added to that, they didn't even know how big the island was or whether they would found shelter for the night or water once they ran out of it. It all made Alice feel very frustrated, so eventually she just decided to go to the beach and check up on Charlie while Jack agreed to help Kate with something. The couple parted for the day, but maybe it was a good thing, Alice thought. Maybe they should stay away from each other. Then again, how long would that last before the fire erupted again twice as strong? She truly didn't know what to do and she didn't even want to think about the future. Claire was pregnant in a very hostile environment and Alice didn't want to end up like that as well. Besides, it was way too early in her and Jack's relationship to even think about children.
"Oh, fuck it," she said to no one in particular as she finally emerged from the jungle and found herself on the beach. She would simply occupy both her thoughts and time with something else. She would keep herself busy and that would be useful to everyone, she finally decided.
She spotted Charlie, so she walked over to him and sat down by his side.
"Hi," she said, trying not to look at his still bruised neck too closely. She couldn't even imagine how much it must've hurt, not to mention the mental agony of wondering if he could've done something more to save Claire. "How are you?" Alice asked another question, but Charlie still hadn't said a word to her. She didn't know what to do in such a situation. She wasn't good when it came to getting people to talk. It just felt awkward and more uncomfortable for her with every passing minute. She knew she should probably tell him how they would surely find Claire and they would all be all right, but could she really lie to him like that? It didn't take a genius to figure out that whatever she said could turn out to be a big, fat lie. Because they were in danger. Because there were people out there and because neither she nor Jack or anyone else could guarantee Claire's safety.
In the end, Rose came over, asking Charlie to help her as she was dragging a part of the plane with her. It took a while, but eventually she got him to get up and give her a hand for which Alice sent her a grateful, yet sad smile.
And then Shannon suddenly ran right past her, crying.
"Shannon?" Alice followed, wanting to be useful at least this way. "Shannon, what's wrong?" she asked when catching up with the blonde near the jungle where she sat on a trunk of a fallen tree.
"I'm useless," Shannon said as she kept on crying. "Everyone says so and I'm actually starting to believe it."
"What? You're not useless," Alice protested when joining her friend on the trunk. "No one really is and if they don't see how special you are, then screw them. They're idiots."
Shannon actually laughed through her tears on hearing that.
"I can't translate Rousseau's papers for Sayid," she finally explained. "He said I was talking rubbish for a whole hour of his precious time."
"So what? Maybe the French woman isn't as sane as she used to be. You did enough, Shannon, thanks to you we found out about her and what her message said in the first place. That was a huge help and then Sayid managed to find her and she told him that we weren't alone." Alice wasn't sure whether there really was much logic in what she just said, but Shannon didn't seem to care. Her mood had clearly improved. She hugged Alice in gratitude and then she gasped.
"It's a song!" she yelled and Alice just shot her a blank look. "I know what the papers say!" she explained quickly and then she was just gone.
Alice only shook her head and after a while of mingling among the people on the beach, she slowly made her way back to the caves.
"Are you all right?" she asked Jack when she spotted him and noticed that he was angry. "How did it go with Kate?" she followed with another question when sitting by his side. She really missed him even though they'd seen each other this morning. Hell, they'd had sex the night before and woken up together! Alice really started to doubt that they would be able to keep their hands off of each other for much longer. Maybe they should just give up and screw everything else. Screw the future. Technically, they could die the next day. They could even die today!
"Kate's a liar," Jack told Alice, "and I'm sick of it. She and Sawyer are really worth each other."
Alice didn't say anything to that. She just rested her head on Jack's shoulder. Maybe he was right. She herself had trouble establishing any friendship with Kate because the woman never seemed to let her guards down and whenever Alice asked something, Kate either gave her an evasive answer or lied straight to her face.
"No sign of Claire," Alice then said when taking Jack's hand and intertwining her fingers with his.
"No sign of Claire," he repeated with a sigh, putting his arm around her.
Sadly, everyone started settling in on the island and getting used to their new life style. It was as though they'd already given up. Sun even created her own garden. Alice truly didn't know whether she should be happy that they would have herbs or not. Was there anyone looking for a way out of the island anymore? She wondered.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Sawyer who just came to the caves and started going through Jack's stuff.
"Can I help you with something?" she asked in a tone that indicated her rather being angry than willing to help.
Sawyer stilled and straightened up, looking at her just standing there with her arms folded across her chest.
"Ok, sweetheart," he started when putting his hands in front of him as though he was trying to protect himself, "this is so not what it looks like. Jack was supposed to give me my last dose of medication today for the wound in my arm and he's nowhere to be seen, so I decided to look for it myself. Where's the doc anyway? Romancing some other girl?"
Alice sighed when he said that. She was already getting though Jack's stuff and taking the right bottle to give Sawyer his pill. "I don't get it," she said then.
"And what that would be?" Sawyer prompted when taking the pill from her and swallowing it.
"You and that attitude," she explained. "You're not doing yourself any favors, you know. We've all been through hell. All of our lives were crappy sometimes. We all made mistakes, I'm sure of it. So whatever it is that's bothering you, just drop it."
"Oh, really? And what can you really know about life, sweetheart?" he responded.
There was something in his eyes, something that told her that he wasn't as tough as he presented himself to be. So far she'd felt nothing but resentment towards him, but now she could tell that he was the way he was because of something dark in his past, some kind of a secret or suffering that influenced everything else. And exactly that vulnerability he was obviously covering with insults and gruffness pushed her to just tell him the truth.
"Actually, I know a lot," she said idly. "I lost my entire family in a car crash. My twin sister died on an operating table. I was the only one who survived and I have no one now. I was in Australia to scatter their ashes because we were always dreaming of taking a trip there and… the plane, I was coming home to on, crashed."
There was silence as Sawyer was just looking at her, processing those words, maybe trying to assess if she wasn't making it all up. Eventually, he told her the truth as well since it only seemed fair. In fact, he told her more than he ever had Kate.
"When I was little, my mother had an affair with a conman. He convinced her to invest all of our money, told her that she would get it back tripled. In the end, he stole from us and my father killed her and then himself. Ever since that happened, I've been trying to find that man and in the process I became him. My name isn't even Sawyer. It's James. James Ford. And I was in Australia to kill Sawyer. Only the man turned out not to be him."
Alice was speechless when she heard that and didn't really know how to respond. In the end, she just said the best thing she could. She understood that they didn't want any pity or compassion from each other, they were just sharing their stories and they wanted to do it without shedding tears and exchanging hugs. "You see? We're all the same and we all have our own demons."
"If you tell what I just told you to anyone, I'll deny it," Sawyer immediately threatened, putting his mask back on again and she nearly laughed at the sudden change.
"Don't worry. Your secret's safe with me," she assured him and then saw something softening in his eyes.
"Yeah… thanks," he brushed it off quickly.
The moment was broken by Jack coming back.
"Sawyer," he said with a nod.
"It's ok, Jack. I already gave him the pill," Alice assured her boyfriend.
"And I was just leaving," Sawyer informed and then walked a few steps before he came to a stop and turned back to Jack, "She's a nice catch, doc and easy on the eye," he said. "If I were you, I would hold on to her." After that, he finally left.
Alice nearly smiled, figuring that it was the best compliment she could hope to receive from the man.
"What was that all about?" Jack asked her in surprise.
"Getting through to people," she told him when looking at the blond retreating. In that moment, she felt like they could eventually become friends even though it already sounded crazy in her head. Sometimes people surprised you.
Alice truly didn't understand what the fuss was all about. Michael came up with a plan to build a raft and she really liked that idea, desperately wanting to just get the hell out of the island, but others didn't necessary shared her enthusiasm. She got their point of view, too, she really did. Building up a raft and venturing off into the unknown could have disastrous consequences, but they owed it to themselves to try. No one was coming to help them, that much was obvious by now. Building a raft seemed like their only chance unless they wanted to stay on the island indefinitely. And she so did not want that. Especially after the awkward moment when she was alone with Jack and came over to him, sat on his laps and started kissing him, really missing him and their closeness. Once they'd crossed the line, they was really no coming back. She wanted him and she knew that he wanted her, too.
Only he eventually pushed her away and needless to say, she felt awful about it.
"Alice… I'm… I'm sorry," he said quickly when seeing the look on her face. She got off of him and sat right next to him. "It's just… you know that I want to…"
"Help isn't coming, Jack," she just said, "and we should make our peace with that. There's no way we're getting out of this island unless the raft works."
"It's not that," Jack then told her, choosing his words carefully. Apparently, he was just as embarrassed as she was about the whole situation. "It's not that I'm afraid you'll get pregnant," he finally said. "It's that I… I can't really afford to have a child."
Alice frowned when listening to him.
"I don't understand," she admitted.
"You know about my father and my insecurities where it comes to him," Jack tried to explain as best as he could and quite frankly, he didn't even have to tell her more. Suddenly, everything became clear to her. "I also told you that I was married once."
"Yeah, to a woman whose spine you fixed," Alice remembered. "You said that in the end you wanted to help her too badly and you marr… Wait a sec. Is this what this is?" Alice suddenly asked, pointing herself and then him. "You saved me and that's why you're with me?"
"No!" he denied quickly. "It's just… She wanted kids and I was never ready. I was afraid that I wouldn't be a good father, that I would hurt my kid instead of loving him or her and showing them the right kind of support they'd need."
"To me it sounds like you know exactly what it means to be a good father, Jack. You know it well because you never had one yourself."
"Maybe," he admitted with a sigh, "but still, I don't think I'm ready for this just yet."
"I understand," she assured him, but she just didn't see any other way out of the situation they'd gotten themselves in. She didn't want to come out as someone desperate for sex. No, it wasn't only that, she decided then. She needed him, was falling in love with him. She needed to be close to him. And in that moment an evil plan was seeded in her head. Why not use one of her newly established acquaintances after all?
First Sawyer started laughing. When he finally stopped, he said, "You got balls, I'll give you that! All right, I can get you some." He stood up and got into his tent, then he emerged carrying three packets.
"Don't you have more?" she asked when snatching them and immediately hiding in her pocket.
The man responded by elevating his eyebrow, then he said cockily, "I ain't got much, sweetheart and I might need some one day." He winked at her. "Maybe once you get bored with the doctor, you can come see me."
So far she quite enjoyed their conversation and the playfulness of it. She'd used to hate the guy, even felt disgusted by him, but now that she'd gotten to know him a little bit better, she actually grew to like him. Until he opened his mouth completely, that was.
"Not in this life, buddy," she said and then asked with exasperation, "Are you really always like this? Why do you keep doing this anyway? You show me that you actually have a soul and then say something that makes me detest you all over again. You should be nicer to people, James," she used his real name to emphasize what she was trying to tell him. He didn't answer her, so she just added, "Thanks for the condoms," and was gone.
Once Alice was back in the caves, she located Jack.
"Come with me," she whispered into his ear when approaching him from behind. She could already sense his body shuddering when he felt her breath on his neck. She took his hand and led him into the jungle.
"Alice, where are you taking me?" he asked.
"Just wait and see."
When they were finally alone in their favorite spot, she reached to her pocket and retrieved the packages from there. "I got three."
Jack looked at her, then at the condoms and then back at her again. "Where did you get these?" he asked in surprise.
"Does it matter?" she evaded the answer.
"Oh, no," he realized what she must've done. "You went to Sawyer for… condoms?!" he asked incredulously. "You can't be serious!"
"Oh, I'm dead serious. He's quite all right when you get to know him closer and… well, look past his usual banter."
"I'm not sure how I feel about you and Sawyer suddenly becoming so friendly," Jack voiced his concern.
"Are you actually jealous?" Alice asked, looking at him as though she wanted to eat him. Then she closed the distance between them and put her hands on his chest. His heart already started beating faster, she noticed with satisfaction.
"Well, should I be?"
"Of course not! If there can ever be something between me and Sawyer, in the best case scenario it'll be friendship. I am not attracted to him because I am attracted to you. Now, can we just stop talking about him and get our clothes out of the way? It's done anyway. I've already got the condoms."
Jack actually laughed and then he cupped her face and kissed her with passion. It was finally going somewhere. Alice was happy as she kissed him back and soon enough pushed towards a tree and then to a blanket she'd put there earlier. This time she was going to be the one on top, she decided.
Only it apparently wasn't meant to happen that night, she thought with frustration. She was just straddling Jack and kissing him, his hands on her breasts, her hips moving over him, working him up into arousal when they felt some rustling in the jungle.
They stilled, caught in the act.
"Is someone out there?" Jack asked when they couldn't see anything.
They only heard more rustling and someone walking towards them clumsily.
They got to their feet and Jack reflexively covered Alice with his own body when…
"Claire?" he asked, shocked on seeing the pregnant woman coming out of the trees.
There was a huge commotion in the caves when the survivors spotted that Jack and Alice were bringing Claire back. Charlie was the first one by their side, asking what happened and where they found the girl. Still, it wasn't like they could give him a good enough answer.
Jack lay Claire down on a blanket and immediately started checking her up for any injuries, eventually looking into her eyes. She'd lost consciousness once she'd stumbled upon him and Alice and was just now slowly regaining it. And then, as soon as her eyes focused on the people gathered around her, her pupils dilated as she didn't recognize any of them. She started screaming frantically and moving backwards when asking, "Who are you, people?!"
In the end, Jack figured that Claire must've been suffering from some kind of amnesia and even if it was rare, it was possible. She truly didn't recognize anyone and she had made a lot of wonderful friends among the survivors. The situation changed drastically when Charlie was approached by Ethan in the jungle. The man threatened that if they didn't return Claire to him, he would kill one of them and then another with every passing day.
"We can't give her to him!" Charlie protested immediately.
"I know, Charlie, I know," Jack admitted when pinching the bridge of his nose and trying to come up with a solution. "What if we track him?" he then turned to Locke who was also present. "Can you do it?"
"Maybe," the older man admitted," but what if he's not alone? Do you really think he could pull it all off by himself? Taking a pregnant woman and a grown-up man? And then hanging this man on a tree while… while what was happening to Claire?" Locke asked the perfect question and Jack saw the logic behind his reasoning. As a result, he truly didn't know what to do.
"We'll gather our people and guard them. We'll watch them over the night so nothing will get past us," Sayid suggested the best solution – or so it seemed.
The next morning a woman started screaming on the beach. There was a body there. The guy, Scott, was one of the survivors and it clearly wasn't just an accident as his bones and neck were broken. Ethan and any possible allies of his must've come from the water and there was nothing they could do to stop it in the end. Alice was terrified, her old fears and insecurities returning to her. She didn't want to die just when she found a good enough reason to go on living. Not when even though she had no family, she wasn't alone. Her time on the island had recently gotten so much better. She'd been falling in love, she'd made friends and even found pleasure when talking to people that she'd before thought of as unpleasant and unlikable.
Just when they had no other idea of how to survive another night and avoid Ethan killing them all, Claire found out about him from Shannon and offered to put an end to this by becoming a bait. It was highly dangerous for a pregnant woman, but what other choice did they really have?
Jack quickly gathered up a small group which would watch Claire and wait for Ethan to show up, so they could capture and interrogate him.
"Alice, you need to stay here," he told his girlfriend in a soft voice when she volunteered to help, too.
"Jack, I can't stay behind," she disagreed immediately. "I know you want to keep me safe, but I want to help. I want to be there so I'll know that you'll be all right. I can't just sit around and wait!"
"And I can't have one more person to protect," he explained, not even getting angry with her. "We need to focus on Claire's and our own safety. We can't watch out for you, too. I know you can take care of yourself, Alice," he added quickly, "but you can't shoot a gun and that's our only protection against them."
She knew that. She saw the reasoning behind his words. But it was still hard for her to let him go like this.
"Didn't you have four guns?" she asked, knowing that she should let it go and stay behind.
"I only have three people who know how to use them," Jack explained.
"Sawyer can shoot pretty well," she informed.
"Sawyer can shoot?" Jack repeated. It wasn't as though he couldn't believe her, it was that she immediately thought of the blond guy. "You can't be serious."
"He killed a polar bear right in front of me, Jack," Alice reminded him. "You might not like him, but you need all the people you can get and you know it. And it would be sweet that you're so jealous of him if it wasn't for the circumstances," she then added cockily.
"Jealous? I'm not…" he started.
"Oh, yes, you are," she interrupted him and put her arms around his neck, bringing him closer and kissing him. "Just be careful, ok?"
"Always am," he said and she made a face telling him that she didn't believe him. He just smiled at her and walked away with the rest.
While Jack with Sawyer, Sayid, Locke, Boone, Kate and most importantly, Claire, were gone; Alice was going out of her mind with worrying. Luckily for her, Shannon stayed by her side and kept her company. They didn't know where Charlie was, though. He should've been in the caves with them since Jack wanted him to stay behind. Something, yet, told Alice that he didn't and she could only hope he wouldn't do anything stupid that would put the others' safety in jeopardy.
And then, they finally came back, all wet from the rain that had surprised them earlier in the jungle. The weather acting crazy all over the island was yesterday's news. It could be all sunny and hot one second just to start pouring heavily in the next.
Alice saw with relief that all her friends and her boyfriend came back to the camp. She jumped to her feet and ran straight into Jack's arms. He caught her and embraced tightly even though his clothes were all wet whereas she was dry.
"Where's Ethan?" she asked when not seeing the perpetrator anywhere. "Didn't he show up?"
"Oh, he did," Jack answered with a sigh when letting her go from his arms, "but Charlie shot him dead."
"What? Why?" Alice wanted to know. It did seem suspicious to her that Charlie hadn't been in the caves, after all.
"He never wanted him to go near Claire ever again," Jack explained.
"So we're still grasping in the dark. Claire doesn't remember anything and we have no way of knowing what Ethan really wanted with her and if he was alone."
"Exactly," Jack confirmed, his expression morose.
"So, is everyone all right? Do they need you right now?" Alice wanted to know.
"Yes and no. Why?" Jack asked, but Alice just took his hand and led him out of the caves and straight to their favorite secluded spot in the jungle.
He didn't say anything when she sat him down on the blanket there and straddled him, kissing him and enjoying the closeness of his body. She could've as well lost him today, so she needed to reassure herself that they were all right. At least for now. They both needed each other, they both needed to forget about Claire going missing, about her not remembering anything and about Charlie killing Ethan. They needed to just relax, be together.
Alice started peeling off Jack's still drenched clothes, kissing his skin underneath whereas he was doing his best to undress her as well. She was right to bring them here again. He wanted to just sink into her, find his release within her body, feel his own relax, letting go of all the tension. They were simply there for each other, helping, listening, making love. That was what a real relationship should be all about, after all.