Fixed

[alliecat8]

Title:  Fixed
Fandom:  Lost
Characters:  Kate Austen/Jack Shephard/James "Sawyer" Ford
Prompt:  Written for fanfic100 's prompt #72, fixed
Spoilers: Through "...and Found."
Word Count: 642
Rating: PG-13 for implied UST

Kate wasn’t a meddler.  Really, she wasn’t.  It was just that she couldn’t bear it when things weren’t right.  She wanted to fix everything, and fix it immediately, or die trying.  That’s why losing Tom, and losing her mother on the same day, had nearly broken her.  She couldn’t fix them.  She’d thought that, if she just got back that toy airplane, that reminder of a childhood filled with the security of parents and friends, it would somehow fix things.  And she did get it back, using whatever means necessary, and it did make things better.  A little bit.

 

Being in a plane crash wasn’t something that Kate could fix.  But there were plenty of things on the Island that she could.  She could help Jack find the cockpit.  She could help Sawyer find his damn boar.  She could help Sun keep Jin from leaving, and she could find Sun’s ring.  And when Sun handed her the bottle, Kate wondered if she’d been able to fix something else, as well.  Suddenly, knowing that was the most important thing in the world to Kate.  Heedless of moral standards, she began to frantically scan the messages in the bottle, needing to see if it was still there.

 

She almost told Sawyer, the night before the raft sailed, the night they’d talked by the bonfire.  She’d steeled herself to tell him, worked up every ounce of courage she possessed, and opened her mouth to say the words she’d rehearsed.  But then Sawyer had thrown up his walls, those impenetrable walls that he hid his heart behind, and she knew that he wouldn’t believe her.  He was too afraid, and too closed-off inside his fortress of denial.  He would laugh and walk away, or he would hate her for lying to him.  But he would never believe.

 

She almost told Jack, the day the raft sailed, the day Jack walked out of the jungle with tears in his eyes.  She thought, for an instant, that maybe they’d…but no.  Jack was all business, organizing the away team, walking away from the beach, not even saying goodbye.  Jack didn’t know, and he would never believe her.  He would smile and thank her for her good intentions, or he would pity her for her delusions.  But he would never believe.

 

So she’d done the only thing she could think of to do, the only thing that might fix this.  She’d scribbled a note and put it in the bottle, knowing that Sawyer wouldn’t be able to resist, knowing he’d eventually read the messages.  She’d told him what she’d seen.  The looks that each would give the other when they thought they’d go unnoticed.  The “accidental” touches that happened more and more frequently.  The way that Jack had prowled the beach and brooded until dawn the night before the raft sailed.  The way that Sawyer had searched for Jack before he went into the jungle for bamboo, needing to say goodbye. 

 

So she’d told him, the only way she knew how.  Because if he didn’t know, if he never found out, Sawyer would disappear.  He’d get rescued and never be heard from again, or he’d find a way to get himself killed out there on the water.  If he didn’t know, he’d never find his way back to Jack.

 

Kate read each letter, unrolling them more and more frantically, as Sun begged her to stop.  “I didn’t say goodbye,” she said.  I didn’t tell him what I know, she meant.  Wherever he was, whatever had happened to him, Kate hoped with all her being that Sawyer now had two letters in his possession.  One letter full of despair for the past, and one full of hope for the future.  With shaking hands, she unrolled the last sheet of paper.  It wasn’t hers.  Kate’s letter was gone.

End