presents

Title: Secrets In The Moon
Author: propernice
Rating: PG
Fandom: Lost (Suliet)
A/N: This is for the wonderful ohvienna. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MY DARLING! It is still your birthday here, with 27 minutes to go, so I'M COUNTING IT. You gave me the prompt 'Nighttime in the rec room'. So here you go. I genuinely hope you enjoy it. And anyone else can comment, too! In fact, please do!


There’s this toy in the rec room.

Juliet’s almost positive she had one when she was little. A little plastic plane with little wooden people inside. She’s buzzed, lying on her stomach in the dark between the pool table and the couch. There are rules against being in the rec room after midnight, but her boyfriend is the head of security, so she’s positive she gets a pass. What are they going to do, throw her in jail?

(Kick her off the island, and it would be ironic if she was finally forced to leave.)

Taking a sip of her rum, she traces the line of the red wing before pulling out the wooden blue girl with the blond braids. She stares at it, the line of the mouth curving upward, the wide and innocent eyes. A wooden, happy figure not knowing that planes crash and people die and maybe you never see the ones you love again.

(She needs to put the booze away.)

The sound of keys jangling outside snaps her out of her thoughts and she has the presence of mind to get up about halfway until she hears a muffled ‘son of a bitch’ as keys drop to the ground. She lowers herself back down to the floor (Christ, how many people have walked on this floor) and finishes half of her drink in a few swallows. She doesn’t want James to know how much she’s really had. Too late she realizes that doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it’s done, and she pulls the wooden dad of the toys out of the plane, balancing him on the wing of the plane. When James makes it in, she doesn’t even look up.

“Hey. Past curfew,” he drawls, not meaning it and locking the door behind him.

“I wonder,” Juliet begins. “I wonder what I’m doing right now?”

James just looks at her for a second like she’s asking him the million dollar question, then sits down on the couch eying the bottle of rum on the edge of the pool table. “Currently, I’d say you’re doin’ a damn good impression of a sad, drunk lady,” he points out.

“No, no I mean. Little me. I think I’m gonna get this toy for Christmas this year. And that’s weird. That’s so damn weird.”

“What the hell ain’t weird about all of this? That’s the question.” James gets down on the ground with her, back against the couch. But I stopped askin’ ‘cause it’s been a year already. So why are you?” he asks gently.

“Because. I keep looking at that sub. And I keep watching it leave. And most days I don’t want to go anymore, but I want to find my sister and beg her not to let me ever leave when we’re older. But that’s…doesn’t work that way.”

What she’s saying isn’t so far-fetched, and she watches him sigh a little, one of his hands moving under her shirt to rub her back.

“I think about that too, sometimes. I could go stop my dad. Kill him before he kills my momma, or warn her. Hell, I could make sure none of that ever happens.”

She looks at him seriously, pushing herself up to sit beside him. He’s serious.

(He never talks about this. Ever.)

“Why don’t you?”

He looks at her a hundred different ways, she thinks. The lines on his face move from confused to hurt, to sad, and she has to reach out to touch. “I can’t. I can’t change it.”

“What Daniel said? About…not being able to change the things?”

(Christ she’s drunk, trying to string words together.)

“Maybe. But really, it ain’t that. If he ain’t around to ruin things, I never have a reason to be Sawyer. Which is probably good. And I always wanted my momma around. But then there wouldn’t be a flight 815 for me. And then I’d never meet you.”

(That’s the corniest and most heartfelt thing anyone’s ever said to her. She wants to cry.)

“So you. Won’t make your life better just because…there’s me now?”

James looks at her and this time she thinks there’s something there like awe.

“You don’t get it? You are what’s better, Blondie.”

(It’s dark in this room; she realizes now how dark it is.)

Her arms reach out to wind around him, and suddenly she’s in his lap, her face buried against his neck. He smells like soap and detergent, and a little like the rusty smell of the security station. It’s all him though, and her fingers clutch lightly at the rough material of his DHARMA jump suit.

“I love you. James, I love you.” She’s whispering like it’s some big damn secret.

(Maybe it is, because she’s not supposed to love him. She promised herself.)

This time when he looks at her she only sees him with a smile that lives in his eyes, and he dips his head to kiss her softly. His tongue sweeps across her mouth and she sighs before he pulls away.

(Please let him say it back.)

“I love you, too. And that’s pretty damn amazin’, considerin’ I didn’t think anyone’d ever stop runnin’ long enough to let me.”

She shakes her head vehemently. “Not running. I don’t want to run. I want to stay. With you.”

He kisses her again, pushing her hair away from her face. “C’mon, I’ll take you home,” and then he’s helping her up and she stumbles a little, leaning against him.

“Can you stay? Stay home with me. Come sleep.”

(Well. Not sleep, she thinks.)

“Temptin’ as it is, I gotta work.” His voice is low, full of regret as his hands move down her shoulders.

(Damn.)

He takes her hand and glances down at the plane, then ducks down and grabs the little wooden girl. “Looks like you,” he says, handing it to her.

“That’s what my sister…says. Said. Is gonna say.”

(She’s too drunk or not drunk enough for this.)

James’ arm tugs her closer and he kisses her temple. “Time travel’s still a bitch.”

“Maybe we’re s’posed to be stuck here. In ‘75’. Like it’s…maybe this is just our time,” she tries to explain as they walk extra slow so she doesn’t fall over.

“This is where I gotta be. Don’t plan on goin’ nowhere. Do you?” They’ve stopped outside their house and she looks up at him.

(He looks good in moonlight.)

“Not going anywhere,” she promises.

His smile is blink-and-you-miss-it quick, and he pushes her up to the door. “’Cept bed. Go on. Drink some water. Hell, drink a lot of water.”

She turns to look at him, and she’s sleepy and drunk and warm because he loves her back. “Maybe we can go somewhere together.”

(We can move to Tahiti.)

James pauses, watching her for a second. “Long as you ain’t ditchin’ me.”

“I gotta have your back,” she quips, and she grins, a goofy, wide, heartfelt smile that makes him laugh loudly.

(She’ll do anything else to make him laugh like that.)

“Night, Blondie,” he finally says, and she opens the door stepping halfway inside.

“See you in the morning.” She closes the door without looking back.

(He’ll be there, warm and just out of the shower, kissing across her shoulders, his hands resting over her stomach.)

Juliet stands at the window and watches him walk away in the moonlight, resting her forehead against the wall. And a slow smile spreads across her features.

He loves her back.