Fic, Lost: Soothe the Burn (Jack/Boone), R, for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
un_love_you
Jun. 19th, 2008 11:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janie_tangerineTurns out that I feel very much like writing Jack/Boone even if I wasn't planning it. Now maybe I'll be able to finish a couple of other things. Apart from Kant of course. When is the 24th? *damnit*
Title: Soothe the Burn
Rating: light R
Pairing: Jack/Boone
Word counting: 3375
Disclaimer: Didn't happen on the show. Guess won't happen now, sadly.
Spoilers: Light ones for the S4 finale, though it's supposed to be set a bit before Jack's FF in the S3 one.
Summary: It isn’t really a surprise when Boone appears one day when Jack is really drunk; he was the only one missing after all and it’s just fitting that he’s the last. The first and the last, how damn ironic.
A/N: forun_love_you #12, I'm drunk. Title stolen from a line from Nirvana's 'Dumb', in honor to Nirvana!Jack as usual. Warnings are all the usual for Nirvana!Jack I guess. Nominated for Best Slash Fic at lost_fic_awards, June 2008.
Jack sees each one of them and every time he does, by now, he’s drunk. Oh, he wasn’t, not when it started; but right now he can’t really even remember how it feels like to be sober.
It was just his father at first; then it became pretty much everyone else and every time it’s the same. He drinks, he sees one of them, he drinks more, maybe takes a pill, or even two; whoever it is, he, or she, says that he needs to go back and then they disappear. Then he drinks some more and a couple of times he has wished to just fall asleep and choke up on the damn whiskey. It never was the case.
So it isn’t really a surprise when he appears one day when Jack is really drunk; he was the only one missing after all and it’s just fitting that he’s the last. The first and the last, how damn ironic.
He doesn’t say anything at first and Jack’s vision is so blurry that he can’t distinguish who it is until he hears the voice.
Hi, Jack.
It’s the same as it was last time he heard it; only, last time it said Tell Shannon something that Jack couldn’t tell her. Not because of lack of effort, but Boone had died before passing the message and Jack doesn’t find it strange, not really, when he feels a sudden desire to ask him what he meant. But Jack can’t even distinguish Boone in the dark, he’s just a shape moving in front of his eyes and Jack is drunk, so really drunk, and he just shakes his head, words unable to form.
He feels a hand, real, solid and warm, pressing over his forehead, then a finger running down his cheek; then everything is gone and Jack figures that this time probably was the only one in which he was dreaming.
--
His father is the only one that appeared more than once; the others, they all came to him sooner or later, but never more than one time.
He could make a list. In order of appearance, which would also be the order of death probably.
Scott, Shannon, Ana, Libby, Eko, Nikki, Paolo (he didn’t remember the names when they first showed up, but nothing could make him forget now), Charlie, Alex, Karl, Danielle, Steve with a bunch of other people he couldn’t recall, even Michael, for God’s sake. Not Jin though, and he never was drunk enough not to notice it. But one error rectified is nothing in the sizable list of his errors and he doubts that Sun would ever take this as a proof that he hasn’t screwed up that badly. Even if he has screwed up. Every time, it was just you have to go back or something along those lines and every time he just toasted to whoever it was with the first drink at hand.
So when Boone appears again and Jack isn’t as drunk as he was last time, he figures that he had dreamed and that this was the real thing. So he sits on his mattress, his back up to the wall, a half empty whiskey bottle in his hand, ready for the lecture. He doesn’t even look at him after the first glance. He just waits for Boone to you have to go back-ing him but what he hears is not what he was expecting.
“Jesus. I was hoping that I could say it was good to see you again, but I guess I can’t.”
Jack blinks a couple of times, jerking his head towards Boone; he’s crouching near the mattress, slightly longer hair than he remembered falling in soft brown waves over his shoulders, biting his lower lip. Then Jack looks up and meets blue eyes that seem enormous to his distorted perception and the fact that the only thing showing there is worry makes him think that he must be hallucinating.
“What?” he manages shaking his head.
“You don’t look that great,” is the answer, accompanied by shoulders slightly shrugging. His hand moves in order to bring the bottle to his lips but fingers grip his wrist and they’re real and solid again.
“How… is that… Boone, you’re dead.”
Boone stops biting his lip and the corner of his mouth turns just a bit upward.
“That would be the case, but I’m also here. Guess that’s the important matter, right?”
Then his hand leaves Jack’s wrist and goes slowly to his face, his fingers brushing on Jack’s temple, his palm caressing his cheek; Jack suddenly feels the presence of that beard mediating the contact and for the first time in a while he wishes he had shaved.
He closes his eyes, not realizing he’s leaning into the touch and that he has been actually savoring it.
It has been so much time, he thinks incoherently before the contact is gone and Boone is, too.
Well, he just had to expect it. I’m probably just delusional, he thinks taking another sip and letting himself fall on the mattress.
When he wakes up, the morning after, he realizes that a blanket is draped over him and he surely doesn’t remember having done it. He doesn’t even remember where his blankets are, to be honest.
--
The third time, he is still mildly drunk, but enough to be at least coherent.
Boone shows up near leaning against the sink in his kitchen, bare feet remaining clean while walking over his very, very dirty floor; Jack was on his feet, but just stumbles back in order to sit on the mattress again because it’s far too much and he can’t deal with it.
Then Boone comes closer and crouches again.
“Move,” and that wasn’t really what Jack had been thinking about. He shakes his head and Boone shakes his in return.
“Move over. Why, can’t one want to sit down a while?”
Jack moves over, not getting enough of the situation to reason on it; as soon as he does, Boone just sits near him, his back against the wall, too. Suddenly his leg is just near Jack’s, the right thigh against Jack’s left, real, solid, there and it takes all of Jack’s force of will not to slam his hand down on there.
Then Boone’s hand is on his knee and Jack would really not want to look Boone straight in the eyes because it just feels too intimate but he does and he can’t understand why there’s just some sort of genuine compassion in there.
“A penny for your thoughts.”
He half laughs at it.
“You’re… different. From… the others, I mean.”
There isn’t really any need for specifics. Boone’s head ducks slightly before he looks at him again.
“Well, I’m not the others. Anything against it?”
“Guess not.”
“Fine. So, what about letting that thing be and tell me something?”
Jack’s right hand leaves the bottle of Night Train Express he was going to lift up. Speaking has never seemed so difficult.
“Tell you something? What should I tell you now?”
“Whatever you want. Your pick. It just happens that I think you need a talk. Maybe two. And seems like no one else is volunteering for the job.”
“You’re a psychologist now?”
“You wouldn’t know the perspective death brings on you, Jack.”
His tone isn’t bitter; Boone says it just like it’s the most normal thing ever and when Jack sees the way his face is absolutely relaxed when he talks is enough to get a real laugh out of him, unable to stop it; then Boone at least chuckles and it feels just so good and so weird.
“So is there anything you’d rather hear about?” he asks, his voice still not convinced.
“Whatever you want.”
“Fine.”
Jack does realize that the way things went downhill with Kate is a really boring subject, but he also realizes that he had never actually talked about it. And just letting it out feels good.
--
So he spends a week talking.
They sit on the mattress, Boone doesn’t say anything if not for obvious remarks, sometimes his hand covers Jack’s when the subject is sore and he just is there and listens.
Jack doesn’t really want to think that he might just as well be going crazy and spilling the story of his life out to air, but maybe it’s the exception confirming the rule that hallucinations aren’t anything good. Because he still has his own, he still sees his father first thing in the morning, but the nights are Boone’s and that’s fine. That’s just fine.
--
Then the week is over and he really is more drunk than usual, especially because it was one of the days where his father actually talked in the morning and well, he is bad enough when silent, but when he actually speaks the only thing that Jack can do when he disappears is either swallow two pills or something strong. But he found out that pills fuck his head up more than alcohol does and since he wants to be at least coherent in the evening, he drinks.
He waits on the mattress, motionless, realizing that when you come to rely on a ghost visiting you every night it means you’re really losing it; but then Boone is there again, in the exactly same place, and the silent understanding behind his eyes is enough to make Jack want to crawl into some hole and stay there.
“You spoke with him?”
No need to specify who him is.
“How do you know?”
Boone shrugs and Jack realizes that it was a stupid question.
“Why?”
Boone raises an eyebrow.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re the only one not telling me I need to go back. And you are... well, different. Just… why?”
Boone’s hand goes to his cheek, turning his head back up; suddenly Jack has an answer and it’s two soft lips slightly touching his own, warm and gentle and everything that they shouldn’t be. Not to him.
“Because they want what is right,” he says softly when parting, even if he stays close, his mouth so impossibly close, and Jack wonders if he could taste the Wild Irish Rose on his tongue.
“And what do you want?” Jack asks, realizing that it’s the same as asking why are you here.
“I want what’s right, too. Only, they want just what is right in the big picture.”
“You don’t?”
Boone shrugs and his cheeks flush. Jack knows he should feel unsettled. He doesn’t.
“I want what is right for you, and this isn’t.”
Jack can barely register the feeling of Boone’s tongue tracing his lips before he disappears again.
--
The day after, Jack tries to shave.
It takes two hours and a countless number of aborted attempts, not counting the frequent pauses because his hand just won’t stop twitching and shaking. When he’s through, he still has some stubble left over his face, three cuts on his left cheek and two on his right, but at that point his hand is trembling so badly that he’s a afraid to slay his throat without even knowing it and he lets it be. It has to be enough.
He passes one hand slowly over his face, barely recognizing how it looks. Well, he does recognize it, but it seems from so far away. Maybe a couple of ages ago, he thinks shaking his head, then biting his lip until he can taste blood. He feels ridiculous standing in his bathroom, his hands clenching the sink, unable to look at his reflection; he stumbles out of the room and opens the fridge. He groans at seeing that there’s nothing solid in there, just two bottles of beer.
Fine anyway, he thinks opening the first one.
--
“You look good.”
Jack laughs and shakes his head, moving over as usual, Boone joining him again on the mattress.
“I don’t.”
“Oh, you do. You just don’t realize it.”
Boone’s voice is soft, almost soothing, as his hand suddenly squeezing his shoulder is.
Jack turns again towards him and it doesn’t take a genius to see that Boone is deadly serious.
“Why would you say that? We both know that...”
“You don’t. You only think that you know. You just don’t have a clue.”
Jack doesn’t know what to make out of it. Boone’s hand doesn’t leave his shoulder; if anything, it seems to Jack that he’s squeezing harder.
“You really look good.”
“You must be out of your mind.”
“It’s a question of what you see.”
“Well, I don’t see anything worth considering.”
“That’s where you don’t realize it. Then again, you never did. Not even back then.”
Jack doesn’t have the time to form a coherent answer in his head; suddenly Boone’s knees are against his thighs, he’s kneeling above him, Jack’s head between his hands. Boone bites his lip for a second, then lowers his head and Jack just parts his lips as soon as Boone’s touch them.
He’s way less drunk this time even if he did have his share, he took just two pills in the morning; suddenly there’s too much going around in his head, every feeling intoxicating him. From the way Boone’s fingers feel on his skin (and how does he feel naked right now?) to the way his thumb swirls against his cheekbone, from the unexpected warmth suddenly rushing through his body to the way Boone’s hips are real and solid under Jack’s hands, so much that he has to draw him closer, everything feels blissful, especially in comparison to what he’s been up to lately.
He lets Boone lead, a moan escaping his lips when they part, realizing that he has stopped caring about how crazy is this, it’s really not everyday that your fingers dig into the much warm skin of someone who should be long dead and gone and well, actually is long dead and gone for all Jack knows. It just doesn’t matter. Leave it to dead people to find what’s left of any good in yourself, is his second to last thought before Boone’s hands leave his face and reach his jeans; then he realizes that he’s actually hard as he can’t remember being since the last time he and Kate were together without promises and ghosts lingering between them. Then Boone’s head drops down and Jack stops thinking altogether.
--
It happens again and again; every time Jack is less drunk than the precedent.
When one day he just spreads his legs and nods, biting back a scream when Boone is inside him, he’s as close to stone cold sober as he has been in the last nine months and he welcomes the painful wave rushing through his body. Painful is better than the absolute nothing that has been there since he can’t even remember when; when painful becomes blissful, soft lips are kissing their way from behind his ear to his chin and he doesn’t think that he’s imagining too much if Boone’s eyes show something very close to happiness, for how fucked up it can be.
--
One day, he goes to his windows and keeps them wide open for one day; he throws away anything with an alcoholic content, then takes a trash sack and gets rid of everything lying on his floor, not caring about what it is. He looks at the Oxycodone lying near his mattress and realizes that he’s had not more than one each day for a long time.
In the evening, it’s not anywhere near clean or decent, but at least the air is fresh; he has to get down to a phone booth in order to call some restaurant since he doesn’t have a phone book anymore. He calls an Indian take away and has a full dinner always sitting on the damn mattress; he thought his stomach would protest but it doesn’t, maybe because he takes it slowly. When Boone appears and asks if he can have some rice, Jack doesn’t even ask whether dead people also need to eat now.
He also realizes that he hasn’t seen his father for two weeks in a row.
--
The day Boone says that it’s the last time, Jack doesn’t flinch. He knew it was bound to happen. Fun that it’s the first time he’s actually wearing clean clothes since a while.
“Do you really have to go?” he asks already knowing the answer.
“I wish I could stay. But I can’t. I don’t belong here.”
Jack nods, sitting over a new mattress, on a bed he sent his mother to buy; she actually sounded shocked when he called her (and probably hearing him sounding more or less alright, since the last time he called her he was, well, drunk out of his mind and he doesn’t blame her for not calling him after) and she had it delivered right at his door. He found out that he was getting tired of the ground.
Boone sits near him, looking at his hands laying between his knees first, then raising his head and having another look at him again.
“Well, now you look great.”
Jack nods, smiling just slightly, feeling his hand shake again.
“Not thanks to me, I guess. Though I still don’t know why you did it.”
“You want the easy answer or the real one?”
“Both.”
“Fair enough. The easy one, I owe you a liter of blood at least.”
Jack shivers, his eyes instantly going to his arm, even if he knows that whatever sign had been there, is long gone. He still remembers every second of that night.
“The real one... let’s say that I’m not one that does things just out of charity.”
The meaning of the sentence sinks in at once and Jack would say something, knows that he has to say something, but Boone stands up shaking his head and stopping him there; then he leans down again and Jack can make out a sparkle drowning in blue before Boone’s hand is on his chin and his lips over Jack’s again, moving slowly for a bit. Jack relaxes on instinct and it’s slow and just feels good, nice, even if it tastes of goodbye from beginning to end; then Boone parts and nods at him, standing up again and going towards the door.
“Good luck, Jack.”
He turns then, and Jack has to ask him.
“Wait a second! You didn’t... you haven’t...”
Boone faces him again and he looks more amused than anything.
“I told you, Jack. I don’t care about what is right in the great scheme of things. Do what feels right for you. If you think it means going back, go back. If you think you should stay, stay. I’ll make sure they’ll leave you alone. I won’t be the one telling you what to do anyway. Oh, by the way? If someone didn’t appear to you, it was for a reason.”
Then he smiles at him again and he’s gone.
Jack sits on the bed, his right hand shaking beyond control.
Two months ago, he would have definitely needed a drink. Now he doesn’t.
He stands up, goes to the fridge, pours himself a glass of water and swallows a methadone pill. He stays there with his eyes closed for a while. Then he takes his cellphone in the hand that doesn’t twitch and starts to think. When he figures what’s best to do, he curses himself for not having thought about it before. He searches for the emergency number Penny gave him before they left the Searcher two years ago and presses call.
It works and he lets out a breath of relief when the receiver is picked up.
When the call is over, he feels dizzy and his head his heavy; it doesn’t take much to realize that he’s completely drunk on excitement, but it’s been so long and it’s just so good.
He lies on the bed and falls asleep in a second; until the phone rings again a couple of hours later, he dreams of pens, CPRs gone wrong and a pair of eyes as blue as an ocean he longs to see again.
End.
Title: Soothe the Burn
Rating: light R
Pairing: Jack/Boone
Word counting: 3375
Disclaimer: Didn't happen on the show. Guess won't happen now, sadly.
Spoilers: Light ones for the S4 finale, though it's supposed to be set a bit before Jack's FF in the S3 one.
Summary: It isn’t really a surprise when Boone appears one day when Jack is really drunk; he was the only one missing after all and it’s just fitting that he’s the last. The first and the last, how damn ironic.
A/N: for
un_love_you #12, I'm drunk. Title stolen from a line from Nirvana's 'Dumb', in honor to Nirvana!Jack as usual. Warnings are all the usual for Nirvana!Jack I guess. Nominated for Best Slash Fic at lost_fic_awards, June 2008.Jack sees each one of them and every time he does, by now, he’s drunk. Oh, he wasn’t, not when it started; but right now he can’t really even remember how it feels like to be sober.
It was just his father at first; then it became pretty much everyone else and every time it’s the same. He drinks, he sees one of them, he drinks more, maybe takes a pill, or even two; whoever it is, he, or she, says that he needs to go back and then they disappear. Then he drinks some more and a couple of times he has wished to just fall asleep and choke up on the damn whiskey. It never was the case.
So it isn’t really a surprise when he appears one day when Jack is really drunk; he was the only one missing after all and it’s just fitting that he’s the last. The first and the last, how damn ironic.
He doesn’t say anything at first and Jack’s vision is so blurry that he can’t distinguish who it is until he hears the voice.
Hi, Jack.
It’s the same as it was last time he heard it; only, last time it said Tell Shannon something that Jack couldn’t tell her. Not because of lack of effort, but Boone had died before passing the message and Jack doesn’t find it strange, not really, when he feels a sudden desire to ask him what he meant. But Jack can’t even distinguish Boone in the dark, he’s just a shape moving in front of his eyes and Jack is drunk, so really drunk, and he just shakes his head, words unable to form.
He feels a hand, real, solid and warm, pressing over his forehead, then a finger running down his cheek; then everything is gone and Jack figures that this time probably was the only one in which he was dreaming.
--
His father is the only one that appeared more than once; the others, they all came to him sooner or later, but never more than one time.
He could make a list. In order of appearance, which would also be the order of death probably.
Scott, Shannon, Ana, Libby, Eko, Nikki, Paolo (he didn’t remember the names when they first showed up, but nothing could make him forget now), Charlie, Alex, Karl, Danielle, Steve with a bunch of other people he couldn’t recall, even Michael, for God’s sake. Not Jin though, and he never was drunk enough not to notice it. But one error rectified is nothing in the sizable list of his errors and he doubts that Sun would ever take this as a proof that he hasn’t screwed up that badly. Even if he has screwed up. Every time, it was just you have to go back or something along those lines and every time he just toasted to whoever it was with the first drink at hand.
So when Boone appears again and Jack isn’t as drunk as he was last time, he figures that he had dreamed and that this was the real thing. So he sits on his mattress, his back up to the wall, a half empty whiskey bottle in his hand, ready for the lecture. He doesn’t even look at him after the first glance. He just waits for Boone to you have to go back-ing him but what he hears is not what he was expecting.
“Jesus. I was hoping that I could say it was good to see you again, but I guess I can’t.”
Jack blinks a couple of times, jerking his head towards Boone; he’s crouching near the mattress, slightly longer hair than he remembered falling in soft brown waves over his shoulders, biting his lower lip. Then Jack looks up and meets blue eyes that seem enormous to his distorted perception and the fact that the only thing showing there is worry makes him think that he must be hallucinating.
“What?” he manages shaking his head.
“You don’t look that great,” is the answer, accompanied by shoulders slightly shrugging. His hand moves in order to bring the bottle to his lips but fingers grip his wrist and they’re real and solid again.
“How… is that… Boone, you’re dead.”
Boone stops biting his lip and the corner of his mouth turns just a bit upward.
“That would be the case, but I’m also here. Guess that’s the important matter, right?”
Then his hand leaves Jack’s wrist and goes slowly to his face, his fingers brushing on Jack’s temple, his palm caressing his cheek; Jack suddenly feels the presence of that beard mediating the contact and for the first time in a while he wishes he had shaved.
He closes his eyes, not realizing he’s leaning into the touch and that he has been actually savoring it.
It has been so much time, he thinks incoherently before the contact is gone and Boone is, too.
Well, he just had to expect it. I’m probably just delusional, he thinks taking another sip and letting himself fall on the mattress.
When he wakes up, the morning after, he realizes that a blanket is draped over him and he surely doesn’t remember having done it. He doesn’t even remember where his blankets are, to be honest.
--
The third time, he is still mildly drunk, but enough to be at least coherent.
Boone shows up near leaning against the sink in his kitchen, bare feet remaining clean while walking over his very, very dirty floor; Jack was on his feet, but just stumbles back in order to sit on the mattress again because it’s far too much and he can’t deal with it.
Then Boone comes closer and crouches again.
“Move,” and that wasn’t really what Jack had been thinking about. He shakes his head and Boone shakes his in return.
“Move over. Why, can’t one want to sit down a while?”
Jack moves over, not getting enough of the situation to reason on it; as soon as he does, Boone just sits near him, his back against the wall, too. Suddenly his leg is just near Jack’s, the right thigh against Jack’s left, real, solid, there and it takes all of Jack’s force of will not to slam his hand down on there.
Then Boone’s hand is on his knee and Jack would really not want to look Boone straight in the eyes because it just feels too intimate but he does and he can’t understand why there’s just some sort of genuine compassion in there.
“A penny for your thoughts.”
He half laughs at it.
“You’re… different. From… the others, I mean.”
There isn’t really any need for specifics. Boone’s head ducks slightly before he looks at him again.
“Well, I’m not the others. Anything against it?”
“Guess not.”
“Fine. So, what about letting that thing be and tell me something?”
Jack’s right hand leaves the bottle of Night Train Express he was going to lift up. Speaking has never seemed so difficult.
“Tell you something? What should I tell you now?”
“Whatever you want. Your pick. It just happens that I think you need a talk. Maybe two. And seems like no one else is volunteering for the job.”
“You’re a psychologist now?”
“You wouldn’t know the perspective death brings on you, Jack.”
His tone isn’t bitter; Boone says it just like it’s the most normal thing ever and when Jack sees the way his face is absolutely relaxed when he talks is enough to get a real laugh out of him, unable to stop it; then Boone at least chuckles and it feels just so good and so weird.
“So is there anything you’d rather hear about?” he asks, his voice still not convinced.
“Whatever you want.”
“Fine.”
Jack does realize that the way things went downhill with Kate is a really boring subject, but he also realizes that he had never actually talked about it. And just letting it out feels good.
--
So he spends a week talking.
They sit on the mattress, Boone doesn’t say anything if not for obvious remarks, sometimes his hand covers Jack’s when the subject is sore and he just is there and listens.
Jack doesn’t really want to think that he might just as well be going crazy and spilling the story of his life out to air, but maybe it’s the exception confirming the rule that hallucinations aren’t anything good. Because he still has his own, he still sees his father first thing in the morning, but the nights are Boone’s and that’s fine. That’s just fine.
--
Then the week is over and he really is more drunk than usual, especially because it was one of the days where his father actually talked in the morning and well, he is bad enough when silent, but when he actually speaks the only thing that Jack can do when he disappears is either swallow two pills or something strong. But he found out that pills fuck his head up more than alcohol does and since he wants to be at least coherent in the evening, he drinks.
He waits on the mattress, motionless, realizing that when you come to rely on a ghost visiting you every night it means you’re really losing it; but then Boone is there again, in the exactly same place, and the silent understanding behind his eyes is enough to make Jack want to crawl into some hole and stay there.
“You spoke with him?”
No need to specify who him is.
“How do you know?”
Boone shrugs and Jack realizes that it was a stupid question.
“Why?”
Boone raises an eyebrow.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re the only one not telling me I need to go back. And you are... well, different. Just… why?”
Boone’s hand goes to his cheek, turning his head back up; suddenly Jack has an answer and it’s two soft lips slightly touching his own, warm and gentle and everything that they shouldn’t be. Not to him.
“Because they want what is right,” he says softly when parting, even if he stays close, his mouth so impossibly close, and Jack wonders if he could taste the Wild Irish Rose on his tongue.
“And what do you want?” Jack asks, realizing that it’s the same as asking why are you here.
“I want what’s right, too. Only, they want just what is right in the big picture.”
“You don’t?”
Boone shrugs and his cheeks flush. Jack knows he should feel unsettled. He doesn’t.
“I want what is right for you, and this isn’t.”
Jack can barely register the feeling of Boone’s tongue tracing his lips before he disappears again.
--
The day after, Jack tries to shave.
It takes two hours and a countless number of aborted attempts, not counting the frequent pauses because his hand just won’t stop twitching and shaking. When he’s through, he still has some stubble left over his face, three cuts on his left cheek and two on his right, but at that point his hand is trembling so badly that he’s a afraid to slay his throat without even knowing it and he lets it be. It has to be enough.
He passes one hand slowly over his face, barely recognizing how it looks. Well, he does recognize it, but it seems from so far away. Maybe a couple of ages ago, he thinks shaking his head, then biting his lip until he can taste blood. He feels ridiculous standing in his bathroom, his hands clenching the sink, unable to look at his reflection; he stumbles out of the room and opens the fridge. He groans at seeing that there’s nothing solid in there, just two bottles of beer.
Fine anyway, he thinks opening the first one.
--
“You look good.”
Jack laughs and shakes his head, moving over as usual, Boone joining him again on the mattress.
“I don’t.”
“Oh, you do. You just don’t realize it.”
Boone’s voice is soft, almost soothing, as his hand suddenly squeezing his shoulder is.
Jack turns again towards him and it doesn’t take a genius to see that Boone is deadly serious.
“Why would you say that? We both know that...”
“You don’t. You only think that you know. You just don’t have a clue.”
Jack doesn’t know what to make out of it. Boone’s hand doesn’t leave his shoulder; if anything, it seems to Jack that he’s squeezing harder.
“You really look good.”
“You must be out of your mind.”
“It’s a question of what you see.”
“Well, I don’t see anything worth considering.”
“That’s where you don’t realize it. Then again, you never did. Not even back then.”
Jack doesn’t have the time to form a coherent answer in his head; suddenly Boone’s knees are against his thighs, he’s kneeling above him, Jack’s head between his hands. Boone bites his lip for a second, then lowers his head and Jack just parts his lips as soon as Boone’s touch them.
He’s way less drunk this time even if he did have his share, he took just two pills in the morning; suddenly there’s too much going around in his head, every feeling intoxicating him. From the way Boone’s fingers feel on his skin (and how does he feel naked right now?) to the way his thumb swirls against his cheekbone, from the unexpected warmth suddenly rushing through his body to the way Boone’s hips are real and solid under Jack’s hands, so much that he has to draw him closer, everything feels blissful, especially in comparison to what he’s been up to lately.
He lets Boone lead, a moan escaping his lips when they part, realizing that he has stopped caring about how crazy is this, it’s really not everyday that your fingers dig into the much warm skin of someone who should be long dead and gone and well, actually is long dead and gone for all Jack knows. It just doesn’t matter. Leave it to dead people to find what’s left of any good in yourself, is his second to last thought before Boone’s hands leave his face and reach his jeans; then he realizes that he’s actually hard as he can’t remember being since the last time he and Kate were together without promises and ghosts lingering between them. Then Boone’s head drops down and Jack stops thinking altogether.
--
It happens again and again; every time Jack is less drunk than the precedent.
When one day he just spreads his legs and nods, biting back a scream when Boone is inside him, he’s as close to stone cold sober as he has been in the last nine months and he welcomes the painful wave rushing through his body. Painful is better than the absolute nothing that has been there since he can’t even remember when; when painful becomes blissful, soft lips are kissing their way from behind his ear to his chin and he doesn’t think that he’s imagining too much if Boone’s eyes show something very close to happiness, for how fucked up it can be.
--
One day, he goes to his windows and keeps them wide open for one day; he throws away anything with an alcoholic content, then takes a trash sack and gets rid of everything lying on his floor, not caring about what it is. He looks at the Oxycodone lying near his mattress and realizes that he’s had not more than one each day for a long time.
In the evening, it’s not anywhere near clean or decent, but at least the air is fresh; he has to get down to a phone booth in order to call some restaurant since he doesn’t have a phone book anymore. He calls an Indian take away and has a full dinner always sitting on the damn mattress; he thought his stomach would protest but it doesn’t, maybe because he takes it slowly. When Boone appears and asks if he can have some rice, Jack doesn’t even ask whether dead people also need to eat now.
He also realizes that he hasn’t seen his father for two weeks in a row.
--
The day Boone says that it’s the last time, Jack doesn’t flinch. He knew it was bound to happen. Fun that it’s the first time he’s actually wearing clean clothes since a while.
“Do you really have to go?” he asks already knowing the answer.
“I wish I could stay. But I can’t. I don’t belong here.”
Jack nods, sitting over a new mattress, on a bed he sent his mother to buy; she actually sounded shocked when he called her (and probably hearing him sounding more or less alright, since the last time he called her he was, well, drunk out of his mind and he doesn’t blame her for not calling him after) and she had it delivered right at his door. He found out that he was getting tired of the ground.
Boone sits near him, looking at his hands laying between his knees first, then raising his head and having another look at him again.
“Well, now you look great.”
Jack nods, smiling just slightly, feeling his hand shake again.
“Not thanks to me, I guess. Though I still don’t know why you did it.”
“You want the easy answer or the real one?”
“Both.”
“Fair enough. The easy one, I owe you a liter of blood at least.”
Jack shivers, his eyes instantly going to his arm, even if he knows that whatever sign had been there, is long gone. He still remembers every second of that night.
“The real one... let’s say that I’m not one that does things just out of charity.”
The meaning of the sentence sinks in at once and Jack would say something, knows that he has to say something, but Boone stands up shaking his head and stopping him there; then he leans down again and Jack can make out a sparkle drowning in blue before Boone’s hand is on his chin and his lips over Jack’s again, moving slowly for a bit. Jack relaxes on instinct and it’s slow and just feels good, nice, even if it tastes of goodbye from beginning to end; then Boone parts and nods at him, standing up again and going towards the door.
“Good luck, Jack.”
He turns then, and Jack has to ask him.
“Wait a second! You didn’t... you haven’t...”
Boone faces him again and he looks more amused than anything.
“I told you, Jack. I don’t care about what is right in the great scheme of things. Do what feels right for you. If you think it means going back, go back. If you think you should stay, stay. I’ll make sure they’ll leave you alone. I won’t be the one telling you what to do anyway. Oh, by the way? If someone didn’t appear to you, it was for a reason.”
Then he smiles at him again and he’s gone.
Jack sits on the bed, his right hand shaking beyond control.
Two months ago, he would have definitely needed a drink. Now he doesn’t.
He stands up, goes to the fridge, pours himself a glass of water and swallows a methadone pill. He stays there with his eyes closed for a while. Then he takes his cellphone in the hand that doesn’t twitch and starts to think. When he figures what’s best to do, he curses himself for not having thought about it before. He searches for the emergency number Penny gave him before they left the Searcher two years ago and presses call.
It works and he lets out a breath of relief when the receiver is picked up.
When the call is over, he feels dizzy and his head his heavy; it doesn’t take much to realize that he’s completely drunk on excitement, but it’s been so long and it’s just so good.
He lies on the bed and falls asleep in a second; until the phone rings again a couple of hours later, he dreams of pens, CPRs gone wrong and a pair of eyes as blue as an ocean he longs to see again.
End.
