fic: i've missed you so much (part 8/8)
A/N: So here it is. The last part. Thanks so much to everyone who has been reading this and for everyone's patience as I struggled through it. You guys are the best and I really hope you enjoy this last bit.
----
April 12, 2050
Dear Kate,
I’m writing this for you now so that you’ll remember. I’m not sure how much time left I have to get it all down. Yes Kate, this is you. Katherine Anne Austen. There are some things that are just too important for you to forget.
It seems funny to me now that I would be writing about these specific three years. At the time, I spent most of those years trying to forget the time I spent on the island, and now when it’s likely I will not be able to remember them, they are the years that I so desperately want to hold onto. My life began with the plane crash, at least the life that I want to remember. It began when I met him, as sappy and cliché as it sounds. Now, 46 years later, there hasn’t been a day since that first day that I haven’t loved him.
It all started in 2004, the year you were in a plane crash. That’s always one of those things that you see in TV shows or movies, sometimes on the news, and you think that will never happen to me. And you think if it ever did, it would be one of the worst things to ever happen to you. Maybe at the time, I was thinking that. Part of me is glad that soon I won’t be able to remember some of the images from that day. But the plane crash is how I met him, so in the end, I can’t say that I’m not glad that it happened. Since then, after all the things I’ve seen, I think it was meant to be.
His name was Jack Shephard. He was a doctor, but in an ironic twist of fate, you were the one who fixed him up that day. He had this huge gash on his back and you were pretty sure you wouldn’t be able to sew him up, but he had such strong faith in you despite the fact that he didn’t even know you and it calmed you in some way. He told you a story about this girl he did surgery on in his residency. He had messed up and he had to fix it. So he let himself be afraid for 5 seconds. That was it. Then the fear was gone, and he fixed her up good as new. I still count to five sometimes when I’m afraid. It always helps, but maybe it’s because he’s on my mind.
I’ve been in love with him since that day. I don’t think I knew it at the time, and God knows there were times I wish it wasn’t true, but if there were one constant in my life, it would be that. There isn’t a day he doesn’t cross my mind in some way.
I used to see him everywhere at work. I was a nurse but I retired recently. I specialized in emergency care. There’s something so thrilling and mind numbing to it. You only have an instant, you can only think about what’s at hand at that very second. There isn’t room for much else. It helped get my mind off things, usually off of how much I was missing him. But sometimes I’d be on break, or dropping off files at the nurse’s station, and there he’d be. Walking down a corridor. Helping a patient. Just a few years ago, I saw a doctor with the same short buzz cut that he had when I first met him. I felt a familiar ache inside. It hurt to think that he was probably the same age Jack was when he died, and I am now old enough to be his mother. How could we have spent so many years apart? It seems like an eternity and yet I can remember him - the feel of his touch, the sound of his voice, the warmth of his lips - just like it were yesterday.
Sometimes I regret leaving him there on the island. But I know it was what he wanted me to do. He wanted me to live my life. And I did. I did it for him. He changed my life in so many ways, that it seemed wrong to waste my opportunities. He died to save us all, and I spent every day trying to remember that, especially in the beginning when all I could think to do was be angry with him over leaving me once again.
But I know how much he loved me. And I felt loved even after he was gone. I know if there had been a way we would have been together. Maybe we will be once again.
My mom once told me “you can’t help who you love Katherine”, and it wasn’t until I met Jack that I truly understood what she meant. I couldn’t help loving him even after he was long gone. I dated some people, but never had anything serious. I never married. Never had any children of my own. But I loved fully and lived my life, and maybe that’s all anyone can ask for in this lifetime.
My greatest fear right now is that I won’t remember him. I’ll lose the way his hair felt running through my fingertips, or the sound of him reading to Aaron, or the feel of his scruff against my cheekbone. I’ll never remember how he made me feel or all the ways he changed my life. So I’m praying to a God that I never used to believe in, praying that by writing this all down, he’ll never really leave.
I’m praying that maybe one day I can get back to him.
Please, just try not to forget.
----
You wake up on his chest. The beat of his heart is steady underneath your fingertips and you think for a second that this must be another one of your dreams as a swell of disappointment washes over you. But you don’t wake up and then it all comes rushing back to you. You’re dead. You’re in the afterlife. And he is really here.
You look up to his face. He’s sleeping soundly (it seems weird that you have to sleep in heaven, but you like the normalcy of it), and you just watch him, taking in the lines of his face and the curve of his lips. Suddenly you can’t resist the urge any longer, and you reach out to touch him, stroking his cheek, and smile as his eyes flutter open slowly.
“Hey,” he says sleepily and smiles.
“Hey,” you say grinning back.
“Are you okay?” You almost begin to cry as those familiar words meet your ears. You had missed the way his eyes would shine with so much concern for you.
“Yeah,” you say, swallowing back tears. “I just can’t believe you’re here.”
He cocks his head, and gives you one of those looks, like he can’t believe you’re there with him either, or that he’s touched by your words. And then he pulls you up to him until you’re face to face, gazing at you with so much love that you think your heart just might explode. He closes the distance between you then and kisses you softly, and you can feel all the years of absence, all of the pain, slowly dissipate as if they weren’t even a part of you.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he whispers against your lips as you pull away. And as he wraps you in his arms and you lie in bed together, you know that this time, you have him forever.
----
April 12, 2050
Dear Kate,
I’m writing this for you now so that you’ll remember. I’m not sure how much time left I have to get it all down. Yes Kate, this is you. Katherine Anne Austen. There are some things that are just too important for you to forget.
It seems funny to me now that I would be writing about these specific three years. At the time, I spent most of those years trying to forget the time I spent on the island, and now when it’s likely I will not be able to remember them, they are the years that I so desperately want to hold onto. My life began with the plane crash, at least the life that I want to remember. It began when I met him, as sappy and cliché as it sounds. Now, 46 years later, there hasn’t been a day since that first day that I haven’t loved him.
It all started in 2004, the year you were in a plane crash. That’s always one of those things that you see in TV shows or movies, sometimes on the news, and you think that will never happen to me. And you think if it ever did, it would be one of the worst things to ever happen to you. Maybe at the time, I was thinking that. Part of me is glad that soon I won’t be able to remember some of the images from that day. But the plane crash is how I met him, so in the end, I can’t say that I’m not glad that it happened. Since then, after all the things I’ve seen, I think it was meant to be.
His name was Jack Shephard. He was a doctor, but in an ironic twist of fate, you were the one who fixed him up that day. He had this huge gash on his back and you were pretty sure you wouldn’t be able to sew him up, but he had such strong faith in you despite the fact that he didn’t even know you and it calmed you in some way. He told you a story about this girl he did surgery on in his residency. He had messed up and he had to fix it. So he let himself be afraid for 5 seconds. That was it. Then the fear was gone, and he fixed her up good as new. I still count to five sometimes when I’m afraid. It always helps, but maybe it’s because he’s on my mind.
I’ve been in love with him since that day. I don’t think I knew it at the time, and God knows there were times I wish it wasn’t true, but if there were one constant in my life, it would be that. There isn’t a day he doesn’t cross my mind in some way.
I used to see him everywhere at work. I was a nurse but I retired recently. I specialized in emergency care. There’s something so thrilling and mind numbing to it. You only have an instant, you can only think about what’s at hand at that very second. There isn’t room for much else. It helped get my mind off things, usually off of how much I was missing him. But sometimes I’d be on break, or dropping off files at the nurse’s station, and there he’d be. Walking down a corridor. Helping a patient. Just a few years ago, I saw a doctor with the same short buzz cut that he had when I first met him. I felt a familiar ache inside. It hurt to think that he was probably the same age Jack was when he died, and I am now old enough to be his mother. How could we have spent so many years apart? It seems like an eternity and yet I can remember him - the feel of his touch, the sound of his voice, the warmth of his lips - just like it were yesterday.
Sometimes I regret leaving him there on the island. But I know it was what he wanted me to do. He wanted me to live my life. And I did. I did it for him. He changed my life in so many ways, that it seemed wrong to waste my opportunities. He died to save us all, and I spent every day trying to remember that, especially in the beginning when all I could think to do was be angry with him over leaving me once again.
But I know how much he loved me. And I felt loved even after he was gone. I know if there had been a way we would have been together. Maybe we will be once again.
My mom once told me “you can’t help who you love Katherine”, and it wasn’t until I met Jack that I truly understood what she meant. I couldn’t help loving him even after he was long gone. I dated some people, but never had anything serious. I never married. Never had any children of my own. But I loved fully and lived my life, and maybe that’s all anyone can ask for in this lifetime.
My greatest fear right now is that I won’t remember him. I’ll lose the way his hair felt running through my fingertips, or the sound of him reading to Aaron, or the feel of his scruff against my cheekbone. I’ll never remember how he made me feel or all the ways he changed my life. So I’m praying to a God that I never used to believe in, praying that by writing this all down, he’ll never really leave.
I’m praying that maybe one day I can get back to him.
Please, just try not to forget.
----
You wake up on his chest. The beat of his heart is steady underneath your fingertips and you think for a second that this must be another one of your dreams as a swell of disappointment washes over you. But you don’t wake up and then it all comes rushing back to you. You’re dead. You’re in the afterlife. And he is really here.
You look up to his face. He’s sleeping soundly (it seems weird that you have to sleep in heaven, but you like the normalcy of it), and you just watch him, taking in the lines of his face and the curve of his lips. Suddenly you can’t resist the urge any longer, and you reach out to touch him, stroking his cheek, and smile as his eyes flutter open slowly.
“Hey,” he says sleepily and smiles.
“Hey,” you say grinning back.
“Are you okay?” You almost begin to cry as those familiar words meet your ears. You had missed the way his eyes would shine with so much concern for you.
“Yeah,” you say, swallowing back tears. “I just can’t believe you’re here.”
He cocks his head, and gives you one of those looks, like he can’t believe you’re there with him either, or that he’s touched by your words. And then he pulls you up to him until you’re face to face, gazing at you with so much love that you think your heart just might explode. He closes the distance between you then and kisses you softly, and you can feel all the years of absence, all of the pain, slowly dissipate as if they weren’t even a part of you.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he whispers against your lips as you pull away. And as he wraps you in his arms and you lie in bed together, you know that this time, you have him forever.