The living area is what you would call modestly furnished. Sawyer calls it home, the second floor of a neighborhood tavern. Decent living for a man who had gotten used to so much less. One small couch, a coffee table made of slate and a slab of wood, a second-hand arm chair and a side table fashioned from a stack of books. He's plopped his island digs right in the middle of the tundra for all intents and purposes. Probably appears that way, like he's holding the past. Figures the irony of it all ain't escaping Jack.

Jack picks up a book from the coffee table and quickly throws it down like it's molten lead. It's Sawyer's latest read, and he shouldn't be embarrassed by Jack's disapproval of  his choice of literature. It's torture that he's reading it. It's “Survivor,” by Charlie Pace, one of  a slew of Oceanic Flight 815 post-crash, tell-all books. He just finished “Raised By Another: the Aaron Littleton Story,” truly the most bizarre thing he’s ever read, even if he lived most of it himself. Probably because the little shit isn't but five or six years old and already has a five-book deal and a Lifetime movie in the waiting. Seems everyone who made it back from hellhole island alive has written a book or snagged a book deal or done a fucking media tour. They all have representation, publicists, agents.

All except for the ones that got swallowed up by the island and never made it home. All except for Sawyer, who has managed to make himself as good as dead by disappearing into oblivion. No more Sawyer, no more James Ford. Had to do it. He wasn't going on Oprah, wasn't going to be no dang consultant for a made for television movie about his time in tropical hell neither. Certain things don't need to be re-lived over and over.

So he took his class-action lawsuit settlement from Oceanic Airlines and high-tailed it far away from the media circus. Never to look back.

Until now.

Until Jack showed up on his doorstep.

Leave it up to Doc to keep banging on a closed door.

“Jeezus Sawyer, did you have to pick the coldest part of the world to live?” Jack asks in that irritated tone of his while shivering and wrapping his arms around his waist, his tall form hunched over like a homeless person on a street corner, teeth chattering something fierce. He has his blazer wrapped around him so tight looks like he's in a straight jacket. Sawyer would offer due sympathies, but he knows Jack ain't getting warm no matter how hard he tries.

“Alaska ain’t the coldest part of the world Doc. You're schooled enough to know that.” Sawyer scrambles around picking up his library of stray books and magazines -- island memorabilia really. He’s covering up the evidence,  tidying up for a guest he doesn’t really want, but he still has some pride.

“Well it's not the warmest either.”

Sawyer lowers his brow at Jack's emotionless response, peering at him resentfully as he rocks against the chill on the edge of the ragged sofa, just making himself at home. That's Jack for ya. Still as deadpan as ever. Still full of assumptions. Still willing to challenge every word out of Sawyer's mouth no matter how flip or inappropriate. The one-upmanship hasn't changed in the slightest. Swell.

What's the warmest place on earth? Hell Island, and there are darn good reasons why he embraces the cold and the solitude. For one, he ain't going to live the rest of his miserable time on earth being cornered in public places by every wacko in the United States who read about him in People Magazine, wanting to know if he really stole from corpses. What asshole would do that to the dead? When was he going to come out with a tell-all book of his own anyway?

Answers: Because it was necessary, this asshole would and never.

Still, inquiring minds needed to know every last fucking detail. And what happens when one is unwilling to offer any? People with nothing better to do fill in the blanks, spin their own stories.

Did aliens really inhabit the island, did they probe him, plant a chip in his brain, make him immortal? Did they have to eat each other to survive?

Answers: No, no, no, no and hell no.

Newsstands are scarce in Central Alaska. They don't get cable up here. The whole town hasn't read all about his con-artist past in Cassidy's true-crime novel, “Sleeping with the Enemy: Letters from a Prison Cell”. He’s pretty much anonymous here, as non-real as his borrowed moniker. No trace of James Ford either. He keeps to himself, guards his privacy well. Nobody in the arctic can figure him for the low-life he was in that previous life or write him off for the low-life he's become.

And here comes Jacko with the threat of a hurricane hell bent on stirring things up.

Leave it up to Dr. Pandora to open a box that should remained closed.

“Is that fireplace the only source of heat in this place?” Jack asks disapprovingly.  Rubbing his hands together briskly, he pushes past Sawyer and huddles closer to the meek fireplace.

Central Alaska, town of Fairbanks. Here the summers can have temperatures reaching into the upper 80s, while in the winter, the temperature can fall to -60°. Right now it's closer to 60 below.

Fine with Sawyer. Extremist he is. Nothing middle of the road for him.

Sawyer remembers his first months post-rescue. There wasn't a place on earth warm enough for him so he gave up trying. He was a master of contradiction anyway -- charm ‘em while he was really robbing them blind, go to a cold place when he needed warmth, pretend not to care when his heart swelled with yearning.

Sawyer cranks his neck as his eyes follow Jack's movements. Same ole Doc, so much so it makes his head ache. He's ballsy as ever, blunt and direct, still with not a lick of comprehension about personal space. But now it's Sawyer's turn to cut to the chase -- nip this little untimely reunion in the bud.

“What are you doing here, Jack?”

“Just about to ask you the same question, Sawyer.” His tone is cocky and challenging. Sawyer matches it.

“It's where I live.”

“It's where you're hiding.”

“Didn't know you were looking Doc. Could have saved you the trouble in coming here.”

He says this through gritted teeth. He says this with seething annoyance because Jack always did think he knew something about him that he didn't. He's not hiding, just finding another place to be.

They both pause and turn into a standoff, their eyes meet dead on. Their gazes linger. The sizing each other up is meant for people meeting for the first time, not for men who had been to hell and back together.

Breaking the trance, Jack reveals a wry smile, as if he has a secret that he's dying to tell. But Jack, always uptight and bottled up, really is a bunch of raw nerves and emotions always ready to explode, ever on the brink of bubbling over. Fucking powder keg. And the guy never knew how to keep his heart away from his sleeve.

“Happy to see you too Sawyer.”

As the  hum of Jack’s voice lingers in air, trailing down Sawyer’s spine, he shudders, waits for him to say more. Needs for him to say more. Dr. Chuckles simply smiles until any trace of amusement completely fades. Sawyer demurs to return any warm sentiments. Instead he scowls, shuffles his feet and mumbles under his breath. He's not as good at revealing his feelings, not the true ones at least.

“There's a bar downstairs I noticed. Figure the temperature must be above zero there?”

Sarcastic asshole. Maybe he was happy to see him, maybe if he kept yapping on the temperature probably not.  “Maybe.”

“Why don't we go get a drink then.”

+++++++

Sawyer works behind the bar of the busy tavern, pouring booze, wiping clean glasses dry. Doing his bartending duties three days a week basically pays his rent and gives him something to pass the time. The sweet settlement from Oceanic is more than enough to cover the rest of his modest living for two lifetimes.

He periodically checks on Jack, who is huddled in the corner, nursing his drink. Sawyer feels the Doc's eyes on him even when he isn't looking, and when he dares to look, he finds Jack staring over, his eyes dark and longing, almost pleading. It's just enough to tug at whatever heartstrings he has left.

Sawyer instructs the barmaid to keep Jack's tab open and his glass full.

“You wanna go join your handsome friend over there, Jim?” the woman asks Sawyer with a sly smirk. “He's looking awful lonely. If you’re not going to keep him company I will. Why don’t you take the next round over there yourself. We've got more than enough coverage tonight. Go on ahead.”

Sawyer hesitates. He rubs his hands against his hips and fidgets. He's now Jim, not Sawyer, and he'd rather work just a bit longer, a tad longer to avoid facing any trace of his past. He suddenly feels a swirl of what he figures is butterflies in his stomach, but he rebukes any notion of nerves. He shouldn't give a shit that the Doc's there looking for a crumb.

Jack catches his eye and nods his head in acknowledgement. He's stoic and patient, waiting for Sawyer -- just waiting. 

It's suddenly hard for Sawyer to swallow. His 'handsome friend'. Fading sunlight is cutting across Doc's face. He's sitting straight and upright, his chest solid and strong. Those fucking puppy dog eyes beckon.

“Grab me one of them bottles of the good stuff,” he requests while bucking up. “Put it on my tab.”

“Thought you were avoiding me,” says Jack as Sawyer slides into the booth seat across from him with a bottle of whiskey in one hand and a pack of cigarettes in the other. Jack's eyes immediately brighten, and his eagerness kills Sawyer.

“What gives you that idea,” he mumbles with a cigarette hanging from his mouth.

“Maybe because you are all the way up here. In Alaska of all places.”

“And you assume me being ‘all the way up here’ gots something to do with you? You're awful damn full of yourself .” He lights the cigarette, grunts through a long drag.

“So I've been told.”

Jack reaches over and helps himself  to a cigarette. Sawyer frowns a bit, not pegging Jack for the smoker type, but it wasn't like there had been a stash of Dharma-brand cigarettes on on the island anyway.

“Help yourself Doc. Let's die of lung cancer together. Might be the only thing that can kill us.”

Jack chuckles lightly, grins like a goofy kid and acts as if he wants to put the cigarette back. Sawyer swirls amber liquid in a small glass, savoring in anticipation, before kicking his head back and letting it slide down his throat. He smacks his lips as the liquor steals his breath.

“That's some good shit.” He tips the bottle and tops-off  Jack's glass without him asking. “If this don't warm your ass up, nothing will.” Nothing will. He knows.

Sawyer watches as Jack thumps the end of a cigarette, lighting it and taking a long drag. His eyes follow the Doc's hands. They are large and ample, fingers long and lean, exquisite. He always admired those hands for some reason. Hands of a surgeon he supposes, except they're now laced with battle wounds -- scrapes and scars, telltale -- and now shaking, a slight tremor that's probably only detectable if one really looked, and oh hell yes, Sawyer's really looking.

Jack's ruddy, gaunt appearance that he had burned into his brain has been replaced. He's now clean shaven, skin a bit paler, cheeks fuller. His hair is still closely cropped, but now with detectable flecks of silver sprinkled throughout.

Sawyer rubs his stubbled chin, tosses his overgrown hair from his eyes, pushes up the sleeves of his flannel shirt. Not much about himself has changed, nothing he can peg. So he doesn't clean-up quite so nicely. Probably spooks the Doc too.

Jack takes another drag, eyes staying trained on Sawyer through a haze of smoke. Sawyer wants to look away, wants to keep himself from reacting like someone who got caught with his hands in the cookie jar. Yet he can't look away, and he doesn't want to.

“When you take up that habit anyway, Doc? The smokin' not the drinkin'” Obviously not the drinking, he thinks, as Jack coughs a bit in response to the potent liquor. “Bet ya didn't smoke before ... ya know.”

Jack shivers as a gust of wind from the opening door hits his back. The Doc's a big heaping mess.

His voice shudders, cracks. “After I realized I was really alive.”

Did that realization ever really happen, Sawyer asks himself? Being alive is a relative term when you're drowning in the relentless, gnawing thing called memories.

What happened on the island needs to stay on the island. Doc's not offering any details of what he remembers, and he shouldn't. None of them were supposed to. The book writers can kiss his ass. Inquiring minds can lick his sweet ass. He's not telling a fucking thing.

Unspoken pact that only the Doc kept anyway. Except he's made it his business to find Sawyer when he didn't want to be found. He probably wants to “talk” about it like some fucking broad. Not happening. Lips zipped.

“Never figured you for the frontier's man type,” Jack says after a long, painfully uncomfortable silence.

“Frontier? This ain't no frontier. Just because you don't see no highrises don't make it the frontier.”

“Well it's pretty damned remote. You know what it took for me to get here?”

“I got an idea.”

“A ship, a train, a bus…”
 
“Ha, this ain't Club Med? Ain’t supposed to be easy to get to,” Sawyer interrupts. “That’s kind of the point. Don't tell me you got on a plane somewhere between here and wherever you came from.”

Jack's hands begins to shake like a crack addict as he takes another drag. His body shudders. Sawyer wants to hold him still, wants to make him stop, wants to make him understand that the past is the past. He figures the chill has made itself home in Jack's body though. He understands this, he's felt it, never really managed to shake it himself.

“Haven't been on a plane since ... well you know.”

“Yea same here, and I wasn’t exactly itchin’ ta neither. I took the same trek you took gettin' here. So you made it, found me. Guess I’m the lucky one,” Sawyer says with his brand of heavy sarcasm.

Jack nods knowingly, like he really believes Sawyer’s damn lucky to be graced by his presence. Guy’s full of himself, Sawyer thinks with resigned disdain.

“Antarctica.”

“What about it?” Sawyer asks.

“That's the coldest place on earth. You could have gone there.”

“Here is where I need to be,” he says sternly, shooting Jack a look of warning to drop the subject already.

The opposite of tropical, the antithesis of anything resembling a jungle or a beach, or an island is where Sawyer needs to be.

“And why do you care so much about where I live anyways?”

Jack shrugs nonchalantly as if he weren't really conducting an interrogation, only he is and it's beginning to irritate Sawyer something fierce. Jack sighs, and Sawyer follows his gaze out of the window, watching the warm orange glow of the setting sun bounce off white mounds of snow lining the paved street. His hazel eyes take on a vacant stare. He puts out his cigarette and plays with his drink, his eyes hover a bit before falling squarely on Sawyer.

Uttering softly, “I'm just glad I found you.”

Sawyer gasps slightly as his breath catches his throat. Doc’s voice is too earnest to take, and he feels caressed by it. The whiskey is beginning to work its way through his veins and his chest thumps heavily against his chest. Sawyer wants to ask how he found him, but somehow it doesn't seem to matter right now. Only thing that matters is he did.

“You seen any of the other ones?”

Jack shakes his head no. “No you're the first one. . . the only one. They've tried to contact me, but...”

“Yea, you don't want to be found neither.”

“There's nothing to find.” Jack's solemn voice trails off, and he quickly tries to shake himself out of it as if he is attempting to pick-up his own spirits. “So here we are. Two people who need to stay lost.”

“Yea I s'pose. Better that way ain’t it?”

“Maybe it is.”

 “To staying lost,” offers Sawyer, lifting his glass to click it against Jack's.

“I'll drink to that.”

Just as soon as their glasses are empty, Sawyer fills them again. The tavern is nearly vacant now as the happy hour crowd has headed home.  There is a lingering sense of intimacy and Sawyer revels in the feeling, satiated and full -- warm.

“To Oceanic Airlines for making us damn near millionaires.”

“Okay I'll drink to that too,” Jack answers a little louder than what is necessary. He misses his aim a bit, making amber liquid slosh out of his glass.

Sawyer shakes his head. The Doc was never much of a drinker.

“What are you doing with your payoff Sawyer? Certainly not spending it on a decent place to live.”

“Well home’s where the heart is ain’t it? And don’t disparage a man’s digs. A man’s home is his castle and all that shit.” Sawyer sits up straight and sticks out his chest as a gesture of pride.

Jack doesn’t seem to buy it. “Castle. Whatever you say.”

Sawyer refreshes the drinks, finishing off the bottle and gesturing for the barmaid to bring over another.

“Anyway, guess we’re supposed to shoot the shit right now like we got all the time in the world and nothing to do with it. Ya know, like old times,” he says cynically.

“Okay. Go ahead. Shoot it,” Jack responds, laboriously through an audible slur.

“Got my pilot’s license last week. Fixin’ to buy me a plane.”

“Wha? Why in god’s name would you do that?”

“Cuz,” Sawyer shrugs. “Ain’t much to do around here for excitement.”

“Still ….”

“I had this notion ya know. It comes to me as a dream lots of nights. I get in the plane and just fly away. Just fly into the horizon. Don’t refuel or nothing like that. Just keep going ‘til the engines burn out, and then…”

“You die? That’s one crazy macabre thought Sawyer.”

“Maybe.”

“Not a way to honor the dead.”

“Depends on how you look at it, Doc. You can come. We'd be like fucking Thelma and Louise. Yee haaa.”

Jacks looks at him like he's utterly insane.  It amuses Sawyer to no end. He lets out a loud, sinister, unrelenting laugh. He may or may not be crazy, may or may not have a death wish. But he loves that Jack assumes it and is disturbed by it.

“Pretending you didn’t s'gest that Saw-er. Jus make another toast. Enough of throwing the, the shit.”

“Shooting it.”

“Which ever.”

Sawyer pauses looking curiously at how quickly Jack let's the liquor completely take over.

 “Alrighty then. To Ana Lulu. Warrior woman's kickin' and scratchin' her way into the pearly gates, I bet.”

“To Ana . . . .Lucia.”

The glasses clink again. They knock them back. Sawyer fills them back up. “You slept with the Muchacha too didn't cha?” he asks through slitted eyes that demand a true confession.

Jack jerks his head in an affirmative gesture. “Just swonce,” he slurs holding up one finger.

“Once?”

“Okay stwice.”

“Dang it, I knew it. Wild one that gal was.”

Sawyer doesn't stop there. He's on a roll, willing to let it all spill -- see how much he can get away with.

“And to Henry, I mean ole Benny. May his evil soul burn in hell.”

“Hell yes.”

:Clink:

“And to Freckles. God rest her soul.”

Jack puts down his glass, and presses the back of his palm to his lips,  looking like he just got socked hard straight in the gut.

Sawyer curses the alcohol. Being two sheets to the wind would be the only thing that could make him mention her name in his presence. He wants to take it back, but it's beyond too late, and they're way beyond idol chitchat.

Jack’s hand shakes against the table. Sawyer reaches over and holds it tight, looking directly into his watery eyes.

“What happened there ain't nothin' to be 'shamed of Jack. We all did what we had to do. The rules of living and dying were different there. And we lived. And that's all there is to it.”

Jack nods, choking on his response.

He whispers, “thanks.”

Not in a hurry to let go of Jack's hand, he feels him squeeze hard as if he needs Sawyer to pull him up from a drowning whirlpool. Then those dang tears start welling up in the corners of his eyes. Jack was always extra sensitive. Just as his temper could ignite like a match, so could his tear ducks. Never took much to get him choked up -- story here or there about his Daddy. A mention of a woman named Kate. Never took much at all.  Sawyer understands this, and if Jack needs to get all sentimental, then he'll let it be. If Jack trekked all the way up here for him to tell him that it's alright, the past's the past, then so be it.

 “You're welcome, Doc.”

A swarm of people enter the bar, all dressed up with glittery paper hats that read 2010, blowing noise makers.

“Shit, forgot it’s New Year’s Eve. It’s about to hectic in here. Let’s get gone.”

+++++++

“God Dangit.” Sawyer stomps over to his starter kitchen and begins kicking the small furnace with his boot. “This shit happens all the damn time nowadays. The heat will kick-in in a few. Sorry Doc. This ain’t no four star hotel. If you're going to stay here, be prepared for the coldest night of your miserable life.”

“Ahh terrific. Well good thing I'm too, uh ... drunk to feel it,” he slurs while scratching the top of his head in slight confusion as if he doesn’t really recall where he is. “Can we, can we get the fire going . . . at least?”

Sawyer chuckles loudly at Jack stumbling and trying to gain control of his inebriated body, while attempting repeatedly to strike a match. He's a fucking adorable mess, an overgrown calamity.

“Got it there Doc?”

“I know how to start, to start a fire.”

“Okay then. I'll fetch some extra blankets. Don’t burn the place down now.”

The floor shakes below their feet -- the vibration of heavy bass and the dull roar of a jovial New Year’s Eve party crowd. Sawyer is happy to be away from all of that, even happier to not be totally alone.

“Sit down lightweight. Take a load off.” He tosses him a heavy wool blanket, watching Jack unfold it and gingerly lower his body to the floor, holding on to the edge of the couch for dear life.

 “Boy you sure can’t hold your liquor,” he whoops and hollers, his Southernness coming out in full force.

He hovers over Jack a bit before slinking down to sit next to him. Hesitating a bit, he huddles his body as close to Jack as possible, wrapping another blanket around him. His arm lingers around Jack's shoulder.

Jack stiffens and shoots him a look of surprise

“Body heat. Until the furnace kicks in.”

Jack nods, relaxing his body into Sawyer’s chest.

Sawyer curses under his breath. Grand manipulator he is, he's even fooling himself. He's not cold, but he still needs Jack near.

They sit in long silence staring at the burning embers, long legs intertwined, just breathing into each other and being.

“Well well so here we are. Two men who ain’t got nothing better to do on New Year’s Eve ‘cept cuddle. Ain’t this a sight.”

Jack knocks his head back and releases the loudest laugh he has all evening. He’s laughing so hard he can barely catch his breath. Jack’s hard body convulses into Sawyer, and his face lights up with total amusement. Sawyer loves it. It’s so fucking adorable he can’t stand it.

 “You haven't changed a bit Sawyer.”

“Well that's a darn shame.” He feels a smile plastered on his face. Probably now has the same goofy grin as Jack's.

“No, no it's not. I'm glad.”

“Why don't we pretend that I did change then.”

“Ohh kay.”

Jack relents way too easily while snuggling closer against Sawyer’s chest. Snug as a bug. This time Sawyer isn’t willing to let it go.

“Why are you glad? That I haven’t changed.” Last he remembers most people found him reprehensible, especially Jack.

“Because you need to be the way I remembered.”

“Do you really want to remember, Doc?”

Jack looks at him squarely. The light from the fire is reflecting and bouncing off his hazel eyes, and Sawyer can see every fleck of brown and green in them -- they sparkle, they beckon.

Jack answers him softly, honestly. “I can't forget.”

Leave it up to Jack to make Sawyer feel things he doesn't want to feel, do things that he swore he would never do outside of his wildest dreams . . .

. . .like stroke the back of his palm against Jack’s cheek and down his neck. Jack closes his eyes and lets him touch him. Maybe he’s enjoying it. Maybe this ain’t so foreign. . .to either of them. 

Sawyers’s mesmerized now, comfortable embracing Jack, holding his hand and stroking his flesh Jack returns with gentle caresses against his palm -- up his forearm. Jack manages to explore all the parts of his exposed flesh, and Sawyer wants to rip off his own shirt and let him touch more. . . so much more.

“You still cold?”

“No. Not now.”

He swears it’s the liquor, had to be the whiskey that was making his chest so warm, his heart swell, his pulse race. But only it’s not the liquor that now has him intoxicated. It’s Jack, it’s all Jack.

Cutting through the silence is the sudden roar of partygoers below them. The dimly lit room is suddenly illuminated by distant flashes of light that make them both jerk out of their comfortable trance. It’s the town fireworks display. Sawyer hears the low hum of Auld Lang Syne. It’s past midnight, it’s a new year.

“Sounds like we missed the ball drop,” says Jack through a cracked, groggy voice.

“You disappointed?”

“Naw. New Year’s was always just another day to me. But now it kind of takes on a whole new meaning, once, well after what happened.”

Sawyer feels Jack chocking back against his body. In the glow of the firelight he can see Jack biting his upper lip, and trying so hard to hold it in. He doesn't want Jack going there again, can't have him become a blubbering mess. Can't handle it at all. The man's all fucked up like a shell shocked war veteran, and it's time to end that. He holds him tighter, presses his lower lip against Jack's ear, rocks his body gently. It's as if he's hushing a fussy child.

“I need.. I can't...”

“We survived it Jack. We survived it all. But there’s no need to tell that tale, no need to relive it in our minds. It’s time to move on. Got to let it go. It's a new fucking year. Got to let it go.”

Should auld acquaintence be forgot and never brought to mind?

Jack nods slowly in helpless, pleading agreement. He takes Sawyer’s hand and pulls it to his cheek. Seems as if he's testing the waters, seems as if he needs the same thing Sawyer needs.

 His lips graze against Sawyer’s cheek, heading towards his mouth. Sawyer can feel the moisture of his lips, the day-old stubble against his own -- smell his liquored up breath and he wants to burst. He hesitates to take all of him,  because if he starts he won't stop. He would never want to stop. Instead he begins a countdown to the inevitable.

“Ten, nine, eight, seven . . .”

Jack smiles wryly and joins in. They chant in unison.

“. . .six, five, four, three, two . . . one.”

“Happy Fucking New…”

Before he can finish the refrain, Jack seizes hold of his lips and laces him with a searing kiss. Sawyer meets his aggression, palms the back of Jack’s head as he dives in, hungrily and relentlessly tasting every bit of him.

Sawyer unbuttons his own shirt in a fury. Rips it off himself, wants Jack to do the same. Jack presses his palms against his bare pecs. His hands are so large so ample. He needs to feel those hands all over him, needs to explode against those hands.

Sawyer's pants slip below his ass and he climbs over and straddles Jack. Their lips are locked again. Sawyer quickly frees Jack of his shirt keeping his body close, so close that he doesn't catch a chill. Moaning  against his ear, Jack rakes his wet mouth along his pulsating neck, desperately clings and grasps at his shoulder blades.

"Doc we got to do something here, now," he rasps in utter desperation.

Jack's hand slinks down his stomach, down below, shrouding his crotch, latches on to his cock. Gasping, throwing his head back, Sawyer lets out a loud groan, wants to hollar for mercy.

“Fuck Jack.” His hand is warm and strong, a vice grip on his cock. Sawyer sinks into the feeling, gets lost into the rhythm of it, urging him along until he let's go.

Jack is murmuring something about needing, needing as Sawyer's lips lock around the tip of him and move their way down his shaft. Jack's giant hands are splayed against the back of Sawyer's head, fingers intertwined in his scraggly mane. He's pushing him deeper, locking him into himself. He's taking all of him in. He chokes on him, drowns in him. He's lost.

+++++++

The embers have faded into a faint orange glow, matching the rising sun. Sawyer lays on the floor cradling Jack in his arms. They are both nude, and exposed, raw. Feeling Jack stir, Sawyer rakes his finger tips along his bicep. It flexes at his touch.

“Not cold anymore?”

Half asleep, Jack clears his groggy throat. “No.”

“Comfortable?”

“Sure.”

“Hungry?”

Jack laughs. “Not really.”

Twisting his body around, he faces Sawyer and begins trickling his fingertips down his cheek, circles it around the rim of his dimple. He's examining Sawyer with eyes so earnest and probing. Sawyer has never felt so exposed.

Parting Sawyer's lips with his thumb, Jack leans in and nuzzles at his lips in a drugging kiss that is slow and tender. Sawyer can die kissing him, but he needs to know something -- just one more thing.

“Why me Doc?” he asks breathlessly into his lips. “Of all the survivors, of all the people you helped keep alive in Hades, why'd ya come lookin' for me.”

Jack's expression lights up. He looks relieved, like he's been waiting for this, like a weight's been lifted.

 “Because Sawyer,  you’re the one that matters.”

He twists his body back around and molds his back into Sawyer's chest. Snug as a bug. The whole scene makes Sawyer's head spin.

Holding Jack as he drifts off, he thinks about the plane, and the crazy notion to end it all. Fly his plane into oblivion, go out in a blaze of fire. He erases all of that, because now, sleeping next to him, is one good reason to push on in this crazy thing called life.

He waits until he hears a faint snore from Jack before whispering in his ear the best truth he can admit. “Yea, Doc. It’s good to see you too.”

Leave it up to Doc to make a broken man want to live.

--end--