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Juliet had had one hell of a week. Although it shouldn’t be possible, each day just seemed to be worse than the day before. As a result, she had been more and more snappy as the week went on. Jin still didn’t understand most of what was going on, so he was safe, for the most time. But James, Miles, and Daniel had all been in one or more arguments with her, during the week. As late as last night, she had smashed her dirty plate in the sink, when the guys had once again expected her to clean them, even though she had made dinner, after having had another long day at the motor pool. Then she had growled something spiteful at them, before she had stomped off to her bedroom, slamming the door.
When she returned to the house after another day, it was alarmingly silent. Juliet wondered for a bit, if she had scared them all away permanently. Maybe that would be good, there’d be a bit of peace and quiet. Instead of Dan and Miles’ bickering over the possibilities of time traveling. It had been fine in the first week, but by now it was just really pissing her off. James had only, like herself, taken part in the bickering in the first couple of weeks, but had then backed off. By now he spent most of his evenings reading books. It was so calming to watch, that Juliet had gotten into a habit of joining him in the living room too, with a book of her own. It wasn’t like there was much else to do in the evening anyway.
Juliet headed to her room, to find clean clothes and then go shower. But when she got there, she was distracted, by the note and the flower, waiting for her on her bed. Furrowing her brow, she looked around, like the culprit might still be in the room, before she walked over to pick up the note and the flower. A yellow daisy.
“I know you’re pissed.
Meet me at the marked spot, at sundown.
It’ll be worth it, promise. “
Followed by a small map, with an X that looked to be placed at the beach a few miles away.
There were only so many people that could have left that note. James, Jin, Daniel, or Miles. Juliet was pretty sure that Jin’s English wasn’t good enough to write that note, Miles would never do that, Daniel was too distracted to even notice that she was upset. So that just left James.
A small smile spread across her lips, the first in a long while. Twirling the flower between her fingers, Juliet changed her mind about what to wear and then headed for the shower.
----
When she emerged from the tree line, onto the beach, the first thing she saw, was James, turned towards the quiet waves. As she walked closer, she saw that he was wearing his usual, loose fitting, jeans. But instead of his usual shirts, he was wearing a white, recently ironed shirt. It made her happy that she had decided to put on a dress, before she left the house. Or she would have looked too casual, for .. whatever this was. Juliet didn’t want to think of it as a date, although.. What else could it be?
There was a blanket, on the sand behind him, from this distance she couldn’t tell what was on the blanket, but she could see that he had built a fire not too far from it, it just wasn’t lit yet.
She stepped up next to him, not saying a word.
“About time you showed up” He smiled, looking at the waves for another moment before he looked at her. She let him look her over, only catching the end of it, as she looked at him too.
“What is this?” She asked quietly.
James shrugged lightly. “A night off from the three stooges?” he smiled, making her smile back in return. She needed that. At least he was aware enough to notice that. That made it almost okay, that none of the others were.
“If they’re the three Stooges, what does that make you? Charlie Chaplin?”
“If you say so Blondie” He grinned, making a wide gesture with his hands, before he turned towards her and gestured to the blanket behind them.
As she turned towards the blanket, Juliet felt the light brush of the back of James’ hand against her arm, sliding down to her hand, but never grapping onto it. From her elbow to her wrist, down the edge of her palm and barely touching her pinky. She could almost feel his eyes on her, more than she could feel his hand. “You look beautiful” His voice was low and rough against her ear, making her shiver in a way that had nothing to do with the chilly breeze.
Before she could say anything, he gave her a gentle shove against the small of her back, towards the blanket. “Take a seat”
The sun was setting slowly in the horizon as James lit the fire and sat down beside her on the blanket. “What’s in the basket?” Juliet looked over her shoulder, at what looked remarkably like a picnic basket.
“Ah” James grinned like the cat who got the cream, before he turned to open the basket and pulled out a plastic container, a box of wine, spoons, and glasses. He handed Juliet a glass and filled it, “wine” then he lifted the container “And ice cream – The good kind. Got it from the kitchen, when nobody was looking”
Juliet smiled with an excited look on her face, “You stole ice cream for me?” She leaned in closer to see the Dharma stamp and the word ‘Chocolate’, on the container. That was possibly one of the best thing about living at the barracks. Not the fact that you didn’t get sand everywhere, like you did at the beach. But the fact that there was ice cream. Ice cream and coffee. Oh well, that and indoor plumbing.
James shrugged again, smirking. “I figured improving your mood was more important. Or we’re gonna run out of plates soon”
“It was only one” She protested, with a roll of her eyes, before she reached over and yanked out the container from his hands “Give me that”
“Oi.. You better save me some” He protested in return and moved closer to try and snatch back the container. He would have succeeded too, if Juliet hadn’t seen that coming.
“Or what?” Throwing the lid down on the blanket, Juliet grabbed a spoon and ate a big spoonful of the chocolate ice cream. Then proceeded to hold it outside of his reach, despite his attempts of getting it back, by leaning in over her, supporting himself with a hand behind her.
“Or I’ll… Never steal ice cream for you again” He said, face only inches from hers, raising an eyebrow at her in mock of a threat.
Juliet laughed quietly “That’s a horrible threat” She smiled as her eyes darted from his, to his lips and back again.
“I know” He nodded, leaning in closer until Juliet could feel the warmth of his breath on her lips. He held that position for a beat of a moment. Before he used closeness as a distraction and finally managed to get that container out of her hand. “Give me some of that” James grabbed the other spoon and dug into the ice cream as well.
After that they seemed able to share the ice cream. They sat like that for a while, eating, exchanging smiles and giggles, while the sun crept further behind the horizon. “So..” James then said, breaking the silence. “What’s got you so wound up?”
Juliet shrugged, sipping her wine, avoiding his eyes, as she wasn’t sure if this was actually something she wanted to talk about. The idea of being distracted for a while, was much nicer, than the thought of having to talk about what she was feeling, and all those other things that made her feel so vulnerably feminine. Even more so, considering her current household. “Just.. Having a bad week”
James tilted his head, with a prying look and kept that look on his face, just waiting for her to continue.
“It’s just .. Frustrating, being stuck here” Who knew if they would ever get back to their own time, or if they would ever get off the island. They had the opportunity now, to get off the island, it wouldn’t be the world they knew, the people they knew. But she wanted to go. God, she just wanted to get out of here, away from all of this. She just wanted to go home, no matter if that home was before or after she was born. It wouldn’t be here and that was all she wanted.
James nodded, thoughtfully. “Why didn’t you leave? You said you’d stay two weeks, but you could have left after that.. Why didn’t you?”
“I don’t know..” Juliet pulled her legs to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. “I just want to go home” She swallowed and looked back at James, “But so do you”
“You stayed for me Blondie? Damn, that’s - “
Juliet wiped hurriedly at her eyes, not entirely sure why she was crying. Other than it being the built up frustration of the week, culminating now, at the worst time.
“Hey..” James scooted closer, putting his arm around her and pulling her close. “We’re doing alright aren’t we? At least we’re not living at the beach anymore” He was trying to cheer her up, that much was obvious. But the thing was, she had been living at the barracks for three years already. It wasn’t comforting that they weren’t living at the beach. The barracks felt like a prison, even without Ben there (Or the Ben she knew, anyway).
She leaned into his embrace, allowing herself to find comfort in it. The last one who had done that, was Jack. It had been obvious to everyone, that she had liked him, before he left. But it had been at least just as obvious, that he loved Kate. And in the end he had just left her behind and gone off with Kate. Not that he had had much of a choice of course. But it still seemed rather ironic to her, she never did seem to be able to hold on to the men she liked. Not counting her ex-husband.
“I’ll talk to the others, make sure you’re not the one doing all the chores at the house” He offered, giving her a tender squeeze with his arm.
“That’s not why I’m upset.. But thank you” It would definitely be a help, to not feel like she was responsible for keeping those men fed. They were old enough to cook themselves. They might have been set back to the seventies, but when they were in their house, they didn’t have to pretend. Jin was just as capable of swinging a vacuum cleaner as she was. No matter whether he had done it before or not.
“You got it, Blondie.. Anything else I can do?”
Juliet shrugged lightly, before looking at him “More wine?”
He smiled at her, before he took his arm away from around her, and got her some more wine. She hadn’t realized how warm James was, before he leaned away. The sun was gone now, only a line of light remained at the horizon, with it, the warmth of the day had gone as well. Even though this place was tropical, the nights were still cooler. And with her, only wearing a sun dress, it was a bit more chilly than she had expected it to be. If it wasn’t for the fire, she would have been cold, sitting still like this. But as it were, she was comfortable, at least when James had his arm around her, she were.
“I’m glad” He said, as he settled back in next to her, handing her a glass that was now filled with red wine. Juliet was glad that he didn’t move to sit further apart.
“I’m sorry?”
“That you stayed, I’m glad you stayed” He explained. James lowered his head slightly, looking at her. “We’ll make it work, even if we’re stuck here forever” Reaching over, he moved a lock of her hair away from her face. “You won’t be alone”
Juliet met his eyes, feeling her own watering again. She hadn’t realized that she was slightly scared of being alone, until he promised that she wouldn’t be.
There was a piercing sincerity in his green eyes, like the honesty that had been there, when he asked her to stay with him. Maybe she was naïve, but she believed him, although it might not have been the smartest thing to do.
He smiled softly at her, like he had then, before she agreed to stay. Part of her thought that he would be able to make her agree to anything, if he just looked at her like that.
Juliet smiled back at him, before reaching up and removing a smudge of ice cream from the corner of his mouth, with the pad of her thumb. “Daniel should outlive you all.. He’ll be around to keep me company, once the rest of you have gotten yourselves killed by the hostiles” Moving her eyes from the smudge to his eyes, her hand just sort of stopped, still placed against his jaw.
“That twig won’t outlive me.” James stated, sounding almost insulted that she would think that. But with what she had seen his group do, in the short time she had known them. Could he really blame her for thinking like that? “He’ll get himself blown up or something”
“Maybe..” Juliet smiled softly, almost unaware of how her thumb moved across his stubbly chin. They fell silent as James leaned in on her, closer and closer, at an almost painful speed. Until his lips finally touched hers.
The kiss wasn’t much more than James folding his lips around her bottom one, and holding her there for a long moment. The arm he had around her, tightened for a moment, before he broke the kiss and leaned away again. Only a few inches, as his eyes searched hers.
Juliet held his eyes for another moment, before she took initiative to lean in for the next kiss. Both seemed more confident this time, reaching for the other. James by pulling her closer, with the arm he already had around her. And Juliet by moving the hand at his jaw, further back along it, burying her fingertips in his hair.
If she hadn’t believed his promise before, Juliet definitely did now. James sealed the promise with the softness of the kiss and the firmness of his intentions. There was no doubting him now.