Chapter Text
The first thing Jack noticed about being rescued was that nobody left.
On the island, people disappeared constantly.
They went hunting.
Exploring.
Collecting wood.
Looking for fruit.
Following rumors.
Arguing.
Sleeping.
People came and went so often that eventually Jack stopped paying attention.
If somebody wasn't in front of him, they barely existed.
The hospital was different.
The hospital never stopped.
Doctors.
Nurses.
Parents.
Social workers.
Police officers.
People with clipboards.
People with questions.
People with concerned expressions.
The room never stayed empty for long.
And somehow that was worse.
Jack spent most of the first week wishing everyone would leave him alone.
Then the second they actually did, he found himself staring at the door.
Waiting.
The realization annoyed him every single time.
Because he knew exactly who he was waiting for.
Simon.
The real Simon.
Not Dream Simon.
Not Tree of Destiny Simon.
Not the Simon who had sat beside him on hillsides and park benches and school rooftops that never existed.
The real one.
The one currently recovering somewhere else in the hospital.
Alive.
Breathing.
Existing.
The fact still didn't feel real.
Sometimes Jack would remember it and immediately smile.
Other times it made his stomach twist.
Because every time he thought about Simon, another problem followed.
The dream.
Months.
His brain had created months.
Months of conversations.
Months of memories.
Months of grief.
Months of learning how to live without Simon.
Months of falling in love with someone who wasn't actually there.
That part especially made his head hurt.
Because what exactly was he supposed to do with that?
How did you explain to someone that you'd spent months talking to a version of them that only existed inside your own head?
How did you explain that version knew things they never said?
Had conversations they never had?
Comforted you through things they were never present for?
The entire situation sounded insane.
Because it was insane.
Yet it still felt real.
Jack remembered every conversation.
Every argument.
Every appearance.
Every stupid thing Dream Simon had ever said.
The memories didn't feel fake.
They felt exactly as real as everything else.
That was the problem.
A sharp knock interrupted his thoughts.
Jack looked up immediately.
For half a second his heart jumped.
Then Ralph walked through the door.
The disappointment must have shown.
Because Ralph stopped immediately.
"Oh wow."
Jack groaned.
"No."
"Oh wow."
"Don't."
Ralph pointed directly at him.
"You thought I was somebody else."
"I didn't."
"You absolutely did."
"I didn't."
"You looked heartbroken."
Jack threw a pillow at him.
Unfortunately Ralph caught it.
The traitor.
Ralph laughed and dropped into the chair beside the bed.
"You've got issues."
"Thank you, Ralph."
"Anytime."
Jack hated him.
Not really.
But enough.
The conversation drifted naturally after that.
School.
Parents.
The rescue.
The endless stream of interviews.
Apparently adults became incredibly interested in children the second those children got stranded on an island.
Who knew?
Jack mostly listened.
His attention drifted in and out.
Not because he didn't care.
Because he was tired.
Everything exhausted him lately.
Thinking exhausted him.
Sleeping exhausted him.
Existing exhausted him.
Sometimes he felt like his brain was running two lives at once.
The real one.
And the dream.
The problem was that both felt equally important.
Ralph was halfway through a story when Jack suddenly realized he'd stopped listening.
Again.
"You disappeared."
Jack blinked.
"What?"
"You keep doing that."
"I do not."
"You absolutely do."
Jack groaned.
Not this again.
First Maurice.
Now Ralph.
Apparently everyone had decided this was a personality trait.
"I was listening."
"You haven't heard a word I've said for the past two minutes."
Jack opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Opened it again.
Ralph looked unbearably smug.
Jack hated when people were correct.
It happened far too often.
"See?"
"Shut up."
Ralph laughed.
The sound bounced around the room.
Normal.
Easy.
The kind of laugh that should have made Jack feel better.
Instead it made him remember another one.
Simon's.
Not real Simon.
Dream Simon.
The laugh beneath the tree.
The laugh at the park.
The laugh after one of Jack's particularly stupid comments.
The memory arrived so suddenly it almost stole the air from his lungs.
Because it felt recent.
Not months ago.
Not a dream.
Recent.
Like yesterday.
Jack looked away quickly.
The feeling passed.
Mostly.
It always came back eventually.
Ralph must have noticed something.
Because his expression softened slightly.
"You okay?"
Jack considered lying.
Then remembered Ralph had known him for years.
Pointless.
"I'm fine."
Ralph stared.
Jack stared back.
Neither blinked.
Eventually Ralph sighed.
"You're terrible at lying."
"Thanks."
"Anytime."
Silence settled between them.
Comfortable.
Then Ralph spoke again.
More quietly this time.
"You know none of us really know what we're doing, right?"
Jack frowned.
"What?"
Ralph looked down at the drink in his hands.
"The island."
A pause.
"The rescue."
Another pause.
"Everything."
Jack didn't answer.
Because he knew exactly what Ralph meant.
People kept acting like rescue solved things.
Like the second they got home everything magically became normal again.
It didn't.
The island had followed them home.
It lived inside all of them now.
In different ways.
For Jack it lived in memories.
In guilt.
In dreams.
In Simon.
Always Simon.
Eventually visiting hours ended.
Ralph stood.
Grabbed his backpack.
Started toward the door.
Then stopped.
"You should visit him."
Jack blinked.
"What?"
"Simon."
Ralph shrugged.
"You've been worrying about him constantly."
"I have not."
"You asked three separate nurses about him."
Jack immediately looked away.
Ralph burst out laughing.
"Oh my God."
"Stop."
"You actually did."
"Leave."
"This is incredible."
"Ralph."
"I'm leaving."
"Good."
Ralph grinned.
Then headed toward the door.
Halfway out he paused.
Without turning around he said,
"For what it's worth..."
Jack waited.
Ralph glanced back.
"I think he's worried about you too."
Then he left.
The door clicked shut.
Silence returned.
Jack stared at the empty doorway.
His heart felt strange.
Too fast.
Too heavy.
Too aware.
He hated it.
A few minutes passed.
Then ten.
Then twenty.
The room slowly darkened as evening approached.
For the first time all day nobody interrupted him.
Nobody asked questions.
Nobody spoke.
Jack closed his eyes.
Immediately the memories returned.
The Tree of Destiny.
The hill.
The town lights below.
The wind in the branches.
Simon sitting beside him.
Always beside him.
Jack remembered entire conversations.
Conversations that had never happened.
The realization should have made them feel fake.
It didn't.
He remembered Simon laughing.
Remembered Simon teasing him.
Remembered Simon sitting close enough that Jack could almost feel the warmth of another person beside him.
He remembered the park.
The bench.
The hand resting against his arm.
The impossible certainty that Simon was there.
Jack opened his eyes immediately.
His chest hurt.
Because he missed him.
Not Simon.
Well—
Simon too.
But also the dream.
The version of Simon that had existed solely for him.
The version that appeared whenever things became unbearable.
The version that never left.
The realization filled him with guilt.
Because Real Simon was alive.
Real Simon was recovering.
Real Simon was here.
And somehow Jack still found himself mourning somebody who had never existed.
A soft knock interrupted the thought.
Jack sat upright.
The door opened slowly.
And Simon stepped inside.
Everything stopped.
Not dramatically.
Not like in movies.
The world didn't freeze.
Music didn't play.
Nothing magical happened.
Jack simply forgot what he had been thinking.
Simon stood in the doorway holding a backpack over one shoulder.
His hair was messy.
One sleeve was rolled unevenly.
There was still a faint bruise along his jaw.
Tiny imperfections.
Tiny human details.
Dream Simon had never had those.
Dream Simon had always appeared exactly how Jack remembered him.
This Simon looked tired.
Real.
Alive.
And somehow that made Jack's chest hurt more.
Because Dream Simon had never been capable of leaving.
This Simon was.
This Simon could walk out the door.
This Simon could get angry.
This Simon could decide Jack wasn't worth the effort.
The thought terrified him.
Simon frowned.
"What?"
Jack realized he'd been staring.
Again.
Wonderful.
"Nothing."
Simon continued staring.
Jack continued existing badly.
Finally Simon laughed softly.
"You've gotten weird."
Jack snorted.
"I got stranded on an island."
"You were weird before that."
"That's fair."
Simon smiled.
And for the first time all day—
for the first time since waking up—
something inside Jack settled.
Just a little.
Not enough.
Never enough.
But a little.
And for now, that was all he had.
Simon stayed.
That was the first thing Jack noticed after the initial awkwardness faded.
He stayed.
Not for five minutes.
Not for ten.
Not for the polite amount of time people usually visited hospitals before finding an excuse to leave.
He just... stayed.
The realization settled somewhere warm inside Jack's chest.
They talked about stupid things.
Normal things.
The kind of things Jack hadn't realized he missed until they were happening again.
Apparently Maurice had already gotten into trouble twice since the rescue.
Which honestly felt low.
Jack had expected at least four times.
"Twice?" he repeated.
Simon nodded.
"Only twice."
"That's disappointing."
"I know."
"He's losing his touch."
Simon laughed.
"That's exactly what Roger said."
Jack snorted.
Of course he did.
The image of Roger judging Maurice's ability to cause problems felt completely believable.
Nothing about that surprised him.
For a while they talked about the others.
Piggy was apparently arguing with doctors.
Ralph was somehow handling interviews better than everyone else.
Roger remained Roger.
Meaning nobody knew what he was thinking.
Some things never changed.
The conversation flowed easily.
Too easily.
That was the problem.
Because every few minutes Jack would forget.
Forget that Simon was real.
Not in the literal sense.
He knew Simon was real.
He knew Simon was alive.
He knew this wasn't another hallucination.
But sometimes Simon would say something and Jack would get this strange feeling.
Like he already knew the answer.
Like he'd heard the conversation before.
Then he'd remember.
No.
Not before.
In the dream.
The realization hit every single time.
And every single time it hurt.
Because Dream Simon and Real Simon weren't the same person.
The similarities were obvious.
But the differences kept appearing too.
Dream Simon had been calmer.
Real Simon interrupted people.
Dream Simon always knew exactly where conversations were going.
Real Simon sometimes lost his train of thought halfway through a sentence.
Dream Simon existed solely in relation to Jack.
Real Simon had an entire life Jack wasn't part of.
The distinction shouldn't have mattered.
Yet somehow it did.
Jack found himself studying Simon when he wasn't looking.
The way he sat.
The way he talked with his hands sometimes.
The way his eyes moved when he was thinking.
Tiny details.
Details Dream Simon had never possessed.
Details that made him feel real.
Human.
Alive.
Simon suddenly looked up.
Their eyes met immediately.
Jack looked away.
Too late.
"You keep doing that."
Jack groaned.
"No I don't."
"You absolutely do."
"I absolutely don't."
Simon looked unconvinced.
Which was fair.
Because Jack was lying.
Terribly.
Simon leaned back in his chair.
"You're staring."
"I'm not."
"You are."
"I'm literally not."
"You just looked away."
Jack pointed accusingly.
"That proves nothing."
"It proves everything."
Jack hated this conversation.
Simon seemed to be enjoying it immensely.
Which somehow made it worse.
Eventually Simon won.
Mostly because he always did when he got stubborn enough.
The silence that followed wasn't uncomfortable.
Just thoughtful.
Outside the room somebody laughed.
A cart rolled down the hallway.
A nurse spoke quietly to another patient.
The sounds blended together into the strange rhythm of the hospital.
Jack found himself watching the window.
The sun was lower now.
The sky shifting slowly toward evening.
Time moved differently here.
Too slowly.
Too quickly.
Never normally.
"You've been quiet."
Jack blinked.
Simon was watching him again.
"I've been talking."
"Not really."
Fair.
Jack sighed.
The problem was that Simon noticed things.
Always had.
The island hadn't changed that.
If anything, it made it worse.
"You ever feel weird about it?"
Simon frowned.
"About what?"
The dream.
The island.
The rescue.
The fact that they were here at all.
Jack didn't know which one he meant.
Maybe all of them.
Apparently Simon understood anyway.
Because he looked away.
Toward the window.
Toward the fading sunlight.
And after a long pause he said,
"Yeah."
Just one word.
Quiet.
Honest.
Jack waited.
Eventually Simon continued.
"Sometimes I wake up and forget."
Jack frowned.
"Forget what?"
"That we're home."
The answer came immediately.
Like Simon had thought about it before.
"Sometimes I wake up and expect to hear the ocean."
A pause.
"I expect the shelter."
Another pause.
"I expect..."
His voice trailed off.
Jack didn't push.
Simon looked down at his hands.
"I don't know."
The room felt quieter afterward.
Not because anybody stopped talking.
Because suddenly everything felt more fragile.
More real.
Jack knew exactly what Simon meant.
There were mornings when he'd wake up expecting sand beneath him.
Expecting heat.
Expecting jungle sounds.
Then reality would hit all over again.
A hospital ceiling.
Clean sheets.
Electric lights.
Home.
The word still felt strange.
Home.
He wasn't sure he remembered how to exist there anymore.
Neither of them spoke for a while.
The silence stretched comfortably.
Then Simon laughed unexpectedly.
Jack looked up.
"What?"
Simon shook his head.
"Nothing."
"That is suspicious."
"I was just thinking."
"Dangerous."
Simon rolled his eyes.
"About how weird this is."
Jack frowned.
"This?"
"Us."
The word caught him off guard.
Simon gestured vaguely around the room.
"The hospital."
"The rescue."
"Everything."
Jack relaxed slightly.
For a second he'd thought Simon meant something else.
Something much more dangerous.
Apparently his heart had other ideas.
Because it sped up anyway.
Simon didn't seem to notice.
Thankfully.
"I spent months thinking we'd never leave."
The confession came quietly.
Jack looked at him.
Simon wasn't looking back.
His attention remained fixed on the window.
On the evening sky beyond it.
"I know."
Simon nodded slowly.
"I used to imagine what home would feel like."
A small laugh.
"Boring, mostly."
Jack smiled.
"Fair."
"But now we're here."
Another pause.
"And it doesn't feel how I thought it would."
Jack understood that too.
Nothing felt how it was supposed to.
The rescue had fixed the biggest problem.
The most important one.
But it hadn't fixed everything else.
The fear.
The guilt.
The memories.
Those had followed them home.
Jack looked down.
At the blanket.
At his hands.
At anything except Simon.
Because suddenly there was something pressing against the back of his mind.
A truth.
A dangerous one.
The dream.
The months.
The conversations.
The fact that he'd spent an entire imagined lifetime learning how to lose Simon.
And now Simon was sitting right here.
Alive.
Breathing.
Real.
Jack wondered what Simon would think if he knew.
The entire truth.
Not part of it.
All of it.
The hallucinations.
The tree.
The conversations.
The fact that Jack had fallen asleep every night expecting Simon to appear the next day.
The fact that he'd started depending on him.
The fact that he'd loved him.
The thought made his stomach twist.
Not because it felt wrong.
Because it felt true.
And Jack wasn't ready for that conversation.
Not today.
Maybe not ever.
A glance at the clock made Simon groan.
"No."
Jack frowned.
"What?"
"I have to leave."
The disappointment arrived immediately.
Embarrassingly fast.
Simon noticed.
Of course he noticed.
The annoying thing about Simon was that he always noticed.
A small smile appeared on his face.
Jack wanted to disappear.
"Don't."
"I'm not doing anything."
"You are."
"I'm really not."
"You have the smile."
"What smile?"
"The smile."
Simon laughed.
Jack hated that laugh.
Not really.
Just enough.
Simon stood slowly.
Adjusting the strap of his backpack.
The movement felt wrong.
Final.
The room immediately seemed larger somehow.
Emptier.
Jack hated that too.
The worst part was that it reminded him of the dream.
Of all the times Dream Simon had disappeared.
Those moments had always terrified him.
Because Jack never knew when he'd come back.
Or if he'd come back.
The fear lingered now.
Even though he knew this was different.
Even though he knew Simon was real.
Even though he knew where Simon was going.
Fear didn't care about logic.
It rarely did.
Simon reached the door.
Then stopped.
Jack looked up.
Simon hesitated.
For the first time all afternoon he looked nervous.
Actually nervous.
The sight caught Jack completely off guard.
"What?"
Simon rubbed the back of his neck.
A habit Jack vaguely remembered.
One Dream Simon had never had.
"I missed you."
The words landed like a punch.
Not painful.
Just overwhelming.
For a second Jack genuinely forgot how to breathe.
Because Simon said it so simply.
So honestly.
Like it wasn't a huge thing.
Like it didn't completely rearrange every thought in Jack's head.
Simon immediately looked embarrassed.
Which somehow made everything worse.
Or better.
Jack couldn't decide.
Probably both.
"You okay?"
Jack laughed.
A startled sound.
Half disbelief.
Half relief.
"No."
Simon's expression softened.
"Yeah."
The answer came quietly.
Like he understood.
Maybe he did.
Neither looked away.
For a moment the hospital disappeared.
The noise.
The hallway.
The lights.
Everything.
It was just Simon.
Alive.
Real.
Here.
Then Simon smiled.
Small.
Warm.
The same smile Jack had spent months trying to remember.
Except this one wasn't a memory.
This one was real.
"I'll see you tomorrow."
Jack swallowed.
Then nodded.
"Tomorrow."
The word felt important somehow.
Like a promise.
Simon opened the door.
Stepped into the hallway.
Then looked back one last time.
"Try to get some sleep."
Jack rolled his eyes.
"Try minding your own business."
Simon laughed.
Then disappeared around the corner.
The door swung shut.
Silence returned.
Jack stared at the empty doorway for a long time.
Long enough for the sky to darken.
Long enough for the hallway noise to fade.
Long enough for his thoughts to return.
Only this time they felt different.
The dream was still there.
The memories were still there.
The grief was still there.
But for the first time since waking up—
they weren't the only things there.
Because Simon had walked out of the room.
And Jack knew something now that Dream Simon had never been able to promise.
Tomorrow.
Simon would come back.
And somehow that felt like enough.