Room 504, Saturday Afternoon

[intraspective]

Being back in Fandom was a peculiar… sort of disconnect.

Ino was curled up on hers and Zack’s pushed together beds and pretending to read. Which was rather futile because she knew it was pretence and so it would have been more productive to actually do something…

But she didn’t really feel like it. There were a lot of things she had to think on, but those thoughts felt almost like she was clinging to broken glass in her hands, and that hurt.

Like a toothache, however, she couldn’t quite stop poking at them. Even when doing so only hurt things more.

And, turn the page. Keeping up appearances, even just to herself, was important.

She was supposed to be reading. Would claim to be reading.

But her gaze wasn't on the book.

[Open door and post!]

Comments

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"It's good to hear you, too. Things got a little... Well, I mean, there's a reason I couldn't call for so long. Kinda was part of a... worst adventure ever sort of thing," Hurley said.

Understatement, to say the least.

[intraspective]

"Uh huh?"

Ino supposed she should... add something to that...

"You okay?"

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

Hurley let out a laugh, not a 'that's so funny' laugh, but a laugh of surprise.

"I guess," he said. "I kinda... I'm thinking about trying to get a bunch of people together to try and do this rescue... thing. There's a lot of people still trapped and stuff."

Hurley probably should have started at the beginning on that story.

[intraspective]

...

That might help, yes.

"... trapped?"

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

Hurley frowned a bit, but nodded.

Yes, even though they were on the phone.

"Kinda... man, I'm gonna have to tell this story a lot. I guess the short version is, like, we crashed on this island where there's polar bears and monsters and evil dudes, and while eight of us managed to escape we need to go back to save the rest of them. Uh, except the other people think we should just forget about it."

[intraspective]

...

"...Why do they think that?"

Not, Ino supposed, she'd done much... better.

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"There's apparently some evil bald dude that will kill everybody there if he finds it again," Hurley said. "And if we go public about stuff, he'll find it and it'll be game over. I thought we owed it to, like, Sawyer and Rose and Bernard and everyone to try and save 'em. And then they... said it was okay if I didn't agree to keep quiet cause everyone would just think I was crazy."

[intraspective]

That was... going to take some parsing.

Ino wasn't entirely up to dealing with her own troubles right now, let alone Hurley's.

"So they don't want to help 'cause they're worried--what's his definition of 'everyone'? On the island? In the world?"

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

That's okay, Hurley was mainly just trying to get people up to date.

He wasn't so good at it.

"It's just... on the island," Hurley said. "But we can't find it again cause it kinda... disappeared from where it was."

[intraspective]

"So you want to rescue people on an island you... can't find... and do it while not... alerting someone else?"

Right?

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"Yeah," Hurley said. "Kinda... hard."

He sighed. "I just hope they're safe."

[intraspective]

"Was there anything on the island that... wasn't safe?"

She wasn't sure if that would help or harm, but...

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"I mentioned the polar bears and the monster thing, right? There's a monster. It's big and I heard it's, like, made of smoke," Hurley said.

[intraspective]

"...Don't polar bears just give you drinks?"

Look, that was Ino's sole experience with them.

"And... smoke as a monster...?"

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, that place, it... it was like Fandom all over again, Ino. There was weird stuff all the time," Hurley said. "I... I'm kinda really glad to be out of there. Some of the friends I made, they didn't."

[intraspective]

"Fandom weren't all bad," she protested, stung.

Not the important part, but...

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"That's not what I meant," Hurley said. "It was just like... my world isn't supposed to be like that island, Ino. I just don't have another way to describe it."

[intraspective]

"Why shouldn't it be?" she asked, frustrated now. "What's so bad 'bout a world where things are weird but it always works out and nothing ever kills you?"

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

That got Hurley crying. "Cause this island, you died, Ino," he said. "Boone, Libby, and... Charlie, Ino. And that's not even half. There was falling planes and shootings and Mr. Eko got eaten by one of the bears and... I wish it all worked out."

So maybe his comparison hadn't been so apt, really.

[intraspective]

"I--I'm sorry," she said, after a few moments of just... listening to him cry. "I didn't know."

[likes-chicken.livejournal.com]

"I guess I wasn't clear," Hurley said, and he really hadn't been. "It was a bad three months."

He paused, getting a grip on himself. "How's... Zack?"

Smooth.

[intraspective]

Mmm whiplash.

Ino was quiet, then--

"It... He's okay."

But just okay, and that was a lie.