"Chasing the Moon"

Pairing: Charlie/Claire

Spoilers: Through "Tabula Rasa"

Claire reminded him of a tattoo he had once seen when he was on tour in Germany. She was a Norse goddess, stomach round with a new world waiting for a safer sun.

The Dragon in his veins was calm, a virgin sacrifice still dripping from its chops - a boy's tears still scarring its scaled paws. Charlie lay in the sand beside Sayid's fire, his body more like a warm tide rather than a thousand ants. His habit was still a mystery - everyone was too concerned with their own lives to ask why he wasn't eating, why he wasn't sleeping. Hurley and Sayid saw it though; their eyes as clear as the horizon - where the world dropped off. The world was gone and they were in Purgatory.

Something sweet was set on his chest, pulling him out of visions of standing in the ocean, thousands of fish circling him like a bible story he couldn't remember to be true or false.

"Charlie." Sayid's voice made him open his eyes to find half a coconut resting on his chest, juice ready to spill off the edge. He caught it and sat up, noticing that someone had caught not only fish today, but had climbed up into the palm trees and gotten coconuts. For the first time since the crash - he was hungry.

Hurley tried to not look famished as he sits in the sand beside Sayid. "Feeling any better?"

He nodded, sipping at the cocoanut juice. His eyes kept drifting to Claire, whose seat had been drug over to the fire an hour ago. She say with her milk white legs draped over the blue cushion near his head while her new clean dress hung over her like curtains. She was writing in her journal, eating the orange meat of a fish Jin had brought over just for her. It seemed to make the baby more active, because her face lit up every time she took a bite.

He loved her smile. It lit up the beach like a full moon. If the fire went out and all they had was her smile - he would still feel safe. Lying back down, he savored every bite of his rare supper and drifted off again. Back to the ocean, back to the water pulling him towards something glowing - something pure.

The moon had snuck into his dreams - and she was round with a world.