Different

definition: partly or totally unlike in nature, form, or quality.

Juliet and Sawyer passed each other a fair few times in this different world, where they had become different people.

After a white flash of light, everything was undone, everything was redone.

He passed over her on a flight that never crashed, she watched it fly over, distant and untouchable.

When she finally found her way home, she landed in LAX the same day he took a flight out to New York, they passed each other, unawares.

They passed each other walking through the wings of the oncology ward in a hospital in Miami, where she was visiting her dying sister and he was visiting Cassidy, who had been diagnosed with cancer barely a year after their daughter's birth. He had been transformed into a different person when he realised he might soon be the only person his daughter had in the world.

They passed each other in the supermarket, stocking up on instant meals for their shifts at the hospital, the perfect bedside vigils. This time he gave her a second glance, but put it down to her "having one of those faces".

She passed him as she ran towards her sister's room, when she had just been told she was coding. He'd swerved to get out of her way as she ran, focused only on one thing, holding his daughter on his way to the gift shop.

He passed her as he was headed to the bathroom, and she was stood in the hospital lobby, holding the hand of a two year old boy who was suddenly orphaned, and suddenly hers. He thought about stopping, as she looked so lost and alone, but he really needed the bathroom, and to get back before Cassidy's doctor came in.

He passed the church, and therefore her sister's funeral, as he drove himself and Clementine to the hospital the next day.

He didn't pass her again for some years.

He passed her in the playground as he picked up Clemmie, his beautiful little angel, from her first day of school. She meant everything to him, and after losing her mother, he meant everything to her, it had been hard to part with her on the first day of kindergarten, but she almost catapulted into him as she ran across the playground, knocking into a boy with blonde curls as she ran.

She turned, and saw the little girl in her father's arms, before walking her nephew out of the playground.

She passed him as she rushed in late to gain her seat in little Robbie's school play, and where Clemmie was singing in the choir.

He passed her on Parent's Evening on the way back to his car with Clemmie skipping at his side, as she headed in. He nodded towards her this time, thinking he'd passed her enough times to acknowledge her.

She spoke to him the first time when they were waving off the coach when Robbie and Clemmie were going away with school for a few days.
"They'll be back soon... it goes quicker than you think." she said, "Rob's been before."
He smiled at her. "My girl's never been away from home before... it's gonna be kinda lonely."
Juliet laughed. "I don't mind my own company."
He frowned at her. "You're all on your own?"
She nodded slowly. "Robbie's... Robbie's my nephew... his mother, my sister... she died when he was little... I've had him ever since... there's never really been any room for anyone else..."
James smiled. "Clemmie's mother died when she was a baby... she's the only thing I've got time for."
He decided he liked her laugh more than a little, and shook her hand firmly when she held hers out, with a "James Ford." in response to her "Juliet Burke."

They passed each other again at the end of that week, when they picked up their dirty, laughing children from the coach afterwards. and this time they smiled at each other like old friends.
In the car on the way home, Clemmie turned to her father. "Why were you smiling at Robbie's Mom?" she asked, eyes bright. "I don't like Robbie... he's wouldn't let me join in the football. Are you and his Mom friends? Can you get him to let me join in?"
James laughed. "Not quite friends, I don't think."

The next time they passed each other outside the little school, it was Robbie's last day before he went to middle school.
"D'you... would'ya like to go out for a drink with me?" he stuttered, almost nervously, and Juliet had smiled and nodded.

They passed each other again when he kissed her goodbye after their third date, but this time they'd finally stopped missing each other.

He passed her again in her kitchen, the morning after he'd stayed over, when Clemmie had been at a sleepover. They averted embarrassed eyes for a moment, and then they somehow managed to meet in the middle, laughter characterising their relationship.

They passed each other in the street, the week after their first major argument, their eyes averted, faces set in stone.

She passed him again when she barged into his house, shutting the door behind her, demanding that he stop behaving like such a child and talk to her.

He held her when she first waved Robbie off to college, and Clemmie passed them on her way out the house, and gave them a small smile to herself.

He passed her on the highway whilst she was struggling to keep her heart beating in a battered car, without even knowing he was passing what could have been her last moments.

She passed him, in the corridor of the hospital, as the surgeon wheeled her into emergency surgery, James praying to a God he didn't believe in for her life.

He didn't move from her side until her eyelids flickered open slowly.

He proposed to her the year after Clemmie left, and she walked up to him at the altar like any blushing bride.

They passed each other at another wedding, a fair few years later, that made them smile because her nephew and his daughter had found something special in each other, despite Robbie never agreeing to let Clemmie play football with the boys.

They arrived together to the same hospital to see their granddaughter born together. There was no passing in the corridors this time, simply hands held and grateful prayers sent up when Clem delivered a healthy baby girl.

She passed him on the way to somewhere else, two years before he did, quietly in her sleep.

He passed her again at the gates to somewhere, taking her hand... finally leaving the different world, heading into the unknown.

So it's disjointed and probably a little crap, but it's my way of processing both Juliet's death :'( and the possibility of what that finale might mean.

Please review.

[this is an AU I might oneday pick up again, if people seem to think it could work]