Oh, look, it's my first J/B pairing! :P

Title: At the Deep End
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jack/Boone
Word Count: 2,060
Warnings: general spoilers for S6
Summary: For hitlikehammers' Alphabet Meme prompt F is for Flotation device - Boone feels like he's floating in the ocean, and Jack is the only thing keeping him up.

+++

It takes him a while to place the deja vu, to figure out why the guy that comes in and swims for an hour in the mornings is familiar.

They'd been on the same flight back from Sydney.

Boone's a part-time lifeguard, taking the first-thing-in-the-morning shifts because the boutique he manages doesn't open until after lunch, and Boone likes having some money that he knows hasn't come directly from his mother, even if it's barely two hundred dollars a week. He gets to read while watching professionals swim before they have to head into the office, and aside from unlocking the locker room access, there isn't much he has to do.

The first thing he notices is the tattoos, which is probably why he couldn't place the man. The guy he saw on the plane in the expensive suit, looking nervous while nursing a vodka tonic and looking like he should be up in the first class section, and hadn't thought that same man would be the type to have ink on his arms.

He gets the name Jack Shephard from the log at the club's front desk. Boone Googles him later in his office, feeling like a stalker, but he's curious as to what tattoos and expensive suits mean about a man. He's not expecting neurosurgeon, a top-rated one at that.

Boone dreams about plane crashes and jungles with polar bears and falling asleep next to campfires. He wakes up in a cold sweat, because it had felt so real. Jack had been there, and his sister, too, which is all the reminder Boone needs that it had just been his subconscious.

+

The first time he talks to Jack, it's because he notices him looking at Boone strangely as he reads.

"It's not a kid's book," Boone says, words defensive even if his tone isn't. And, yeah, okay, kids do read Watership Down, but Boone doubts they really understand it.

Jack's the type of person who looks at the ground when he laughs, like his smile isn't something he shares willingly. "I figured that out the hard way when I rented the movie for my son."

Boone can't help but automatically look for a ring, but it doesn't mean anything that he doesn't see one. It could just be that he doesn't want it to fall off in the pool or get stolen from his locker.

"Well, I'll let you get back to your reading…"

"Boone."

"Jack," he returns, extending his hand.

When Jack swims, Boone can barely focus on the words, getting to the bottom of the page before realizing that he hadn't registered anything he'd just read. Jack's strokes seem less natural than they normally do, more distracted, and while Boone knows he recognizes Jack from the plane, there's a nagging feeling that there's something, somewhere, else too, and he wonders if Jack is feeling the same way.

+

He gets rear-ended after parallel parking his car, the guy hitting the car parked behind him, and he can't focus when the EMTs pull him out of the car. All Boone can see is the spiderweb on his windshield as he's put into the ambulance, and he tries to figure out how it got there until he notices that his head hurts and the EMTs are throwing around words like potential brain swelling and have a neurosurgeon ready.

The woman is talking to him, asking his name and if Boone knows his blood type. He keeps changing locations, one second he's in the ambulance, and the next he's in a cave, and it's someone else asking about his blood type, a tall man, and Boone swears it's Jack, but everything's so foggy on both ends that he can't be sure.

Boone's vaguely aware of being moved, and then he's sure that it is Jack looking down at him, the world alternating light and dark around them, and then Boone feels like he's floating in the ocean, and Jack is the only thing keeping him up.

+

When he wakes up, Jack is there, standing at the foot of his hospital bed and flipping through Boone's charts.

"You-" Boone starts, but his voice sounds like someone went to town on the back of his throat with sandpaper. Or he'd been sucking dick all weekend. The latter thought makes him laugh, and it hurts, but in a distant way. Whatever pain meds they're pumping into his veins, it must be the good shit.

Jack's at his side with a cup of water, putting the straw in Boone's mouth, and it feels good, cold, going down. "Your mother said she could be here in a few hours."

The narcotics do nothing for the stab of guilt at knowing his mother had to receive a phone call about him being in a car accident - almost losing her son the way she had her second husband.

Boone moves to sit up, and he has a floating sensation roll through his body like he had when he was being carted off to surgery. "You kept me up."

"We couldn't sedate you," Jack replies. "It's easier to test brain functionality on someone who's awake."

Boone frowns, not understanding. "No, we were in the ocean."

Jack leans over the bed, his face really close to Boone's, and it causes Boone to draw a sharp breath. Jack's staring into his eyes, and Boone can't look away, feels like his face is probably flushing and feeling like a damn idiot because of it, and it takes Jack pulling a penlight out of his pocket for Boone to realize that Jack was watching his pupil reflex.

"I think it's the drugs," Boone covers. "They've always muddled things. I know you from the pool, that's probably why."

The response is a smile, but it's hesitant. "Just wanted to be sure." Jack looks at the heart rate monitor, pulling away. "Do you hurt at all?"

"No."

"We couldn't determine any definite brain damage in the MRI, but we need to know if anything seems off to you. Headaches, forgetting the names of people you know or everyday objects."

Boone remembers the accident, how he'd been getting out of his car after parking it, one leg in and the other out when he's jolted forward, his head hitting the doorframe as his right leg slams against the inside. He remembers what happened after that until… "I don't remember the surgery."

"It's not unusual to forget things once your adrenaline gets going. Your body's in fight or flight mode and just responds."

That makes sense. Or at least Boone thinks it should. Jack says it confidently enough that Boone believes him. "So if you didn't cut into my head, what did you operate on?"

"You had compartment syndrome in your right leg. There's four compartments in the lower leg, and trauma can shut one of them off. Rising pressure in the compartment leads to tissue death."

Boone's brain freezes on compartment syndrome, and when he closes his eyes, its dark and damp and he's in so much pain. The plane fell. Which explains everything and at the same time makes no sense to him at all.

"…a fasciotomy, which is just two small incisions that, in your case, were done on the anterior of your lower leg." Jack pauses. "Boone?"

"I think I'm just tired," he replies, forcing an apologetic smile as he opens his eyes.

Jack accepts this answer, though. He helps Boone lie back down, and he only now notices that one of his legs is elevated. He can't see the swollen limb because of the blanket, which is white when it should really be blue.

+

"I fucking hate physical therapy," Boone says when Jack's visiting him one afternoon. He's been out of the hospital for two weeks and likes to think Jack stops by the boutique because he wants to see Boone and not out of some sense of obligation.

"I don't like the new lifeguard. She paints her toenails the whole time, and I wonder if she would actually jump in to help anyone if it hasn't dried yet."

Boone laughs, and it's moments when Jack's looking at him like he is now that Boone thinks there really is something else going on here. Boone's hesitant because Jack doesn't seem the type, but he's also the guy with the tattoos and expensive suits, so Boone doubts people can really be typed anymore.

"Well the therapist just keeps telling me I'll be back to full activity in another week if I'm good."

Jack takes a bite of his chicken salad sandwich and chews thoughtfully. "What are you doing tomorrow morning at six?"

"I'll probably be sleeping, which I'll be doing every morning at six until the therapist clears me for lifeguarding. Why?"

"Meet me at the pool," Jack replies, not giving away any further information, and Boone agrees, but it's only because of the glint in Jack's eyes.

+

He can't actually swim laps, not yet, but Jack has him hanging onto the side of the pool and just kicking leisurely. Boone feels like one of the little old ladies that come in for the water walking classes with their hairnets, but he feels instantly less stupid when Jack takes up the space next to Boone and joins him.

"You're right. There really is no reason to expect her to save us," Boone says of the lifeguard just to fill the silence. They're at the opposite end of the pool where diving is permitted, where their toes won't be able to graze the bottom when they kick. Boone would have to tread water if he let go, but then he'd have to maintain a further distance from Jack.

"I don't even know her name."

Joanna drifts through Boone's mind, but he has no idea why. He feels like he tried to save a Joanna, once, but he hadn't been able to. Which confuses Boone, as while being a certified lifeguard he's yet to actually have to use any of his training, but he's gone after a Joanna and in turn Jack had to go after him.

He gets that image, again, the one he had as he went into surgery of Jack holding his head out of the water as they floated. He thinks it's all the same as the cave, though. Boone's pretty sure he died, and Jack had been there too.

After it's been an hour, they get out and go rinse off in the locker room to try and get rid of some of the chlorine smell. Boone waits until they're dressed and standing by Jack's car to say anything.

"Thank you," he says, looking Jack straight in the eye, and Jack looks down at his shoes in response. For trying is what he wants to add, but he'll let Jack think it means for bringing him here this morning, for keeping him company, for being there at the hospital. He's afraid to go further while still not understanding what it means, and Boone doesn't think they've known each other long enough yet to ask Jack's opinion about past lives or whatever the hell it is he keeps catching glimpses of.

Jack looks like he's struggling for words, his mouth slightly open as his gaze moves away from the ground and lands anywhere and everywhere that isn't Boone. Boone steps into his personal space, grasping Jack's chin between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand.

He didn't think kissing Jack in the middle of a workout club's parking lot would give him all of the answers, but it does force his thoughts to the here and now, to the feeling of Jack's lips on his and the scrape of stubble against his face and fingers. He worries that Jack's just being polite until he feels fingers on the back of his head, tangling into his hair to pull Boone closer as they open their mouths wider.

"Do you want to come back to my place? I'll make you breakfast," Jack offers when he pulls away, his forehead pressed against Boone's.

"Yes," Boone says with his voice as much as with his body as he leans into Jack.

Boone's not enough of a romantic to ask about soulmates or second chances, but he can't ignore what he's been seeing, either.

What he knows is that they don't come back.