Elyse opened her eyes, inhaling sharply when a sudden, pounding, headache hit her like a ton of bricks. She started to remember the events of last night, and what had caused the headache in the first place.
She looked to her right and noticed Desmond was sat on the floor beside her small bed, sleeping with his head against the side of the mattress. She smiled lightly to herself, taking note of how peaceful he looked, she found herself not wanting to disturb him.
She then lost her smile when she examined his battered face and his black eye, feeling shame and regret that Dean had done it to him, all because of her.
She slowly sat up, examining her arms and the bruises peppered along them, and then noticed everything seemed a bit... muffled? She realized there were earplugs in her ears and pulled them out one at a time. Did Desmond put them in, she wondered.
"Ah, good to see you're alright sleepin beauty."
Desmond spoke from the floor beside her, rubbing his sleepy eyes before letting out a yawn.
"I- did you give me ear plugs?"
She asked abruptly, feeling silly as she knew the mysterious ear plugs were the least of their worries.
"Aye. There's endless packs of em here so that you'd be able to sleep through the alarms."
He explained, staring off in the distance while he seemed to still be waking up.
"Ya know, I basically never had a partner to swap shifts with so, never really needed them."
He added with a lazy chuckle before standing to his feet and reaching for Elyse' hand.
She took it hesitantly, knowing that the blood rush would cause her head to pound even more once she stood, and slowly made her way up to her feet.
"Wait, did you fix the computer? Are those walls still down?"
She asked him just as the blood rush hit and she winced in pain, reaching up for her head while Desmond did the same.
"Aye, computer is fixed. The walls are still down in the front and back exit, I think they'll go up soon but I can't say for sure."
He explained while he examined her head with an intense stare.
"I'm not gonna lie, I was worried you had a concussion or somethin and I'd be trapped in here with a dead body."
He told her with a playful grin, trying to lighten the mood.
"Aye"
She mocked him, feeling on top of the world at the fact that he'd been so worried about her.
"And is that why you slept on the floor beside my bed?"
She continued, grinning ear to ear up at him, feeling overly impressed with her teasing abilities when he threw his head back and let out a loud chuckle, pulling the smile lines up around his eyes.
"Ya know, I don't seem to remember when my bed turned into yours. Ya must've really hit your head there."
He poked back at her, ruffling his wild brown hair casually before turning on his heel and walking over to the kitchen.
Elyse took notice of the large t shirt she still had on from last night, Desmond's t shirt. She ran her fingers through her frizzy, slept-in waves, feeling surprised when they hardly got stuck, and she was met with smooth tresses instead of the sticky, sandy, mess she'd gotten used to.
"Are ya hungry? We've got cereal and pop tarts and pretty much anythin that could be made shelf stable."
Desmond told her, prompting her to follow him into the kitchen and snap out of her daze.
"Do you have dharma initiative coffee? Oh- and aspirin."
She asked him, feeling a double headache now, from her injury and the alcohol she'd consumed last night. She remembered now why she'd stopped drinking in the first place.
"Aye, unlimited coffee but only Tylenol, dharma didn't account for your medication preferences unfortunately."
He teased her again while he reached into a cabinet and pulled out a medicine bottle, tossing it to her lightly. She reached out quickly to grab it but it bounced off her fingers and landed on the floor in front of her. She blushed lightly while she bent down to retrieve it.
"I can't catch."
She muttered, mentally cursing her parents for never putting her in any sports growing up.
"Aye, i'll remember that. Don't want anymore injuries while we're trapped in here."
He said while he began brewing a pot of coffee for her.
Elyse took a seat at the table after grabbing a water from the fridge to take her pain medicine.
She started to wonder how long they'd really be trapped down there, and if anyone would ever come for them. It seemed Desmond didn't even know who the dharma innitiative were, and he had washed up here completely unrelated to them. Who's to say they even still existed?
She supposed she could think of much worse scenarios than being trapped down here with Desmond but... being trapped anywhere for too long was never ideal.
"So, your boyfriend, Dean, he's always like that?"
Desmond asked her, sounding serious now while he carried two mugs of coffee over to the wooden, oval, table and took a seat across from her.
She took notice again of the bruising around his golden, brown, eyes and the cuts along his cheeks, finally fixating her gaze on a stand alone cut in the corner of his full, pink, bottom lip before becoming flustered and looking down at her coffee at once.
"Kind of-I mean, he's always been the jealous type and he's pretty quick to anger. But he's not my boyfriend anymore."
She explained, taking a sip of coffee and feeling instant comfort in the familiar, bitter taste. She mustered the courage to look him in the eyes again.
"Is your...face okay?"
She asked him, becoming a bit shy for some reason as she wasn't sure how to word the question in a way that didn't sound so childish and silly.
He let out a dry laugh that didn't meet his eyes before responding.
"Ah, it'll be alright. Not the first scrap i've been in and certainly not the worst. Bastard doesn't know how to throw much of a punch but he's got spirit, I'll give em that."
He told her, sipping his coffee while he looked off past her, deep in thought for a moment.
Elyse wondered what he meant by that. How often did he get into fights with people? Did he start them? Desmond didn't seem quick to anger the way Dean was. She was so curious about his past life that she didn't even know where to start, and she didn't want to come off too overbearing with a million questions.
"What did you do before you ended up here?"
She asked him casually, playing with the ends of her brown hair while she tried to remain nonchalant.
"I suppose a better question would be what didn't I do?"
He said with a light chuckle before continuing.
"I was in the military, then I ran. I became a monk and then got kicked out. I fell in love with a girl and lost her because I was a coward."
He rambled on, losing the light from his eyes more with each word he spoke.
"I suppose i'm better off here on this island, pushin a button, eh?"
He said, making eye contact with Elyse again as if he'd snapped out of a trail of memories, painful memories, based on the look on his face.
Elyse wondered what he meant when he said he'd ruined everything because he was a coward. What had he done? Was it really his fault or was he just blaming himself? Did he still love this girl? It seemed Desmond had lived quite an adventurous life already, far different from hers. She wanted to ask more but she didn't want to pry.
"What about you? What did you do before your plane crashed here?"
He interrupted her thoughts before she could think of what to ask him next.
She sighed lightly, feeling reluctant to tell him about her mundane and uninteresting life.
"Well, not much I suppose. I lived in California my whole life. I've worked a few random jobs here and there and I ended up going to college for a degree in philosophy, which nobody with a job ever said."
She explained, pausing to sip on her coffee again, to try and fight the nerves that built up inside her stomach when Desmond stared at her so intently.
It was like he was looking into her soul, like he was truly listening. She didn't want to say the wrong thing and have him interpret her wrong.
She thought about how when she spoke to Dean, it was easy because she knew he didn't really care, and he never truly heard her. Desmond made her feel vulnerable in a way she'd never known before.
"That's how I met Dean. I studied abroad two summers ago in Australia."
She added, remembering her whole reason for being here in the first place was because of him.
Desmond wrinkled his nose at her mention of his name.
"How unfortunate for it to be him who led you here."
He said, gaining the playful look in his eyes again so that Elyse felt too afraid to ask him more questions, afraid it would go away.
Before they could continue, the harsh shriek of the alarm went off and Elyse practically jumped out of her skin at the unexpected sound. Desmond however remained completely unphased as he stood to his feet and headed toward the the computer room.
"I've got it."
It had been about a week since they'd first found themselves trapped in the hatch, and it had gone in the blink of an eye, for Elyse anyway.
She woke up every morning excited to talk to Desmond again, to learn more about him. It felt like everyday she uncovered another layer of him, and he seemed to enjoy learning about her as well.
She'd be lying to herself if she said she wasn't immensely attracted to him, but she was enamored by him as a person much more than that.
It wasn't her goal to date him or make him fall in love with her, she'd just gotten out of a relationship after all, she just wanted to really know him. She couldn't help herself, and with every passing day she felt herself beginning to fall for him more and more.
It was currently 6pm and they'd just finished their dinner, Elyse was cleaning up after herself while she waited for Desmond to come out of the shower. Once she was finished tidying up, she started to wander around curiously, realizing she'd been down there for a week and hadn't truly scoped the place out yet.
In the front room she ran her hand along the wooden bookcase that sat beside the old box TV. She pulled out a few books to look at the covers, Pride and Prejudice then Dracula.
She stumbled upon a tan leather book with no title, pulling it out. She curiously flipped through the pages and stopped when she landed on a photograph in the middle.
She stared at it for a moment, recognizing Desmond, who grinned ear to ear, with his arm around a woman who smiled just as big as him. She looked about his age with blonde hair and friendly green eyes. Elyse figured it must've been the woman he brought up, the first morning over breakfast, the one that got away.
She examined the photo for a moment before she heard Desmond's voice approaching.
"That's it, I say we have some fun for once. Considerin we might be down here longer than we thought..."
She heard his voice getting closer with every word and quickly slammed the book shut, shoving it back on the shelf just in time for him to walk into the room with her and shoot her a confused look.
She noticed his wet hair against the sides of his face, which was almost completely free of injury now, and the way his white T shirt clung to his muscular chest. She scanned his body down to his grey sweatpants, noticing a bottle of alcohol in his hand down by his waist.
"And that's your idea of fun then?"
She asked, pointing at the bottle while she played off the fact that she'd been snooping through his things prior.
"Aye, well, have ya got a better idea?"
He shrugged, staring at her with a mischievous look in his golden eyes while he waited for her to join him.
"I guess not.. Just let me change into some pajamas first."
She said before walking past him to raid his drawers, just as she had been since she got there. She was getting a bit tired of wearing baggy t shirts at this point, but it was nice being able to shower atleast.
"Alright, if you've got on one of my favorite shirts again you're takin the first swig!"
He called out after her playfully.