Title: Songs of Innocence and Experience
Rating: PG
Summary: Watching Simon work reminds Jack of himself when he was younger. Simon reminds Jack of himself when he was younger.
Disclaimer: I do not own Lost. At all. I wish but alas...
Author's Note: For rogueapprentice, who, after a conversation with me, expressed a desire to see this fic written.



Watching Simon work reminds Jack of himself when he was younger. Simon reminds Jack of himself when he was younger. He’s a good doctor, could be a great doctor even. It’s a shame that Jack can’t honestly see him making it past year two.

He tells himself that he may be wrong, that he shouldn’t hang on to first impressions just because they’re there to hang on to. He tells himself that he sounds too much like his father – who’s voice still echoes in his mind and who’s words become much louder in his head every time he even sees Simon.

Christian torments him, even from beyond the grave, because Jack knows exactly what he would say if he were around to see what Jack sees. He would say that Simon won’t make it, that he cares too much.

Jack would say, “You mean he’s too much like me.”

Christian would tell him that the kid couldn’t last like that, talent or no talent. Jack would say, “I did.” And then Christian would become quiet, though Jack knew not out of lack of having anything to say. He would furrow his brow and turn his disapproving gaze on him. Jack can see it in his mind’s eye.

Because as strained as their relationship had been at the time of Christian’s death, Jack still counts on him, weighs his opinion even if he ends up ignoring it in the end. Jack finds that he feels the man’s presence at his side, and in his thoughts, more often then not; maybe more often than when he was alive. Because, like it or not, Christian is a large part of who he is. He’s in his blood, a part of his soul, and that fact won’t be changing any time soon.

But Christian wouldn’t understand Simon – in the same way that he never really understood Jack. But Jack understands Simon. A little too well. He wishes that he could stop his inevitable burn-out a little bit too much. He has to actively remind himself that Simon isn’t him sometimes. The similarities are there – well-off family, top of his class, dedicated to a fault – but Simon is not him, nor is he a younger version of him. And it isn’t fair for Jack to try to fix his mistakes though him.

Simon has to be his own person, to make his own mistakes, and if he does burn out, it would be one hell of a waste, but it isn’t Jack’s job to stop it. He has to let Simon live his own life and make his own choices the way that Christian never did for him.

With a soft grunt and a sigh, Simon’s eyes open. He stares for a bit, lets his eyes adjust so that he can see through the dark. He rubs the sleep from his eyes and finds Jack. “What are you doing?” he asks, looking at the clock, thinking it might be time to get up. Jack can see why he would think that, given that Jack is across the bedroom, standing in the doorway of the bathroom that he had exited ten minutes ago.

Jack shakes his head, smiling slightly and shaking off his inner monologue, and says, “Nothing.”

Simon lowers himself back down to the bed with a tired sigh, rolls over onto his side and pulls the blankets back around himself. “Then come back to bed,” he says, through a yawn. Jack shoves off the wall, his faint smile growing a little, turning into something akin to a smirk before he sighs and crosses the room.

Sliding up behind Simon, he is instantly pulled closer by demanding arms. Jack’s ex-wife, Sarah, had once told him that he was clingy (not necessarily too clingy, but she had sounded a bit surprised), but he thinks he’s met his match in Simon.

He lays his head down against the pillow and lets out a small sigh against the back of Simon’s neck. He can feel the worry and the stress melting away, Christian’s ever-present voice fading off into the distance, now. Hopefully, it will stay away until they have to get up, until they’re at the hospital, working side by side, and Jack can no longer keep things at the back of his mind.

He hopes the peace lasts at least the night. It usually does.