Title: Jacob in Reverse It's been twenty years since he last came to this place. Yet, it doesn't feel like anything's changed in that time. The old neighborhood still looks the same. New faces, same patterns to daily life. Changing the name of the character doesn't make it a new story. He leans against the fence outside of the building he was raised in. If it were up to him, he wouldn't be here. When he left, he never wanted to come back to this place. He did not care. But Jonas had asked. And Locke would do it for Jonas. "I didn't think you'd come." He turns his head towards the voice. He hasn't seen Jonas in years. His brother apparently grew a beard since the last time they met, but beyond that, the man hasn't changed. Locke only shrugs in response. "I've got the key. Let's get inside." Jonas looks at him expectantly. Locke makes a motion with his hand and pushes off the fence. Wordlessly, he follows after Jonas as he walks up the stairs to the front door. "You don't seem thrilled to be here." "I'm not." Jonas sighs. As he unlocks the door, he says, "Locke, you didn't have to come." Locke just shrugs. He doesn't have to say that he's only here because the other man asked. He's pretty sure Jonas knows, just like he knows that Jonas would never actually acknowledge the fact. The two men walk into the building and take the familiar path to the apartment in silence. Locke can feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. His mind tells him that there's nothing here he needs to be afraid of, and he's been in more threatening situations over the years, but it's hard to break old habits. His instinct is screaming at him to run. This place has too many ghosts and old demons who were sealed away instead of slain. They reach the door to the old apartment, and suddenly Locke remembers being thirteen and terrified of what lay on the other side of that piece of wood. The remembered scent of too much alcohol and smoke fills his brain, and all he wants is to be somewhere else. He snarls mentally and plants his feet, forcefully reminding himself that twenty years have passed, and he has stared down far more terrifying sights than the ghost of an old man. When Jonas opens the door, the remembered scent is stronger and not so much remembered as it has permeated throughout every piece of furniture in the room. There is a thin layer of dust covering everything, but the empty bottles from his memory are notable in their absence. The breeze from the window Jonas has just opened chases the remnants of smell out the door, and Locke has to keep from flinching as it whispers past him. He stands on the threshold, his brother standing in the middle of the room, waiting and not saying anything. Locke hates the fact that it takes as much willpower as it does to take that single step and enter the apartment. He looks around and notices for the first time how much smaller everything seems. The second thought is how utterly unsurprising it is that the place looks much like it did twenty years ago. He runs his hand along the couch, fingers tracing a long-buried memory and stilling at a chip in the grain of the wood. Jonas stands in the middle of the room still, just watching him, not saying anything, not judging. There are million things to say, and all of them are left unsaid. And for that, Locke is grateful. But the weight of those things unsaid only adds teeth to the intangible ghosts here. Locke isn't stupid. He knows why Jonas asked him to come here, now. But he'll be damned if he will force himself to do anything other than go through the motions. Because Jonas is simply standing there, silent, and would continue to do so until Locke made the first move. Locke closes his eyes in resignation. He is tired of playing the game. "Why am I here?" To his credit, Jonas looks unsurprised at the question. "Father is dead. We're here to pack up his things. The will..." "That's not the real reason, and you know it," Locke interrupts. "The old man left me out of the will and left everything to you. I didn't even know he was dead until you told me." Jonas just looks at him. Locke clamps down on the urge to shuffle his feet like a little boy who's been caught in a wrongdoing. Then, Jonas turns on his heel and walks off to the kitchen, expecting Locke to follow him, which he does because even after all these years, Jonas still knows him just as well as the team he's lived and bled for. His brother has set two glasses and a bottle of alcohol he found somewhere (and really, he's been expecting to trip over bottles of the stuff since he walked through the door) on the table. He fills both glasses as he sits down. Locke sits down across from him, picks up the drink, and throws it back. Heaven help him if he can't help but feel a smug sense of righteousness in that action. If the small smile on Jonas's face is any indication as he refills the glass, he understands it. The light filtering in through the window catches on the amber liquid in the glasses, causing splintering patterns to fluctuate on the table. He stares at them intently, as if trying to discern their secret meaning. Maybe the alcohol is going straight to his head already. He doesn't drink much, unlike certain teammates who don't drink at all, but it generally takes more than one to make him all philosophical. Maybe it's the location and the knowledge of just who this used to belong to. Maybe it's the fact that Jonas is simply sitting across from him, quietly sipping from his own glass, allowing Locke to make sense of his own head. Maybe it's because he really just is damn tired of trying to keep the demons sealed, and this place is so full of ghosts anyway. "Why am I here?" This time, Jonas does not dodge the question. "I think you know." Locke plays with his glass. And twenty years of silence, no, thirty-three years of things left unsaid never felt so heavy until this moment. His hand is shaking as he places the glass on the table, and in this place of wrath and tears, across from the brother who took him from this hell two decades ago and allowed him the chance to live, Locke allows himself to shatter. He can't stop the sobs that tear themselves from his chest, can't stop them as they wrack his body, and it's once again Jonas who is there to hold him tightly to anchor him before he loses himself at sea. "Why?" Why did he hurt him? Why was Jonas the favored son? Why was he blamed for things he had no control over? Why couldn't his father love him too? The only man who could ever answer those questions is dead. Jonas clutches him tightly to his chest. In his brother's arms, the ghosts in this place can't reach him. "He was an idiot." Jonas speaks with absolute conviction. "He was a bitter old man who spent most of his time drunk off his ass." He holds Locke away from him, holding him by the shoulders. "Look at me." Locke looks up, eyes red-rimmed and face unabashedly tear-stained. "He didn't deserve you for a son. You're too good for him. He didn't. deserve. you." It's the absolute certainty in Jonas's voice that does it. Locke lets out a deep breath, and with it, he realizes the ghosts are just that. They have no power over him unless he gives it to them. The old man is dead. He's only thought he's been living in his shadow for the last twenty years because he's been too afraid to fully step out into the light. The old man has had no power over him since he left. He scrubs his hand over his face, wiping the tears away. He glances over at the table, at the light shining through the glasses and amber liquid in them and sees a beauty in them that chases the shadows away. His father may not have loved him as he loved Jonas or anyone else, but that does not mean he should value himself any less. No one else does or ever has. Jonas is still staring at him with concern. "You okay?" He turns back to face his brother, and there is a small smile tugging on his lips. "Yeah. I'm okay." And he will be.