Title: She's Come Undone

Author: Jeanny

Email: jeannygrrl@hotmail.com

Rating: PG

Spoilers: Season 1 Through Destiny

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, they belong to Stephen King, Michael Piller, the USA Network and anyone else who has a legitimate claim. No copyright infringement is intended.

Summary: The Dead Zone: the Series fic. What (might have) happened to Sarah after the scene in the kitchen.

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She ran the water and disposal for ten minutes, trying to remove all traces of the contents of her stomach that she had retched into there, trying to wash it clean. It had to be clean. She had to be.

It wasn't really happening, she'd decided.

Oh, sure, she remembered it all very clearly. And deep down, if she somehow managed to avoid the wall of lies she'd spent months building, if she told the truth, it had been what she'd gone there for. What she'd come to him for. What she'd come to...

What had she come to?

Walt would know, she knew. Sooner or later, he'd figure it out. She knew him like the back of her hand, so well, almost liked they'd grown up together, almost like Joh-

She slammed her palm against the stainless steel, relying on the pain to back up her mind. Back to the safety of all this deception. Her safe facade. Except...Walt. Her husband. What would he do when he found out...found out she...that she..?

"Mommy?"

Johnny. Johnny was watching her. Oh God. The realization hurt, like a mental slap, but it brought her back to herself for a moment. Sarah plastered on a smile, another lie, before turning to her son.

"Yes, sweetheart, what is it? Did you forget something?"

"You're sick," her son stated, and Sarah snapped at the intrusion of a truth.

"I'm fine, Johnny! Go to school!" Realizing how harsh she sounded, Sarah tried the smile again. She spoke in a softer tone, "I really am fine, sweetie. Just a little upset stomach. It's nothing to worry about." Tears sprang into her eyes, and she frantically blinked them away. She would not fall apart here. Not here, in front of her child.

In front of their child.

"What is it?" he asked, and she realized she'd been staring at her son for a long time, transfixed by the shining truth of him.

"Sorry. I was just thinking...how much you look like your daddy..."

"Nuh-uh," Johnny demurred, suddenly sullen. "I don't. Don't look like him at all."

"Yes," Sarah whispered, and this time neither the tears nor the truth would be blinked out of existence. "Oh God, yes, you do." Round eyes full of doubt met her hollow gaze, and the smile slipped off. Sarah didn't even feel it go. She didn't feel the tears on her cheeks, or the linoleum beneath her knees, or the small arms trying desperately to wrap themselves around her, to somehow buffet the storm of her emotions.

"Mommy! Don't! Don't cry! I won't do it again, I promise! I'm sorry I s-said what I said. I didn't mean to make you cry."

His tears joined hers, and part of Sarah ached to tell him it was all right, or at least would be. But she couldn't lie to him. Not anymore. All the lies, even the ones she'd only told herself...they were how she'd gotten here.

The arms abruptly were gone, the roar in her ears and the hammering of her heart drowning out the receding sound of small pounding feet. She rocked herself instead, humming tunelessly, a small gesture of self-comfort that was belied by her fists clenched tightly, tightly...

"Oh God! Sarah? Sweetheart? Can you hear me?"

Even as a law enforcement officer, Walt never knew till that moment that fingernails could draw that much blood. He bandaged her hands and she looked at him, looking more frail than he'd ever seen her since he first met her sitting vigil with-

"Johnny?" she rasped.

"Is fine. He's at the neighbors." He smiled at her with false encouragement. "And you're gonna be okay too. The ambulance is waiting. I told them to wait. I...let's just go."

He lifted her into his arms like she weighed nothing. She looked up at him and seemed to turn herself inside, imploding.

"I'm so sorry," she sobbed. "I tried...I tried...I tried...but I couldn't stop, Walt. I just couldn't stop it...it was like trying to hold back something that just had to be."

"Shhh," Walt soothed. "You're not making sense, honey. Everything's gonna be okay."

Sarah just cried. Everything was gonna be okay. Right.

That was the biggest lie of all.

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FIN

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