Ben takes care of aging Roger Linus, Alex stops by

In the flash sideways, Ben is making frozen dinners for himself and his elderly and ailing father Roger Linus. Ben tells him about having to watch detention as he switches out Roger's oxygen tank. Ben wonders if he's more of a loser than the burnouts in detention.

Roger then says that maybe if they stayed on the island with the Dharma Initiative, then maybe Ben could have become something greater and had a better life. He say the ironic line, "Who knows what you would have become?" As we know, on the island, Ben ends up killing his father.

Then, the doorbell rings and we get another surprise. It's Alex at the door, wondering what happened to history club. Ben agrees to meet her before school instead of after so she can study for her AP test. This is the first time (I believe) that Alex has seemed happy to be around Ben.

But back to the big question. So if Ben and Roger still went to the island, when did they leave and what were the circumstances of the departure? And what does this say about the effects of the hydrogen bomb? In theory, Ben was still on the island with the others when Juliet detonated it, so the depth of the changes seem to dig deeper and deeper into the past.