Precious and fragile things
Need special handling
My God what have we done to you
We always tried to share
The tenderest of care
Now look what we have put you through

I pray you learn to trust
Have faith in both of us
And keep room in your hearts for two
~ Depeche Mode

Dinner was always an obscene Side-Show to Logan. Not because of the mutants, but because of what he saw everyday. Everyday, from his seat next to Storm or graced with Scott’s presence, he’d see it. He’d seen them.

It didn’t help that he always watched.

That Ice Kid would lean in close to Marie, whisper something to make her blush a nervous pink, and than he’d kiss her. His chapped, teenaged lips pressed against her soft, full ones. It could have been sweet and innocent and chased, but it turns into something else. It lasts too long.

Too long for them. Too long for him.

All the colour drains from Bobby’s face and he pushes Marie back in a panic– the ‘Draining Fallout’ begins. The dazed and tired look on Bobby, the sad look in Marie’s eyes, her shame. And the snickers from all the kids around them, all the ones that saw. Laughing, pointing, mocking, even if they’ve seen it everyday like Logan does.

You’d think this lot would be more understanding, but – no matter where – kids are kids. Still rude and eager to attack the first thing that shows any sighs of weakness. Anything that makes them that much different from the majority. Anything that they can attack someone for.

“I thought kids were supposed to be creative,” Logan sneered, remembering there were others in his presence. His lunch even went uneaten.

Ororo shrugged. She knew what he was referring to, the same thing she had seen him watch every day. With a detached interest, she had mastered, she suggested, “I guess they haven’t really thought about it… Haven’t taken the time to think around the schematics.”

He shovelled a fork full of macaroni and cheese into his mouth, “I can come up with a handful of ways around it, solutions….options.”

Ororo put her fork down, “Have you been thinking about it? P…planing around it?”

His attention was back across the room watching Marie, who had gone back to picking at her food and giving half smiles to Jubilie’s jokes. Things had levelled out into a form of normalcy.
“It gets cold and lonely on the road in Canada,” he replied with blunt honesty, as if being involved with Ororo hadn’t changed their dynamic at all. Or he merely wasn’t thinking about her.

She pushed her own lunch away, no longer having the appetite for it. But unable to tear herself away, she watched him watch her.


XxXxXxXxXxXxXxX


Long after dinner, Logan escaped for his usual walk through the mansion’s underbelly – the X-Men area. Some were sure these walks around sick bay were to bring him closer to Jean’s memory.

They’d be wrong.

He needed to be down here, the cold, sterile environment was the best way to clear his hyper sensitive senses; no sounds, no smells, no one.

Except tonight.

He could smell her frustration the moment the doors sealed. The mix of anger, fear, desperation and arousal. It was Marie.

And he found her, pacing back and fourth in front of the metal doors. She was shivering.

Without turning around, she spoke, “Ah’m so sick of this Logan.” A cold, detached tone in her voice.
It never surprised him when she knew he was around. Maybe it was something that had stuck after all of those Drainings – she could tell the moment he was within five feet of her. Or they just knew each other that well now. Had always been able to spot the other that well.

She continued in her sad frustration. Her accent thickening as aggravation rose, “Ah keep doing this to Bobby. Every time we get close…he ends up here. Or Ah get pneumonia. And the school knows. They laugh and joke, they get scared. They’re afraid of me.”

Which was true – the kids did talk, they did fear.

Marie didn’t deserve to feel like that. Certain not from them. Certainly not for something as simple as a kiss.

Logan put his hand on her arm, just over the end of her shirtsleeve. Marie flinched, but he held on, he had no fear. With a gentle nudge, he turned her to face him. “And here I thought kids saw things differently than the rest of us,” he slowly pulled the scarf from her neck.

She watched him with nervous confusion. Too distracted by the numbness in her brain to realise what he was doing; “Ah wish Ah was different. More like everyone else here. Just…more.”

He wrapped the ends of the silk strip over each of his hands, the material covering his skin. Bringing his hands to the sides of her face, the scarf draped across her mouth and he pulled them together.

The kiss was slow and experimental, even hesitant, but held an eroticism. The feel of silk against warm lips, the texture of tongue working the fabric. And the moist heat between them.
His hips pressed into her smaller ones, seeking the sweet, heated friction. His body moving on it’s own. His body seeking it’s own release.
Marie let out a needy whimper, calling out more of the Wolverine. More than was safe.

Logan pulled himself back, lowering the scarf from her panting mouth. He caressed her flushed cheek with a silk covered pad of his thumb. “Someone like you should never have to change for anyone. Everyone should change for you,” He carefully returned the scarf around her neck, “Remember that ki—Marie,” And locked eyes with her.

She gasped for something to say. But Southern etiquette didn’t cover this. Experience didn’t cover this.

Soon the medical doors slid open, saving them both from any further faux pas, and any longer silences. Or awkward words.
“Rogue,” despite The Beast’s large, furry body, his voice was gentle, “Bobby’s waiting for you.”
With her wide brown eyes, she looked between the two men, searching for direction. For a clue as to what she was supposed to do now that her world had tilted.

Logan gave her a warm smirk, “Go make sure the Popsicle is alright.” He let his hand slide down the covered part of her arm, squeezing and releasing her. For now. The touch of support, but a promise of something else. But he was sure no casual observer would be able to see that. To understand it.

Marie nodded, still seeming dazed, and allowed herself to be lead through the doors. She looked back over her shoulder, a girlish smile and blush greeted Logan before the doors slide shut.

He fought to keep the smile from twisting his lips as he turned to come face to face with Ororo. She wasn’t raging; she didn’t even show any signs of surprise. But the tilt of her head proved as recognition that she knew. She saw. She understood.

She had watched.

He opened his mouth to explain, to defend, to say something, but she shook her head.

“Somehow, it was easier when I thought I was in competition with Jean’s memory,” she gave a sad little smile, “Somehow that wasn’t as precious.” She turned to leave him to his night, but added with sad eyes, “and I don’t think that ever effected you nearly as much as that just did.”


End.