"I cannot ease the burden of your fears ...
Nor for my words shall ye forget your tears ... "
-William Morris

---

Goddess, I'm scared.

She was my teammate, my best friend, my sister.

In my heart, she was my family.

I loved her so much.

And I'm sitting here, trembling in Scott's arms, as I think about Logan.

And Marie.

Like Logan, she is Marie to me.

I can remember so clearly the day she told me to use it.

To call her Marie.

She said she loved me, said I was the sister she never had.

I cried that day.

We both did.

That was years ago, long before she took her own life.

Long before Logan came home.

Long before he fucked Jean.

Yes, I said fucked.

I am human you know.

I blamed her for quite some time, blamed the both of them.

Jean and Logan, that is.

Marie was the only person I could talk to, and I felt they had taken her away from me.

Sometimes I still blame Jean.

Sometimes I hate her.

But I don't blame Logan anymore.

I can't, not with his unstable state after Marie.......left.

All he has left is delusions of her ghosts.

At least I have Scott.

I worry about us.

The team.

Because if Logan can't exorcize Marie's ghost soon, then he's going to crack.

And I don't know if we can handle another loss of that caliber.

---

She's sobbing in my arms.

The woman I once thought so cold is sobbing in my arms.

Her platinum hair is draped over my arms, slithering over my arms with each shudder.

She is thinking of them.

I know it, because so am I.

I miss Rogue.

She was the glue that kept us together.

Without her we have fallen so far apart.

I miss Logan.

Yes, I said Logan.

You'd think I'd hate the man who had been screwing Jean while Rogue killed herself.

I feel nothing but pity and sorrow for him.

He cannot let go, he won't allow himself to.

He loves her too much.

I wonder, if 'Ro ever left me, if she ever died, would I do the same?

Would I imagine her by my side?

In my bed?

Would she follow me everywhere, so that even the most skilled psychic couldn't get into my head because she was still alive there?

Would she ever leave me?

I don't think the others realize that Rogue can't die.

Not with Logan still alive.

How long will it be before she does leave, does die?

How long can Logan hold on?

His face gets dimmer, pinker in my mind as each day passes.

How much longer Logan, how much longer before you're gone too?

---

It wasn't my fault.

It wasn't my fault.

It wasn't my fault.

Maybe if I keep telling myself that it will eventually be true.

There are tears running down my face, sobs lodged in my throat as I whimper in my bed.

I'm thinking of that night again.

The night I slept with Logan, and betrayed so many people in my life.

I have no one now.

Scott forgave me, but it was never the same after that night.

Ororo said she did, forgive me that is, but sometimes, when she looks at me her eyes are filled with such blind hatred that I shudder.

I took her best friend, her family away from her.

Now she has mine.

I blame myself for that too.

For driving him into her arms, for their love.

Yes, I can admit now that they do love each other.

I first thought she was with him to spite me, to take something away from me.

But I can see how much she loves him, how much he loves her.

I can't bear to look at them.

Now I know how Rogue felt.

Now I know why she hurt herself.

Because nothing can describe the amount of pain you're filled with, when the one you love is with another.

I didn't even love Logan, I just wanted a fling, an affair.

She loved him, she would have given him everything, but I took away her chance.

I took him before she could.

I blame myself for dismissing her feelings as a childhood crush, as puppy love.

I blame myself for the shell of a man that walks down the halls, talking to the ghost by his side.

He hates me.

He says I take her away from him.

I try.

I laugh at him, and taunt him.

I try to take her away.

Because maybe if I can, maybe if she disappears for good, he'll do it.

Maybe he'll kill me.

Because I'm Jean.

And Jean's too much of a coward to kill herself.

---

My children are gone.

They are gone.

And I can do nothing for them.

Cannot heal, cannot save.

Nothing.

Scott and Ororo have found hope in each other, but are still shattered and torn over Rogue's tragic death so long ago.

Jean died that day too.

In spirit, if not body.

Logan lost his mind.

He is insane, though no one dares say it aloud.

I can do nothing for him.

If I could have only seen Rogue's disturbed state.....

I'm supposed to be psychic.

I'm supposed to help.

I have saved countless souls in my lifetime.

Countless strangers.

Why can I not save my own family?