"We need to do something fun, chica!" Jubilee plopped herself on the edge of Rogue's bed, bouncing the textbooks Rogue was reading up and down.
"Maybe you have time for that, but I need to study for finals!" she muttered, flipping a page and running the highlighter across a line.
"Come off it, girl, I know you're highlighting the beginning of every paragraph. Some study method!"
Rogue looked down and sighed, closing the book with the highlighter as a bookmark. "Okay, so what are we going to do? Or more precisely, what am I getting myself into?"
"A talent show."
"What??"
"A talent show. We'll all display ... our powers! We're here to learn control, right? So we'll get to show off! Bobby can do ice sculpture, and then John can melt it down...I'll provide the fireworks, obviously..."
//And I'll what? Steal everyone else's powers for fun?// "Jubes, I don't know...I'll help you organize, but I obviously can't..." She waved her gloved fingers at her best friend.
Jubilee paused, her eyes thoughtful. "Sometimes, I just really forget."
Rogue smiled widely as her eyes teared up. It was the best compliment anyone had ever paid her.
"Professor?" Jubilee stood outside his office, still pondering Rogue's dilemma.
//Come in, child//
She strolled in, and plopped herself into the cushioned leather seat across from his desk, much as she'd descended on Rogue earlier. "I want to have a talent show," she said, seemingly daring him to deny her.
"Good. We need a fundraiser."
She waited for more. There was none. And she realized he'd probably known what she wanted from two floors away, and had considered all the ramifications as she ran down the stairs. She smiled. "Thanks, Professor." She stood to leave.
"Jubilee."
"Yes?"
"She's a very good musician."
//Bingo!// she thought.
//Yes, I thought you would appreciate it.//
She skipped down the hall to corner Rogue in the library.
Rogue sighed, closing her textbook again. Jubilee had run off to the professor to ask, and now she had time and quiet to study.
//Yeah, right.// With a sigh she left her room for the library, anxious to focus.
After ten minutes tapping her highlighter on the same page, she growled and giggled. //Not working either.// She left the library for her last refuge.
//Where the hell could she be, damn it!// Jubilee frowned, certain her friend would've left her room for the library by now.
Not a sign of her. She sighed, and then made a leap of faith.
She headed down the hall to the music room.
She strummed the guitar softly, enjoying the feeling of ungloved hands touching the strings. Picking delicately at the strings, she started to sing softly.
"Floating in the summer sunshine...we are flying, we are blue...Falling like a summer raindrop, like a teardrop, like the dew...Nothing but a blue horizon, all around us like a glove. Feeling it go on forever, far below us, far above...
Where you are, do you know I think of you? Where you are, do you know? I hope you do..."
An old October Project song her momma used to sing. She used to wonder sometimes just who her momma was singing to...//I know who I'm singing to...// she sighed to herself.
Her fingers were surer as she played, and as she lost herself in thoughts of a happier past, her voice grew stronger, more emotional.
"Shining like a summer rainbow, we are colors, we are bright. Vanishing into the sunshine, like a river made of light.
Floating in a summer memory, I can see you in my mind. Knowing it goes on forever, far beyond us, far behind...
Where you are, do you know I think of you? Where you are, do you know? I hope you do..."
"I knew it!" a voice burst in. "Chica, you are amazing! You are going to close our show!"
Her eyes shot open, and a yellow-clad bundle of energy stood before her.
"I found your talent, I found your talent..." Jubilee singsonged, skipping off to her room again.
Rogue looked around and wondered when the world had gone mad, exactly.
A week later the buzz around the mansion was high as Jubilee roped one teen after another into participating. The art classes were arranging for decorations, and the Professor had been more than pleased to publicize.
There was, of course, one problem.
"Rogue, come on, sweetie, you'd be the star of the show!" It was an old argument now, three times daily, just as regular as mealtime. This time it was Rogue's bedroom, as she lay on her side reading.
"Jubes, Ah love you, but Ah ain't doin' it! There ain't no way Ah'm gettin' up there and singin' for these people! No one asides my momma knows Ah can sing, and there's a reason for it! Ah'm horrible!" The southern drawl came to the forefront in her frustration.
"No, you're not! I heard you! You're...Rogue, don't you ever want to be more than the untouchable girl?"
//Ouch...// Rogue thought to herself. //Well, that hit home.//
"Of course I do, Jubes, I just don't see..."
"No one sees a side of you besides that! They see gloves and white streaks and distance. Let them see your soul, girl, let them see your heart. Make them remember you're a girl, you have feelings and emotions, you have talents and gifts that aren't in your skin...they're in your heart."
Rogue was quiet, twisting her white streak thoughtfully. As she shifted, she heard a metallic jingle. Jubilee latched on.
"Sing for him. Sing like it'll bring him home."
A sigh. "I'll think about it."
"Better than nothing." Jubilee accepted that answer and left Rogue to ponder in peace.
Rogue laughed to herself. //Free at last, free at last...thank God Almighty, free at last...// She sighed as she rolled to her back, staring up at the ceiling. She pulled the chain from under her shirt absently, clutching the tag in her hand. //Sing like it'll bring him home?// She frowned. //Seems like nothing ever will...//
She ripped a piece of looseleaf from her notebook and picked up a pen to write.
"Dear Logan,
Lord knows you're not in any hurry to come home, but I wish you would. I wish you would tell me what to do. Hell, I wish you would just come home to be here, with me. I miss you. But you know that. At least, I hope you do.
Well, here I am, still the odd one out. Jubilee wants to do a talent show. It'll be next week, finals will be all over.
Everyone's going to show their control off. Except me. I don't have any yet. But she found me out, somehow.
I can sing. Did you know that? I can play piano and guitar too. I never told you. But you're not here for me to tell.
I'm not *really* alone anymore. I think you'd be happy to know that. There are even some boys who seem to think kissing me would be a nice way to go. I don't though, and I keep them away. But the girls are nice. Even if Jubilee is the pushiest thing on two legs.
But I'm realizing as I write this, that I don't really need to. I have nowhere to send it. I may as well write in my journal. And while that scares me, Logan, it lets me let myself go a little more."
She ripped the paper to shreds and threw them like confetti for her new lease on life. She ran hell-bent for leather to Jubes and Kitty's bedroom and threw the door open.
Jubes was on the bed, rocking to her headphones as always. "I'll do it," Rogue proclaimed. Jubilee smiled slightly, not missing a beat, and reaching one-handed under the bed handed Rogue a sheet of paper.
Rogue was already listed on the final talent show program as the show's finale.
//How the hell did a week go by so quickly? I don't know if I wanna do this...// She said it aloud. "Jubes, I don't know if I can do this..."
Electric in a bright yellow tube dress, Jubilee sighed for the fifteenth time. "Rogue. You have to. It's on the program. You have two minutes before I push you out on the damn stage."
They were backstage, waiting for Bobby to finish snowing in the auditorium - //yes, snowing, folks, as in white Christmas flakes//Rogue thought with a giggle - then St. John would warm the audience again -- //Instant climate control!// -- and then when the audience was soothed and awed, they'd send her out.
//Like a sacrificial lamb.// she thought.
"Quit looking like you're about to become some dead offering to some god. Geez, Rogue, you're amazing, and besides, you're playing the damn piano and singing - not exactly big on the 'make eye contact' scale! You'll be fine."
The sound of applause echoed, and Jubilee added, "And you're on." True to her word, the determined organizer shoved Rogue out onto the stage ahead of her.
"Thank you, Iceman, and thank you, ladies and gentlemen for attending our show tonight and supporting our cause." Applause, applause. "And now, I figure it would be best to send you off with a very 'human' finale, a bit of music from our magnificent songstress, Rogue. That way, the norms won't get the mutant cootie vibe off you!" Laughter, and a sharp look from the Professor, softened by the twinkle in his eyes. "And the stage is yours..." Jubilee walked off.
Rogue turned wide eyes to her friend, and quickly got behind the piano as the applause faded. //Just breathe, girl...breathe, breathe, breathe!// A long-forgotten mental voice piped up to bolster her courage. //At least it isn't me, my dear.// Erik reminded her. //You survived me, you can survive anything...// She giggled nervously, a little calmer.
She raised her hands and slowly brought them down, her fingers knowing what to do, and she closed her eyes to conjure the ghost that haunted her dreams. Drawing a deep breath, she began to sing.
"You rise like a wave in the ocean...And you fall gently back to the sea. Now I want to know how to hold you...Return to me..."
Her voice gained surety as the audience slowly faded. Her mind drifted to where those hopeless longings lay, where the tears she cried had pooled in remembrance. She didn't see the Professor's proud gaze, or the tears in hopeless romantic Kitty's eyes.
"You shine like the moon over water...And you darken the sky when you leave. Now I want to know how to keep you.
Return to me...Turn to me."
She threw back her head, eyes still closed, lost in a world of regrets and too few memories.
"Everything I tell you has been spoken. And everything I say was said before. But everything I feel is for the first time. And everything I feel, I feel for you."
Jubilee stood behind the curtain, nearly bursting with pride for her best friend. She could see the blossoming change in Rogue. //Finally, we've gotten through her shell...Thank goodness...//
Power reverberated through the auditorium as the spectators sat spellbound. For this moment of time, it didn't matter that the girl before them had deadly skin, or that she was a mutant at all. She became a woman, who longed for the man she loved.
"I am here calling the wind. I am here calling your name. I am here calling you back. Return to me."
Her entire body swayed with her hands on the piano, her hair flowing across her back, the scarf fluttering as she moved.
She was lost to the audience, playing for herself, playing to bring him back to her, knowing she couldn't.
"I know what it means to be lonely, and I know what it means to be free. Now I want to know how to love you...Return to me.
"I am here calling the wind. I am here calling your name. I am here calling you back. Return to me."
She quieted, nearly whispering now, as she sang the last line, all the emotions she could never convey to him poured into the last plea. "I am here...Return to me." Her fingers fell away from the piano as she finished. There was that moment of silence every musician craves, where the spell of the music is still thick, and the world is still. Then the applause thundered, and she jolted back to the knowledge of where she was, what she was doing.
Jubilee walked out from behind the curtain, wiping tears from her eyes. "Chica, that was heartbreakingly beautiful," she whispered as she caught Rogue's hands in her own. "Take a bow, you deserve it." As Rogue did, the applause increased, with cries of "Brava! Encore!" loudly coming from the row of Bobby, Kitty and St. John. She turned to Jubilee, tears in her own eyes now, and drew her friend in for a hug. "Thank you for doing this for me."
"Anytime, sweetie...anytime," was Jubes' simple reply.
In a bar in Canada, a week later...
He sat, the piece of paper in his hands, its edges beginning to fray from frequent reading. "Grand Finale: Rogue, singing 'Return to Me' by October Project." And just a line from the Professor at the bottom. "She was magnificent, Logan. We all wish you were there...Especially Rogue."
He folded the paper up, replacing it in his pocket. He walked upstairs, the glass of Jack Daniels still clutched in his fist, ice cubes clinking against each other with each step. Unlocking the door, he grabbed the remote from the dresser and hit play.
The CD wasn't his normal musical selection, but he felt closer to Marie, and that's what mattered.
October Project - Return to Me
You rise like a wave in the ocean
And you fall gently back to the sea
Now I want to know how to hold you
Return to me
You shine like the moon over water
And you darken the sky when you leave
Now I want to know how to keep you
Return to me Turn to me
Everything I tell you has been spoken
And everything I say was said before
But everything I feel is for the first time
And everything I feel, I feel for you
I am here calling the wind
I am here calling your name
I am here calling you back
Return to me
I know what it means to be lonely
And I know what it means to be free
Now I want to know how to love you
Return to me
I am here calling the wind
I am here calling your name
I am here calling you back
Return to me
I am here
Return to me
The Wolverine & Rogue Fanfiction Archive
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Author's Chapter Notes:
My first foray into W/R fic. Be gentle. ;) Text in // // are thoughts.