“I feel I may have brought this on myself.”

Jean Grey leaned forward, nudging gingerly at one (note, one) of her black eyes. Checking with her usual efficiency whether the swelling had gone down enough to warrant putting on makeup, and deciding it had not. Not that there was any real reason to try covering up her bruises: The Jean-Apalooza Smack-down (as Jubilee gleefully insisted on calling it) had taken place in full view of just about everyone. It wasn’t like she could pretend that she hadn’t had her ass handed to her by Marie now, was it? And-she grimaced- It wasn’t like she could pretend she didn’t know why, either. The entire school knew why. But there was something, well, soothing, about checking her injuries professionally. Like it made the fact that she had wrecked her life and lost everyone she’d ever loved somehow more manageable. Like she could prove her herself there was more to her than the Phoenix, and the will to maim and torture-

Like there was something to do besides staring at Logan, as he chased Marie LeBeau’s little daughter across the hockey pitch, and completely ignored everyone else.

Jean Grey was above such pettiness as that.

Beccah’s laughter rang through the summer sunshine then, contagious enough that even Emma Frost was smiling at the scene. Jean watched the man she’d once heard Scott describe as a living nightmare pick the little girl up and swing her, her little red plaits flying. Wondering why it didn’t seem odd that he could do this, that he could be trusted with Beccah, despite her tender age. When Jean had first met Wolverine, the scene before her would have been unthinkable: Logan couldn’t be trusted with plant-life or gerbils, much less small children. He fought in cages and lived on beer and growled like an angry wolf when irritated; If given a child to mind he’d most likely have swapped it for biking boots on e-bay. Or tried to teach it how to hot-wire a car and taken off for Vegas to see the sights. He was not someone you left in charge of toddlers, nor was he someone you wanted them to emulate. At all. And yet here he was, playing with Rogue’s children. Making the little girl giggle, calling to her shy elder brother to join in now. Looking at the kids and their mother like they were his family- Which was what they essentially were. Kitty and Jubes were looking on, smiling indulgently, Marie laughing and calling out suggestions for games- And Grey immediately looked away to the magazine in her lap, chastened. Wondering whether it was her own nerves or Rogue’s borrowed telekinesis that was making her sun-chair suddenly rattle like an old tin. For a second it looked like Marie was going to come over and inquire where her thoughts lay personally, but a look from Jubes seemed to halt her-

And a look from Kitty convinced Grey that reading her Marie Claire was wise.

It was slightly disconcerting, to say the least.

“You’re doing it again,” Ororo piped up then, from beside her. She was bopping her head calmly to some music, her blue I-Pod nestled in her elegant dark fingers like it was surgically attached. She loved the damn thing, Kurt had bought it for her. But she didn’t even have her eyes open, so Grey was sure she didn’t know what she could be talking about.

“Doing what?” she muttered, nettled. Pretending her voice didn’t sound guilty.

“Getting all wound up and type-A about this. I can tell by the way you’re pouting.” And a twitch of a smile crossed Storm’s face then, her expression somehow serene and mischievous. Which was infuriating.

“I do not pout,” Jean snapped. Arms crossed now. Pouting.

The serene smile got slightly wider. “You can, you do, and you are at the minute. And besides, I know what you’re thinking.”

“Oh really, what are you, a telepath?”

Storm’s calm smile would have driven anyone to murder. “No, I’m the best friend who’s known you since forever. So long she might as well be able to hear your thoughts. And guess what?” She pulled down her sunglasses, staring over her nose at Grey. Blue eyes sparkling. “You’re doing the exact same thing that irritated Rogue last time. And the time before that. And the time before that, and that again. So unless you want to, ah yes, how did Jubilee put it? Open up another can of Rogue-on-Grey whoop-ass, I suggest you accept the situation and deal with it.” She pushed the sunglasses back up on her nose, still smiling. Lay back in the sun, got comfortable. Serene. “Personally, I think it’s long past due for it to happen. They’re a good team, they make each other happy.” She turned so now she was laying on her stomach. “Besides, what did you expect? He got over you. It’s not the end of the world.” And she took a deep breath, went back to listening to her I-Pod. As if she hadn’t just insulted, worried and offended her best friend in the space of five sentences.

But no, of course she wanted to hear it. She welcomed and treasured the advice of her friends and colleagues. And if she’d listened to Storm about the Logan’s Angels phenomenon then her face might not look like a map of the Rockies right now. Grey wasn’t sure what had come over her in the Mess Hall: She’d just seen the way Logan was looking at Marie and something had…snapped. Not Phoenix snapped (because if that had happened the Mansion would be without a roof now. And she suspected Logan might still be naked…) Just Jean snapped. She couldn’t help herself: She had been the nicest, calmest, most togetherest girl anyone had ever met since puberty, Dammit! She’d always been…perfect, everyone knew that. She’d had to be. Not a hair out of place, not a foot set wrong, that was Jeannie. She was the one he was supposed to be grinning at, not Marie or this mysterious Mariko Yashida Kitty kept mentioning. So long as she was that the world made sense. But now the man her id couldn’t keep from salivating over was grinning like an idiot at his supposed foster daughter, a human train-wreck who’d gotten married and pregnant by nineteen, couldn’t touch for more than a couple of minutes without her inhibitor collar, had multiple personalities and a temper like an irritable grizzly-bear- Who was unlucky and all over the place and never in control of anything-

And had learned to live with it. Love with it. Even have a family with it.

Even kick her Level Five mutated ass three ways to Sunday with it, and that fact was sticking in Jean’s craw more than anything else, there was no use claiming it wasn’t. It seemed to go against all the laws of God and man, that an out-of-control former student could have the man she was supposed to have, the life she was supposed to have. And could wail on her while she was at it, when the last time Jean had seen Marie in the Danger Room, she’d needed a tag team of Bobby and Jubes just to make it through the simulation in one piece. Rogue was too uncoordinated, too gentle to make the team; She and Scott had decided it though they’d kept it to themselves. But now- Marie was a powerhouse. A pro. She’d been moved onto Logan’s team over a year now and Wolverine wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t think she could take it. He wouldn’t have been able to watch her fight, Jean suspected, if he thought she couldn’t take care of herself. Lord, how things had changed. The evidence of Marie’s progress written all over her confident, lithe body, and if she was being honest with herself, it was written all over Logan too, in the way he was playing with that little girl who looked so much like her mama, and seemed to have no notion that Uncle Logan had once been Weapon X…

Jean sighed then.

Because she knew that this, when it came right down to it, was the root of what was making her so mad. When she’d first come back to the Mansion, it hadn’t been seeing Scott (and his new wife) which had upset her. Not really. It had been realising that everyone had moved on, had found so much more than they ever thought they could, and she couldn’t be a part of it. She didn’t deserve to be. The suspicious looks, the whispers, the questioning tenseness whenever she so much as raised an eyebrow let alone threw a punch reiterated the point every day she spent with the team. They didn’t trust her: In all honestly she no longer trusted herself. The guilt of her actions, the weight of it, that was an earned ache which never went away and for someone who was used to being the good guy that was torture, pure and simple. A torture she knew she deserved. The Phoenix hadn’t been forced on her: It wasn’t like something had reached down from the heavens and yanked her into its grasp. It hadn’t been an act of God. It had been an act of cowardice, repressing the part of herself she didn’t like until it broke free. And while she might have had a bit of help with that (she still woke up some nights screaming with rage at the memory of Charles Xavier, and the trust-free decision he had made for her) she couldn’t blame anyone else for the consequences. The Phoenix was her. If she’d been one of the students she’d have advised herself to meet the guilt head on, to face it and try to master it. But it was easy to lecture about responsibility, when you didn’t have anything weighing on your conscience. And it was easy to talk about moving on when you didn’t have to do it, when it wasn’t you trying to slouch into Bethlehem and lay your burdens down at last-

“You got a minute, Red?” she heard Logan ask then.

Jean opened her eyes to see him looking down at her, everyone in the garden pointedly not looking their way. She was surprised she hadn’t sensed his presence, but then she’d been so distracted lately even her most basic telepathy seemed permanently on the fritz. Without even waiting for her to answer Storm stood and abandoned her seat for one beside Kurt, giving him a place to sit and some privacy. Also settling a ring of storm clouds around them, a warning to anyone who might try to interrupt their little tête-à-tête. Logan quirked an eyebrow when he noticed, shaking his head in amusement: When he’d first come to the Mansion the show of power might have irked him, but he’d grown more mellow with age, Jean guessed. Or more familiar with ‘Ro’s temper when challenged, whichever came first. Jean didn’t want to say anything, so she nodded mutely instead. Just sat up and moved her legs to the ground, her ankle accidentally hitting off his-

A spark of electricity moved through her at the contact but he felt nothing. She didn’t need her telepathy to see that. She was suddenly very happy that he couldn’t read minds.

He just cocked another eyebrow at her, his gaze evaluating, and moved back slightly til they weren’t touching. It felt more awkward than disappointing. “Marie’s not coming over here, if that’s what’s worrying you,” he began, his tone even. “And she won’t be giving a repeat performance, she promised me. Promised Jubes too, which might mean more: the Fire-Cracker’s the one we’re all scared of.” And his mouth quirked into a smile, his mind going to some memory she knew better than to try and read.

“I’m sorry to have caused so much trouble for your-” she forced herself to say it, “For your family.” Part of her expected him to deny it; Part of her wanted him to. But he just nodded slowly, sagely, his eyes never leaving hers and never flinching. Never denying it. In that moment Jean realised how much she’d still been hoping, and how much she’d hated herself for not being happy that he’d finally found some peace.

He cleared his throat. “Marie will come around eventually: She’s a little… protective of me, is all.” And again that slow, warm smile spread across his face. A smile she realised he only wore when he thought of Rogue. “It’s kinda funny-”

“Not at all,” she interrupted. “She knows what’s been done to you. Stryker, Alkali Lake, m-me. It’s perfectly understandable.”

Again the cocked eyebrow. “You puttin’ yourself in the same category as Stryker, Red?”

“Um, nearly caused the end of the world and killed you? Then made you kill me in an act of cowardice? Let me think…Yeah.” She couldn’t help her sarcasm: It made her feel safer. But his grin grew cockier as she said it, and the urge to take a swing at him grew apace along with it. Although he didn’t argue with her definition of events.

“Did I turn into a pansy-ass when nobody was watching?” he muttered instead. “Women thinking they gotta defend me-”

“Don’t have to. Want to.” Acting on impulse she reached across and touched his hand. He didn’t move away but he didn’t react either. Just gave her another one of those level-headed looks he’d become so adept at. Instantly Jean took her hand back. “It’s not surprising, I see the way she looks at you, Logan,” she continued softly. “As I said, you two are family now. It’s… It’s good that you found someone.” Who isn’t me.

She pushed the thought away.

“Never thought I’d get this lucky,” he muttered gruffly then. For a man with such a big heart, he never felt comfortable when it was on display. “After Mariko, after you-” She flinched. “Yeah, well, it all went a little country fer a while there, darlin’.” Despite herself she smiled. “But life don’t stay that way, thank Christ.” And he looked over his shoulder, shooting Marie a dry grin. “You can ask Stripes there ‘bout that.”

Jean fought the urge to roll her eyes. “I’ll pass. Don’t feel like getting my ass handed to me again.”

“Like I said, she’ll behave.” And then his gaze flicked back to her. “After all, she has nothing to worry about.” A beat. “You an’ me both know that.”

And there it was.

Impossibility wrapped in six syllables. Jean lowered her head, closed her eyes. She hadn’t needed to hear that, hadn’t wanted to: She understood that she was being told, not asked. And watching him watch Marie she knew he wouldn’t back down. He knew how lucky he’d gotten, and so did his-his woman. (Man, it was strange to think of little Marie like that. But that's what she was.) Storm’s words came back to her unbidden: He got over you. It’s not the end of the world. It just felt like it. And even though she suspected that there was really a lot more to this than losing even the possibility of him, she also felt like her heart was breaking. But she said nothing. Simply cleared her throat awkwardly, nodded.

Tried to look happy for them both.

Logan wasn’t convinced.

“I know it seems like shit now, darlin’,” he said softly, “But it will get better. I ain’t gonna sugar-coat it: ya screwed up, and the good ole days ain’t coming back ever again. But you’ll survive it, Red. You’re strong enough.” He nodded towards his little family. “And when you’re ready, we’ll be waiting for you.”

She snorted, suddenly bitter. “You mean you’ll forgive me, do you?”

“I mean you’ll forgive yourself. Eventually. But I can’t do that for you. Red. Hell, nobody can.” And with that he walked away.

Beccah saw him coming and squealed in delight, running over to him. Marie leaned over and rubbed his arm, the gesture clearly territorial though Logan shot her an exasperated look. Rogue’s gaze flicked over his shoulder to meet hers and the expression held warning, but also a hint of… pity? Understanding? Maybe even kindness or regret. Jean couldn’t be sure. But she knew Marie well enough to believe that the younger woman would try to help her if she needed it-

Though she ever stirred a toe near Logan, and she also knew she’d lose the limb.

So Jean watched the former bad guy and the former screw up. Watched them play and laugh with their family, and wondered whether she’d ever be where they were. Whether she'd ever feel like she deserved to be.

Whether the Phoenix would ever let feel like she'd the right to win.

Though it did finally occur to her that it wasn’t so terrible, the way some things always change.