Marie’s eyes felt glued shut when she tried to open them the next morning. She rubbed them sleepily and wondered for a moment why she hadn’t taken off her dress before going to bed the night before. Just like that, the memories came rushing back to her, and she buried her head in her pillow.
Reasons. She remembered telling Logan that Bobby was a reason for her to stay at the mansion, an excuse to keep from running away again. She had begun to understand shortly after taking the cure that she had allowed her growing dependence on Bobby to wind its way through her mind like some kind of invasive weed. At the time, she hadn’t believed that she was getting the cure because of him, but after weeks of mostly her own company as her former friends shunned her, Marie had been forced to admit, at least to herself, that she really had taken the cure because of him. It was such a temptation to try to be normal, and it hurt so much to have your boyfriend flinch away from you. She wanted that all to disappear.
After Marie took the cure, it seemed as if she had made the right choice at first. Bobby was actually willing to touch her. In fact, he was the only one willing to be near her for the most part, with the sole exception of Logan, who was so busy trying to help Ororo keep the school in one piece after the past months of disasters that he had little time for Marie. She understood, but that had made her cling to Bobby even more, all the while realizing that their relationship couldn’t continue much longer. The only time he spent with her seemed to have the singular goal of getting into her pants, which might have been flattering to a less intelligent woman, but to her it was just plain insulting whenever she thought about it. It hadn’t helped that when she and Bobby finally did have sex, it was incredibly disappointing on her part, and the act didn’t get better with repitition. She hadn’t been lying to him when they broke up the previous night. There definitely never were any fireworks.
The only time Marie had felt fireworks from someone’s touch had been the few times Logan’s skin had met hers, the times when he was able to get away from his unexpected responsibilities for a while. Somehow, he managed to find wherever Marie had gone to sulk about her friends’ lack of understanding over the cure each time. They would sit for a while, staring at the sunset or watching ducks lazily swimming in the lake, and he would take her bare hand in his. Even before the cure, Logan had never been afraid to do that the few times he had been back at the mansion. Always before it had been a comfort, two friends seeking companionship and trying to find anchors to a world that felt like it was smothering them sometimes.
Marie had underestimated what it would feel like to have Logan’s bare skin pressed against hers, though. Once she was able to feel the warm, smooth skin of his hand, something happened that caused little sparks to run up her arm and tingle all the way to her toes. She tried to ignore it for the sake of the one true friend she had left, and he never gave any indication that he felt anything odd about her touch. So they would sit there, hand in hand, each lost in thoughts.
Weighed down with the realization that one of her few remaining ties to mansion was severed while the other one was as eager to escape as she was, Marie burrowed under her blanket and tried very hard not to think about what might come next. It was a testament to how much the mutants tried to ignore her now that no one noticed her lack of attendance at meals despite the drama she had recently been part of. She managed to hide in her room for two days, appetite completely gone, before someone pounded on her door.
“Marie, open up. I know you’re in there.” His voice was commanding, and Marie was too tired from the effort of not thinking to deny him. She crawled out of bed, stood up on shaky legs and barely made it across her room to the door.
When she opened the door, Marie’s tired, sore eyes beheld the sight of Logan loaded down with a very full tray which included a huge sandwich, a glass of milk, and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream. He glared at her until she moved out of the doorway, and then he pushed his way into the room, kicked the door shut, and carefully set the tray on her mostly-clean desk.
“You haven’t been eating, Marie. The first day I thought it was my imagination, but then I realized I couldn’t even tell you had been around anymore. Eat,” he ordered, pointing at the tray.
Marie stared at him dumbly for a few moments before she gave in with a sigh and sat down in the desk chair. She picked the sandwich and took a tentative bite from one corner. As Logan watched, she devoured the thing with much more enthusiasm than she thought she could muster.
Logan made no attempt to talk to Marie while she ate. There were no words of false sympathy. She wouldn’t have believed him anyway. He had never bothered to hide the contempt he felt for Bobby from her. She knew he thought the younger man was an idiot, and just then she wasn’t going to argue with that assessment.
Finally, after she gulped down the glass of milk and had opened the carton of Chocolate Fudge Brownie, he asked, “What are you going to do?”
It was such a simple question, but there were so many possible ways to interpret it. What was she going to do about Bobby? What was she going to do about the others at the mansion? What was she going to do for the next few days? What was she going to do with the rest of her life?
Marie chose to answer the last one. “I think that I need to leave,” she told him softly. She didn’t dare look him in the eye.
“Why?”
Marie hadn’t expected him to be so calm, but when she looked up at him in surprise he was frowning. Disapproval was definitely more along the lines of what she expected.
“I don’t know who I am anymore, Logan. I’m not sure I ever did. Just when I was starting to grow up and figure myself out, I got stuck with enforced multiple personality disorder thanks to my skin, and after I got here I guess I kept changing so that they would want to keep me here, wouldn’t try to kick me out. It was easier to just get along with everyone, not make any ways. But…I don’t think I’m the kind of person who’s good at doing that for long, only I’m really not sure about that either. I need to find somewhere to discover me,” she finished lamely. The rush of words had felt like a relief at first, as if a damn had burst inside of her, but at the end she wondered if sounded stupid and silly to him.
Logan leaned against her desk and crossed his arms. “So you’re not doing this because of some boy?” he asked. She almost missed the small smile that curled at the corners of his mouth.
Shaking her head, Marie did her best to return the smile. “No…well, the dumb boy did make me rethink a lot of things, so I guess in a way, yeah, I’m doing this because of a boy,” she told him honestly. When his eyes darkened, she waved the spoon she was about to dip into the ice cream. “Not like that, though. I really do need to figure out who I am now, and breaking up with IcePrick just made me realize that,” she added hastily, taking a big chunk of ice cream with one swift scoop of the spoon and shoving it into her mouth so that she couldn’t blurt out anything more.
Logan’s eyes slowly lightened, and he nodded. “I’ve said it before, Marie. I’m not your father. I don’t have the right to tell you that you can’t go, but I am your friend. As you friend, I wanted to make sure that you’re doing what’s best for you. I don’t forget my promises,” he said. He leaned down and pressed his lips to the top of her head. When he straightened back up, that smile reappeared again. “I think this time you might have actually thought it through, too. So I’m behind you. Remember that,” Logan told her.
As Marie stared after him, spoon half-descended toward the ice cream again, Logan strode over to her door, opened it, and left without a backward glance. She sat there long enough for the carton to get squishy from melted ice cream before she chucked it into the trash can. Marie stood up and went to her closet, pulled out a familiar green duffel bag and began packing.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
So I finally got around to writing this. This particular story in the series I actually *gasp* have plotted out should be finished with just another chapter. :-)
Chapter End Notes:
I wanted some nice Rogan tenderness here. Sometimes, I think there's not enough attention paid to developing their relationship slowly. What did you think?