Story Notes:
So there are two perspectives to this story, I've written Marie's take on it. And Wolverine has written Logan's.
My therapist’s name was Sandra McKnight. A twenty eight year old full of ‘mhmm’ and ‘I see.’. She asks about my family, my hobbies, fears, thoughts and how I felt about things. So yeah, you can go ahead and classify me as a freak from the beginning. I guess I’m the type of person that has never been normal. I was always a bit too content with being alone.

I’m 5’7”
Brown Hair, white bangs.
Green Eyes.
Seventeen.
Trust issues.

At least that’s what my file says.

High School, something my mother decided was a necessary part of growing up had suddenly become a reality in my life. I’m not a particular fan of kids my own age, but, how hard can one year of public school be? The last three years I had spent in a boarding school, returning for holidays and summer vacation. Before that I was homeschooled. Exciting life, I know. My last boarding school, a problem had arisen when I had a problem with some of the other students. And now I’m here. Who would have figured.

Maybe it was karma. Then again, high school seems a bit severe punishment. Even to karma standards.

Either way, that led me to today where I’m sitting on my bus, on my way to my first day of high school. I stared out the window darkly, attempting to actually focus on something other than the passing lamp posts, or the fact I was too warm from my black sweater and gloves. This is why I prefer winter, less people stare. Anyone who asks is told I have poor circulation, and run a low body temperature.

I glance down to the paper I have clutched in one hand, my schedule. Sucking in a deep breath I looked at it for the millionth time, trying to picture my teachers kind and trusting.

Advanced Placement Math 30 227
Fine Arts 30 Room 271
Advanced Placement Chemistry 207
History 30 Room 215


And I’m already late, on my first day. Mother always said it was unprofessional and disrespectful. She was usually right, but I couldn’t bring myself to care at the moment. I couldn’t make myself exciting for this hell of a world. I slipped my book out and tried to read rather than think about how angry my math teacher would be since I was late. This one was new. It was a book on Philosophical Classics. Perhaps it would help me to understand kids my age and why they did things.

My bus passed the stop before mine and I glanced around for the nearest string to pull to signal the next stop. My gaze flickered to the man next to me. He had his head down, clearly watching what his hands were occupied with. Shuffling a deck of cards over and over again. I couldn’t see his eyes, they were covered by a classic jazz hat while his hair was dark and mid length. The collar of his jacket was flipped up covering most his face, but failing to hide the bit of scruff left from not shaving. I contemplating reaching around him, but the second I leaned forward he reached up without looking at me and pulled the string, like he knew what I was getting at.

“Thanks.” I murmured awkwardly grateful I didn’t have to lean onto a strangers lap to get off the bus.
“My pleasure chere.” He had a slight accent I didn’t recognize, but he met my gaze for the first time, looking at me from just under the brim of his hat he smiled.

Grabbing my bag off the floor I headed for the door, pulling out my phone at the same time as I hurried down the steps. 9:32 getting the time wasn’t worth the glare that I got from the guy, probably my age who I almost bumped into. His eyes were dark with pure annoyance, he looked like he’d cut off my head right then and there if there was no one else around. A fear shot through me into my chest as I tried to ignore him and ran. “Thanks!” I called over my shoulder to the bus driver.

Leave it to me to piss off the first cute guy from my school.

I wrap my arms around myself in the cold, with my grey bag hanging off my shoulder and my textbooks in one arm. It was exactly the same as it had been last year. The pale grey making it look increasingly depressing and the school name written across the roof in big letters, though several were missing. It was supposed to say Central Memorial High School. But now all that was there was Cent-al Me-or-al Hi-- -c-ool.

I sighed as I rushed into the doors, which opened into the main foyer. It was completely dead. No one was around. I looked at the schedule. Math. Room 227. Is that upstairs? Oh god. Okay. Think, think. Thinking does no use when you have no idea where anything is and missed orientation. I ended up wandering around till the numbers got warmer.

I dragged myself up the stairs and hurried down the hallway as quick as possible. My textbooks were at serious risk of clambering to the ground so I gripped them tighter as I glanced at the number on every door, looking from right to left. Of course. The last classroom. Total bull.

The door was open so I slipped in as quiet as possible, listening to him talk about the beginning of math, and how this was the end of high school math for us. I finally found an empty desk and sat down, he glanced up at me and looked at his attendance list. “Anna Darkholme?” he asked, slightly mispronouncing it, but I wouldn’t correct him.

“Yeah.” I said quietly.
He nodded. “Late.” He muttered, clearly writing down what he had said on a piece of paper.

I sighed and grabbed my binder, pulling it out onto my desk and writing the notes he had on the board. He walked over to me and gave me the four hand outs that I had missed, along with a demerit. Oh yes. This year was going to be a blast.

I spent the class organizing my binder and rather than following along with the teacher I went through the later lessons. In truth, teachers weren’t very understanding and I taught myself better than anyone else could. I had gotten five lessons ahead when the bell rang.

Art. A fantastic break from all the difficult classes that I would be taking. It was still hard, and took a lot of time to do shading and everything... but it was thoughtless. And I loved to draw. Not as much as I liked to paint though. Our kind female teacher had told us to draw whatever we wanted. She was new here, and I liked her. When a teacher tells you to do whatever you want, it’s always a test. They can analyze your work and understand you from small and simple things. So I drew something easy. I drew a rose, there wasn’t much she could take from that. Right?

It was about halfway through the drawing that I realized how much accent I had put into the thorns... the petals had turned out amazing, they were gentle and soft looking and fragile. But down the stem the thorns appeared dangerous... threatening and foreboding. As beautiful as the rose was, it was untouchable. I took a deep breath and held it up so that I could look at it closely.

It took me a moment to realize that the teacher was behind me, looking at my finished work over my shoulder. “That’s very beautiful Marie.” Miss Fulton murmured.

“Thanks.” I whispered quietly. “It turned out good.” I admitted. There was some time left, so I wrote my name on the back of my rose and slipped it into my bag as the bell rang.

Chemistry was the easiest to find. I already had a class in that room. There were a lot of people filing through the door in front and behind me. No one had asked me about the gloves yet, which was a dream come true. I used to get a billion questions on the first day. But today was good. This teacher in particular wanted to learn our names, so he made us all fill out a sheet with some of our favourite things, activities and what not. Name, middle name, last name. Parents. Pets. Siblings. He gave us the entire class to work on it, and mine was quick. I didn’t have a lot to fill out.

When I finished I pulled out my Philosophical Classics book again. The second I did the teacher saw what I was reading. “Interesting choice.” He commented. “Any thoughts so far?”

He was attracting attention to me by singling me out. I don’t like this. I took a deep breath. “None just yet.” I told him quietly. He nodded and moved on. I had only gotten through a couple pages when the bell rang. I was right in the middle of a paragraph, so how could I put it down? I would re-read that paragraph over and over again if I didn’t finish it. I kept it in my hands in front of me, slipping out into the hallway like a goldfish in the ocean. Out of place and overwhelmed.

But I kept my eyes down on the page, capable of seeing most people before I ran into them. But one was going too fast as his chest hit my book, slamming it against me. “Watch out Bub.” He yelled over the hallway madness. Distracted with theories about how there are no accidents in life, I paid no attention to the rude boy, simply raised one hand and fingered him.

The stupid classroom was far too difficult to find, and I hate being surrounded by people. I had left my scarf in my locker, exposing my neck. I hadn’t thought much of it until someone behind me was pushed, and they fell into me, her face hitting my back.

There wasn’t a lot of contact, but there was enough to shock her. She pulled away immediately. I didn’t want to turn around though. A short amount of touch like that just left her feeling like she had shoved a fork in a socket. She’d be fine, just a bit dizzy. But I wouldn’t.

I rushed to the bathroom and into a stall, locking the door behind me and sitting down. Not really doing anything. I just sat there trying to calm myself down and push away the memories that weren’t mine. I felt the tears rushing to my eyes as the eternal question repeated in me over and over again. What am I?

This happens every time. Every single time I touch anyone they get hurt. There’s nothing I can do about it. There’s no way I can control it. I sucked in a ragged breath and tried to look normal again. I walked out of the stall, dragging my bag behind me in the echoing empty bathroom. I heard dripping water, and that was it.

The mirror was no friend of mine. It showed me the truth. The one thing that made it clear to me that I was definitely not normal. It was a streak in the front of my hair, the bangs were all white. And I hadn’t done it on purpose. It just happened. But it reminded me every day I looked in the mirror, that there was a part of me that would never be the same as everyone else.

I found myself standing outside the History classroom 215. Taking a deep breath I knocked once gently. No answer. Does that mean I can go? No hope there. I knocked again, harder this time and sighed when someone opened the door. I walked into slowly trying to dodge the glances of every student in the classroom. The teacher murmured something I didn’t catch. The only reason I knew he said anything was because he was staring at me.

“Huh?” I muttered dumbly. Wow. Smart.
“Name.” He said, his voice less tolerant now.

“Oh.” Reality hit me like a ton of bricks. For one, I was standing in front of a classroom of students that think I’m a total idiot. Two, the teacher now thinks I’m dyslexic. “I’m sorry. I’m Anna Marie Darkholme.” He nods and looks down at a piece of paper, checking something off and then looking at the class, and I did the same.

There were no seats except for a guy in the back of the classroom. He looked familiar, and I wasn’t sure how I knew him. I glanced at the board where the teachers name was written. Meet Mr. Pentaluke. What a name. He spoke “Go sit with...” he paused “What was your name?”

The guy hadn’t been paying much attention. He had been staring out the window, fiddling with a pencil. “Me?” he said surprised.

“Yes you.” Mr. Pentaluke muttered.
“Oh, I’m Logan.” He glanced at me only took look away immediately.

The teacher turned back to me. “Anna Marie, would you sit next to Logan please?” It seemed like he was faking his politeness.

I took a deep breath. “Just Marie,” I murmured “Please,” I finished quickly, worried I had made a bad impression. I quickly hurried over to his side and sat down next to him. It took me a moment, but as I glanced over at Logan I remembered him.

The boy who I bumped into off the bus, and had yelled at me in the hall. Oh shit. I hope he didn’t remember me. I opened my binder and focused on it carefully, trying not to look at him again. I just keep making horrible relationships with everyone at this school. Fantastic.

The class droned on and on, even I thought it was boring listening to the teacher lecture about the basic outline of the entire year. Looking around the classroom trying to pay attention, my gaze naturally wandered over to the boy next to me who looked like he was writing notes.
I looked at his paper.

Notes? Sure. More like a gruesome drawing of a dead bird. It was a robin, it’s neck was broken and crushed against the ground as thought it had fallen out of a tree. Honestly, it was mentally disturbing. I didn’t even want to know what the hell was wrong with this guy. For the moment, I was terrified but I couldn’t look away despite the obvious demonic sense of the drawing.

I took a deep breath and grabbed a notebook trying to find something else to occupy myself with rather than continue to look at it. I pulled out my copy of Catcher in the Rye, starting to read. I wasn’t aware of how much time had passed till the bell rang, startling me and making me scramble for the rest of my books. As I stood up my bag, hanging over my shoulder caught the edge of my chair making me lose my balance and stumble backwards into another chair which was just sliding out.
In short, I fell.

From the ground all I heard was his angry voice. “What the fuck!”
I open my eyes to see him staring down at me, still sitting, not bothering to offer a hand to help me up. “I—I’m sorry.” I stammered. “It wasn’t my fault…” I tried to get up, just as he pushed his chair back out to stand. I flinched away from his chair and watched him leave before I pushed myself, humiliated onto my feet.

“Asshole.” I muttered under my breath, only to receive a dirty look from my teacher. I can see that this is the beginning of a rather dysfunctional relationship with the guy who draws dead birds. Logan.
Chapter End Notes:
For more insight on Logan's thoughts of Marie look for Wolverine's story under the same title. Thanks for reading!
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