He lights up when she walks in a room.

Don’t matter how long she’s been gone fer, whether it was a couple o’ minutes or a mission. Don’t matter how tired or how beat up she looks, the boy’s eyes just widen and he wraps his arms around her like he’s never gonna let her go. We all smile, look at one another, even if my smile ain’t as wide as the others’. It’s what we’ve been fighting fer, what we all wanted. To see Marie happy- And she’s at her happiest when she’s with him. He’s got light, neat, blond-brown hair like his daddy. The same even features, the same small, delicate frame Steve had before Project Rebirth went GI Joe on his ass. But his eyes, those are Marie’s: Wide and honest and brown and beautiful. The kinda eyes that right look through you. The kinda eyes you never wanna see filled with doubt. He may be the spitting image of his father but I see his momma in him every single time he looks at me-

And as much as that makes my heart hurt like a motherfucker it also makes me glad.

See him grin then, hold his arms out to Laura. She picks him up, cradling him to her chest while he shows her’n Jubes his newest toy and the pair of them laugh with him, telling him that he’s their favourite god-child. I guess that’s something else he got from his momma, his way with us ferals. Boy just seems to know how to talk to Laura, just like he seems to know how to act around me. It’s probably just as well: He’ll be starting defence with me soon, the baby course in anyways. His mutation hasn’t manifested yet- if it ever will do- but Steve’s got more’n enough enemies to make training little Jamie up worthwhile. I know Jeannie’s worried about it, not sure what it’ll dredge up between us. She’s no fool, my woman, she knows what Marie meant to me. But I made my choice that night in the Infirmary, and I’ll stick with it. I gave Rogue the out she needed and there’s no way I would ever go back on that. I smelt it on her, ya see, smelt what mighta been the beginning of a pregnancy. Smelt the hope and sex and affection from the night with Rogers and something just clicked inta place in my chest. Because that night in the Infirmary was the first time since Jeannie had returned that she’d smelt… happy. The first time in as long as I could remember that she hadn’t stank o’ heartbreak just because I was near.

And it was in that moment that I finally realised just how much I’d hurt her by bein’ a blind, self-involved moron-

Feel Jean pushin’ against my mind at that and realise I must be broadcasting. Seems to be something of a habit fer me whenever I think about Marie. I look across the room, give her this tight-lipped smile that’s part apology, part reassurance. Feel her mind slip away from mine now she’s made her point, watch her as she and ’Ro go back to flirting with Fury, Stark and LeBeau. I close my eyes, just fer a fraction of a second, trying to get a handle on my emotions. Trying to remind myself that everybody got what they wanted, even if it feels like some kinda purgatory the Bible never bothered to name. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I ain’t a saint and I ain’t a martyr: I got a beautiful woman who loves me in Red and I stuck with her. Made the effort once I realised she wasn’t gonna give up on me, wasn’t gonna give up on us. But she ain’t Marie and she ain’t ever gonna be. I know that, just like I ain’t ever gonna be that golden, perfect warrior that emerged from Project Rebirth oh so many years ago. I’m lucky, I’m happy Marie’s happy-

But when I stare at that little boy o’ hers I can’t help thinking shit I really don’t wanna dwell on.

I can’t help thinking of a little boy with auburn hair and innocent hazel eyes.