Jean and Scott

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

After taking a sleeping pill and leaving Scott a note, Jean goes to sleep, and then eventually they wake up. It's cute. We're all shocked.



It took Scott about two seconds flat, upon waking up, to realize that he wasn't alone in the bed. He'd been sleeping on his side, facing the nighttable, and there was a note there that hadn't been there before he'd gone to bed. 'If you wake before me, I'm sorry' it read, in Jean's distinctive handwriting.

Scott shifted around, turning over, and there was the redhead he'd left down in the medlab, curled up beside him. The knot of tension that had been there in his chest for the last few days eased, all at once, and he shifted closer to Jean, putting an arm around her.

After the fifteen hours in the medlab, getting a normal night's sleep had almost seemed redundant, but Jean knew she needed to catch up, and she wanted it. Now that she was sane enough to remember what peaceful sleep was, Jean didn't think she could get enough. Especially not since she had known Scott would still be asleep. Half of a sleeping pill had insured she would sleep and the note had been left in case he had woken first. She hadn't had the courage to curl up against him, but just knowing he was there had helped her to drift off. Feeling his arm, though, seemed to release the last of the tension in her body and she breathed out a soft sigh, shifting closer to him without waking.

Scott glanced in the direction of the window. Probably seven or eight, to judge by the amount of light and the angle. Well past time that he should be down in his office or the Danger Room... but screw it. He closed his eyes, a sigh very like Jean's slipping out.

As he let himself drift off Jean's breathing shifted into synch with his, and down below the fog of dreamless sleep her sense of the rightness of the world returned.

---

The medication had fallen below the threshold level to keep her under and, well satiated with sleep, Jean had awoken, coming to conscious knowledge of Scott's presence and the soft, drowsy thoughts in his mind. Her eyes flickered open, taking in the softness of his face as he slept - a sight she didn't get to see as often as she liked, since he usually woke before her.

She shifted her hand, resting it on his chest and feeling his heartbeat, a soft smile on her lips. "I love you," she whispered. "And I truly don't deserve you."

"... no, you don't," was the murmured response, sleepy but definitely wry-sounding. His arm tightened around her, pulling her a little closer. "Stubborn," he complained, shifting a little so that he could kiss her.

She smiled into the kiss, whispering, "I'm sorry," against his lips.

Scott sighed, and told himself that clinging was really undignified. Fortunately, though, no one was there to comment on the lack of dignity, so he'd do it anyway. "You just scared me," he said quietly. "I scare easily. We both know this."

Jean shifted her arm around his shoulders, holding him just as tightly. "I know. I scared me, too, although that doesn't help. I didn't mean for any of it to get so out of control."

"We never do. It just... tends to happen." Scott smiled a little. "Ever wonder where we picked up our bad work habits?"

"I got them from you and you got them from me?" she suggested. "Or do we want to just blame Hank for it all?"

There was a new tightness, in his throat this time. Waking up, her being here... it felt so right but it didn't feel quite real. Not like their argument down in medlab had felt real, and what did it say that it was moments like that that sunk in and ones like this that seemed a little like a dream?

"It's Saturday," he said, his voice a little hoarse. "Think we could get away with hiding out for a little while?"

"Yes, please?" Jean said, although it came out as more of a question. His memory of their fight flickered through her mind and connected to her own - a memory that was decidedly less than pleasant and she pushed it away.

"Oh, good." He pressed his lips to her temple for a moment. "I love you," he said softly. "Even when you're an idiot workaholic bucking for sleep deprivation psychosis."

"I am very glad to hear that," she whispered, arms tightening slightly. "Very, very glad. And I do try not to be that..."

"I'm really not one to talk. Although I do sleep, at least." It was just anything other than sleep and work that he didn't tend to do.

"You make me sleep, I'll make you do other things. Although... I think I agreed to help Hank and Maddie out with the night shifts at some point..."

"I can still make sure you sleep." He stroked her hair. "Tuck you in at seven am and then go to work... I could handle that."

Jean pillowed her head on his shoulder, smiling softly. "I think that's at least the beginning of a plan. And the sleeping pills will mean maybe I won't miss having you here while I do quite as much."

"Jean..." Scott trailed off, hesitation making him squelch the thought down so that it didn't slip down the link. Maybe this wasn't the time. In fact, it probably wasn't the time. And definitely too early. Wasn't it?

She didn't catch the thought, but the worry... Jean bit her lip, but didn't pull away. "Say it, whatever it is. Holding on to things never works."

"I... well," Scott floundered a little, feeling himself flush. "There are a few empty suites, you know. In this wing."

Flustered Scott was not new, but was so much not a part of the way she thought about him anymore that it took Jean a few seconds to make the connection. Although the thought that he was still adorable when he did it floated across her mind. "Empty suites?"

"Don't get me wrong, I've really enjoyed sharing the suite with Sean, but... he'd understand. If I... moved out on him." Scott blinked at her. "Into an empty suite." She was still gazing at him. "With you."

Jean blinked back at him, and then a smile spread across her face. "Yes. Yes, yes. You worry about the strangest things. Did I say 'yes' yet? Because, yes, if I didn't. Well, yes, if I did. Um, yes." Rather than keep on babbling she kissed him.

"I worry," Scott said happily, still flushed, once she'd let him up for air. "You'd worry about me if I didn't worry. Wouldn't you?"

"Yes, I would. It would be very unlike you, yes. That was a different 'yes', by the way. Although the other yes still stands."

"Good. Because after this week I have this overwhelming need to have you where I can keep an eye on you." Because of course that was the real issue. All for her welfare, oh, yes. Had nothing to do with how badly he wanted to share all the little things with her again. All the times she'd stayed the night, these last few weeks... well, not that he hadn't thoroughly enjoyed the nights, but waking up to her, having breakfast with her, laughing over the morning paper...

"Am perfectly willing to be eye-kept upon. More than perfectly willing. I'd have gone non-verbal, but I keep failing to shut up. And eye-kept upon is definitely not the right way to say that." Jean did ecstatic babble a little too well for her own piece of mind, but it was cute.

A delighted laugh slipped out before Scott could help himself. Entirely too cute, yes. He hugged her tightly. "Just think," he said. "You can start smacking me upside the head for leaving the toilet seat up again."

"And stealing all your drawer space." She beamed at him before kissing him again.

"And critiquing my eating habits. Pardon me, my non-eating habits." The rush of dizzy joy that swept over him robbed him of speech, briefly. Felt real, though. One hundred percent.

"And doing my best to make it all up to you, whenever I get the chance, so that you keep putting up with me."

He grinned. It was probably one of those loopy grins. Ah, well. "Just steal my shirts on a regular basis so I can ogle your legs, and I'll consider us even."

Jean's grin was no less loopy, so she was in no position to tease even if she had been at all inclined. "Given I'd probably do so even if you didn't encourage it, I'd say you have a deal."

"Show-off. Of course, there's something to be said for having a moral obligation to show off one's legs when one has legs like that. Although," he said warningly, "there are a lot more teenaged males around these days, so you might want to be careful this summer." The grin he summoned up this time was of the cocky variety. "Unless you want to see me getting all growly."

Oooh, that was the grin that tended to make her go weak in the knees. Good thing they were already not vertical. "Mmm, growly. I like growly. Although, really, I steal your shirts because they're yours and have that comfortable guy-shirt thing going for them. The growly is a side benefit."

Scott laughed again. He seemed to be doing that more often in general lately, when it was just him and her, at least. "Noon," he said abruptly. She raised an eyebrow at him. "We don't leave the room until noon. Sound like a plan?"

"Sounds like an excellent plan. Your planning skills are unrivaled in all the land. Master planners the world over seek out your wisdom. And I'm babbling agian. This is bad. Right, no more babbling from me." Rolling over to straddle his hips she kissed him deeply.

Enough of the talking in general, apparently, Scott reflected. Not that he was really going to offer any objections to that.