xp_logs | Doug and Marie-Ange, date night

During the date night that they scheduled for this evening, Doug comes to a realization about something and asks Marie-Ange some pointed questions.

Suspicion had been in the back of Doug's head for quite a while, but like many leaps of logic that involved his power, it was the smallest, most random thing that tipped the scales. He and Marie-Ange were out to eat. Occasionally, they would play a quick rock-paper-scissors to see who paid the bill. In the past, Marie-Ange tended to win a slight majority of the time, perhaps due to her power, perhaps in part just her familiarity with Doug, maybe even a bit of both, but Doug still enjoyed it as a way to be slightly childish and silly.

But when he realized that he'd won the last dozen rounds of "rock-paper-scissors for the bill", a host of comments and asides and things he'd observed without realizing clicked in his head.

"When were you going to tell me?" he asked her quietly but firmly as they left the restaurant.

Marie-Ange didn't answer, she could barely even speak, until they reached Doug's car, and then leaned against it, looking both shocked and slightly ashamed of herself. "I.. I did not mean to go so long... I did not know how to say it, and then I was worried it had been too long and I did not know what to say." She had kept it secret for so long, the only thing she could do now was to be totally honest.

It seemed obvious now, looking back at all the clues. The way Marie-Ange had been sleeping through the night, little things she'd said here and there, things she had actually been surprised by. "I thought we had settled the whole issue of secrets," he replied, more than a little hurt creeping into his voice.

"I was not trying to ..." Except that she had been, after a fashion. "I was not sure, and then when I was, it had been so long without saying." Marie-Ange raised a hand to reach for one of Doug's but pulled it back abruptly before he could react. "I had thought it would just come back, and then.. and then I almost had hoped it might not, and worried that you, all of you, might try to ... talk me into trying to fix it."

Doug shook his head sharply. "That wouldn't be my decision to make. It's your power, your body, your decision." He said that firmly. He believed very strongly in people making their own decisions about taking care of themselves. "But I wish you had trusted me enough to tell me."

"What was I supposed to say? My precognition is broken and I do not know why or what caused it and I hope it never comes back?" Marie-Ange asked, a bit more sharply than she intended. She couldn't meet Doug's eyes, and kept looking off towards the sky, obviously not happy with herself.

Doug winced. He hadn't quite thought about how he took something simple like sleeping through the night easily for granted. For Marie-Ange, she probably felt rested for the first time since her precognition had manifested itself. "Essentially, yes," he answered her a bit more gently. "I would have liked to know, at least. Whatever happens next, whatever you decide to do, I just want you to be able to talk to me about it, see if I can help in whatever way I can."

Leaning more heavily against the door to Doug's car, Marie-Ange continued to look up towards the sky. "I felt.. still feel terrible about it. I know it is useful, and has helped, and yet.. if it never comes back, I do not know that I will miss it. I sleep, I do not wake up at all hours.. I have not woken you with one of my nightmares in months, I have not had a migraine in longer than I can recall..."

Doug placed a reassuring hand on Marie-Ange's shoulder. "Then why don't you try and enjoy that and do a little less worrying and feeling guilty? Let tomorrow take care of itself for a while."

"Because it is useful, and it is half of why I am working for Remy and Pete and not Scott and Ororo. Because ... " Marie-Ange shook her head, and winced. "Because if I had said something earlier, we might have been warned about Mark almost dying, or Amanda being eaten by London." And she held herself just a bit responsible for that. "And now, because all I can think to do is call Tante Mattie and ask for her help and if she finds out that I have not had it for months, I am afraid she is going to... it will not be good at all."

"But it's not -all- of why you're working for Remy and Pete," Doug corrected her. "You bring a lot to the job even without the precog." He shrugged. "And Tante Mattie might be mad initially, but you know what? It won't last forever."

"It still does not relive my guilt, and how could I say now that it was only ... only, that I was being selfish and stupid that I did not say anything before?" It wasn't even that they'd be angry, Marie-Ange had seen Remy and Pete, and even Tante Mattie angry before. It was that she'd let them down.

"I..." Doug paused. "Okay, at this point I'm just going to start saying the same things over and over again to try and reassure you." He ran his hand through his hair and snorted, looking a bit sheepish. "What can I do to help?" he asked earnestly.

Marie-Ange reached up to gently take Doug's hand out of his hair. "You need a haircut..." She said with a wry smile. "Help me find some way to tell people? And to figure out what might have caused this? If I have a reason, if I know when or why it happened..."

"I can absolutely do all that," Doug promised with a smile in reply. "After all, if there's one thing I'm good at, it's figuring things out."