xp_logs | [Logan, Marie] Your letters they all say that you're beside me now.

It's still MHM right? Right. Another installment to that end. Starting to say everything that's built up in the wall of silence.

Logan had been waiting all day for this and now he was feeling the strain. Impatient, he stalked to Marie's door. He knew before he saw the note that she wasn't there. The note said she'd gone to his room.

Hrm. He turned and stalked toward the stairs, trudging up them, back to his room, to find her.

Damnit. He wasn't in his room. Marie turned and headed back to her room, not quite sure why she wanted to see Logan so much right now when she'd studiously avoided him all day. She'd see him around dinner, she was sure, he usually dropped by. At the top of the stairs, she paused for a brief moment when she saw him coming up the steps toward her. Before she knew was she was doing she was half-flying down the stairs, then bruising her cheek on his collarbone as she flung herself into his arms. Startling even herself, she burst into tears.

/That/ was unexpected. Logan took a step backward down the stairs to steady himself, then started walking back up, arms wrapped around Marie to keep her against him. "Shh, baby. It's okay," he murmured into her ear, heading for his room. Their room.

"I'm sorry." She tried to compose herself again. The tears were unexpected and frustrating. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

"Don't apologise," he said firmly, pushing open the door and walking inside. He kicked the door shut behind them and lowered her to the ground. "Don't. Just...it's okay. You don't have to be okay, baby, you don't. It's okay." He stroked her hair gently as he spoke, his voice quiet.

She leaned on him, her tears soaking his shirt. "I'm... I talked to Angie today and she was so nice and I don't know what's wrong with me... I've had a few good days, why am I doing this now? I hate myself."

"Mebbe 'cause y'need to?" Things hadn't been okay for her in a long time, he knew. This, as strange as it sounded, even in his head, was a good sign. She was letting herself feel, even the bad things.

"It's like everyone else is over in some foreign country, Logan." Marie pulled away from him and paced the living room, hugging herself. "I feel like I left and I don't know how to get back. I may live on the second floor but... I don't live where they do anymore. I'm just... drifting." She gestured helplessly.

"You're not young anymore," he murmured, trying to keep the guilt out of his voice.

"Then why do I feel so small?"

Logan looked away. "Bein' abandoned'll do that, I think."

She stared at him from across the room, arms wrapped around herself. "People had things to do," she said after a little while, sitting down in her chair and dropping her gaze to the floor between her feet. "Wasn't anyone's fault."

He didn't buy that, and he knew that, deep down, she couldn't either. Some of it, at least, was his fault, through and through. He knew it. She must know it, too. "You'll never be alone like that again, baby," he promised.

The words didn't have the effect he'd intended. She shivered and shook her head, feeling sick all of a sudden. "Don't." She looked up at him, trying not to yield to her instinct to flee. "Please."

"I'm sorry," he said. He hadn't expected her to be able to trust him. Hoped maybe, but not expected. She'd trusted that he wouldn't leave her before, and he'd been gone for six months.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, knowing he could hear her easily from where he stood. "I'm so sorry. I can't." -I can't believe you. Please don't lie to me.- She was shaking and hating herself for how she felt right now, so broken and pathetic, like a supplicant with her hand outstretched for whatever he'd give her before he left again. -I said I could do this for the rest of my life. I don't expect you to let me.-

He nodded, accepting her words for what they were, even as they tore through him with an intensity he couldn't hide. He walked forward slowly, coming to rest on his knees in front of her. "I know. It's okay. You don't hafta believe me." You don't have to believe me for it to be true.

"I'm so sorry," Marie said again, and it felt like they were the only words left in her vocabulary, she'd been stripped down to nothing but an apology. She reached out to touch his face gently, her fingers still shrouded in silk after a day of teaching. The delicate fabric snagged a little on the rough stubble along his jaw.

Logan shook his head, then turned his face into her hand, kissing the silk-covered palm. "'s not for you t'be sorry for. I did this, baby, an' I'll deal with the consequences."

"Don't go." It made all sense and no sense to say it and she wasn't sure still that she should, or could say such a thing to him. All she knew was that she was afraid; of being left, of driving him away by asking him not to leave her, of a clamour of conflicting things that wouldn't let her be.

"I'm not goin' anywhere." He'd done this to her, to himself, and he wasn't going to shrug off his responsibility just because it wasn't any fun. She was worth it.

"I love you," she said, and wondered if that made her weak but couldn't stop it, because it was one thing she knew was true. She leaned forward to kiss him tentatively.

He tugged gently at a lock of her hair, leaning in to brush his lips over hers. "I love you, too," he whispered, sitting back on his heels.

Marie held out her hands to him, almost like a child, asking wordlessly to be held, to be close. "Don't leave me. You can go away... but don't leave."

Logan grasped her hands and pulled her toward him, out of the chair and into his lap. "I won't, baby. I won't."

It was already a little easier to believe and she nestled against him, closing her eyes and letting her tension ebb away into the warmth of his arms. The knot in her chest loosened enough to let her breathing smooth out and she sighed with relief. "It'll be okay," she said, as the realization of it sank in slowly. "I think it will be."

She smelled like salt-water and fear, but both scents were slowly fading. He stroked her hair, pressing a kiss to her forehead. "It will." He knew it would. It had to be, eventually. And they had all the time in the world.

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Title and tag from So long, Marianne, by Leonard Cohen