Thicker than water...

[x-rogue.livejournal.com]

Tues @~11:15am. No smut. No angst. In Logan's bedroom. Second sign of the apocalypse, people.

The door is closed -- it usually is -- and Logan is sitting in an armchair near one of the windows. There's another armchair next to him, as if the person who set up the room expected it to house two people, but that one has gone unused for as long as he's been here. Which, granted, isn't that long.

He's tense, waiting, but relaxed, too. It's the strangest combination of feelings. He knows everything will be okay, talking to Marie, but he's nervous about it anyway because he doesn't want to hurt her again. More.

She walks up the stairs slowly, still damp from her shower under her neck-to-toe clothing. Once, she might have been in tears long before this point but it could wait. Her mind is full of him, of his confusion and his guilt and she knows it wasn't deliberate, any of it, and they just have to get through this to be okay. She knocks gently on his door, knowing he's waiting for her.

His tension fades when he hears the knock. No sense being nervous now. He debates calling out, then stands and walks to the door, opening it for her. He nods at her, offering a sad smile of welcome. "Come on in." He waves toward the interior of the room, letting her choose a seat. The king-sized bed, the armchairs near the window, the chair near the desk, whatever she wants.

"Thanks," she says softly. She enters and sits down in one of the chairs, pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them, hugging herself. "So... talk" It's not quite a request, verging more on a quiet order. She rests her chin on her knees, watching his face intently.

He frowns, closing the door and seating himself in the chair beside hers, staring at his hands. "I'm not sure how much you already know," he admits. "And I'm not sure how much you /want/ to know now."

She smiles. "Well... let's see. I think I can skip knowing any more about you and Storm than I already do, thanks," she says dryly. "You don't seem too knotted up about that. It's the stuff with Bobby that worries me... *you* worry me. It's all confused and I can't sort it out, but, it's just... something's not right and it's eating at you." Her eyes are cool and calm. "You want to talk to me about that? Details, I got. You and him are both real good at remembering those. It's the emotions I can't sort out."

He coughs at her comment about Ororo, glancing at the window, then nods slowly. "Okay. Well..." He looks up at her, meeting her eyes. "It started out okay. In the kitchen. He was just...experimenting, I think." Logan shrugs, secure in his belief that the kitchen blowjob wasn't emotional on Bobby's part. He could be wrong, but. "Then, Sunday." He shakes his head. "I don't know."

"Well, tell me what you do know." Her voice is soothing. "Logan, this is bugging you. It's not just some kind of ambient guilt over doing my barely-ex-boyfriend, I don't think..." She gives him an unimpressed look. "If you're gonna play hero and make me better like that, we have to be able to talk. I mean, I'm bleeding to death somewhere, I don't want you taking mental catalogue of your latest conquests to make sure I'm not going to get upset."

He'd blush, if he were that kind of person. Instead, he grumbles quietly, glancing away. "He came to my room. And then he was out of his clothes and crawling all over me and..." He trails off, frowning. "And asking me to fuck him in this /dead/ voice that just..." He meets her eyes again. "I should've made him leave right then, but I think that would've been worse."

She looks uncomfortable but then composes herself. "Possibly, yeah. He's on a bit of an angsty kick" She bites her lip, looking thoughtful. "I know he's feeling like he's got nobody, you know, with his family being such shits and John taking off. And, well," she can't keep the pain and bitterness out of her voice, "I don't count for anything, apparently. John said he picked you because you don't care about anyone, don't have family, don't have friends, but I don't think that's it." She shakes her head. "I think it's the other way around somehow. I mean, aside from you being irresistable." She winks at him and smiles a little through her hurt. "Anyway... keep talking."

He tenses at the mention of John. So that's where she got the idea that he didn't care about her. He shakes his head. "I don't know why. I mean..." He trails off, then gets back on track. "He wasn't /there/. And he wanted...he wanted to be /fucked/," he says, glancing at her apologetically. "I don't know why he picked me. Maybe because he wanted it rough. Or maybe because he thought I wouldn't say no to a roll in the sack." He shrugs, looking uncomfortable.

She shifts in the chair, sitting sideways with her feet on one arm, her back on the other, looking pensively out the window. She's surprisingly relaxed, latching onto the problem instead of her own unhappiness with the situation. "So why does it bother you so much?" she asks, looking over at him. "Did something happen after?"

He frowns, turning to look out the window with her. "It bothers me because it shouldn't've happened. He's all...I don't know. Fucked up. And I wanted him, sure, but he wasn't even in the room when it happened."

She nods, chewing her lip thoughtfully. "I think maybe he just wants to belong to someone," she says almost to herself. "And you, when someone belongs to you, it's not just going to go away. It lasts. Right?" She looks over at him and some of her pain shows through her mask of calm, a flicker of panic in her eyes.

He turns his face toward her, meeting her eyes. "Right." And, right then, he wants more than anything to draw her into his lap and hug her. Just hold her and show her how much she means to him. His hand makes it halfway across the distance between their chairs when guilt stops him and his hand hangs there, waiting.

She reaches out for his hand, turning towards him, swinging her feet to the floor, her black-silk covered fingers winding in his.

He tugs lightly on her hand, letting her decide if she wants to make the journey from her chair to his. He squeezes her hand gently. "Marie. I'm not going anywhere unless you want me to. I promise." He squeezes again. "And you know that I mean it. You've got enough of me rattling around in there," he nods toward her head, "to know better than to even worry about me leaving you."

She slides over into his lap, curling up with her head under his chin. "I know," she says shakily, nestling as close as she can. "I just don't know why," she admits at last. "But I believe you. I trust you."

That makes him sigh with relief. It should make him nervous that she trusts him so much -- and that he trusts her just as much -- but it doesn't. He rubs his stubbly chin over her hair and murmurs, "Thank you."

"Are we okay?" she asks quietly. "I mean, there being a 'we' to be okay with and all... I thought I'd be mad at you, but I'm not. I know you don't mean to hurt me. It hurts but it's okay somehow, even if it does." Her voice gets teary. "I don't want to be alone, that's all. I couldn't talk to you on Sunday, didn't think I could, and I got scared." She sniffles a little. "Are *you* okay?"

"I'm okay. We're okay." He shifts her slightly in his arms. "And there is /definitely/ a 'we' to be okay with. We've already talked about that." Stroking his hand over her arm, he murmurs, "I'm sorry that you didn't think you could talk to me. And...thank you. For not being mad at me."

She sighs happily, tension running out of her muscles as she melts against him. "I don't have so many people in the world that I can go around just being mad," she says quietly. "What you give me, you get a lot of leeway for it. End of the day, I have you, I'm still good. You're one of my Good Things, Logan. You know, those things the Universe gives for making life so shitty? You're my best Good Thing. I missed you."

"I missed you, too, Marie." He continues to rub her arm, petting her. "You /are/ why I came back, you know. I don't /come back/ to places I've been. It's a new feeling, wanting -- needing -- to be here, because you're here." He's quiet for a few seconds. "I think I'm starting to like it," he says, certainty trickling into his voice.

"That makes me happy." She finds his dog tags, toys with them as she speaks. "You ever don't want to come back... you'll say goodbye, right? Just so I don't wonder? Cause if I don't see you for a long time, I'll still wait. Even if you say goodbye, you can always come back." Her voice is thin and tired.

"If it ever happens, I'll say goodbye," he promises, unable to foresee a future in which he'll want to not come back. She, this girl who has become his family, has come to mean too much to him in the short time he's known her, for that to seem possible. He scritches her back with one hand, still rubbing at her arm with the other. "But, for now, I'm not going anywhere."

"I like this," she says, her voice full of contentment. "I'm glad you're home. In all the ways you could take that..."

"Me, too," he rumbles, after a slight pause to consider the meanings of the word 'home'. "Me, too."