‘ ’ indicates thought
“ ” indicates spoken words
Seven months since that fateful afternoon,
She enters her room and even in the dark of the night, she instinctively senses a presence there, the glowing end of the puff-stick pinpointing the person. ‘As if I didn’t know it already,’ she smiles to herself.
“Fancy seeing you here,” she is in a good mood, having just returned from yet another dinner date with the now well-settled Davis Cameron. It was their fourth and tonight, she finally gave into his unspoken request to kiss her goodnight. Even though it was just a peck on the cheek, it was definitely a step forward. Previously, contact had been limited it to just a shake of the hands.
Having gotten over the initial awkward phase, their relationship is fast developing from colleagues and friends to something more. The heart aching, painful incident that finally brought the blonde surfer-god into her life is a distant memory and isnt’t even on her mind right now. Hasn’t been for many days. Neither has the gruff Canadian who *responsible* for it.
All that is about to change.
“You been partyin’ Ororo,” his words lack the usual life, something she doesn’t notice instantly.
“What, Remy? Not calling me Stormy,” she chuckles as she drops her purse onto the dresser and starts towards the light switch. “You must be really off your game today my friend.”
“Don’,” his hushed voice stops her mid action. “Don’ turn on da light.”
“Remy,” she does not miss out a second time. “What’s the matter?” She asks softly as she leaves the room as it is and starts towards the window, on who’s sill he is sitting on, a smoldering cigarette dangling from his fingers. He doesn’t even seem to notice that its ashes are falling on his overcoat.
“Nothin’ padnat,” he tries to sound his usual debonair self, but the hollowness is still clear to her practiced ear.
“Don’t lie to me Remy Lebeau,” her voice carries a concern admonishment. Sitting down in front of him, she notices the dimmed light in his usually glinting eyes. He had a tired look on his face. “What happened?” her tone is soft and urging.
“Rogue an’ Remy,” just the start is enough to sound the alarm bells in the weather goddess’s mind and heart.
‘Rogue,’ just one word, and its enough to clear away all her euphoria, strong waves of regret, pain, anger, betrayal, sorrow and various other dark emotions, washing over it and carrying it away like a paper boat in high tide.
‘Ever since that morning,’ she thinks, not wanting to let even the barest memory of the previous afternoon trickle through her carefully constructed shields. ‘Ever since that morning,’ everything has changed between her and the usually calm Rogue.
It all started with that morning.
----
After leaving her standing there in the corridor, the girl stomped off to her room, the loud slam of the door, echoing in the empty hallways. She hadn’t come out the whole day, missing all her classes and snarling at anyone who tried to come near her. Even the Professor had been on the receiving end of some sever verbal thrashing, courtesy of the girl’s inner Carol, Logan and Magneto. Carol had given her the confidence and Logan the choice words and the bolstering fiery anger, while Eric had given the cold calculated and time gathered ammunition, which the young woman had used, to the fullest.
All this coupled with her own youth and the rebellious nature it brought along with it.
The other person who had come both as an authority figure and as a friend had received a similar response. The minute Scott Summers opened the door and stepped through it, he was very clearly and succinctly told to ‘fuck off’. Being the team leader and the second in the school, he did not let off so easily. He had tried reasoning with her that Logan would come back soon and that he wouldn’t want her to be worried about him.
That blew the top off her anger, and she almost let the secret out.
“Yeah, ya like thaht he ain’t here. Dontcha’ Cycke?” her voice dropped to a threatening growl. “That will give ya the peace of mind that he ain’t no longer gonna fuck yer precious Jeannie.”
That shut him right up, his hands clenching at his sides. He knew that those words weren’t entirely made up from the girl’s mind. They were from the Logan inside her. She was fuelling her anger from his mental essence. There was only one solution for that particular problem.
She was left alone to cool down, with only Jubilee and Kitty going near her. One, because she allowed them to come within a feet of her. Two, because they shared the room with her, and three, they needed to get food and nourishment to her.
---
Lost in her thoughts she misses out on his words….almost all of them, except for the last few.
“….and den she left.”
“Calm down Remy,” she lays a supportive hand on his knee. “Tell me everything that happened. Slowly.”
“You don’ wanna hear it padnat,” he shakes his head in denial.
“Yes I do,” her voice is soft, yet full of determination.
He is silent for what seems like hours. Finally, he lets out a deep sigh and starts talking.
-----
That evening,
Both lovers were sitting in the gazebo, overlooking the cliff side drop into the ocean, silently watching the sun set over the horizon, its fiery yellow having turned a dull orange and then to a dull grey of the approaching night.
“Come on Remy,” Rogue spoke with her characteristic southern drawl, her gloved hand grasping and pulling the similarly gloved limb of her Cajun charmer. “Lets go in.”
“Why Cherie? Don’ you like spendin’ time wit’ Remy now?” He teased with a twinkle in his eyes.
“Sure do mah swamp rat,” she shook her head, a little pink blush coloring her cheeks. “But ah from the south, and me and cold don’t go so well togethah. So, what do ya say, we go inside and spend some time togethah theah.”
“Remy like the way you tink’.”
Hand in hand, they walked towards the imposing mansion, its Victorian architecture, presenting an impressive sight, especially when it was the only one around for miles. Xavier had bought quite a lot of land, both to have adequate space for any future expansion plans, and to ensure the safety and privacy of the school and its students.
They were about a couple of hundred feet away from the structure, when the sound of a sports car engine powering to life reached their ears, its sound soon followed by the vehicle itself.
Seeing it and its occupants elicited different reactions from the couple. Where on one hand Remy smiled a happy smile, Rogue’s frown clearly mirrored her feelings, something that her partner had noticed, but avoided talking about…..till today.
His next remark, a simple, innocent one blew the lid of the simmering pot.
“Stormy looks happy, no.”
“Yeah, sure does,” the words were spat out. “Of course she will be happy. She’s sucked it outta othahs Succubus.”
“Rogue?” His reaction was instant, more of a concerned annoyance than an outright one.
Everyone in the mansion knew about the sudden aversion Rogue had developed towards her teachers, one that hadn’t abated even after seven months of Logan’s leaving. Initially, she had gone against everyone, including the Professor. The only one who wasn’t on the receiving end of her teenage wrath, was Beast. During the first few weeks, the mild mannered doctor had been the only one she allowed through the barriers she had put up. However, with the passage of time, her anger towards some of them seemed to have cooled down. After withdrawing from all classes that Beast couldn’t instruct her in, she had taken courses taught by her other teachers.
The only teacher she didn’t seem to let go was Ororo. Since that morning, she had never set even a foot in any of Ororo’s classes, a situation that garnered dozens of rumors about the cause of this animosity and also Ororo's part in Logan’s leaving.
When Davis had joined the school, he had taken over some of Scott’s and some of Henry’s classes, freeing them to take over Logan’s self-defense classes. He had soon become quite familiar with the students and all of them liked him, including Rogue. That all changed about two and a half months back, when Davis took Ororo out for dinner. From the next day onwards, Davis started getting an Ororo style treatment from the southern firecracker. This sudden change in behavior only added oil to the already blazing rumor mill.
---
Back in the mansion grounds, Remy was dumbstruck by the sudden change in his girlfriend’s moods. Where she had been all lively and bubbly, she had gone to a polar opposite, angry and scowling.
“Rogue,” he caught hold of her hand as she tried to walk away from him. “What is your problem wit’ Ororo?” It had been the second time he had asked this question. The first had been when she had blown off for the second time in public against the snow haired beauty. She had said that she did not want to talk about it and given her tumultuous emotional state, Remy had let it slide, something he did not intend to do this evening.
“Ah don’t wanna talhk about it?” Came the usual answer as the slim girl tried to free herself from the firm grip. If she wanted, she could easily do so and toss the card-thrower just like one of his playing cards.
“Tough luck,” Remy stepped forward and enclosed his arms around her front. Now she would have no choice, if she wanted to be free, she would have to but to hurt him, something he knew she would not do.
The next few moments were filled with an uncomfortable silence as one of them tried to reign in her anger, while the other tried to extend his patience.
“She has no right to be happy,” came the soft but cold answer.
“Don’ say that Cherie,” loosening his grip, the charmer came around to face her. “Everyone deserve a chance to be happy. Specially Ororo.”
“NO,” the sudden flare up caused him to automatically tighten his grip. “Not her. Not now. Not with….” Her voice grew softer with each other, finally trailing off without completing her sentence.
“Not without Logan, huhn,” Remy completed her sentence, taking in the slight flinch that passed over the girl’s face at the spoken aloud name.
---
“Why can’t you let go of ‘im Rogue,” Remy urged softly. “He left. He hurt you, Stormy. As far as Remy is concerned that wolf-man could stay away all his life.”
That was the wrong thing to say. The next instant, the Cajun found himself flying through the air, landing harmlessly on the hedge that grew around the whole mansion.
“Well, foh your information Gambit, she was the one that hurt him. She was the one that made him leave. She was the one that played her games with him,” the use of his codename and the way it was spat out stunned the swamp rat. “And as far as I am concerned,” she used his words against him. “Yer Stormy can fall of the face of tha earth and go to hell, and ya know what, so can ya. We are ovah.”
No sooner had the last word left her lips that Rogue took to the skies, leaving a dumbstruck Cajun sprawled out on the grass.”
----
“An’ dat is the whole story,” the demon eyed charmer sighs dejectedly.
The snow haired beauty doesn’t know what to say, her own thoughts dragging her back to that afternoon, the one she has learned so well to avoid.
---
“Ororo….” he had whispered, loud enough so that only she could hear it.
“Leave,” she had ground out.
“Leave?”
“Get away from me. Leave me alone,” she supplied an unfeeling elaboration.
“You want me to leave here now,” the Wolverine could take only so much before rearing its wild head. “Or do you want me to leave altogether.”
She hadn’t given a verbal answer to his question. Instead, she turned away from him and let her winds carry her away from him.
---
‘And leave he did,’ she thinks now. ‘Just as you said,’ a small part in her accuses her; a part that she thought had left with him. A part that had remained silent, only to be let out now. ‘He gave you your wish.’
“Ororo,” the concerned voice of her best friend pulls her from her mulling. “What happen’ between you and Rogue?” He cryptically asks what happened between her and Logan.
“I don’t know,” she hates herself for having to lie. She knows, she just doesn’t want to talk about it. She knows that the girl knows everything about her and Logan and also about Jean and Logan. She knows everything.
That means, she also knows about the first talk that had finally led to the last one. She knows everything.
“What happen’ between you and Wolverine?” He spells out the question he wanted to ask in the first place.
She doesn’t answer this time, forcing him to try it a second time.
“’Roro…” he starts; only to be stopped as she lets go of him and stands up abruptly.
“I am tired Remy,” the excuse comes out automatically. “I think it would be better if you would leave.”
“Stormy?” He is not at all surprised at her reaction. He would have been seven, even six or months ago. Not anymore.
“Goodnight Remy,” She wishes him and walks away towards the bathroom. “Please leave,” the words scratch at her conscience.
-----
She comes out ten minutes later, the silken fabric of her nightgown billowing in the wind that had suddenly come out of nowhere.
Silently as a ghost, she walks to her bed and lays down on it.
She is alone now. Alone with freshly clawed out wounds of the past. She is alone.
She tries to sleep, but her mind doesn’t let her do so. It wanders.
It wanders and takes her to the one place she doesn’t want to go to.
It takes her to the cold, harsh wilderness of the north…
….it takes her to him.
Note: So, how did you like this chapter. Post your reviews and let me know. Hope to get Logan back into the picture sometime soon....not that he is actually out of it.
[Reviews - 162]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story |
Has been viewed 2139 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story | - Text Size +
You must login () to review.
