Logan stood at the entrance to the door it was their ritual as always never ending and unbroken. His hand was extended toward her and she was looking down at the shiny metal dangling out of his hands, clad in black leather gloves meant for the motorcycle, not for her. His hands were covered so he could touch a machine and keep a better grip, not so he could touch her. When she hesitated to take them, hesitated because taking them meant him leaving, he did touch her. Shifted his weight impatiently from foot to foot and reached down and grabbed her hand and implanted the rectangular tags into her waiting palm. There she was, always waiting.
“You jus’ got here!”
It was literally all she could say, and it was true, Logan had only just come home a week ago and he had been gone so long, too long. She had kept track of the days, marked them on her calendar faithfully every night with a red pen to represent her almost always bleeding heart. She nearly always missed him even on nights when she’d go out to a movie with Bobby or eat ice cream in the park, her heart and mind would settle on him like a blanket a cold girl could wrap herself into.
240 days last time, how long until I’ll see you again this time Logan?
“Yeah well kid, the professor got a new lead it was unexpected and it came real fast, I gotta go check it out.”
Logan couldn’t for the life of him figure out why he was bothering to explain this to a stupid kid. Even if it was Rogue, she was still a child, and she needed to learn to stay away from him to bond with kids her own age. There would come a time when he might not be welcomed at Xavier’s school anymore for whatever reason, whatever future blunder he might make or for whatever gruesome plight of his past that may come to light. Hell, he might even grow sick of the place, sick of Summers and the untouchable Dr. Grey and he might just tell old wheels to go roll off the sunny side of a cliff.
In either event he wouldn’t be the reason Rogue couldn’t come back, because she was stubbornly clinging to this hero that he wasn’t. He refused to let her cultivate the bond between them any deeper than it already was.
“Logan, I-”
“Rogue.”
He spoke that one word and it had a catalyst affect, causing Rogue to really and earnestly look at Wolverine, at Logan. His tone was so harsh, and stoic, like a demanding force that she equated with admantium or steel. She looked at him like she had never seen him before, he had always, always, called her Marie, why was he suddenly calling her Rogue? She took and involuntary step back almost flinching. Whatever he was going to say next she had no doubt she wasn’t going to like it and she braced herself for the worse.
Logan understood her reaction, could smell first doubt then the slight traced of fear. This had to stop here, he sometimes didn’t know what was worse, having Chuck sneak around in his head or having Rogue walk around with a piece of him up there, like the boy she had first kissed, like he had told her. She had to stop looking up to him, it was bad enough that he could already see the way her body had changed in the last eight months since he’d originally left.
When Logan had left Mar-Rogue, he corrected himself in his mind, was pencil thin from months on the road, malnourished to an extent and deprived of a happy home; she was a vagabond on a Rogue. In the months that he had been gone Rogue had filled up and out, he could pin point every location on her body that had altered since his departure, and damn him to hell if it didn’t sicken the shit out of him and scare him all at once. Wolverine ran from nothing but from this girl and her audacious attempt at being his friend, he fled.
“Listen, I have to go, and you take care of those for me and I’ll see you when I get back-be good.”
He ruffled her hair as a way of making himself regard her as a child, he hoped it fooled her better than it had fooled him.
All he heard as he turned to walk out the door was a breathy good-bye.
Logan had been gone for a couple of days now and Rogue couldn’t help the way the light seemed to dwindle in her eyes when he wasn’t around. She missed him terribly and the same heart-ache and loneliness that had had run out of her when Logan returned, had come back with a vengeance as soon as he had departed.
“Roguey! I’m so sick of this! You’re still moping over that fur ball and we’re all set to leave for out trip! C’mon! You have to cheer up at the circus! Lions, and tigers and bears- oh my!”
Jubilee said the “oh my” part with a suggestive wiggle of her eyebrows and tone that implied she wasn’t talking about being scared but about doing very thrilling.
Rogue managed a small smile at Jubilee’s antics and looked up with a fresh smile on her face to show her friend how unaffected she was by Logan’s departure.
“I’ll have ya know Jubilee that I am perfectly fine without Log-”
“Oh my god Rogue, no! Rogue, I can’t hear you say his name even one more time, if I so much as hear someone say the word low, I’m going to explode!”
Kitty Pryde started in dramatically as she walked through the closed door and into the three girls shared bedroom, Jubilee meanwhile stuck her head out of the bathroom door and said in convincing earnestly,
“Hey chicka’s whose been using all the Mousse? We’re totally running low on the good stuff.”
Rogue knew Jubilee was just doing it to aggravate Kitty who in turn crossed her arms over her chest and turned to Rogue with an exasperated face on before stating:
“Like, kaboom!”
Rogue had to laugh at her friends and she was happy she had them to make life as a mutant with deadly skin slightly less difficult.
The three girls all became quite at once when they heard the voice of the professor chime into their minds as if he’d been there all along. For the sake of Rogue’s modesty and considering what she’d been thinking about with her and Logan before her and her friends began to chat she really hoped she hadn’t been projecting loud enough for the Professor to hear.
Students the bus has just arrived please proceed to the foyer in a prompt fashion and do not forget any items you may wish to utilize at the Circus.
“Ugh! That’s so too creepy!” Jubilee exclaimed coming out of the bathroom.
“Yeah, and I’m bettin’ since he used “students” he wasn’t just in our minds but in everybody’s.”
“Saves a bundle on intercoms though.”
The Circus was fun at first and Rogue had plenty of opportunities to take her mind off of her troubles and off of Logan. Jubilee, Kitty and Rogue all took seats to watch the show she was amazed at the spectacle. Growing up a poor girl in Mississippi, Rogue never really saw something like this before, she saw a woman walking a thin strap of a wire and a man got shot out of a cannon, she saw another young woman ride a horse six different ways from Sunday, including backwards and while standing on the horses back! Elephants, giraffes, horses, dogs and even tigers and Lions!
No the show wasn’t disappointing and Rogue had to admit that with everything she saw that day she didn’t have much time to think about Logan. She made it all the way through the two hour show before the last five minutes ruined everything. It was time for the Tiger to come out and boy was he a hell cat! Rogue had never seen such an animal spirit before and this was coming from someone with Logan’s personality rattling around in her head!
A booming voice broke out speaking to the crowd as the announcer addressed the audience.
“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! I GIVE YOU THE GREAT AND FEARLESS LION TAMER, ABLE TO TAME AND SOOTHE EVEN THE WIDLEST OF BEASTS, THE MIGHTY, THE MYSTICAL, THE ONLY ONE OF US HERE AT THE CIRCUS WITH A PREMIUM INSURANCE POLICY, MARLO THE MAGNIFICENT!”
The crowd laughed at the announcers joke and went bonkers with applause has a Scandinavian looking man wearing a sparkly costume and tight-and Rogue meant TIGHT- spandex pants came out with one hand raised as he waved to the audience. When the crowd died down the announcer began to speak again.
“Now, Marlo will show his daring and his VIGOR! As he faces the dangerous, the deadly, The KING OF THE CAGE! Bruno, the vicious!”
The crowd ‘Oohed’ and ‘Ahhed’ at the prospect of seeing a man take on a Tiger, but rogue was already to far gone. She was already thinking over the words the announcer had just said, the King of the Cage. The last time she heard someone say that she was with Logan, in Canada and she hadn’t met him yet but she was watching him take a brutal beating and give out a little bit too. Her eyes glazed over at the memory and from that point on good ol’ Bruno and Marlo could have started doing the Tiger tango for all the difference it made to Rogue. Next thing she knew Jubilee and Kitty were standing up and the crowd was filing casually out of the Big top Tent, and Jubilee was exclaiming
“Did you see how tight his pants were! Marlo can come teach me something about magnificent any time he wants to!”
When they got out of the big top Jubilee and Kitty both said they had to go to the bathroom and Rogue just smiled and said she’d meet up with them later she was going to have some popcorn and take a look around. She walked around for a few minutes until she saw a vendor selling popcorn and decided she really did want some, she always savored the smell of corn kernels being popped over slow rising heat add a little salt and plenty of rich butter and Rogue was sold.
She walked around eating her popcorn, earning a few stares because she kept her gloves on. She hated to ruin them with the oily butter but this was way to populated a place to even consider taking them off. Eventually the looks of the people around her got to her and Rogue sought a less populated area where she could remove one glove and eat in peace. She finally spotted a shady area behind the vendors and gaming machines where the crowds were thin and where she could sit undisturbed. She sat on the grassy ground and started to ponder Logan and his weird behavior.
Yesterday i got lost in the circus,
feeling like such a mess.
And now I'm down,
I'm just hanging on the corner.
I can't help but reminisce.
When Logan came back it had made her so happy, she didn’t mean to beat a dead horse but the girl had missed him plain and simple. She would never tell a soul but on nights when it was really bad she’d lay in bed talking to Logan, inside her head. She closed her eyes and she was there with him, talking to him and sometimes…not only talking…But one of those hadn’t gone on in months. There hadn’t been enough Logan left to generate a fully fledged face to face liaison.
Logan was fading out of her mind, even though she had absorbed a lot of Logan’s powers when they were on top of the Statue of Liberty, eight months was a long time. Logan would always been in Rogue’s mind but truth be told she was having more trouble bringing him to the forefront of her mind than she’d ever had before. She knew it was only a matter of time before Logan lost his voice in her mind and she heard him growl in response.
The won a smile out of Rogue but thinking back on the way he’d acted and thinking back on some of the things the Logan inside her head had said…it didn’t make sense to her.
“Dammit Logan!” rogue stomped her foot hard on the ground like a little kid.
She didn’t care, she knew Logan wanted her, she knew he’d thought about her even when he first picked her up in that rutty little truck. The only thing that dissuaded him from doing anything was they way she flinched when he went to touch her, that and she wasn’t really clean at the moment. It would always be to Rogue’s embarrassment that Logan was able to smell that she hadn’t bathed for a good week when he picked her up that night. Still nothing made missing him any less difficult and when he wasn’t with her...Rogue didn’t know how to put it without him everything seemed dull and lackluster. She cast a bored look around the circus grounds, without Logan…everything seemed grey.
Cuz when you're gone,
all the colors fade.
When you're gone,
no new years day parade.
You're gone,
colors seem to fade.
The return from the circus was uneventful and Kitty and jubilee viciously scarfed down the rest of Rogue’s unfinished and forgotten popcorn. Rogue tried not to think about Logan with minimal success and days turned to weeks and pretty soon Logan had been gone for his first month, again. Rogue tried not to keep track of the time he was gone but the day he left was burned into her memory so any time she allowed herself to disregard his absence she’d think to herself if he left that Tuesday than now he’s been gone 31 days… and it was hard for her to stop. She didn’t use the calendar anymore though and she continued to go out with Bobby even though her heart wasn’t really in it.
Rogue did continue her nightly visits with Logan though. She closed her eyes, like she would when she would meditate with the professor, they were working on her controlling her mutation. She would sit for many hours with him trying to explore her minds and her mutation triggers and he would test her control limits. So far it was a bust because she didn’t have any mutation control limits, she had no control! The lessons continued though.
By pseudo-meditating, as she referred to it she was able to clearly envision Logan in her mind. She didn’t have the power to picture him in a dress or anything because the real Logan would never wear a dress and the Logan in her head would only appear in a way he would in real life. So she’d close her eyes and she would listen to the noises in her head.
Always it was risky, because first she would have to tell David, she was sorry she didn’t want to speak with him. He was so faint though she could easily push him aside and next there was Eric, he was a little more difficult-and dramatic! All the time he would say,
“If Auschwitz couldn’t hold me than neither shall you!
He really didn’t seem to understand that he was just residue in her mind and not the real Eric. Next came Logan and she sighed contently because in her mind she could feel him, just like in life she could smell him. He’d always greet her the same way with a smirk and a nod, sometimes depended on how she came dressed he’d even let out a low whistle. It was a strange sensation to be meditating and basically…lost in your mind and then to feel yourself blush because it was your actual body that was blushing. Very strange sensation.
Rogue had to concentrate very hard to make a mental picture of Logan appear, and this wasn’t her memory of Logan, because that was easily thought up, this was her mental Logan. It was the ability to tap into him inside of her, to draw him out from the shadows of her mind and it took a bit out of the girl when so much time had elapsed after absorption. She needed to talk to him though, she needed affirmation and dammit she was still a little pissed about that hair ruffle! Who the hell did Logan think she was dennis the mennis?
“Don’t worry about it darlin’, I’ll come around. Jus gonna take a little time is all.”
Even his voice made Rogue feel 200% better but she was till frustrated as all holy hell.
“Why’s he…you, running though? We had so much fun while you were here, you even let me watch a movie with you and drink beer!”
“I loved the way you smelled that night, that’s why I kept my arm around you, though I could smell you before you even walked in the room, I’m sure.”
Logan in Rogue’s mind was the Logan guide for the Logan in Rogue’s life. He told her everything she ever needed to know, he told her what to wear that ‘he’d’ like, for when the real Logan would get a glimpse of her and he told her that the real Logan was definitely just trying not to do something nasty like take advantage of her.
“Your young darlin, you might be over 100 years younger than I am, I know I want it but you can’t expect me to just fall over for ya without you being even legal yet.”
“I’m seventeen Logan, I turn 18 in a couple of measly months, then I graduate and god dammit I don’t want to do it without you.”
Mental Logan ran a shimmery hand down Rogue’s face, they couldn’t really touch and feel it up here in Rogue’s mental land but they could talk and her Logan had told her some downright sinful stuff that made her blush so hard she snapped out of her mediation once.
“Marie, the first time I saw you I thought you were some scared kid and then when you took off your hood I thought you were a fine looking girl and I didn’t know or care about you. I can’t lie, that night if Sabertooth hadn’t crashed the truck, I would have tried something. Maybe I would have waited until you trusted me a little more but I have no doubt. Then when we came here, I found out you were only 16 and I wasn’t about to lay a hand on you, it would have been sick and you had a real shot here. Now it gets harder every time I see you and I know I feel the same way on the outside as I do on the inside.”
He meant the real him felt the same way as the version of him in her head.
On the other side of the mansion the phone was ringing in professor Xavier’s bedroom and he wheeled himself over the bed stand to pick it up, because he hadn’t actually gotten to bed yet.
Your mama called, she said,
that you're downstairs crying.
Feeling like such a mess
Ya, I hear ya,
in the back ground balling.
What happened to your sweet summer time dress.
“Hello?”
“Yeah, Chuck?” Logan spoke into the pay phone, his mouth forming words around the end of a newly lit cigar.
Charles Xavier sighed wearily as he spoke to the man on the phone; shaking his head at being addressed as ‘Chuck’ he supposed it was better than ‘wheels’.
“Logan, did you find anything in Virginia?”
Xavier had sent Logan to a long closed, but still standing military office in Virginia; it was suppose to be the data headquarters for the Alkali Lake Compound Logan had just returned from. The Professor hoped he was able to find something, some glimmer of his past or some trace of himself that still remained on file.
“Nothing spectacular, I found a name and an address for one of the doctors who worked at the compound, I tracked him down to Nevada where he supposedly retired but turns out he died last year. I’m on my way back to the School now, was just wondering if there were any fresh leads….”
Logan hadn’t called for fresh leads, he had a cell phone courtesy of the professor for that and if that failed the Professor had his own gifts to relay a message. Logan had called because he wanted to talk to Marie, he knew it was wrong and he knew he wasn’t going to get her on the phone calling Xavier’s private line but he hoped that maybe the Professor would give him an update on how the girl was doing. Xavier did from time to time, mention in passing that she was going to this school dance, or she had executed a highly inappropriate fighting move that hadn’t been taught to her by Scott or any of the Defense teachers and she had to be more careful with her reflexes.
“I’m afraid not Logan, I’ve recovered nothing new since the last time we spoke when you were here.”
Xavier was not a man who liked to mettle in the affairs of his students, nor did he perceive Logan to be a man who was interested in any other mans opinion other than his own, he however, felt that it was time he made a suggestion to Logan.
“Well, I figured you woulda let me know if ya did, how’s…everything else?”
Logan tentatively ventured at the Professor hoping he’d catch the hint.
“Things are fine, we’ve recently enlisted a new recruit to the team and Marie is preparing for her eighteenth birthday, she turns in just a few short months. She herself has expressed interest in joining.”
“Marie wants to be an X-men?”
This he could not allow, it was cute that she had gleamed some of his fighting skills but she’d be a sitting duck in a real combat situation. Mutants who had active powers like Storm could conjure up a lightning bolt and electrocute someone. If Marie couldn’t get close enough to touch her target she’d have no way of defending herself. He had to prevent this; surely Xavier could see the logic in not letting her join?
“Oh yes, she’s actually quite eager,” Xavier hesitated silently hoping that his next words would sound causal and inviting, “You know Logan, many of Rogue’s classmates have also expressed their wishes to join the team and of course they’ll need proper combat training.”
“Your point being, Chuck?”
Xavier could tell just by his tone that his defenses were up; he was treading on thin ice.
“My point Logan is that I would very much like to hire you, even on a temporary basis as a teacher for the children. Teach them self defense, teach them combat, get them ready for future missions.”
“Isn’t that one-eye’s job? What’s the problem is he blind sited nowadays?”
Logan was referring to Scott and Jean’s engagement, and truth be told Scott was a little distracted nowadays but Logan was still a good candidate for the job regardless.
“Scott is more than adequate Logan, I have no doubt of his capabilities I just think the children would benefit from lessons with you as well. I’m sure Rogue would prefer you to Scott as she already has a hold on your defenses. I’m offering you a paid position Logan, a place to stay while you track down your next lead and a chance to rest for a while.”
Xavier drew back, careful not to let it slip that he had read Logan’s mind on more than one occasion and was aware that the other man was not fond of road life.
Logan on the other hand was knee deep in the idea that if he did return to the mansion he would be able to have some say in whether or not Ma-Rogue- joined the X-men. He’d whoop her butt so good (and he had to admit he got a little shiver when he thought about whooping Rogue’s anything) that she wouldn’t dare want to actually go out into the field. Logan was sure Xavier would respect his opinion if he, oh say, tied Rogue up and refused to release her unless she was never allowed to go near the X-anything.
“Logan? Are you there?”
“Yeah, I’m coming home professor, I’ll see you soon.”
With that Logan hung up the phone and jumped on his bike. He figured he was somewhere in Utah right about now and that meant it would be at least another forty-hours of hard driving before he got back to Mar-the mansion.
I know we all
we all got our faults.
We get locked in our vaults,
and we stay..
Logan battled with himself on the road, because it had only been a month since the last time he’d seen Marie. It had only been a moth since they’d cuddled up on the couch and he’d wrapped his arm around her drawing her close to him and he’d be damned if he didn’t lower his nose to the crown of her hair every chance he got to smell her and breath her all in. it had only been a month since he swore to himself that he wasn’t going to think of her as a woman and remain faithful to her as a person she could rely on, as a friend.
Then again Logan had to admit if he was honest with himself the road was lonely and cold. He hated the foreign smells he had to adjust to when he went to a seedy motel, he hated that most of the bars he earned his living in reeked of piss and beer and he hated that in his back pocket he had a scarf that belonged to a certain untouchable girl and on more than one occasion he had wrapped on thick hand around himself and one hand held the scarf to his nose. It had been on month since he’d felt Marie push herself against him in a hug and one month since he’d noticed how her clothes clung to her body her the way her hair was long and fell just past her breast. It been one month since she’d come to find him to see if he wanted to do something and he’d sent her away, saying he was busy, just so he could watch her hips sway when she walked away. To be honest with himself, more times than not, he’d gone to find her after she left to tell him he’d changed his mind. It’d been a month since he’d seen that light in her eyes whenever he, not even slightly afraid, would take her gloved hand and say “lets go” and watch as her eyes sparkled to life with a brilliance that would make any diamond envious. Without that sparkle in her eyes, without her face, the world seemed bathed in gray.
When you're gone,
all the colors fade.
When you're gone,
no new years day parade.
You're gone,
colors seem to fade.
The Wolverine & Rogue Fanfiction Archive
Barely Legal Since 2000
Story Notes:
Amos Lee, I didn't even know who he was, but you all know that commercial with the man and the cell phone and the little girl puts a monkey in his briefcase and he takes pictures of the little monkey all over NY? And the song in the background is "Sweet pea, apple of my eye la lalalala" Well Amos sings that song. SO I looked up the lyrics one day and then saw a bunch of other Amos lyrics, I seriously think that he's been writing songs for LOgan and Rogue the whole time! I'm making a series out of his songs with their thoughts in between, Omg wait until you read some of these lyrics! Its like "WHAT THE HELL!"
Author's Chapter Notes:
The chapters are named after the songs I used. Chapter one is set to Colors by Amos Lee