Sunset: Remembering
by
Elizabeth Wilde
DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of these characters. They are all copyright... Marvel and/or Twentieth Century Fox and possibly even other places or people. Point is, not mine. I make no money from this site and I don't have any to give, so there's no point in suing.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This series was originally inspired by the Barenaked Ladies song "Go Home." Now I'm not even using that song in the series. Go figure. The song used here is "Daddy Said" by Nanci Griffith.
Now I dream of a lover that I don't know
It's safer this way 'cause I don't have to go
And he won't come so nobody goes away
Sometimes I wish for the warmth of his hand
Take a look at these eyes and understand
I'm just a little too old to be learning the rules of the game.
I'm twenty-two years old, and sometimes I feel like I'm a hundred. I look into the mirror and look into my own eyes and don't even recognize myself about half the time. The woman in the mirror scared me when I was younger, back when I still cried myself to sleep every night because Logan had left me. Back then, the old woman didn't feel like a part of me. Now she is. I am.
I make a lot of people uneasy anymore. After we graduated, Jubilee and I drifted apart almost at once. She's a happy person, and most of the time I'm a pretty dark person. Most of the pulling away was on my side. I didn't want me to rub off on her. She deserves her smiles. Kitty and I still talk some. We don't have light conversations, though, don't wave and smile when we pass in the hall. Just every now and then, we seek each other out and bare our souls like it's the last chance we have. It feels good.
I think Bobby held out hope for quite a bit that he'd be able to wear me down, convince me to go out with him. I never had to tell him why I said no. Robert Drake may be just a guy, but damned if he doesn't know me better than just about anyone I've ever known even when I do keep him in the dark. He'd ask me, I'd say no, he'd smile, and we'd go on just like nothing had happened. It was part of the routine. He doesn't ask anymore. I think that hurt me at first, but now I'm glad. I don't like the way it used to hurt him even when he pretended it didn't.
Bobby knows me well enough to know I love Logan. Alright, I love the Logan who lives up in my head. He's always there. He never runs away from me. It's easier loving him that it is loving Wolverine. My Logan loves me back. He has dirty little fantasies reserved just for me, not Jean.
I'm a member of the X-Men now, and so are Bobby and Kitty and Jubilee. We save the world on a regular basis, and still my life seems like it's missing something. Scott tells me I'm a "valuable team member" often enough that it's starting to tick me off. Or maybe that's Wolverine talking. I can't be sure sometimes. My thoughts, my actions, they aren't always me. It certainly wasn't me who used to stare at Xavier like he was Logan shirtless everytime he wheeled into a room. That's an annoying little habit that I'm glad seems to have gone away. Erik was not a fun person to live with. But being a member of the X-Men is good. I'm helping. I'm using those powers I stole to help people. It doesn't help much with the guilt, with the knowing that poor woman's going to be in a coma for the rest of her life because of me. But it helps some.
Jean tries to get me to confide in her sometimes. I used to leer at her and say she just wanted to get in my head again before remembering that she never had been in my head. Just Wolverine's. Now I tell her that I'm fine and I don't need her help. Which still sounds a bit more like Logan than me. I actually do talk to Ororo sometimes, mostly because she doesn't try to get me to. She's quiet but she's strong. She won't take anything from anybody, and all that calm goes straight to Hell if somebody ticks her off. I've gotta admire that. Or maybe Wolverine does. Anyway, some part of me does.
I've got people all around me wanting to help me and talk to me and make me feel normal again. It's sweet, really. I appreciate it. But it won't work. I'm Rogue, the mutant life-force vacuum, and I'm not ever going to be normal.
The only time I come close is in my dreams and in my head. That's where Logan lives too. In my head, he loves me and wants me and needs me the way I need him. So I don't need Bobby or Remy or anybody else. I have Logan.
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