Author's Note: "It Would Be Love" is one-shot, short and sweet. Rating is 'T' for minor suggestive adult themes. This has not been Beta-ed, so your reviews will be read voraciously. I do not own the X-Men in any way, shape, or form; they are registered to Marvel.
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He watched as the man's world came crashing around his ears. He sent the news of the diamond bullet. He offered a sympathetic shoulder and a drinking partner. He forced a mercenary mission to distract the man from depression. He gave all this to him, but he never received anything more than a "I hate you" and a "Why can't you all leave me alone". He had to drink him in a stupor to get him to come with him.
He listened as the man whined about his life: his perfect life destroyed, his wife and his therapist fighting, one of them burning with rage and the other shattered into a billion pieces, and his career and his life since adolescence flushed down the toilet. He always envied the other, to a sickening point. He wanted to be him, and to be him was to be normal. He wanted a steady job, a faithful wife, and a mansion full of people who were filled with admiration. He hated him for the Summers cool, and yet he loved him for it.
Women fell on the man's feet, screaming in a futile attempt to crack into the man they knew only as a pair of ruby quartz visors. That's all they were going to know him as, because the man was strong. He was cold, stolid even. He didn't know how similar they really were. It was natural they should be together.
They could pull each other up out of funks, protect one another. They would love, and be loved in return, but they would not change. They would be fiercely loyal and defensive, yet each would not be shielded or hidden. He would regale the younger man with stories of his battles and be entertained with stories of wit and humor only he would be privy to. It would be love.
But it would be a secret love, love only he would know about. They would equally love each other, but only he would accept it. He would see the looks he was given and respond with a touch and a lowered voice. Whenever the man would fall he would be there to catch him and pull him up. He would tease him, call him a 'Boy Scout' and an 'X-Boy', but it would never be hurtful. He would never hurt him.
He would be hurt. The other man would unintentionally turn his gaze away and give him a cold shoulder. He would be denied, embarrassed and emasculated, but he would never give up. His lover was a married man, unsure and childish, but he loved him for his naivety. He needed to protect someone, to show someone how the world works, but the younger man only needed to be protected. His women knew nothing of reality, nothing beyond the confinements of their hyper-advanced minds. The man didn't know what he needed; he didn't even know he was missing a hole in his heart.
But he'd never discover the missing piece. He'd ache, tear at his chest and rip off his visor, but he'd never look in front of his nose. He'd never look at someone who he pushed away, who only came to heal. He'd never breathe, calm down and think about his life. He'd never be forced to, the older man would see to that. He'd be helped in the darkness by someone, but never knowing who his guardian was. Scott would never know Logan loved him so deeply it broke his heart.
