Disclaimer: I don't own anything to do with X-Men. The comic, or the movies. As amazing as it would be to have Logan hiding in my closet and waiting to pop out at the opportune moment, he's not there, because he's not my character. Sighs

Never Said

It's been five years. Five years, six months, eight days and about forty minutes since that man drove into my life, or rather I walked into his. Either way, it now seems like a bitter mistake. It's not that I have been counting or anything. Not that I'm keeping track so that I can tell the baby when she's older the exact moment that I realized, lying in his bed, her father really didn't, really couldn't love me. It's not going to be a story I'm looking forward to telling. Instead I have decided to let him go out in some heroic tale of blood and glory. Of self-righteous revenge for the hell that Eric had wreaked on his life. I threw that in as an afterthought, guessing that our daughter should learn caution early on. She should know that most humans are not out to help, but merely to destroy any piece of a life that we have made for ourselves. Hell, that even sounds cynical to me, but with all the pieces of Logan and Magneto left in my head, I can hardly help myself sometimes.

I wonder sometimes if Logan can read not only my scents, but my thoughts as well, because it's all too warranted as he rolls over in bed and reaches for me, almost as if to comfort me. Even when he is asleep, he knows my every mood, silently smoothing his hand over my hair and murmuring in my ear as he pulls me closer.

Sometimes I think I could handle it. Love isn't the only thing out there. I mean, I landed him. I'm the only one with the ring on my finger. And he is an amazing man. He would never cheat. He protects me with his life. And I'm sure he would love his daughter with all he had in him to do so. But these are also the same moments that I think if I tell him, if I give him the hope that knowing we created a new life, he would somehow look at me in a different light. See me no longer as little Marie that he picked up on the side of the road, that he was obligated to protect for the rest of his natural-born life, and look at me as his wife. Because let's face it folks, you do not marry your sister, your cousin, or your daughter. Not even where I'm from. And I know that he had good intentions from the start, but marriage means something other than protection. It's something more than just a promise.

Being as damn observant as he is, I personally can't believe that he doesn't know. There has only been that one time: about a month ago, right after the wedding. The way he acted almost made me believe for a moment that all he had said up there on the altar was true. Afterwards, he only turned away from me in bed, and I knew the truth. Just a formality. It had to be done, and now when I think of it I can almost taste the reluctance in his kiss. Whether by choice or by a deluded sense responsibility, he stayed with me, made a home for me, and in every other way, it was great.

Everyone always talks about his amazing instincts, his incredible mutation. Maybe he's just preoccupied, maybe he just doesn't want to believe it, but trust me, I'm not getting queasy every day because I have the flu, like I've been telling him. I didn't burst into tears yesterday over my mashed potatoes because I was having a rough day. It's called hormones, and as amazing I'm sure the miracle of childbirth will be, it's no walk in the park.

For the first couple of weeks, I thought it was only exhaustion. He had just come back from a run and decided that we should marry. I suppose I was just that blinded by joy in the fact that he finally saw me, twenty-one-year-old Marie, the one that loved him more than I could tell him, that I didn't notice the look on his face as he simply stared at me. One would think that I was already pregnant. That my daddy was standing nearby with a shotgun in his hand and a scowl on his face. Not that it would do any good. He never asked. Just thrust a ring upwards at me from his knee, and in my daze of exultation, I didn't see the disinclination in his eyes. I didn't even want to know his motives. And everything around us was happening so fast, I didn't have time to think.

At the time I thought I knew him so well. Thought I understood his every motive, could predetermine his every move before he made it. After all, he had been my life for nearly five and a half years. He had been my savior. More than once. And in my clouded vision of twenty-one years, I saw the man I had been waiting for all of my life. He was there when a crazy maniac using me for an even crazier scheme captured me. He was there when I touched Eric and needed someone to hold me in the dark hours of the night when I found myself completely inconsolable. He was there the day that I learned control, offering me a congratulatory, albeit against school policy, beer.

But as of late I saw him less and less. He seemed to be everywhere, but nowhere that I was at the same time. His monosyllable responses had now been replaced with grunts and gestures of approval, or a scowl if he wasn't particularly interested. He kissed me only on the forehead, and never in public. I thought that he had gotten over the looks and comments that our being out together had warranted years ago, and now it seemed to bother him even more than before. He would murmur obscenities under his breath and just stare back, eliminating any contact we had before the incident.

I guess I was just being naïve when I thought that he had gotten over the age difference thing. Because when people pin him with that "cradle-robber" gaze, and stare disapprovingly, I can almost feel him recede even further into the safe haven he has created for himself. The one place that I am not allowed.

And it was only tonight that I woke up and noticed the brutal truth. When I pulled myself out of the trance-like state and recognized all the noncommittal promises and excuses that I had created for myself in anticipation of our perfect life.

He had never said it.

Not once. Not even after the wedding. Not before, not during, and definitely not after we made love for the first, and only, time. Not after he returned from a fruitless trip to Canada. Not when I came back from my first official mission as one of the X-Men, bloodied and bruised and in severe need of medical attention. Not on our one month anniversary.

I had ignored it until now, content with the fact that I loved him more than I could express. To say that he was my world is a severe understatement, and I don't think he even understood how deep I was in when he married me. It hurts to breathe when I look into our future and see my child and myself. My poor fatherless child.

I had decided early on that he couldn't know. Not yet. And the decision was put off indefinitely when I realized that his sense of obligation to me was so strong that he wouldn't let me have a go at parenting on my own. Guilt is no basis for a marriage. No reason to stay with me, but he would make it work. Even if he was miserable.

Sitting here alone, all my decisions have now pointed me in the right direction. Even considering the fact that I won't be showing for at least another month or two, it's best for me to leave now and spare myself further heartache. Further pain for no reason. And for all the good it will do him, Logan will be finally free to do whatever it is that he does when I'm not around. My girl will love me, as I will her. And once I convince myself that she's all I need in life, that I'll be able to get along fine without Logan, without the man who has made me all of what I am today, we'll both be fine.

It's going to be a girl. I know it. It's something I can feel as strongly as my love for him. I've already chosen a name. Delilah. It was my mother's name, and I think she would be proud of the woman that I am going to raise my beautiful little daughter to be. Proud of the fact that I am going to make it on my own, and of the fact that I am willing to be strong for my family, small though it may be.

Scott won't be happy. Jean will be furious. The Professor will go looking. Which is why I need to get as far as I can, as fast as I can before they realize that I have left. I know that it's probably futile, seeing as Charles has Cerebro, and is fully capable of locating me at any time. But it's not going to matter after I have the baby. I'll be moving around a lot. Not settling in one place. They can't bring me back if they can't track me down. And yeah, I know it was wrong, screwing with the Blackbird's engine, but I have a feeling that there won't be any mutant related crisis any time soon. Nothing that would require immediate attention. And Scott's bike travels a lot slower than Storm behind the controls of the Blackbird ever will.

I'm crossing the border. I know it's clichéd, and I know that it's probably the first place they'll go looking for me, but Canada is where I met Logan, and it's definitely the place where I feel the most comfortable. Strange seeing as I have only been there once, not counting all the times from Logan's memories. Something about the snow, about the fresh scent of forest and the city far away that makes me think of new beginnings. It almost makes me think that I won't be lonely for a while. Almost.

I never thought that I would be one of those people who sat around feeling sorry for myself over a cup of coffee and a ruined marriage, but I don't really look at it that way. In my eyes, it was never really a marriage, never really a partnership. In the end, all I can say is that Logan and I were a match made in heaven, but God fucked up a little. He didn't realize that as far as love goes, fatherly affection just doesn't do it for me. Guilt doesn't really do it for me either. I know that he feels like he failed me somehow, but the reality is that I have never blamed it on him. Even seeing him beside me now, in our bed, in our home, I don't think that he did anything wrong. Because when you really look at it, that's not something that you can fake.

I think if he loved me just a little we could have made it work. I think maybe if I hadn't been so clingy in the beginning, if I hadn't told him I didn't want him to leave, he would be happier about coming back. He wouldn't look at me with those wounded eyes that he doesn't even know he has.

It makes it better though, knowing that this will free him. If there is one thing I could never stand, it was to see the man of my life unhappy, feeling trapped by his life, by his memories or lack thereof. And I think that he really did try. I'm sure he really did want it to work in the beginning. But there are certain realities that I have to face about Logan as a person, first and foremost being that he just can't bring himself to love. I die a little bit inside when I say it, but I know now that it's none of his fault. I mean, how can someone like him, someone with such a convoluted past as he has, learn fall in love again, especially with someone as mainstream as "the Rogue".

It comforts me just a little bit to know that he could've had Jean. That I am not the only one who could have fallen for his gruff attitude and his heart of gold. And with a shameful bit of satisfaction, I know that they would have been just as unhappy as we are now. I know that it would have fallen apart in just the same way as we have, because that's just the way of it.

I have never thought of myself as a romantic. Never thought I was one for the frivolous words and kisses in the dark. But I guess you just never know until you fall this much in love. Never know how much a touch can mean. Never know that the words he said, or rather didn't say, could mean so much.

I think I could've handled it if he once said he loved me. Just once. Even whispered against my hair late at night when he thinks that I sleep, it would have made it just that much easier to write it all off as stress. As Logan. Just to ignore the fact that he needed me more as a child than he ever will as a partner.

So for all it's worth now, I love you Logan. I love the way that you look at your damned motorcycle, I love the way you used to talk to me, I love they way you snarl when Scott enters the room, but you secretly think his visor is so cool, I love the way you try to scare Jubilee in the hallways, I love the way your hair sticks up in those little peaks on your head. But mostly, I love the fact that you've given me a reminder or all the ways that I love you.

My daughter.

A/N: I actally had no idea that this fic was going to be so incredibly angsty at the beginning, but to be totally honest with you, I had not idea what this fic was going to be period at the beginning. Thanks to everyone who read it, and I hope you enjoyed it. I'm not sure yet if I'm going to give it a Logan's POV chapter. We'll see.