Notes: Set post X3, but is AU in the sense that Pyro never joined Magneto and the Professor is still alive. This is mostly movie-verse but I did take some canon from the comics and made up some things into my own special brand of canon. Just go with it.

This is being written for the Writing Marathon on the forum The Muse Bunny. The prompts for this piece were to start a scene with "If my life were any emptier, it would've even exist" and to write about the main characters "skeleton in the closet."

Comments/critique/ideas extremely welcome!

"If my life were any emptier, it wouldn't even exist," Rogue sighed forlornly as she lounged on her bed staring up at the ceiling.

Kitty rolled her eyes and idly threw a pillow at her from where she sat on her bed, working on chemistry homework.

"Hey!" Rogue cried as the pillow bounced off of her face.

"What?" Kitty asked, looking up from her textbook and smiling sweetly. "You needed that and you know it. Your life is plenty full."

"It was. It's just…" Rogue let out another gusty sigh.

"What?" Kitty prompted, trying to sound helpful rather than annoyed as she capped her pen and tucked her paper inside the Chemistry book before snapping it closed. Once Rogue went off on a tangent like this Kitty knew she wouldn't be able to concentrate on her homework for quite some time.

"I thought taking the Cure would make everything better. You know?" Rogue replied, turning her face so she was looking at her roommate.

Kitty shrugged, leaning over and placing the book on her painfully neat nightstand.

"Sometimes, one thing can't fix everything," she answered slowly.

"I guess. I just…I did it for me. But everyone thinks it was for Bobby."

"Did it make you happy?"

"Yes…at first. I mean…it still does sometimes. I can touch people now. I can wear shorts and T-shirts and flip flops like a normal girl. I don't have to worry about killing someone if I brush up against them in the hall or on the street. I can have hugs and shake hands and even kiss people!"

"Those all seem like good things. Who cares if everyone thinks it was for Bobby? You know who it was for."

"…I never thought I would miss being an X-Man, you know?" Rogue whispered, twisting a lock of snow white hair around her finger.

"Why?" Kitty asked a look of shock on her face as she lounged back against the wall that her bed was pushed up against.

"I was always horrible in the Danger Room sessions. I was too afraid of my mutation to ever use it. You're a much better X-Man than I ever was."

Kitty raised an eyebrow.

"What? You are! You can phase people and get them out of the way. You're an asset. I was just a liability."

"Well…" Kitty began thoughtfully. "You aren't a liability any more since you aren't an X-man or doing Danger Room sessions."

"But I've got nothing! All I do is go to class and come back to this room. Everyone shies away from me now, not because they're afraid of me but because I'm a disgrace. I turned my back on all of them."

"And you're just going to have to live with that," Kitty replied back waspishly. "It was your choice and you said that it made you happy so that just has to be enough!"

The agitated girl then rose to her feet and stalked across the room to the doorway, shooting Rogue one last disparaging look before she phased, vanishing through its surface.

John lurked in an alcove just off the library, lounging against the wall and flicking his lighter, for no other reason than he was bored and this place offered him a good view of passersby without him being readily seen. No one had walked by in quite some time and he was contemplating going outside when he heard a pair of footsteps running down the hallway.

With a malicious grin on his face he flicked the lighter so that a flame appeared and gathered it in his hand. Timing it by the footsteps, he threw a small ball of fire into the corridor just as he predicted the nameless person would be approaching. He expected shrieking or at least someone to fall down or exclaim or something! Rather, he watched as the person simply melted away and passed through the flames unharmed, stride never even slowing. Glowering, he stormed out of his hiding place and followed the annoying mutant girl, who forced him to go at a quick pace to keep up with her.

Pyro trailed her down the stairs, through the corridors and out the front door where she increased her pace (and he likewise increased his.) Once the girl hit the woods at the rear of the mansion she slowed until she finally came to a stop, wrapping her arms as far as she could around a large tree and pressing her face tightly against the rough bark.

Now that they were stationary, Pyro was uncertain as to what to do or why he even followed her in the first place. The young man watched in disgust as Kitty began to weep softly against the tree, appearing to press herself even tighter to it until suddenly she became transparent and slipped into the tree.

He walked around it, wondering if she had passed through it without him seeing or if she was somehow still inside the trunk. When he got to the other side he startled - there she was, or at least part of her. Her face emerged from the ashen bark, gazing out soulfully into the woods and looking very much like a youthful version of a dryad.

She gasped when she saw John and her transparent face pulled back a little more.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, her voice quavering a bit, tears still rolling down her cheeks.

"Followed you."

"Why?"

"You didn't fall for my prank," he replied lamely, still unsure of why he really had followed her. "Why are you in a tree?"

Her eyes closed and she sighed, floating outward until she was free of the trunk. She then resumed her natural un-phased state.

"I came out here to be alone," she said pointedly, glaring at him. However, the effect was ruined when she gave a mighty sniff.

"Why are you crying?"

"Why do you care?" she countered.

He shrugged. "I don't, really."

She gave an exasperated sigh.

"I was bored."

"Rogue just got me thinking about things," she began, closing her eyes and slumping backwards against the tree. "She was going on about how she thought the Cure would make her happy but everyone's against her now. And it wasn't even related at all but it got me thinking about something awful that happened a long time ago."

"What have you done that's so awful?" he spat.

"The first time I phased I had a hold of my cousin's arm," she whispered slowly. "We accidentally fell into the wall but we didn't come out on the other side. I didn't understand what had happened. It was so dark and tight and I couldn't move. Somehow I let go of her and I ended up getting out but she didn't."

She looked up at him with haunted eyes.

"I don't know why I just told you that…I've only ever told Storm that…oh God what if you tell everyone? I could be thrown out or arrested or…"

"Stop it! You didn't tell me anything. So you stuck her in the wall for a little while, so what?"

"When you're completely in a solid object you can't breathe! I was so scared I would be trapped again…I didn't go back for her."

John gazed at her perplexedly.

"I killed her," she whispered brokenly. "I killed my cousin."

She turned around and pressed her face to the tree again.

"What did everyone think happened to her?"

"It happened at the library. We met there on Saturdays to study. Mom always came to get me first. I pretended like my cousin was there when I left and everyone just thought she was kidnapped or ran away. The police got involved but they never found anything."

"Did they suspect you?"

"No. They all kept saying it was lucky that mom picked me up when she did or I probably would've vanished too."

"Well, I can see why you were worried about word getting out.

She looked up at him and the blood drained from her face.

He rolled his eyes. "I'm not going to squeal. Besides, this was years ago, right?"

"Yes, I was thirteen."

He shrugged. "Five years might as well have been a lifetime ago. As long as you don't make a habit out of leaving people to die in walls then it's cool. Hell…if you did make a habit out of it that would probably only serve to make you more interesting."

He turned and walked away, leaving Kitty to stare in shock after him.