Title: Words Felt (never heard)
Disclaimer: Don't own
Rating: PG
Pairings: Logan/Kurt
Summary: Logan keeps on staring at Kurt.
A/N: This is a sort of mix from the movie and the comics. I just thought it would be short and sweet. Enjoy.
He's caught himself doing it time and time again. And after about the fifth time, he didn't really care about what it might seem like. Though, he'd always tell himself it wasn't staring. It was analyzing. Ya. It's the thirty-fourth time he's done it, and he still can't make himself buy that lie.
It's normally random. Just some moment where his eyes look around, and all they can find is blue. Somehow, his eyes always like to go to blue. And then his mind starts to wonder. It isn't bad, he says over and over again, but there's still something there.
The thoughts are normally…just that. Thoughts. And sometimes, after hours of just sitting and thinking about them, even after the blue has gone, he still can't grasp what his thoughts are trying to say. Or he just can't remember them when someone comes by and snaps him out of it, but the feeling afterwards….
It's just odd. Like he feels dirty. As if he were a horrible person for doing something that he can't quit comprehend. So, ya, it's odd. After a few more times, it's gotten easier. To make it not feel as dirty. Because it's exactly how he should feel, when it comes to him.
The first few times, his mind wasn't in the state it is now. For some reason he didn't like him. Nightcrawler. Kurt. He figured that's why he always felt so bad afterwards, but in the end, that was a lie too.
Kurt was, and is, always will be, one of the nicest people ever, if not a bit childish. Polite, always polite. Saying please and thank you, and sorry, even if it wasn't his fault. Like when someone might step on his tail, he'd hiss and quickly pulling it away, wincing as it curled up around him, and he'd say "I'm sorry." before anyone else could, like his tail was in the way of your boot. He'd give this sheepish smile before going back to his business. And everyone loved him. Everyone was his friend, because that's the type of person Kurt is.
At first, Logan couldn't stand it. And that didn't make much sense to him. He was hating the person everyone loved. It was like one of those stupid teenage rebel movements, he felt childish for even thinking about it. But, the hate was still there. Until he started to stare for a little longer, looking for something that was harder to find.
It would keep him up at night. His thoughts about the elf. About everything that he was and wasn't and just…should be. How he was so good in everyone's eyes, except his own. Those scars were evidence enough for that fact. This only made Logan stare more.
Kurt didn't talk much about his past. Just about the circus, which he seemed really proud of. Logan could see that. Why he was proud to have been there, to call one huge group of people a family, and to really mean it. He'd talk and talk, but never got into much else besides the dancing bears and his acrobatics. Sometimes, Logan heard, he'd slip up sometimes and there would be a name he'd say, which caught in his throat right after he'd say it. After that, he'd just continue on.
It made Logan think even more about what he might be hiding, and why. What could a person like he have ever done that is so bad to mark up your body with so many cuts and swirls.
Whenever these thoughts came about, it made him glance down at his own hands, imagine what they would look like with scars, if they even had time to heal over into scars.
It all made sense then. The scars, that is. Logan could see it in his eyes sometimes, after he was done with his stories of the carnivals and lights. The look that had something deeper in it. That, maybe, if he could just dig a little deeper, he would get to where the scars all began. They were never meant for healing, Logan figured. Not for Kurt, anyway. Because healing meant you would forget, in time. He knew that they were for reasons he also wished that maybe he could get all scared up and look down at them with the look Kurt gave his.
Memories. Every one of them. Because he didn't want to forget what made him feel so bad. Made him tear into his own skin and draw all the different symbols that shouted forgiveness. A punishment in its self.
But that's why he would run. The teleporting was just like another scar. He could feel it in the air, right after the blue man would disappear. A stench of brimstone and the left over sort of smoky mist. It told more then it should have. Like his past he tried to run away from, but could only get so far as to reappear again, into the same world he had left, just a different point in it.
None of them could ever get away, not even those who could disappear.
Whatever he had done, no matter how horrible it was, deep down Logan knew that the elf didn't deserve any of it. Though, he was good at hiding it. Fun loving, he came to think of him, after he realized there really was no reason to hate him at all. Hypocritical, he thought.
Like all the people that stared, like he did, except with eyes that weren't as knowing as his.
It was when he had gotten the hologram. That's when everything started to come together. Kurt was hiding himself from the world, because they all stared at him. Hate and an unknowing fear. A normal person saw him as a demon. Maybe he could've been, but that alternate world was far, far away. Kurt just never liked the staring and the feeling of eyes all over him. Whispers, maybe.
Logan knew that feeling. All mutants did at some point or another, but that was the point. Kurt was different. He was the type that couldn't just hide and say it was all normal. He wasn't blessed with the type of mutation that was just skin deep, and not skin.
More reasons to stare.
Blue, fur, tail, ears, feet, teeth, eyes, hands. From top to bottom, you could automatically think that this kid was a freak. A mutant demon that would just jump, kill, and repeat. It made Logan think back to the circus, and how far away Kurt must have been from the people for them to think everything he was was actually a costume.
Logan knew that a lot of the kids that got this so called special gift had a hard time with it. They woke up one day and could freeze everything within a three foot radius of their body, or maybe turn an apple into an orange, or something like that, but that's just it. When they woke up, they still looked normal, until it finally came out. They didn't wake up and their whole body was turned into a monstrous form that they had to hide behind a hologram. They could go through a normal life hiding it.
Kurt had to go through life lying it.
All the more reason he had to wonder about this god Kurt prayed to. He'd never been the religious type. He never found a reason to be. But Kurt obviously had. He's ready to give himself up to this higher power. The same being that made him the freak, right?
It was bad to say, he knew. So he didn't say it. That's not why the elf prayed. It wasn't. Even Logan had to wonder sometimes, what and why he was made the way he was. It made him want the scared memories all the more. He was a freak too, but he could keep it all secret if he really wanted to. He didn't have to take out the claws. But he did, because he wanted people to know.
That might have been the reason he hated Nightcrawler at first. He was scared of everyone that didn't know what was wrong. The people would shun him and hate him and want him dead. That's why he was hiding who he was. And probably come on by past trauma.
See? It all comes back together. It does.
Thirty-five. That's how many times it took for Logan to finally realize it. Why he stared at the blue for so long and so intensely. It all clicked together, making him blink his eyes, coming back down to reality.
The showers, after training. Everyone had gone, except for him. Sitting on a bench in the locker room, his mind to filled on the blue to actually care about a shower or changing. The smell of brimstone made him come out of it. Out of the corner of his eye, Logan could see the remaining puffs of purpled smoke coming out of the tiled floors of the shower stalls, and he knew that the elf had come in.
He'd probably gone to have some conversation with the professor and hadn't gotten the chance to come in yet. The sound of water coming down, pitter pattering on the white tile made his current guess true, followed by a soft singing. More religion and prayer, because Logan could recognize 'Amazing Grace' even if he didn't care for the cross it belonged to. Obviously, the other thought the room was empty. Wolverine had never heard the elf sing before.
He was quiet, perfectly so, as he listened in and moved closer, off of his bench. It felt hypnotic, just hearing the voice spill out these words, and all the feeling behind it. You'd think it was church, begging for forgiveness for all the sins of the world.
It made Logan want to know about the rest of Kurt's life. Not just the circus part. The scars part. And he wanted to hold him close and help him bare the weight of all his hurt, because he could hide it so well. Better then anyone ever should.
He didn't hear the water turn off, or the voice stop singing, because it was still in his head, playing over and over again. His mind was wandering around; trying to make sense of everything he already made sense of, because he's done it all thirty-five times. It took that many to realize exactly why he kept staring.
"Ah! Logan, I didn't see you there…"
His eyes fell on the elf, holding a towel to his head, trying to catch all the drops of water before they fell onto the floor or his body. A towel also wrapped around his lower body, the white standing out against the blue. His tail whipped back and forth behind him, like it always did; a mind of its own.
Logan just stared again. Kept on staring, because now he was right in front of him, smelling of soap and a sort of lingering fresh that he could only think of as what Germany would smell like if he ever went. Looking at all the scars, rolling and twirling together, up and down the bare chest and arms, crawling up his neck, and he could understand it all know, to the best of his abilities. He could keep on staring, because he knew why he hated him and liked him and needed to keep on looking at all the cuts and imperfections until it was all right!
He had always been one to never hold back what he was going to say. So Logan had to say something, with or without the worlds or thoughts that were rolling around in his head.
"Logah--"
He cut off the elf, pushing him back with enough force to hold him still against the shower wall, damp with steam. His hands holding arms tight, squeezing enough to make sure he was still there. Kurt didn't have much time to react anyway.
His lips were soft; like he thought they would and should be. He was glad about that. And the sent of foreign land was stronger now that he was so close. The call of his own name died when he covered it up, becoming a soft mumble, only to disappear a second later. The kiss was a sure surprise, but there was no struggle, so he pushed farther in.
They stood in the empty room like that for a few minutes, the only sound from the dripping shower head. The only reason Logan broke it was for a breath, because he still had so much more to say. He noticed the row of white teeth, sharp, trying to pulling him back in.
The two stood panting, still close up again the wall, Logan pinning Kurt, both looking into the other's eyes. Kurt's yellow only made his thoughts even stronger. He had to finish them.
"Whatever it was, you don't deserve it. You don't. And you're not a freak. Don't ever listen to them. Ever."
He finally pulled away, and left.
He didn't care if it didn't make any sense at all. He wasn't going to look back at the elf and his curious face, panting and wondering, and having something else in those eyes. Because he was done staring. And, if Kurt wanted to know too, he'd have to keep staring as he walked out.
All Logan could hope, was when and if Kurt ever does meet that god of his, and that powerful being asked if he wanted to be cleansed or perfected or normal-- whatever, that Kurt would say no, because there was nothing wrong with him at all.
A/N: Title from the poem 'Outcast' by Claude McKay.