True Love never dies

As you all know I don't own any of the characters, settings or anything else apart from the words so enjoy.

Scott was locked away in his room. Again. It was dinnertime and the rest of the inhabitants of the mansion were eating. All but one. The students were all clustered around the few tables in the cafeteria chatting together about their lives, sharing the latest gossip or arguing over who had the best mutations. It was just a normal day. Their teachers sat round a smaller table off to the side, all staring down at their own plate, not talking. They looked like a sorry bunch, the three of them, and the students all felt a pang of unexplainable guilt when they happened to glace over at them—which many seemed to do frequently.

Logan was looking at his soup whilst he absentmindedly stirred his spoon around the bowl, not bothering to actually eat. His left elbow was upon the table and his hand cupped around his cheek, giving him a look of the uttermost boredom.

On his right sat Storm. She looked marginally happier even if she wasn't her normal self. However, she was eating her tomato soup. She had convinced herself that as sad as she might be about Jean's death, there was no reason to show it when the children were around. Someone around here had to show some control or else everyone would be thinking that the X-men had lost their nerve. It isn't easy losing you're best friend, but Storm knew that she was in a better situation than Scott.

The Professor felt the same was as Storm. He too was eating, although his appetite seemed to have dropped extremely since his visit to Alkali Lake. As much as he claimed that it was a diet, Storm and Logan knew better: he was experiencing both shock and a slight bit of depression. He blamed himself for the whole incident and no matter how hard they attempted to convince him otherwise, the Professor still remained adamant that he was to blame for Jean's death.

Storm set her spoon down next to her now empty dish. "Scott's not here again."

"He's in his room," the Professor told her after a quick moment of concentration.

"I should take him some food," Storm said. "We can't have the guy starving to death even if that is his present intention."

"You're right," Xavier sighed. "The soup's in the back."

Storm nodded and stood up but was stopped by Logan's hand pushing her back into her seat.

"I'll go." Both Storm and Xavier looked at him, but neither said anything as he pushed his chair under the table and headed into the kitchen. The two looked at each other and Xavier nodded. Storm sighed out of relief. If the Professor was allowing Logan to go then he was actually going out of kindness rather than attempting to spite Scott.

Once Logan had picked up the soup and a spoon he proceeded up the stairs to Scott's room. He knew that knocking was useless; Storm had informed him of that yesterday when she had spent five whole minutes banging on the door to no answer. Eventually, she had barged into the room to find Scott sat on the bed looking blankly at the wall. She hadn't been impressed. So instead of following the mistake that Storm had made, he opened the door and walked inside.

"Hi," he greeted Scott. No answer. "Well, I brought you your dinner," still no answer. "And I took your bike out for a run earlier. She needs filling up." Wow, Scott wasn't even replying about his bike. Things must be bad. "Listen," Logan sat down next to him on the bed, "I know that you miss Jean but you can't live like this forever." That received a response.

"Well you claimed to love her but now you're back to normal. You couldn't care less any more could you? Well then Wolverine," he said the name mockingly like a child would, "why don't you enter the real world where love is forever, not just a month or two?"

"I did love her," Logan argued. "I'm just coping better than you are."

"Well maybe that's because you knew all along that she preferred me!"

"Even if I did know that there was no point in letting you have her to yourself," Logan found himself shouting now.

"So you felt contented to attempt to ruin our relationship?" Scott was at least showing some emotion other than hopelessness.

"No, I just wanted her to be sure who she actually wanted and so I left her choices open." Scott turned his head away from Logan in disgust. He seemed close to tears, or as close as Logan could tell behind the ruby glasses that he constantly wore. "Listen, I didn't come up here to spite you about Jean, I just came to bring you your food."

"Well it's funny that you managed to do both even if you only intended to do one of them. You know, when Storm has brought my food up every other day she's at least managed to make me feel better whereas you just can't do that can you?"

Logan sighed. Yes, he knew that Scott was upset about Jean and only time would heal that wound. However, he was still acting oddly and Logan wasn't prepared to argue about this. He missed Jean as well.

"I'll go now," he stood up.

"Yeah and don't bother coming back to visit," Scott stood up too in order to collect the food which Logan had placed on the drawers. There was a moment of silence between them in which neither said anything and Scott sat back down on the bed. However, it was disturbed by the door banging open to reveal Storm whose temper didn't look good.

"Logan, what the hell are you doing?" she yelled. A rumble of thunder sounded from outside. She must be mad.

"Just leaving actually," he replied.

"You absolute idiot!" she yelled. "None of this is easy on any of us, least of all Scott and you just come up here and ruin things for him. Why can't you think of someone else instead of yourself for a change?"

"Woah," Logan raised his hands tentatively to show peace. "Calm down, I'm leaving."

"Good," Storm replied. She watched his retreating back as he closed the door behind him and then sat down on the bed in the place where Logan had just vacated. "Sorry about him," she apologised as Scott ravenously tucked into his soup.

"He's an idiot," Scott said through a mouthful of tomato soup. "I can't stand him at the best of times, but when he starts gloating that he's getting over Jean better than me it really makes me mad. That just proves that I loved her more."

Storm nodded. "I'll leave you to your soup. If you want anything, just let me know." She stood up and walked out of the door. For the first time in weeks, Scott managed to muster a smile. It didn't last long and had no warmth about it, but it was there and that's what mattered.