"Rogue!" Logan barked as soon as she stepped into the mansion.
She resisted a sarcastic quip and raised an eyebrow that, while she didn't mean to, had just as much of a rebellious impact than any sarcastic quip she could have come up with.
"Where the hell have you been? Curfew's at eight on school days. It's nine."
"Ah was out havin' dinner. Lost track of time. Sorry." She shrugs.
He takes a long sniff, and even though she walked through that wiccan store with all the incense after pelting herself with her body spray, he growls. And she then gulps. Going out with Pietro was okay. He smelled like stolen cologne and fresh grass and little, insignificant scents that were as passing as the wind he was frequently compared to. Remy smelled of cigarettes and alcohol and spice and all the things that tended to really linger. And he so enjoyed invading her personal space.
"Jeez, what have you been rolling around in?" He wrinkles his nose and waves a hand to try and break up all of the smells bombarding him. Smoke and flowers and... tobacco.. alcohol, but not the cheap stuff with the low alcohol levels. The big heavy stuff that would really rot your liver. Not on her, but around her. Hints of leather, spices, and... Gumbo.
"Who the hell have you been with?" He growls, already having an inkling of an idea. That strong smell of worthless filth wasn't one you forgot easily. He smelled of everything you wouldn't want a girl you thought of like your daughter to be around, though he himself enjoyed those things immensely in his spare time.
"You already know, don't you?" She snaps, the reluctant feeling of happiness from being around Remy quickly dissipating.
"You're right." He growls again. He should have gutted the worthless slimeball the moment he saw him. The moment Rogue looked up at him after grabbing his clawed hand ready to skewer and gave him that look down in New Orleans. The one that all the female students in the mansion had seemed to learn that tugged him around like some pushover that didn't have three adamantium claws in each fist.
"You're not seeing him again." He decides.
"The hell I ain't!" Rogue wasn't called Rogue because she thought it sounded pretty, although she did think it sounded pretty cool. She had an X-Man heart, but she definitely got her stubborn, and violent, streak from her adoptive mother.
"This ain't negotiable, Stripes."
"Who says? Ah cin hang out wherever Ah want with whoever Ah want!" She yells, some part of her realizing that she sounds like some spoiled brat teenager hanging out with the wrong crowd. But Remy wasn't the wrong crowd. He was just... an annoying crowd. Like Pietro.
"Not when they kidnapped you and smuggled you across state borders down to New Orleans!"
"Ah'm pretty sure Ah can judge somebody's character well enough." Rogue snapped. Will people stop bringing that up already?
"I spent my whole life judging characters, and I know that type well enough to know that he's no good."
"The life that you remember, that is."
"I remember a helluva lot more years than you ever had, runt." Logan growled, warning Rogue that she was pushing her limits.
"Ah've got more lifetimes than you can believe up here!" Rogue shouts, paying no attention to the crowd at the top of the stairs.
"Who? Magneto, the Cajun, the Brotherhood more times than I can count--They're not exactly winnin' you any points there, darlin'."
"So you're sayin' you trust me as well as you do them?"
Oh shit. The girl is tearing up.
"No.... I'm saying that when I say a boy is no good for you, you gotta listen to me." He says carefully, his hands out as if he's about to defend himself from a wild animal. Only worse: a teenage girl.
"Listen to you? You ain't mah father!" She snaps, sidestepping him and running up the stairs, where the crowd immediately parted for her.
A moment of silence passes, while he's forced to listen to all of the whispering upstairs.
"Wow, Rogue's got some major authority issues."
"I could never stand up to Mr. Logan like that."
"Does Rogue.... have a father?"
"Wait, she was with Quicksilver, right?"
"No, Logan said something about New Orleans. That's Gambit, for sure."
"She's not gonna turn on us, is she?"
"Of course not! She's our teammate, how can you even think that!"
"Well, she only joined us cause of Mystique, right? What if, now that Mystique isn't in Bayville anymore..."
"You're crazy."
"She's the one who's hanging out with the enemy."
"Just shut up and go to bed."
"Bitch, make me."
"Fine!"
"Ow! I didn't mean literally!"
"She's not really gonna turn on us, right? I'd hate fighting her. Fights with her always end with me hurt. Or unconscious. Or both."
He hated teenagers.
Rogue was sitting in a chair. It was a very comfortable chair, with a nice soft cushion for her derriere, and it was just the right height so her feet touched the ground perfectly.
She was far from comfortable, though.
It was her turn to talk.
"Mah name... Mah name is Rogue, an'... an' Ah'm a mutant." Rogue admitted shyly, putting a hand to her chest in shame.
"Hi Rogue." The support group said encouragingly. A bunch of silhouettes and cheery unrecognizable voices.
Their voices gave her confidence.
"An', well, I'm also uncomfortable bein' in close proximity with anyone. Both in mind and body. Cause my powers suck the life out of ya, and Ah've been used so many times Ah just have a hard time--"
"Whoa whoa whoa, Roguey, Roguey, you can stop with the tortured soul bit, okay?" Pietro, sitting next to her, put his hands up in an attempt to stop her.
"What?"
"'S sad, but true. Y' broodiness is a bit offsettin'." Remy, who was in the chair on her other side, invaded her personal space a bit more than Pietro, leaning over and putting his gloved thumb on her mouth, effectively shutting her up. For a second before she smacked it away.
"Ah don't care 'bout yo' opinions!" She stood up angrily and glared at Remy with all the venom she could muster.
"Hey, hey, hey! Relax, Rogue, this is a friendly environment. No need to make it a negative one." Pietro soothed, pulling her by the sleeve and settling her back into her chair.
"Shut the fuck up, you white rat! The fuck are y'all tryin' ta pull, anyhow!?"
"That sounded a bit racist." Pietro pouted.
"Don' need t' get all defensive, chere. We tryin' t' help y' become a better person."
"Yeah. Haven't you always wanted to be a better person? Like Jean?"
A marble statue of Jean in the lotus position erected itself in the center of their circle of chairs. Empty chairs. Only the three of them were in the room. The statue floated in the center, glowing like the statue had a fucking halo. Only then did Rogue notice how dark everywhere else was. Especially the spot she was sitting. Hell, the only thing other than the statue she could see clearly were Remy's glowing eyes and Pietro's stark white gelled hair.
She couldn't see anything of hers at all.
"As if." Rogue stood up harshly, beginning to stalk away.
"Right! Go! Go to your room and blast My Chemical Romance! Go and write your emo poetry! Paint your nails and wear rings-even-though-your-gloves-always-cover-them-up! Cause-it's-so-hard-growing-tits, right?"
"Mah tits are already grown, thank ya very much! And Ah'm fuckin' proud of them!"
A moment of silence passes, filled with Rogue glaring at them and the two boys leering at her chest.
Remy's the first one to snap out of it.
"Y' don' have t' run away, chere. 'S lonely out dere on y'own."
And then she woke up.
That was, by far, the most disturbing dream she had ever had.
"Hey, Rogue!" Bobby ran up to her cheerily, ditching his friends to be with her and her broody self.
"Bobby." She nods, acknowledging his presence before spinning the knob on her lock.
"Wanna eat lunch with me today?"
She pauses in the spinning of her lock and gives him a questioning look, eyebrow raised and face filled with skepticism.
"I mean, cause you've been eating alone lately, so I was wondering if you wanted some company?" He clarifies.
"Ah don't think your group is much mah preferred company." She looks over to 'his group', where Sam is balancing a textbook on his nose, Roberto and Ray are helping him by piling more textbooks onto him, and Jubilee is popping an obnoxious amount of gum trying to blow the biggest bubble in the world.
"Maybe just you and me then?" He asks, wondering if he's ever going to say something not worded into a question.
She gives him one of those rare smiles, and like a girl he goes a little weak in the knees.
"Ah appreciate the offer, Bobby, but," Her locker opens and she grabs her books before looking at him again, "Ah really need the time to myself."
She shuts the locker and, if it were anyone else but Bobby, the hope of any chance for them to be together, but Bobby was a fighter.
"Maybe some other time." He grins cheerily as she walks away, not really listening to him at all.
Pietro quickly zips by, Bobby's notebook flying into the air, and catches up to Rogue.
Bobby yells out in anger, both at the scattered pages of his disorganized notebook that he used more as a folder than anything, and the fact that he saw Quicksilver had his arm around Rogue for three seconds before she shoved him off.
Then considered yelling again, since instead of at least avoiding the papers on the ground like decent people, the mutant-hating scumbags trampled all over his stuff. And called him a freak as he was picking it up.
He hated life.
"So, Roguey."
Rogue rolled her eyes and shoved off Pietro's grabby arm.
"What?" She snapped, her tone doing a complete 180 from when she was talking to Bobby.
"You. Me. Early dinner late lunch?"
"Can't." Rogue huffs.
"Why not?" Pietro said, an inch away from whining. But Rogue did not like whiners. Rogue punched whiners very hard in an attempt to make them stop whining.
"Got grounded for breaking curfew. Lahke Ah can't be trusted tah take care of mahself." She mutters, punching a locker and scaring everyone around her.
"Whoa, Roguey, what's got your panties in a twist?" Pietro asks warily, careful not to mention any of yesterday's happenings. When she ditched him for that dirty no-good son of an ugly swamp alligator. And broke curfew with him.
"Nothin'!" She yells before shaking her head, holding a hand to her forehead, "Nothin', Ah just... There's a whole debate team in mah head arguin' over every action Ah take, and now Logan, who's already yellin' at me in mah head over what tah do, is tryin' tah..."
"Control you like the voices in your head?" He offers, seeming not bothered at all that he was attempting to woo a basket case.
"And it makes meh so angry!" She huffs, crossing her arms.
"Why don't you just join the Brotherhood then?" Please please don't actually do it. She'd find out about the bet from those losers and kill him! "No rules, no curfew, and we don't care what the hell you do!"
"Ah wish," She shook her head, "Naw, Ah'm just gettin' angry over nothin'. They just care, right?"
Pietro shrugged. Rogue sighed in response. The two didn't have much experience with things like caring.
"It's nice there, Pietro. The rules are a hassle, but bein' cared about..." She trails off as they approach her classroom, one that he does not share with her, "Ah really need that in mah life."
She walks away from him, too, and Pietro is amazed. For all those people in her head, she was as ignorant to the truth as Wanda was.
As if the Brotherhood wouldn't have cared about her just as much as the X-Men.
He zipped away to his class before the bell rang. He may have been badass, but he was a badass with a perfect attendance record.
Author's Note: No Remy in this chapter?! How could I!? No worries. He'll be having more than enough screen time in the future.