DERRANGED MARRIAGE
~ Part Eleven ~
~ Preparations ~
Rogue was frightened for Remy; she paced back and forth across the kitchen keeping an eye out through the window for the return of his car but so far she'd seen no sign of headlights coming down the road although she'd been silently praying to see them.
He'd left more than five hours ago and it was midnight now, which was what had worried her more, he'd never just gone like that before, he'd never not said where he was going. She felt so horribly abandoned as she stood there alone in the kitchen of the LeBeau house, wondering how long it would be before she even seen him again.
She's gone to look around the house for Henri after Remy had left but he'd apparently left before she'd even arrived, his car leaving an empty muddy space on the grass out back, just as Remy's had done.
Ah can't believe this is happening, Rogue thought to herself miserably as she stepped onto the porch; the air was still warm but a slight wind was creeping up to shift the leaves on the trees and ripple the water.
She sat down on the steps and slipped her phone out of her pocket to check for a signal just in time to see that one last bar of reception disappearing from sight. The words no connectivity replaced the name of her network and she groaned as she went to check through her list of missed calls which showed Logan had tried to phone a further three times after she'd left the hospital.
He's pissed with me, Rogue thought as she placed the phone back in her pocket. He's pissed with me 'cause Ah left without sayin' anything to him, and Remy is pissed with me 'cause Ah'm the one who told him his daddy is dead.
She wished she could call Logan now, just to hear another voice, just to have someone to lament to about how bad things were here, how lost she felt, how she didn't know what she was supposed to do to help Remy. She'd noted during the week – with great disappointment – that the LeBeau's had actually once had a landline phone, but it had been disconnected. There wasn't even a dial tone any more. That landline might have come in handy, right about now.
Finally, through the darkness down the road which was diagonally to her right, she saw headlights cutting through the trees up in the distance, and she stood up feeling relief spreading through her.
The car sped down the road and stopped at the side of the house as she approached; she realised to her disappointment that those headlights were not from Remy's 1956 Ford Zodiac, but from another car which also wasn't Henri LeBeau's Cherokee (which now had a missing windscreen and a busted headlight as well as a few additional dents).
Rogue sighed as she approached the car, the headlights nearly blinding her. The guy who got out was in uniform, she could tell that much. She squinted and tried to make out his features and to her horror realised he was a cop. She felt a horrible sense of dread until he opened the back door of his car and pulled a rather unsteady Remy LeBeau from the back.
She hurried over as Remy fell to the ground, he gave a grunt and a laugh.
"That was assault..." said Remy, trying to get up, he tumbled onto his side, his cheek in the mud at the side of the road.
"Remy...what the hell..."
"You a relative?" asked the cop, wandering over, he held out his hand to offer her something, which she realised was Remy's car keys.
"Actually..." Rogue gulped, "Ah'm his wife..."
"Holy crap," said the cop, he whistled. "Remy LeBeau took a wife? You gotta be kidding me."
"'Fraid not," Rogue folded her arms, feeling quite annoyed.
"She the light of my life," Remy gave an odd laugh, "the syrup t' my pancakes, the cherry on my sundae," the weirdest grin stretched across his face as he looked at her.
"Found him staggerin' from a bar in town; so drunk couldn't even get the car key in the door of that piece of shit he drives," said the cop.
"I'll have y' know..." Remy got up slowly, one side of his clothes splattered with mud, "that that car is a classic..." he slurred. "And I'm not drunk...I'm just havin' trouble with my coordination."
"Goddamnit," Rogue put her hand to her face, she felt like crying so much right now.
"What happen to your face? He do that to you?" asked the cop.
"No," she lied. She couldn't explain why – even to herself – that she felt the need to defend him even if her broken nose had been an accident. She moved over to Remy, "c'mon. In the house."
"Next time he gets in that condition, I'm going to have to charge him. He could have killed someone if he got in that car and started drivin'..." warned the cop. "If his father see's him like this-"
"His father died this afternoon," Rogue replied coolly.
"He wasn't my fuckin' father!" Remy pulled away from Rogue suddenly and started heading for the house.
"Jean-Luc LeBeau is dead?" asked the cop, he scratched his bearded face curiously.
"Yes. Now if you'll excuse me..." Rogue turned to leave.
"Mrs. LeBeau," said the cop.
She spun around, "what?"
"If he did do that to your face...there are steps you can take to ensure he doesn't do it again."
"He didn't do this to me," Rogue frowned, "what? You think just 'cause he got a little drunk this one time he must be a wifebeater too?"
"No," said the cop, he sighed, "but in my experience, with the stuff goin' in that house..." he gestured up to the house. "It wouldn't surprise me."
"What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded.
"The LeBeau family haven't exactly got a good reputation in 'round these parts, which I'm probably sure you must have been aware before you married into them..." said the cop, "so if anything happens to you at their hands...well...maybe you should call me..." he slipped a card from his pocket, "at this number. It'll get you through to my office."
"Oh my god," Rogue shook her head, "You're actually looking for a reason to bring them down."
"No," said the cop, "I'm looking to make sure history doesn't repeat its self. Have a safe night, Mrs. LeBeau," he said and he turned to head back to his car. "Don't lose that card."
Rogue pocketed the card and shook her head as she went back to the house; she could hear the cop's car pulling away.
Remy was in the kitchen on his knees searching under the sink for something.
"What the hell...?" Rogue demanded.
"Hmm?" he asked.
"You..." she kicked his foot gently, "comin' home drunk in the middle of the night!"
"I went for a few drinks. Big whoop," he muttered.
"You could have driven yourself into a tree, or killed someone, or anything if you had got into that car!" she tossed his car keys onto the windowsill angrily. "Are you out of your goddamn mind?"
"I was gon' sleep in the fuckin' car when deputy dickhead caught me," he muttered.
"Bullshit," Rogue hissed. "What the hell are you looking for?" she demanded.
He leaned out of the cupboard and sighed, "for the vodka bottle used t' be in here."
"What? You want to get more drunk? Don't you remember the last time?"
"Yeah, kind of the point," he muttered. He stood up, he was apparently quite unprepared for her open palm to smack his face hard so much that he stared at her blankly, mouth hanging open. "What the fuck?"
"Do you know how fuckin' worried Ah was about you? You can't just do that to me! You can't just take off and not tell me where you were goin'! You can't just stay away for five hours lettin' me sit here not knowin' if you're okay or not!"
"I'm okay," he assured.
"Ah didn't know that!"
"I needed some air!"
"You could have had air out there!" she gestured to back door.
"I needed some scotch with my air. "
"What you need is to go to bed."
"Why?" he demanded, "I'm not tired! I jus' wanna forget this fuckin' day ever happened!"
"Get upstairs," she pointed to the door, "now!"
"Y' can't tell me what to do!"
"The ring on my finger says Ah can, now get up there! We got a rough day tomorrow ahead of us. We gotta arrange a goddamn funeral."
"Fuck you," he muttered as left the room; she heard his footsteps thudding as he went up the stairs.
Rogue took a deep breath and ran after him, "fuck me? What happened to 'she's the cherry on my sundae' crap? So soon you forget, huh?"
"I didn't forget!" he turned around on the stairs. "I meant every damn word I said! Fuck it, Chere, y' just don't get how much you mean t' me!"
She stood at the bottom of the stairs, hand braced against the banister. "You mean a lot to me too, Remy, and that's why I don't want you drinkin'...or tryin' to avoid everythin' that's goin' on here. Ah'm sorry, sugar, but Jean-Luc didn't make it. We both knew it was a possibility he wouldn't. It doesn't matter what you do, how much you ignore things, it happened and you can't make it go away. You need to start lettin' yourself feel it before it tears you up."
"Don't y' think I know that?" he demanded. "Don't y' think I wanna just deal with this? Y' don't understand how much I wanna deal with this, but then I think back at all the shit I've been through at his hands and it numbs me. It makes it hard t' try and feel anything. And I thought maybe, just maybe, that you above all people would get that."
"Ah think what Jean-Luc did to you goes deeper than what Mystique did to me," Rogue gripped the banister hard, a foul taste seemed to overwhelm her mouth just having to speak Mystique's name. Every time she had to say it, it felt like reopening a wound and leaving it raw.
"Y' got no idea," he said bitterly.
"Then tell me..."
"No..." he shook his head.
"Remy...what the hell is going on? Ah get that he beat you...Ah get that he stole from you – Ah saw glimpses of it in your thoughts before..." she confessed. "But none of that even comes close to what really makes you mad at him...and Ah can't pinpoint why."
"Some scars shouldn't be reopened, chere. Some should just stay closed so they don't bleed."
The sound of a car horn was what woke them up at 8am the next morning; Rogue fell out of bed at the sound and made a hard thump against the wooden floor. Grunting, she pulled herself up, groggy and in pain. The car horn sound was coming from the back of the house where the road met with the parking area.
"What the fuck?" Remy grumbled, pulling the pillow over his head to try and drown the sound out.
Rogue padded over the floor in her socks to the window and leaned out to look slightly right to see a car pulled up in the middle of the road running behind the parking area. "Who the hell..." she frowned.
Then a shock of slightly greying black hair caught her eye, and a stocky shape exited the car, the smoke from a cigar poised between the fingers of his right hand seemed to rise in the air; she could even smell it now.
"Oh my God," she cried out.
"What?" Remy grumbled, his tone immediately told Rogue he had a hangover.
"It's Logan..."
"What?" Remy sat up, "what the fuck is he doin' here?"
"He called yesterday...Ah answered. Ah didn't think he was gonna come here."
"Terrific," Remy rubbed his head, "As if I don't have enough t' fuckin' contend with, Santa Claws hit town early."
Rogue dashed across the hall and down the stairs, through the kitchen and threw the back door open. "What are you doin' here?" she asked.
"Nice welcome," said Logan, he had the cigar between his teeth now. "I don't see ya in a week and that's all ya got? Aintcha glad to see me?"
She moved over to hug him cautiously. "Of course Ah am...it's just...such bad timin'..." she stepped back to look at him. "Why did you come all the way out here?"
"You sounded upset. That was my cue to get here and make sure you were okay..." his expression darkened as he studied her bruised eyes and swollen nose. "What happened to your face?" he put his hand on her hair and tilted her head to the side so he could examine her face more closely.
"Ah got elbowed in the nose tryin' to stop a fight," she rolled her eyes as she pulled away.
"Looks like ya went ten rounds with Mohammed Ali," he grunted unhappily. "The Cajun do this to ya?"
"It was an accident," Rogue frowned. "God, why is everyone so quick to judge him as the kinda guy who hits girls?"
"Just a question, kid. I'm lookin' out for ya."
She smiled just a little at this, "How did you find us?"
"Asked around; this is about fifteen miles off of where you came with him the last time so I knew I had to be close...I asked around town if they knew where I might find the LeBeau residence, and they all pointed me to here."
"Come on in, Ah'll make coffee."
"Coffee? Ya make coffee now? Don't tell me he's got ya all domesticated," Logan mumbled as he followed her into the kitchen. He looked around, grimacing at the badly scuffed floors and the kitchen cabinets that had seen better days.
"You have to fend for yourself 'round here," Rogue smirked, "Ah caught on fast..." she took the stovetop pot off the shelf and went to filling the filter with coffee and the pot with water.
"That's a hell of a sparkler you have on your ring finger, Rogue. I can't help but notice it's right below a plain band on that special hand."
Uneasily, she glanced down at her bare hand, gasped silently and tried to hide her hand in her sleeve.
"What did ya do? Marry him?"
She looked down into the sink as the water from the faucet filled the poet, she didn't dare answer.
"A response would be nice. Especially since I came all this way out to make sure you're okay."
"Yeah, okay. Sure," she said ashamedly. "Ah married him."
"You outta your mind?"
"No...I-" she faltered.
"Did somethin' happen that I don't know about? Did he somehow get you pregnant?"
"Ah can't even touch him," she reminded, a little furious at the question.
"That wasn't what I asked."
"No, for Gods sake, I'm not pregnant," she grumbled.
"Then...what? It don't make sense...ya don't even love the creep."
Rogue glanced at Logan hesitantly. She said nothing.
"Oh come on," Logan groaned, "ya seriously can't be thinkin' you're fallin for that stupid hick..."
"It's a marriage of convenience, that's all this is," Rogue said, glancing through the window noting Henri's car still vacant from it's space. Where was he anyway? She sure would have loved Henri to meet Logan...she was sure it would have wiped the permanent smirk from the boy's face.
"Convenience?"
"To avoid a betrothal," Rogue explained, "he was supposed to get married the day before yesterday."
"Ya got his scent all over ya, Rogue...you sure there isn't more to this than ya ain't tellin'?"
"We share a bed," she shrugged, "we have to...Ah mean...we're tryin' to keep up this...facade that we're a happily married couple."
"What have ya gotten yourself into here?"
"It's complicated," she admitted. She put the coffee pot on the stove and clicked on the gas.
"I bet."
"His daddy died yesterday..."
"I know. When ya said it, I booked the soonest flight out I could – woulda been here sooner, but there was a storm in Bayville preventin' flights goin' out 'til late last night. I figured you're both gonna need some help arrangin' the funeral so I had to get here soon as I could."
"Yeah," Rogue nodded. "Ah don't even know where to begin with arrangin' a funeral..." she sighed. "Ah don't think Remy does either."
"How is Remy," Logan made a point of using the boy's real name, although Rogue could hear in his tone he didn't like this one bit.
"Coping...Ah guess. It's complicated."
"So you keep saying," Logan sighed. "The Professor gave me a blank cheque to give to you...in case you need anything...that covers funeral costs or anything else...you can write your own figure if needs be..."
"We're fine," Rogue refused. "Remy has his own money..."
"You have none of your own. You didn't even bring any clothes, did you?"
"Remy bought me clothes...he got me everything Ah need."
"This place is a craphole," Logan uttered, "I thought his family were meant to be rich."
"No. That's just Remy," Rogue went to look for some breakfast items. "Scrambled eggs?" she offered.
"Wouldn't go amiss. Haven't eaten since yesterday afternoon."
Rogue turned just in time to see Remy waltzing into the kitchen sans the t-shirt he'd worn to bed. Just as she was about to ask where exactly it had gone, he wandered over, kissed her hair, and patted her back side.
"Mornin', lovemuffin," he cooed near her ear, he threw a strange glance towards Logan before going to the cupboard to pull out a packet of Pop tarts.
"Lovemuffin?" she asked, blinking.
Logan laughed, "oh, c'mon, Gambit. Y' couldn't have made any more of a show of markin' your territory if y' had pissed on her leg."
"Territory?" Rogue raised an eyebrow; she winced and hated that again she had forgot about the pain this would cause.
"He thinks I'm steppin' on his territory, Rogue. That means you."
"Ew," Rogue made a face and passed by Remy to get the carton of eggs from the fridge.
"I don't need t' mark my territory," Remy remarked coolly.
"Yeah, so I see. Ya already got a ring on her finger. Guess that makes ya fast worker, huh?" Logan frowned.
"Y' sound jealous, mon ami," Remy uttered.
"Remy, shut up!" Rogue warned.
"So, have y' made an appointment with a funeral home yet?" Logan asked of Remy.
Remy paused, then turned and left the room silently; they head his footprints as he ascended up the stairs. Rogue sighed and rubbed the back of her neck in frustration.
"He's not handling it well."
"Ya think?" Logan raised a thick eyebrow. "What have ya done since finding out?"
"Nothing," Rogue admitted. "Remy doesn't wanna talk about it...we haven't begun to make plans or anything...we don't even know if there's a will or anything..."
"Ya need to see the father's lawyer. Ya got a number?"
"Remy might," Rogue admitted. "But we're gonna have to drive out a bit to get a decent signal – this place has like hardly any connectivity."
"Guess that explains why it's taken so long for ya to answer my calls," Logan made a face. "This house stinks..." his nose crinkled as he sniffed, the look on his face was one of disgust.
"Well...yeah...they had cats at one point and they used to crap everywhere..." Rogue explained, "His daddy used to drink himself unconscious in the livin' room – there was pee on the sofa cushions..."
"And the weed?"
Rogue couldn't smell it anymore, but she supposed someone of Logan's incredible senses could smell it a mile off. "His brother's."
"Where he at?"
"We don't know. He left yesterday and hasn't been back. They aren't really talkin'," she explained.
"One hell of a family he has here."
"His brother is all he has left now. Apart from some distant cousins maybe...none of whom Ah've met."
"I smelled alcohol. Gambit been drinkin'?" Logan asked.
"Last night, yeah. He was upset..."
"No car out there," Logan noted.
"Yeah, he left it in town."
"The nearest town is about fifty miles away..." Logan noted.
"Yeah..."
"He walked?"
"He got a ride," Rogue answered. She deliberately kept the part about the cop to herself – at least for now.
Logan slipped his jacket off and tossed it over the back of a chair. "So...ya wanna tell me what's really goin' on here?"
"Nothing is going on."
"Then why do ya look so...unhappy?"
"I'm worried about Remy..." Rogue sighed, "He's so...I don't know...unreachable sometimes. He keeps walking away every time Ah try to talk to him about all this. He keeps avoidin' havin' to deal with it. It's kinda scary."
"He had a beef with his father?"
"He hated him," Rogue sighed. "Ah tried to make him go to the hospital to visit him..." she sighed, "but he didn't wanna."
"What he die of?"
"It's a long story," she sighed, "Ah'll explain it all after breakfast. Right now Ah just want some coffee and eggs..." she grumbled. As she placed the large frying pan on the stove she felt something clasp against her bare cheek and she gasped as a rush of memories seemed to jump through her own thoughts mixing with everything. She broke away from Logan's hand and cried out.
"What the fuck!"
"Hey, language," warned Logan, this thick eyebrows knitting together; he grasped onto the counter, weakened, his face pale from the drain. "Just tryin' to get away some of that mess in your face...can't have ya goin' around in pain like that – especially if ya don't have to."
"Don't do that," she rubbed her cheek. "Ah like the fact Ah haven't had to use my powers in a while, and Ah want to keep it that way," she muttered. Although she was angry with Logan for touching her – especially when she had been quite content to deal with the pain that had been partly her fault for trying to hold back her angry husband – she couldn't deny that the relief that begun by the release of pressure from her nose and eyes was wonderful; even the blurriness in her bad eye begun to improve dramatically.
"Sorry," said Logan, he took a seat at the table, he looked exhausted already. "I just don't like seein' ya in pain. Shocked even Gumbo could stand lookin' at ya like that..."
"He wanted to call for you," Rogue confessed, she chewed her lip, "but Ah wouldn't let him."
"Why?" Logan asked.
"Because Ah knew you'd drag me away...and Ah can't go yet. He needs me."
Logan looked down to the table, his expression pensive, "can't help but feel like ya gonna get hurt out here – worse than a broken face."
"Ah don't care..." Rogue shook her head, "You don't understand, Logan. He has no one."
"Not true," Logan admitted, "he has you...and he has the X-Men...if needs be."
Remy was annoyed. He was annoyed that his morning was to be filled with looking at photographs of coffins and flowers with demands on his opinion and what he thought his adoptive father might have 'liked'. He was annoyed that he was being made to talk about what music he wanted played at the funeral, as if Jean-Luc had ever listened to hymns and gospel and had appreciated it any of it.
So many other decisions to be made...where the funeral would take place, how long it would be for, how many people would be in attendance. Which of the three cemeteries in hundred mile radius Jean-Luc was to be interred, and what kind of headstone.
What would you like on the memorial stone, sir? Which font would you like? Which style? Black polished stone? Ah, you're a man of excellent choice...how about this one sir, it has a beautiful rope design with brass inlay, quite exquisite. And the inscription? Special words? Beloved father?
All Remy wanted to say was 'Fuck Jean-Luc LeBeau! Fuck him! Cremate the son of a bitch and let him burn in hell!'. That certainly might have made an interesting inscription for the 'memorial stone'.
It surprised Remy how...experienced Logan seemed to be with arranging funerals. He let Rogue and Logan pick almost everything and sat back unable to do much more than just observe and nod, not being able to find it in himself to participate fully in the experience.
Perhaps arranging his adoptive father's funeral shouldn't have been a spectators sport, but he couldn't help it. It felt odd that it had only two days ago he had been considering his own affairs. He wouldn't have liked to be buried, and not with a flashy polished black headstone with brass inlay engraved with untrue sentiment to forever rest above his lifeless head.
He felt so disconnected from everything; he felt things, yes, he was aware of Rogue sitting at his side, both her hands clasping his against the top of her left thigh. He was aware of the thick smell of Logan's cigar smoke lingering on the older man's jacket...it made him want a cigarette.
It felt...surreal, sitting there in the office of a guy who dealt with death for a living, him sitting there behind that expensive mahogany desk nodding his head and pretending to be all sympathetic and understanding when Remy knew it was nothing but an act he was well practised in. Remy felt like he wasn't altogether there, as if it were just a weird dream he was about to wake up from at any given moment.
But the way Rogue squeezed his hand told him that this wasn't a dream. And he only vaguely heard the guy who's name he had already forgotten making phone calls to confirm which church the ceremony would be held, what time, which date. He barely even heard the date confirmed to him. Tomorrow.
So soon, Remy thought. So soon...he's barely went cold and we're already throwin' his ass into a box and dumpin' in him a hole in the ground.
He was glad when they finally left the funeral directors, Rogue's arm curled around his elbow as he walked with his hands in the pockets of his jeans, slow and deliberate – he certainly felt as if he had nowhere to go now and he wasn't sure he really wanted to go back home right now. He was afraid his brother would be at home by now, and his brother didn't know yet
How fucked up is it that the funeral is all arranged and my brother hasn't even found out yet? Remy wondered.
"I'm gonna go see if I can find a caterer," said Logan, they stood in the one long street that served as 'town'. "Don't quite think any of us are prepared to cook food for the reception and even if we were, we ain't got enough time between the three of us to do it all."
"I can cook," Remy said quietly, his eyes to the ground.
"No, ya can't," said Logan. "Leave it to me, I'll find someone to do it."
Remy gave in, he was too tired and emotionally drained to argue.
"I'm also gonna try get some stuff to fix up the house – you can't have a reception in the house with it lookin' like a crack house."
Forcing a smile, Remy agreed with this, he reached for his wallet from his back pocket and took out a credit card under one of his lesser known aliases. He went to hand it to Logan, but Logan refused.
"Don't worry, kid. I got it covered."
Remy raised an eyebrow, "I got...plenty money, mon ami."
"I know," said Logan, "I spoke to the Professor last night on the phone when I went for a walk and he offers his condolences and wants to foot the bill for any incidentals the house might need to be presentable to guests."
"Don't t'ink my house ever been presentable in all the time I lived there," Remy mused sadly.
"How you two set for clothes for the funeral?" Logan queried.
Rogue walked slowly with Remy, "Ah don't even have anything black to wear..."
Remy mused on this, his eyes shifted to her. "You...don't have anything black? You're a goth...how can you not have somethin' black?"
"Ah don't have anything appropriate," she corrected. "Ah...didn't think Ah would have to attend anything that would require somethin' smart and black not bein' held together by safety-pins and a dozen zips..." she gave a half smirk, her expression sympathetic.
"I don't have a suit either. Guess me and you be goin' shoppin'."
"Ah have the car keys," Rogue patted her jeans pocket, "We'll drive back together...so we'll meet you at the house later," she promised Logan.
Logan nodded, before he walked away, he gave Remy a strange thoughtful kind of expression and gave him an odd and awkward pat on the shoulder. "You'll be okay, kid. You're gonna be fine."
Chapter Fifty-Two
Rogue didn't like the town very much; the people were all too familiar with Remy LeBeau, and she couldn't help but catch those furtive glances they would throw his way while whispering to each other. The news of Jean-Luc's death was on the front of the Newspaper in town; his notoriety as the rumoured leader of an elite guild of Thieves made this a headline for such a small place.
When Remy hadn't been directly next to her, Rogue had allowed herself a brief moment to read the articles written about the man, surprised that they went on to say he had been suspected of connections to the infamous Thieves Guild when his finger prints had been found on a recovered item that the guild had been reportedly responsible for pinching in 1996.
While Remy had been trying on shoes in the town shoe store, Rogue had gone to get laundry detergent from the store next door, and had listened in to a couple of old gossiping fishwives who were discussing the possibilities of Jean-Luc murdering his wife. Taking her time in picking which fabric softener had the best scent, Rogue quietly eavesdropped on the women, who went on to say that Vivienne had been suspected of being a battered wife, and that her death – apparently falling down the stairs – should have been treated more suspiciously.
"You know his son found her, you know," one of the old biddies was saying to the other; for some reason she still had curlers in her hair beneath a rain bonnet despite the fact it was sunny without a cloud in the sky outside. "The younger one – the one who's the mutie."
Rogue winced at this; had it been true? Had Remy found his adoptive mother at the bottom of a staircase dead? She shuddered at the thought. Suddenly, she understood all too well what the cop had been suggesting last night when he'd brought Remy home.
No wonder he's so screwed up, she thought unhappily as she quickly picked her items and paid. Outside, Remy was waiting for her with a bagged shoebox, his expression dark, his voice irritable when he asked her if she had gotten everything she needed yet.
After trying a few more stores – with only one women's clothes store in town – and still observing that Remy's family were under so much speculation from the gossiping locals, Rogue decided to request they drive out to the Walmart that was almost a hundred miles outside of where he lived. Remy, having had enough of the stares himself, accepted this, and so after finding the car; parked right outside the town's only bar, they took off together.
Behind the wheel of Remy's car, Rogue felt slightly more comfortable, she didn't have to struggle to read the signs on the road this time thanks to Logan and his healing factor's reparation of her broken nose and swollen eyes.
Remy sat quietly in the passengers seat – having been refused allowance of his own car keys on the grounds of his drinking the night before. If that cop happened to catch him behind the drivers seat so soon, Rogue was sure he would be in serious trouble.
She wondered what was going on in his head at that moment. She'd seen the blank look on his face while he was being asked about headstones and caskets and plots. He'd been so lost and couldn't seem to do much more than give an occasional yes or no. Part of her wanted to believe that he was being deliberately insolent out of hatred for his father, but the other part of her, the part of her that really cared for the boy told her that he was just too torn up inside over the death of the only parent he'd ever known to handle anything.
"Ah can't believe Logan came all this way," Rogue said to Remy, now that they were completely alone and definitely out of earshot of the older man.
"I can," Remy frowned. "He can't help himself...comin' all this way t' be with you."
"You make it sound like...there's somethin' underhanded about it..." Rogue frowned, she swept her hair away from her face and pushed down the sun visor, the midday sun was beaming down over the road white hot and blinding.
Remy dug into the glove compartment and pulled out a pair of sunglasses to offer her. "Y' don't think there is?" he asked. "He caught the next plane out over five states and drove three hundred miles t' be with you...y' don't think there somethin' more to that."
"No, ah don't," she replied as she put the sunglasses on, glad of the relief it offered her. "He's my instructor," Rogue reminded with a frown. "Isn't anything more to it than that."
"Y' see the look he give me when I came in t' say mornin' to y'?" Remy asked pointedly.
"You mean when you waltzed in wearin' nothin' but a pair of joggin' pants, kissed my had and smacked my ass?" she demanded.
"Po-tay-toe po-tah-toe," he rolled his eyes at her. "Look the point is, he got all...pissed. He don' like that you got married. He don't much like me either, and he's definitely not pleased with the fact that y' got married t' me and that y' sharin' a bed with me. I was standin' by the door when I heard him sayin' he could smell me all over you...I saw the look on his face...he didn' like it one bit."
"You acted so weird this mornin' it probably only made his opinion worse. Anyway..what does it matter...even if he did like me – and Ah know he doesn't 'cause that would be just plain icky – what do you care?"
"You're my wife," he reminded.
"So...you don't like it," she remarked. "You were marking your territory."
"Wouldn't call it that," Remy uttered, he glanced down at his wedding ring and absently spun it around his finger. "I just don' like the way he is with you."
Rogue made a face; she felt some sort of revel in the fact she could actually do this now without causing herself any pain, "he's like a father to me, Remy."
"Yeah well...jus' cos y' think he be a father t' y', and jus' cos he might act like he is...it don' mean that there aren't boundaries he'd still cross when it suit him."
"You make it sound like...like he's a dirty old man," she grimaced and shuddered. "He'd never cross any boundaries."
"If y' say so, chere," Remy leaned back in the seat and shut his eyes. "If y' say so."
Shopping for the right black clothes, Rogue felt, was a little bit of a challenge in itself. This wasn't just any funeral, she thought. The whole town had been buzzing with the gossip of Jean-Luc's death and she didn't want to turn up to Jean-Luc's funeral as Remy's goth wife who looked more deathlike than the corpse.
She perused the same aisles over and over again, picking up items that were inappropriate she felt, and putting them back down trying to tell herself she needed to be a little more specific about what she wanted before randomly picking things up.
Remy walked along, pushing a cart that was filled with booze for the reception. She didn't like the thought of him buying so much alcohol, she definitely didn't want to see him getting drunk again but she couldn't help but feel it might be unavoidable.
Do I have the right to stop him getting drunk at his own father's wake? She pondered miserably as her eyes roved up and down the aisles.
"You gon' pick somethin' already, chere? I think this the fifth time we been down this aisle."
"Ah'm trying," Rogue said, "Ah don't want everyone in your town talkin' about me behind my back. Or talkin' about you and how you picked a weird wife."
"I don't care what they think."
"Ah don't want to go to this thing lookin' like me..."
"Why not?" he shrugged.
"Hello. There's somethin' a little inappropriate about me probably lookin' more dead than the person we're burying."
"Doubt y' can look as dead as him. He looked that way for years," Remy jested. "How bout this..." he picked up a black polkadot dress, "this look cute on you."
"It's low cut."
"Good. Give me somethin' t' look at while I'm mourning. If y' could wear a thong maybe jus' in case the wind pick up, that be nice too."
"Funny guy, today, Mr. LeBeau."
"C'mon...least y' can do is try this on...this is pretty standard. Maybe a cute little black sweater...some high heels...stockin's and suspenders..."
"Remy, it's a funeral, not a cocktail party."
"Yes, I do realise this," he muttered, shaking his head and putting the dress back.
"Okay, okay, fine," she grabbed the dress from the rail and examined it. "You sure this doesn't look too..."
"Slutty?"
"Yeah..." she frowned.
"You'll look like a lady in this."
"Should Ah dye my hair?" she asked, touching her hair.
"No," he frowned, "I like your hair. Don't mess with it."
"Ah've never really been to a funeral before...Ah don't know how Ah'm supposed to look."
"You'll look fine. No one gonna care...everyone gonna be pretendin' like Jean-Luc was a stand up guy, no one really be carin' about me or you."
"They're already whispering about you...Ah heard them at that store we got your shoes at."
"'Course they're talkin' about me. First time I go in there I didn't shoplift shit."
His joking didn't fool her, she could see that dull look in his eyes and knew without a doubt his mind was still on his adoptive father's death, on the funeral, and on something else, too.
"After the wake tomorrow, we gon' have t' drive up t' the Council of the Guild lair and speak t' the council about our marriage," he sighed.
"So soon? They can't give you a break after what's going on?"
"No. They gon' wanna know what's goin' on with the guild...they gon' wanna talk t' Henri about him takin' over from Jean-Luc."
"Takin' over what?"
"Guild leadership."
"Your father was the guild leader?" she blinked.
"I thought I'd mentioned," he said absently, pushing the cart.
She couldn't remember if he had but so much had passed in the past nine days that she couldn't be sure of anything anymore.
"Did he actually do anything?"
"Guild pretty much runs itself up until somethin' big comes up. The only thing he done in last year was arrange this marriage, and he only agree to that so he can keep tabs on them. Weren't nothin' about avoidin' a war. His death the biggest thing t' happen to the guild in over four years."
Rogue threw the dress into the cart. "Ah can't believe this all went into the news," she admitted.
"Small town. Everyone knows everyone else's business, even if you live out in the back of beyond," he grumbled. "It's most likely that Henri has found out by now...not lookin' forward t' seein' him."
"You think he'll even turn up for the funeral?"
"Who knows. He might just go get wasted and show up a few days later."
"What makes you think that?"
"It's just his way. He doesn't deal with things."
"None of the LeBeau men do," Rogue noted.
"I'm dealing, aren't I?" he frowned.
"Barely."
"What y' want me to do? Break down and cry, stomp my feet and throw a tantrum and scream 'daddy I love you' at the top of my voice?" he queried.
"No...I..."
"It ain't gon' happen. I'm not sad. I never will be," he said stubbornly. "I'm glad he's gone."
"You don't mean that," Rogue uttered. "It's just somethin' you're sayin' to seem like you don't care."
"I really don't," he said casually. "C'mon, lets go pick you some shoes...and maybe that thong we were discussin'."
~ End of Part Eleven ~
Okay, I apologise for having taken so long to get this uploaded, had a bit of a crazy week. Hope you all enjoy part eleven! Hopefully it won't be too much longer until part twelve is up ;) Thanks as always for everyone's kind reviews. I can't believe I've had so many reviews for this story! Gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside, especially hearing all your thoughts (glad no one is sad about Jean-Luc's untimely death! Haha!). Thanks everyone, you're awesome.