Epilogue: Company

but i still love the smile on your face. but i still love the sense of this place. i'm so happy i know i can never leave. even though my, my brain it fucking bleeds.

-wattsville blues

                Of course, I did as the Professor asked the next day. Bright and early, I took Rick to see Hank, to have blood drawn, tests run, and his skin poked and prodded every way possible. He endured it like a man, so I'm told. He informed me that he did not need me to stay with him.

                I didn't insult him by insinuating otherwise.

                I spent most of the day wandering, since it was the weekend. Thinking, instead of hiding in my papers and book, instead of losing myself in my obsession with money. Perhaps you did not think there was more to me than that. But, as it turns out, there is. And I was thinking far too much, in all probability. It does indeed, as Kurt implied, make one rather morose. But I suppose my usual state of unfriendliness makes it appear quite normal, to the casual observer. And god knows, there is no one here who is more than that to me.

                I spoke with Paige, in the gardens, discussed what had happened with her. She's a good girl, if rather ridiculous over Warren. Not that the man isn't a vision, but I fail to see the attraction. Perhaps I've still not forgiven him for that whole irresponsible businessman issue. The idea of my money funding anti-mutant werewolves, or whatever those were exactly, still makes my stomach turn.

                I managed to avoid Stacy, with a bit of help from my speed. Something about her, after seeing her and Paige cat fight the way they did… makes me uneasy. Perhaps it is my history with women who can manipulate pheromones, but I find it difficult to relax around her. Not that I think she's going to convince me I'm in love with her, and take me to some faraway Caribbean paradise, mind you.

                Then again, she might just be catty enough to try it. If she would let Kurt be for long enough to pull it off.

                But Bobby caught my attention, sitting on the front step. He didn't even notice me until I sat down next to him. Leaving some distance between us, of course. I'm not certain what compelled me to torture myself. I doubt that we can ever really even be friends. But I was not in a mood to deny myself, perhaps.

                "Hear you had a rough night," he didn't even look up, but he didn't seem upset that I'd joined him.

                "It was… difficult," I agreed. I did not particularly want to talk about it. But he looked so very alone, sitting there, hunched over on the step. "Did you and Warren enjoy yourselves?"

                He only shrugged, "I guess. Things will never be the way they were."

                Perhaps it should have struck me as out of the blue, this statement. But for some reason, it didn't. It was the recurring theme of the week, it seemed. Regrets. "No. They never are."

                And there we sat. Next to each other, but perfectly, utterly, alone.

                And we stayed like that, each staring at his own feet, for the better part of fifteen minutes.

                "Hey, Jean-Paul," he said, as I finally stood to return to the lab and see what progress had been made.

                I stopped, and looked down at him. And thought he was beautiful, like that.

                Beauty is strange. It's so charmingly subjective. Something is beautiful when it answers something inside you, says the thing you meant to say, but could not manage to articulate. And at that moment, Bobby looked very alone.

                "Thanks."

                I nodded, "Misery loves company, non?"

                His brow furrowed. He looked as if he wanted to say something else. I considered him a moment longer, wondered what it was. Certainly, he had h is problems. Particularly of late. Could it be that he was really so grateful that he wanted to tell me about it, unburden his soul?

                But I left. No. He would only be sorry if he did, only make excuses the next day. Perhaps it was selfish of me. Perhaps I was only scared to get closer. Perhaps I'm so used to being alone, that I don't know how to be anything else.  But I went inside.

                Back to the business of being an X-man. It's not so bad, really. And at least I know, that if I were doing anything else, it would be dishonest. I do this for Joanne. I do this for Jeanne-Marie . I do this for my teammates, for Peter, for Rick, for all of the people who have ever made me stop and think for a moment. Made me think about my life. And yes, I do this for myself.

                 Not a terrible ending, for a man who never wanted to be a hero.