Author's Note: I don't own anything. I'm not familiar with the X-Men comic, so this is going solely off the movie; please forgive me if Bobby is OOC. I don't know when or where this story is set; it's just my take on Bobby's feelings after the X-Jet picked up him and the others at his house, and him looking down at his parents. That scene pissed me off royally. Be warned; this is not a happy story.
Requiem for a Motherless ChildWritten by Kyheena (aka Omega WEAPON)
"Bobby…please…"
I stiffen at the sound of my mother's voice, but I do not turn to face her. I don't think I could make myself. The child in me wants to turn around, run into her arms and into that timeless maternal embrace, but the adult that I have become has been too hurt to allow it. People often tell me that time heals all wounds. Heh. That's such a lie. I know now it only dulls the pain, like some sort of abstract painkiller. But no matter how much time has come to pass, the stinging memories and present reality always rips those wounds wide open. The hurt that I had to endure…that my heart had to endure that day… will never go away.
"Bobby…" Dammit, I hate it when she pleads. "Bobby, please, listen to me. Look at me, baby. Please."
I have no choice but to turn around. If she kept pleading me in that manner, then I would no longer be able to hold back the tears I've been hiding for so long. I don't meet her eyes, though. I already know what I'm going to find there. Pain, sorrow, regret. And fear. Even though it doesn't show in her voice, it will be reflected through her eyes like mirrors.
I can almost sense her painfully attempted smile through the tears marring her face. "You've grown up, Bobby." I can only shrug in reply. If I let my guard down for even a moment, the wall of security I've built up around myself will come crashing down. Ice water flows through my veins, so cold it's nearly frozen. Call me cruel if you must, but forgiveness is not an option anymore.
The feeble attempt at lightening the mood withers and dies like a leaf in autumn as the silence becomes increasingly thicker. I know I should say something to be less of an ass-hole than I am right now, but any words that I may have spoken get stuck in my throat.
"I'm sorry…" My mother begins, her voice so quiet I can barely hear it. "So sorry, Bobby. It should not have happened like that…not like that. I know, it must have been hard enough for you as it was, but we should not have reacted that way. If I had known that Rodney was going to call the police… I would have never let it happen."
"I know." There. Two words, but they tore at my throat like razorblades. Then a sudden bitterness followed in their wake, rising much sooner than I had expected it to as the memory of heavily armed police men and women, aiming their guns at me and my friends as if we were some sort of monsters flashed through my memory. "But what about when you knew what was happening?"
"Oh, Bobby, I don't know!" The quiet whisper of her voice quickly rose to an agonized wail. "We were afraid! It was thrown at us all at once, and in the midst of the assassination attempt against the president and mutant liberation movements… We had only heard the bad stories! How did we know how we were supposed to act when we knew it would be so close to home?"
"Rodney knew the answer to that one." Wrong words, all the wrong words, but I couldn't stop myself. It was the pain doing the talking now, but I had no will to stop it. "Call the cops, have friends and family members arrested and hauled away to prison as if we were some sort of dangerous animals. Forget the fact that I was still sane and would never hurt the people I cared about."
A small gasp escapes from my mother, as if my words were a physical attack. "Bobby… we were afraid…"
I'm getting sick of that excuse. As if would justify their lack of action when the cops fired on Logan, showing that they would not have thought twice about doing the same to us. Maybe she was telling the truth, but the thought that it was fear that made my family remain inside the house, huddled close together, cowering away from me as the X-Jet took my friends and I away from them... It just didn't make sense.
"We love you, Bobby. We still do, and we always will. No matter how different you are."
"Was that the love that kept you from stopping the cops aiming their guns at me? From shooting at my friends? Was it was love that prevented you from telling them that it was some big misunderstanding?" The words fly relentlessly from my mouth now before I even have a chance to think of their meaning. "Was it that love that kept you inside the house as I left in the jet, not knowing when I would see you again? And was it the same love that kept you from accepting what I am?"
"Bobby, stop!" My mother yells, making a motion as if she wanted to cover her ears to keep my harsh words out. "How were we supposed to respond to that? Where could we start? How are you supposed to deal with that, when all you hear is the bad consequences of the mutant gene?"
"Mom…" I try to keep my voice soft, as if doing so will keep me thinking rationally. "How does a parent cope when they're told that their child's suffering from a terminal illness or a defect from birth? They must feel the same way; hopeless, scared, wondering how something so horrible could happen to them. What they don't do is abandon their kid as a lost cause. They don't stand back and call it quits. They make use of their time, cherishing every day that they have with their kid. Despite their illness or disability, they are there to support their kid any way they can. They do whatever they can to make life for them, do whatever it is they can do to make them healthy and happy. These parents…love their children, even when in the face of the inevitable. That way…it doesn't seem so horrible in the end. But what do you think happens…when the child in need reaches out for that love, in need of that understanding, and receives only empty air on the other end?"
The silence that has come between us again is much worse than the first time, so that I have to face away from her again. I don't want her to see the tears that leave frozen trails down my face.
"Bobby…I'm so sorry…"
"I know, Mom. Me too."
The wind blows cold and unforgiving as I walk away, knowing now isn't the time forget, nor to forgive.
And maybe…there never will be.
~Fin